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If you are Mr. Skop please start reading from the bottom up. If you aren't, then do whatever you want.

In a Germans Eyes

German Soldier

April 6 1943,

            Today went well I think, we got many Jews into the cattle cars and sent them to Triblinka, the killing center 50 miles off of where we are. The troops even sent a whole orphanage with them on the train, all those kids. I did feel a little bad about it, but I just reminded myself that it is for the good of Germany. On another note, Lyra and I are going to watch a play today and Jon told me some new moves I’m goanna try on her.

April 10 1943,

            The date didn’t go so well, apparently it’s not attractive to buy a large popcorn and eat it all in front of her, I don’t trust Jon anymore. At work though I noticed there seemed to be a lot fewer people on the street and it felt colder for some reason. That’s probably why the people weren’t out, because of the cold.

April 16 1943,

            There is fighting in the streets! There seems to be some kind of force attacking the guards from the ghetto! It was so quiet and empty on the streets, and then all of a sudden a hundred men jumped on the German soldiers with knives and pistols! I was on my break when I first heard the noise and then quickly ran to help. Alas though we had to fall back, because though they seemed weak, they were determined.

April 25 1943,

             Now the ghetto has turned into a game of hide and seek. My fellow Germans and I go out and one by one find and kill pockets of resistance scattered about the ghetto. It has been going on for a few days nonstop, so I didn’t get a chance to write anything. I can’t wait until this is over and I can start writing books again, maybe Lyra and I could move out to the country and have a farm or something. It’s been two years for god’s sake and I have the best idea of how to propose to her when the time comes.

May 8 1943,

            That’s it! Finally we killed all of em! Yanzel’s troop found the commanders bunker today and was able to find out where the rest of the rebels are hidden. I’m glad its over for now. Our general, Sir Jürgen Stroop asked that to symbolize our victory over the rebels, we should destroy The Great Synagogue on Tlomacki Street. We ordered the explosives, and I think we will blow it up on may 16^th. Oh I can’t wait to see my family again!

In a Citizens Eyes

Laery Forin, Jewish mother of two

April 19 1943,

 There was outbreak on the streets, my family and I ran inside to shelter ourselves from the attacks, luckily the attacks weren’t directed at us. The fight was between the German soldiers, and the Jewish rebellion. I hope the rebellion wins because my best friend Gertrude’s mother is on a train getting sent to the killing center in Treblinka, and as I am writing this, the rebels are… yes! They freed the passengers on the trains! Oh Gertrude is going to be so happy! Oh, but I better go get her mother, she looks terrified, poor thing!

April 20 1943,

             Life is better now in the hands of the rebels, no more people are being sent to the killing center, and no more mean soldiers everywhere. I hope it stays that way.

April 21 1943,

             My god! They have started burning down the houses! The Germans are burning everything down! I don’t have time to write now; my family and I must find a place to run to.

May 7 1943,

             Its over, the Germans won. They took my daughter Julia, and my husband as well. It’s just my son and I now, in a town of ashes. What a terrible idea this fight was.

In the Fighters Eyes

Commander General Mordecai Anielewicz, the leader of the Jewish rebellion.

Commander Mordecai Anielewicz’s Journal,

Entry 53,

April 19, 1943,

Today we will be heading out to fight these beasts holding us caged like rats in a cellar, there is no way we will lose. Here is a copy from the speech this morning at four o’ clock, this is what started the rebellion.

 “Today they ordered for another block of our Jewish comrades to die. Another ten thousand souls murdered right in front of Hitler’s empty eyes, right in front of our eyes. Today they think that they can get away with another ten thousand souls rearing up in anger upon them. Friends, today we know what will really happen. Today we know that not another good man shall die for no reason, but that all of the men who think it is okay to kill and torture and enslave our people, our Jewish people, all those men will die. We will kill them all of them, and we won’t stop until we are coated and soaked in their blood. To the end I will go for my people, and I know you will do the same.”

Commander Mordecai Anielewicz’s Journal,

Entry 55,

April 21, 1943,

This morning they began razing the ghetto to the ground. With it they killed many of my men and many, many civilians of the ghetto. I’m sure that this will continue, so I’m moving my men and I deeper into the ghetto so that we will not perish. I remember when we started fighting the first time. We were able to hold back the German army for a day, and we were able to rescue the Jews who were getting on the train to Triblinka, now we can’t do anything. They are just so much stronger than we are. I don’t think we will make it.

The Journal of Jansu Korczak,

or Dr.Henryk Goldszmidt

One of many who helped begin the Warsaw ghetto uprising

July 22 1942,

Hello again! As I'm writing this, my wife Henrietta Goldszmidt is making me a delicious cake out of whatever we can find, for it is my birthday! I am finally 64 and I think that I will have some friends over, maybe Sefta and a few others. But I will mostly spend my day at the Orphanage, as that is where my life work is. As you know the children in the orphanage are just like my own. In my late twenties I really began to realize that I had a bad childhood. My father, a writer of books, became mentally ill when I became eleven. Because of that our income greatly decreased and it was with great difficulty that I was able to go to Warsaw University to study medicine, but that wasn’t where my future lied.

In 1901 I published my first children’s book titled, Children of the Streets, and was so successful that soon led me to write many more. It was then that I noticed that my future wasn’t about just writing children’s books and curing them of illnesses but to give children who were having the same experience as I did as a kid, a better one. Since I loved my Jewish roods I decided to apply for a grant to build an orphanage in Warsaw, Poland. I received the grant and began building it on Karmelicka Street, where I am now. I will write to you soon again, but right now we must be happy and celebrate!

 

July 26, 1942

             It is getting worse here, in the ghetto. As it has been for two years ever since that accursed Hitler man has taken control of Germany and has forced all of us Jews into ghettos where the conditions are horrible and many are dying. Luckily though, the ghetto is in Warsaw, so I could stay with my children in the orphanage. Now though, they have begun to send people away, to who knows where, all we know is that they don’t come back.

August 2, 1942

            Horrible news! Rumor has it that the people being taken away are being taken to be killed in massive gas chambers, and they’re sending us by the thousands! What is even worse, is that they have called for the orphanage to be sent away as well! I don’t know what to do.

August 5,1942

            Dear journal, this is the last time I will be able to you, for tomorrow the orphanage is being sent away. There is word of rebellion in the air and that there may be and organization forming that will combat the Germans holding us, but that is just a rumor. I must get the children ready though. Oh, and the reason I will not be able to write to you again, is because I have decided that because the orphans are my kids, my family and my responsibility, I will go with them, to the end. Goodbye.

THE WARSAW GHETTO UPRISING

On October 12 1940, only one year since the beginning of the Holocaust, the German army made 300,000 Jews move into the Warsaw Ghetto, a space where only 251,000 people had lived beforehand. The ghetto took up 2.4 % of the city’s land, and held 30 percent of the city’s population. The reason for this, of course, was Adolf Hitler. A few years before, Hitler became the leader of a political party known as the German Workers Party, or the Nazi party as the name was soon changed to. He and his allies eventually forced themselves to the top of the German government. This happened shortly after World War I and the Treaty of Versailles, so the German community was enraged and struggling because of the new rules put upon them by the treaty. Hitler noticed that the Germans were angry and had no way to vent their anger, so he decided to blame the Jews. He blamed them for the debt and economic struggle the Germans were having, he blamed them for not helping in the fight of World War I and he blamed them for the loss of World War I. This brought upon a great change in Germany and the countries around it and all the change was at the cost of the Jews. One of these changes was the moving all Jews into Ghettos, small towns blocked of by high cement walls and barbed wire. There were way too many people to fit in these Ghettos, and there was an abundance of disease and starvation all over, but nobody did anything, except the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto.

            Starting June 1942, the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto had started being transported to the Treblinka death camp, where they were killed in gas chambers upon arrival. Eventually, word of the mass murder got back to the Warsaw Ghetto and a resistance organization called the Z.O.B. (Zydowska Organizacja Bojowa) was formed to prevent any more deportations from the ghetto. A similar party known as the Z.Z.W. (Zidowski Zwiazek Woskowy) was made by the Revisionist party shortly after, and they soon joined forces to try to combat the thousands of Jews getting deported each month. In January 1943 the two forces resisted the next wave up for deportation. The rebels fired on the Germans as they tried to load the Jews into railroad cars to be transported to the killing center, and successfully made the Germans retreat after four days of fighting. They then began to prepare themselves for later engagements. Although in the long run the Germans took back the ghetto and killed all pockets of resistance one building at a time, they prolonged the life of many Jews, and made one of the very few circumstances where the Jews fought back against the German army. This was a brief history of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.