The report thus describes the ghetto:
“The Ghetto thus established in Warsaw was inhabited by about 400,000 Jews. It contained 27,000 apartments with an average of 2½ rooms each. It was separated from the rest of the city by partition and other walls, and by walling-up of the thoroughfares, windows, doors, open spaces, etc. * * *” (1061-PS)
Conditions within this ghetto are indicated in the statement of the report that an average of six persons lived in every room. (1061-PS)
Himmler received a report from the SS Brigade Fuehrer Group A, dated 15 October 1941, which further illustrates the establishment and operation of the ghettos. (L-180) The report states:
“Apart from organizing and carrying out measures of execution, the creation of ghettos was begun in the larger towns at once during the first day of operations. This was especially urgent in Knowno because there were 30,000 Jews in a total population of 152,400.”
* * * * * *
“In Riga the so-called ‘Moskau Suburb’ was designated as a ghetto. This is the worst dwelling district of Riga, already now mostly inhabited by Jews. The transfer of the Jews into the ghetto district proved rather difficult because the Latvians dwelling in that district had to be evacuated and residential space in Riga is very crowded. 24,000 of the 28,000 Jews living in Riga have been transferred into the ghetto so far. In creating the ghetto, the Security Police restricted themselves to mere policing duties, while the establishment and administration of the ghetto as well as the regulation of the food supply for the inmates of the ghetto were left to civil administration; the labor officers were left in charge of Jewish labor.
“In the other towns with a larger Jewish population ghettos shall be established likewise.” (L-180)
Jews were forced into ghettos in the Polish Province of Galicia. The conditions in these ghettos are described in the report from Katzmann, Lt. General of Police, to Krueger, General of the Police East, dated 20 June 1943, and entitled “Solution of Jewish Question in Galicia.” (L-18):
“Nothing but catastrophical conditions were found in the ghettos of Rawa-Ruska and Rohatyn * * *.”