ABSTRACT
In mid-March 1942 Nazi Germany stood at the threshold of a momentous assault on Polish Jewry. In greatly reduced remnant ghettos or in SS-controlled labor camps, about half a million Polish Jews lived under a brief reprieve. A number of Jews had fled into the forests, many hiding in well-concealed underground bunkers. The destruction of the Polish ghettos and the murder of more than half of Polish Jewry in a brief eleven-month period was probably the greatest logistical achievement of the Nazis in perpetrating the Final Solution. The emptied ghettos were routinely combed for Jews hiding in every conceivable spot that offered hope of concealment. The male Jews of working age were to be separated and taken off to a work camp. The remaining Jews—the women and children, the frail and the elderly—were to be shot on the spot.
