Why go
This chronology explains why the ghetto does not have a simple ending at one site. Kaiserwald, Auschwitz and Biķernieki figure in the final months, showing how imprisonment in Riga fed into a broader network of forced labor and extermination. The November transports mark the final stage of that removal.
The full story
In summer 1943, the Nazi authorities built Kaiserwald concentration camp in Riga and began moving Jews there from the ghetto. The first group, about 400 people, was transferred in July. For those sent to Kaiserwald, the move meant separation from relatives as well as prisoner clothing, shaved hair and the loss of what little privacy remained. Other prisoners were placed in camps tied to enterprises that used forced labor. The ghetto was emptied in stages, largely during November 1943. Older people, children, caregivers and people with illnesses were sent by train to Auschwitz; accounts differ on the exact total, but many observers estimate around 2,000 on that transport. Others were murdered at Biķernieki or elsewhere. By the end of November, the prisoners still alive had been removed from the ghetto. Forced labor had kept some people alive for a time, but it did not spare them from the Nazi policy of destruction. Tracing these transfers helps connect Riga’s ghetto history to the later camps and killing sites.