The concentration camp of Șimleu Silvaniei/Cehei (Sălaj County)

The Jews of Sălaj County were concentrated in the “Klein” brick factory in Cehei, located about 5 km away from Şimleu Silvaniei, in a marshy and isolated area, making this camp one of the most terrible places of detention for the Transylvanian Jews. About 8500 Jews from the districts of Crasna, Cehu Silvaniei, Jibou, Supuru de Jos, Şimleu Silvaniei, Tășnad, Zalău (Sălaj County) were concentrated here.

The abandoned land of the “Klein” brick factory in which the camp was located was 700 m long and 200 m wide, and in the middle of it was a large pit filled with water where reed grew. The factory itself consisted of a three-room building, a kiln, and two sheds with no side walls. A further 25 barracks with no side walls were built in a hurry after the Jews’ transfer to the enclosure. However, the improvised housing was insufficient, and so of the approximately 8,500 interned Jews, around 3,500 remained out under the open sky, in the rainy and windy weather. Some of them made improvised tents from their clothes, but the camp commander, Krasznai László, forced them to undo them and brave the weather without shelter. The camp was enclosed with barbed wire and guarded by gendarmes.

The camp had a well for drinking water, as well as another one with water infected with E. coli. The Jews were forbidden to drink from the former, as it was reserved exclusively for those in the camp command. All the prisoners exclusively drank infected water, with over 80% of them becoming ill with diarrhoea and enterocolitis. The food was very poor (a bowl of soup and 80 g of bread per day), the prisoners being left starving and thirsty. Many picked up the leftovers from the gendarmes to ease their hunger. After a while, a few dairy cows were brought near the camp, but the milk was eventually consumed by the gendarmes and not by the starving prisoners. The non-Jews of Cehei who attempted to help were shot. However, a few of the children of Cehei slipped food through to the prisoners, unnoticed by the camp guard.

Sanitary conditions were deplorable, with the most affected being women and children who became severely ill, even of typhoid fever. Pregnant women gave birth alone on the wet ground. For physiological needs, four ditches were dug in the middle of the camp which served as latrines, where the Jews were forced to take care of their needs in everyone’s sight. The Jews were photographed relieving themselves by Commander Krasznai László, and the photographs were displayed in Șimleu in the window of a bookshop to publicly expose the alleeged depravity and lack of morals of the prisoners.

Under the leadership of Krasznai László, the gendarmes brutally tortured the prisoners (hanging them by their wrists and beating them with rubber truncheons, beating them on their testicles) and raped many women, some of whom became pregnant.

The deportation of the Jews from the camp of Cehei/Șimleu Silvaniei to Auschwitz took place between 31 May and 6 June 1944 in 3 transports. Because of torture, inadequate food and deplorable conditions in the camp, the Jews of Cehei/Şimleu Silvaniei reached Auschwitz nearly exhausted physically, so 70% of them were selected for the gas chambers.