Zawiercie

At the time of this epidemic the population of Zawiercie was about 44,000, so that the attack-rate was about 3 per cent. From official figures which were given to me it appears that the Jews formed 19 per cent. of the population. According to Dr. Ryder the Christians were attacked in a larger proportion than the Jews, as shown in the following table, which deals with about three-quarters of the epidemic and with the first six months of 1919: . . .

The Jews were said to be less cleanly than the Christians, and from what I saw of them I should say that this was true. But there were reasons for thinking that there was more concealment of cases amongst the Jews; the authorities had had some trouble in getting certain of the Jewish medical attendants to notify...

Causes of the Prevalence of Typhus

It is not difficult to account for the wide prevalence of typhus in Poland since the beginning of the war on general grounds. Constant warfare, the movements of troops, the influx of refugees from the districts which were the actual scenes of fighting, the return of prisoners of war, especially since the armistice, in both directions across the country, the lack of soap and clothing and of medical and surgical necessities in the country districts and in many of the towns the difficulty of obtaining sufficient water, would be factors conducing to the prevalence and dissemination of lice, that is to say of typhus, in a country where the disease had been endemic before the war. Medical men and nurses have been very scarce, and there has been a deficiency of food for the poorer classes, especially in the East and South-east. The figures I gave at the commencement of this paper showed that typhus had been especially prevalent since the armistice. There is no doubt that when the Germans and Austrians established themselves in Poland in 1915, they both, and especially the former, used their utmost endeavours to keep infectious diseases under control, not from any love they bore to the Poles, but with the object of keeping their armies free from sickness. There can also be little doubt that to a certain extent, especially in the country and smaller towns, they succeeded. In spite however of their efforts there was the large epidemic in Warsaw in 1917-18. Dr. Trenkner attributed the epidemic chiefly to the action of the Jews. Much smuggling, especially of food, went on from outside into the city. The smugglers, who were chiefly Jews, hid and slept together in little groups in sheds and barns. Members of the groups became infected with typhus and carried the disease into the city. Dr. Trenkner on various occasions traced fresh cases to group infection in this way. Overcrowding and want of cleanliness did the rest. In Zawiercie the action by the Germans seems to have had more effect, and there was not any great prevalence of disease before they left. In that part of Poland which I visited--viz., the county of Bendzin, typhus had become especially rampant since the armistice, as was exemplified in the Zawiercie epidemic. Directly the Germans left there was an unrestrained movement of population to and fro between the town and surrounding country; released and escaped prisoners of war began to return, especially from the East; and refugees flocked to the West from the devastated Eastern districts. . . . The Germans had been severely thorough in their sanitary measures. They set up de-lousing stations and forced the inhabitants to be de-loused at the point of the bayonet. When they left compulsion ceased and personal cleanliness diminished.

. . . . Although in Warsaw and other places the Jews suffered more severely than the Christians, it is doubtful, in my opinion, that they so suffered because they were Jews: the more probable reason is because they were more densely crowded together, for, as has been mentioned, the Jews were less attacked in Zawiercie than the Christians, and as far as I could see from inspection of houses in different quarters of the town, amongst the poorer classes, there was as much overcrowding amongst Christians and Jews.

Adverse, however, as the circumstances have been in Poland, during and since the war, it must not be supposed that the authorities have not attempted to deal with the epidemic. As far back as April, 1918, that is to say, six months before the Germans quitted Warsaw, Dr.Trenkner made a great effort to cleanse the houses and their inhabitants in the worst and most crowded parts of the city, a proceeding to which the Germans offered no objections, as of course such a measure was conducive to keeping their army free from infection. But the task was a very difficult one as the people were by no means anxious to help the authorities. If the inhabitants of a certain square for instance got wind that their houses were going to be visited by the sanitary squad, they cleared out and locked their rooms up. However, this obstacle was overcome by making unexpected visits very early in the morning, taking the passports away from the inhabitants, who were sent off to the de-lousing station, with the instruction that they would not receive their passports back again until they produced the certificate that they had been deloused. Meanwhile, their homes were disinfected and cleaned. . . .23

The percentages given above for the incidence of typhus among Jews are actually quite close, almost identical in some instances, to those given by Zimmermann (see Appendix C) a generation later. It is, therefore, more than likely that the German authors were accurate also.

A possible explanation for the high incidence of typhus among Jews may be their role as merchants of old clothing. For example, in Prinzing's classic work Epidemics Resulting from Wars, the author discusses the possible cause for the spread of bubonic plague and typhus in Eastern Europe during the Russo-Turkish War of 1769-72. After every trace of the pestilence had disappeared except for military hospitals, the reemergence of the plague later on was traced to the purchase by a Jew of a fur coat in a military hospital in Jassy.24 Later again, in Transylvania during the same war, "Jewish pedlars, who purchased clothes, furs, and war-booty in the Russian camp, likewise helped to spread the disease."25 At the end of Napoleon's Russian campaign, Prinzing tells us about the typhus epidemic in Vilna in 1812-13 which "In a short time spread throughout the city, not so much because the soldiers were quartered in private houses, as because the Jews got possession of the clothes of the dead. Of some 30,000 Jewish inhabitants, no less than 8,000 died."26

Jewish Resistance and the Torture of Bathing

The intense resistance by the local population, by Poles as well as Jews, to the public health measures that responsible authorities intended for their welfare is also evident in a remarkable, recent book entitled Typhus and Doughboys about the American military experience in post World War 1 Poland. The book is based largely upon the internal correspondence of the American Polish Typhus Relief Expedition from 1919 to 1921. The book deals at great length with the difficulties American troops encountered when they tried a variety of methods to induce people simply to bathe and have their clothes deloused either with steam or cyanide.

The difficulties are illustrated by the following passage about the efforts of one American officer in what appears from the context to have been a predominantly Jewish community.27

The school children were next bathed and deloused, Gorman observing that 'if the older people were as enthusiastic as these children, typhus would no longer be a dread in Poland.' Unfortunately, the older people were content to live in the unimaginable dirt and filth, one old woman having been heard to cry out, 'death here in my hovel rather than the torture of bathing.'

The book is quite valuable for its insights based upon the actual correspondence of American officers. However, one should recognize that the book was written recently in an age when the foulest rubbish can be written about Poles, Germans, Austrians and even Americans with almost no hesitation at all but when criticism of Jews is almost inevitably accompanied with deep apologies. The following passage is informative nonetheless.

Dixon pointed out some difficulties with the Jews, revealing his own anti-Semitic bias. In the town of Busko, which he inspected, he reported 'there is considerable Typhus in the town particularly among the Jews. They are afraid to go to the hospital and use all means to keep the disease among them hidden.' They believed, in fact, 'that at the hospital they would not be able to live according to their religion--that they would be required to eat what the others ate--that they could never eat with their hats on and that if one of them died there he could not be buried according to his religion. This belief is being overcome and the hospital now has ten Jews as patients.' Dixon also induced local authorities in Busko to impose a fine of 500 rubles on anyone who hid or attempted to hide a case of typhus. But, he recorded, 'it did not prove very effective as the Jews, who were afraid of the hospital bribed the police and kept their sick hidden.'28

Except for Dixon's charge that Jews bribed the police, there seems no reason to believe he was biased; he seemed to be simply reporting what he saw.

The same intense resistance to the most minimal measures which any civilized society can impose for its own survival--the simple act of accurately reporting cases of a highly contagious disease--is evident in Lucy Dawidowicz's The War Against The Jews for 1939-42 for the Warsaw ghetto:29

In the Warsaw ghetto alone, epidemic typhus was believed to have affected between 100,000 and 150,000 persons, though the official figures were barely over 15,000. The spread of disease was concealed from the Germans. Hospital cases of typhus were recorded as 'elevated fever' or pneumonia. Mainly, the stricken were treated in their homes in a massive clandestine operation, covering up the presence of the disease from German inspection teams who periodically threatened to seal off the affected areas.

The intensity of the Jewish resistance to the simple act of bathing, for the 1920's at least, is illustrated in Typhus and Doughboys by the following passage about American efforts in the town of Wlodowa:30

. . . further difficulties were in the form of considerable resistance among the population to bathe. The town's officials also vacillated, whereupon the police had to be used to compel the people to do so. Soon the town officials devised a plan whereby those persons who had been bathed were provided with a ticket and only those who possessed one could buy bread and potatoes in the stores. However, this was rather ineffective as forged tickets soon appeared and also, as Gillespie [an American first lieutenant] contemptuously charged, 'The Jews would get their tickets, alter the name on them and sell them to some other person.' Theft was not unheard of, and the Poles hired to assist the operations proved the worst offenders. This necessitated daily searches by the police.

Another passage tells us just how often the people in a largely Jewish community took baths even under American administration.

It went without saying that none of the houses had any modern sanitary conveniences. All refuse was poured into the gutters at the front door, two latrines were provided by the town but were little used. Snidow [an American first lieutenant] noted that 'in almost all of the house areas would be found after much search an open latrine which they jealously guarded from us by all kinds of disguises and camouflage as the product therefrom would be used after the harvest to put on their small patches in the outskirts of the town.' Most of the drinking water was obtained from a sluggish creek at the edge of the town, which a mill dam rendered more sluggish and sometimes covered the yards of some of the houses, turning them into 'reeking swamps.' The people were inclined to wade in the creek, as were the cattle and geese. There were a few wells, 'but all of them drained directly from the nearby latrines.' Moreover, as Snidow recounted, 'in the first preliminary council we were assured by the priest, the rabbi and mayor and later confirmed by two doctors that not a soul in the town had had a bath for over a year. This statement we considered conservative and I personally doubt if water had touched the persons of most of them since the departure of the Germans during whose occupation they were required to bathe at least once a week, when they could be caught.' There was a good community bathhouse, but the people had 'formed a horror of it' from being compelled to bathe there by the Germans, and would not use it. 31

Confirmation of the general filthiness of the Polish Jews was even given by the Jewish Chairman of the Warsaw Judenrat, Adam Czerniakow. In his diary, which has been highly praised by Raul Hilberg among others, Czerniakow wrote for May 29, 1942:

I have been going through the streets with Brodt issuing reprimands or dispensing money awards to the janitors. Considering the level of civilization in this community, the ghetto cannot be kept clean. People, unfortunately, behave like pigs. Centuries of slovenliness bear their fruit. And this is compounded by the utter misery and dire poverty. 32

After World War 2, General George S. Patton described Jews living under his military authority in southern Germany. Martin Blumenson the editor of The Patton Papers regarded these remarks as indicative of a growing anti-Semitic attitude. For September 17, 1945--five months after the liberation of the last of the German concentration camps--Patton wrote:

We drove for about 45 minutes to a Jewish camp . . . established in what had been a German hospital. The buildings were therefore in a good state of repair when the Jews arrived but were in a bad state of repair when we arrived, because these Jewish DP's or at least a majority of them, have no sense of human relationships. They decline, where practicable, to use latrines, preferring to relieve themselves on the floor . . .

This happened to be the feast of Yom Kippur, so they were all collected in a large wooden building which they called a synagogue. It behooved General Eisenhower to make a speech to them. We entered the synagogue which was packed with the greatest stinking bunch of humanity I have ever seen. When we got about half way up, the head rabbi, who was dressed in a fur hat similar to that worn by Henry VIII of England and in a surplice heavily embroidered and very filthy, came down and met the General. . . .

However, the smell was so terrible that I almost fainted and actually about three hours later lost my lunch as the result of remembering it.33

Clearly, on the basis of the preceding passages as well as Appendices C and D, there was some agreement among German doctors, British doctors, Polish doctors, American military officers and even some Jews as to the incredible filthiness of Jews in and from Poland. To some extent, the backwardness of the Polish Jews may be explained by poverty and persecution. But, whatever the cause, it is still difficult to comprehend the hysterical resistance to minimal standards of hygiene and civilized living when a modest amount of common sense should have persuaded them that it was necessary for their own survival. An attachment to a traditional lifestyle going back centuries, if not millennia, may have been regarded as vital to their religious and ethnic identity.

In any event, it should be understood that Jews from Western countries were generally quite different in their personal habits. When these Jews were placed in camps with Polish Jews, they were as appalled as any other Westerners would have been. It does not seem fair to attribute the behavior of the Polish Jews to religion alone--but, religion may be important, nonetheless.

Although medicine had made great progress in the years between the world war, not much progress had been made with regard to typhus. There was still no truly effective vaccine or treatment. The means for detection of typhus had been improved but that in itself did not go very far in preventing catastrophic epidemics except to alert authorities to be more stringent in their delousing of people, or of contaminated areas or trains coming from or passing through those areas. The real breakthrough came only near the end of the war with the availability of enormous quantities of DDT from the Americans for delousing.

Regardless of the true extent of the Jewish contribution to the spread of typhus, it is certainly safe to say that the Germans authorities were absolutely sincere in their statements that the Polish Jews were a major contributing factor in the spreading of the disease. They had not only the evidence of their own doctors to support this view but that of British and Polish doctors as well. They can hardly be blamed for applying severe measures to the Jews in order to control the epidemic. The severe measures included restrictions on the movements of Jews and eventually to the construction of a wall around the entire Warsaw ghetto. These measures during wartime were entirely reasonable to control the spread of typhus, and to prevent catastrophes like those which had already occurred in Poland and Russia during and after World War 1.

In any event, it is quite clear that the high incidence of typhus among Jews was not simply the result of persecution by the Germans, or of the confinement of Jews first in ghettoes and then in concentration camps. One of the main objectives of the camps was to maintain strict enough control upon the inmates so that typhus would at least subside if not disappear altogether. During the last months of the war, however, when typhus reappeared with a vengeance, the Germans had no choice but to maintain as tight control as they possibly could upon the inmates, to keep any of them from escaping, even if they could do little to help them. When the British took Bergen-Belsen at the request of the SS, they were appalled at what they found and considered simply moving the inmates out of the camp into neighboring dwellings.34 They quickly realized, however, that that would have only compounded the disaster.

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