TREBLINKA: - Holocaust Handbooks

Chapter IV: The Alleged Extermination Facilities in Treblinka 157
the sending of a train car to Lublin with 5,200 kg of shoes. 467 There is nothing
in the documents themselves to indicate that this material was actually the
property of deported Jews. This is particularly improbable in the case of the
“articles of clothing of the Waffen-SS,” since the Waffen-SS had no relationship
to the Treblinka camp, and furthermore it is not clear what use the Waffen-SS
would have for a collection of used civilian clothing. Perhaps the articles
of clothing mentioned are simply Waffen-SS uniforms, which were being
reloaded on their return from the eastern front for the purpose of cleaning/delousing/sorting.
Samuel Rajzman furnished very exact information concerning the quantity
of Jewish property taken by the Germans in another camp. He writes: 468
“One of our organizers was the overseer of the detachment, in which
12-15 men were employed in the sorting of money and valuables, in determining
the worth of objects of value and in packing them. In doing this, he
had to submit a report to the Germans daily. He informed us about the
weekly inventories. Approximately once a week we compared the entries of
each worker. From October 1, 1942 - August 2, 1943, the following were
transported to Germany:
25 railroad cars with women’s hair
248 cars of various clothing
100 cars of shoes
22 cars of textiles
46 cars of pharmaceutical and chemical preparations
4 cars of surgical and medical instruments
260 cars of blankets, pillows, carpets and traveling-rugs
400 cars with various objects (spectacles, gold fountain pens, fountain
pens, combs, dishes, cases, umbrellas etc.).”
In a “classification of the quantity of used textiles delivered from the Lublin
and Auschwitz camps by order of the Main Administrative Office of SS Economics
unit,” which was appended as a supplement to a letter dated February
6, 1943, from the SS-Obergruppenführer Oswald Pohl, 825 cars are mentioned,
which contained, among other things, the following: 469
“Rags� 400 cars� 2,700,000 kg
Bed feathers� 130 cars� 270,000 kg
women’s hair� 1 car� 3,000 kg
used material� 5 cars� 19,000 kg”
Arad comments on this document: 470
467
J. Gumkowski, A. Rutkowski, Treblinka, op. cit. (note 78), reproductions of documents on
unnumbered pages.
468
USSR-337. GARF, 7445-2-126, pp. 243f.
469
NO-1257.
470
Y. Arad, op. cit. (note 72), p. 160.