Small Riga Ghetto

70
After we had happily settled all of them in, we held a short religious service
and said Kaddish (the prayer for the dead).
According to later reports, the liquidation in Rumbula proceeded in exactly
the same way as the previous action.
As I have already mentioned, the columns of people were delivered to the
railway station in order to keep up the illusion, and from there they were taken
in groups at night to the graves that had already been prepared for them.
Once again they were forced to strip naked, then pushed into the graves and
shot. Every individual piece of clothing had to be put in a specially designated
place. This fact shows the cold-bloodedness and precision with which our
murderers went about their business.
Whether men or women, all were overtaken by the same fate! Even the
small children were shot in groups and thrown into the graves, some still halfalive.
This action cost us about 11,500 people. Only three women managed to escape
from these two bloodbaths.
X.
On Tuesday, 9 December 1941, the ghetto experienced the tenth bloody day.
As usual, all the Kommandos left the new camp in the very early morning to
go to work.
And now the same cruel game began anew. At nine o'clock Germans and
Latvians, led by SA men, stormed into the camp. There was a second rounding-up
of the Jews. Once again the Jews tried to hide in attics and cellars, once
again the beasts searched through hiding place after hiding place, shot, looted,
and pushed everyone they found into the blue buses that were standing ready.
Once again they drove back and forth continually, this time not toward Rumbula
but toward the Biķernieki forest. There the same kind of mass murder
was perpetrated.
Our satellite camp was not spared further murders either, and thus our new
shelter again was baptized by Jewish blood.
When Dr. Kretzer, who lived in Viļānu Street, saw all of our misery, he
tried to commit suicide, but he was saved.
Shortly before twelve o'clock, just as a new column was to be sent to be exterminated,
the SA man Jäger showed up among the murderers. He pulled out
his watch and announced, "You're in luck! It is now one minute past twelve.
The action is over."