The Shadow of Death: The Holocaust in Lithuania

22. The Liquidation of the Helpless

22. The Liquidation of the Helpless On the morning of Monday, March 27, 1944, all the working brigades went to work at the airfield, in the workshops, and in the city and the ghetto. The only ones left home were the people working night shifts, the old people, the sick, the young, and some mothers. When all the brigades were out at work, about 8:30 in the morning, more guards appeared around the ghetto fence. This was not a good sign for the ghetto, but until this moment no one had thought anything bad would happen because everyone had gone to work. But this was a new German tactic; while everyone was at work, the murderers would come into the ghetto homes and take the children. This way they wouldn't have to look so hard for them. At the same time the Jewish police were meeting in the commandant's yard. At 8:00 they were all in line ready to listen to the new orders. Commandant Goecke came out with a big group of SS German guards. They surrounded the police and ordered all of them to sit on the ground. Buses started driving into the ghetto. The windows were painted so you couldn't see in or out. A German taxi with a bullhorn started driving through the ghetto streets telling everyone, "Attention! Attention! Everybody has to stay home. Whoever leaves the house for even a few steps will be shot." The Jewish policemen were ordered to crawl on all fours to get into the buses. One policeman by the name of Levner got so scared that his legs cramped and he couldn't crawl onto the bus. He was shot right there. When they realized they were going to be taken to the Ninth Fort, they The Liquidation of the Helpless 127 thought they would be killed. Two other policemen jumped out of the bus and were also shot. When they arrived at the Ninth Fort, the Germans took everything away from them, their clothes and everything else, and beat them to a pulp. After this they were taken to the bunkers and there appeared before them the famous mass killer, Mr. Kittel. He tried various methods to find out from the police who had made hidden cellars and where they were. He also tried to find out about the young people, eighteen to twenty, who were trying to escape from the ghetto and contact the partisans in the woods. The police revealed nothing. The first one they took for interrogation was the chiefofthe Jewish police, Moshe Levin. After him they took his assistant, Greenburg, and another man named Yehuda Zupovitz. Kittel started the interrogation by breaking their fingers, but he could get nothing from them. Later it was said that Police Chief Levin had made a pact with his officers not to reveal anything. But most people knew better than to tell the police anything they might lateruse to save their own hides. Kittel shot all three of them, and their bodies were burned later with the rest. During this time masses ofGerman Gestapo and Ukrainians were runningfrom house to house in the ghetto throwing people out on the street. Everyone knew a liquidation had begun, but what kind no one knew. I saw from the window at work that the Germans and Russians were pulling children from the houses, even some my age. The old and the sick they forced into the buses with painted windows. There they were gassed with carbon monoxide. The screaming and crying tore at my heart. The Germans began playing music through the loudspeakers to cover up the screams coming from the helpless victims all over the ghetto. When I realized what was happening, I thought of my aunts, and that they would lose their minds if something happened to their children. My Aunt Golda wouldn't know what to do with her husband at work. So I left my job and ran to her house to help hide the children. On every street there were guards with guns ready to shoot, but I hid from them, 128 The Shadow of Death jumping over fences and taking alleys through the ghetto. I ran like a deer. When I reached my aunt's house, I opened the door and said, "Quick, hide the kids!" I opened the door to the cellar and threw my cousins down into...