For many the first job in the Ghetto was to clear out the deserted dwellings in that part of the
Ghetto, which had been liquidated. That meant to sort e.g. underwear and linen for recycling by the
Germans, tie the stuff into bundles, and then haul it to a huge shed. Step by step the inmates had to
submit to a strictly organized system of forced labor, and they were designated to special labor
groups (details). Those fit for work, who didn’t have jobs within the ghetto proper, were driven by
the SS in columns to their details, out of the ghetto in the morning and back at night.
As of July 1942 at the latest the transport of residents to the extermination camps had commenced
in all the ghettos of the East. The Riga Ghetto was vacated on November 2, 1943, which for most of
the imprisoned people meant starting the last journey - in a cattle car to Auschwitz.
“Labour Camp” Salaspils
At the time of the arrival of the Jewish inmates the so called ”Labor & Education Camp” Salaspil,
about 18 kilometers from Riga, was still under construction, otherwise its condition was catastrophic.
In December of 1941 men from the ”Cologne Transport” had to help with building the camp, which
was located ”in a seemingly endless snow-covered open country”. Here the Nazi-concept
”extermination through labor” was applied in its most brutal manner.
About 1960 Joseph Strauss recalled: ”We had to drag heavy logs from the woods to the sawmill
when the temperature was a chilling -45°C . Our quarters were old, louse-ridden Russian shacks; our
food consisted of a slice of bread, watery soup, and black coffee. No wonder that of the 1500 male
persons an enormous number died daily from hunger and cold.”
More than 30000 soviet POWs perished up to spring of 1942 in three POW camps that were
attached to Camp Salaspils. Between 1942 and 1944 there were also Lithuanian antifascists
imprisoned at that camp. In the summer of 1942 the ”Jews’ shacks” were liquidated, and only a few
inmates survived.
