Forty miles north west of Prague, Czechoslovakia, surrounded by the central Bohemian Mountains Hitler pinpointed the small town of Theresienstadt to be his paradise ghetto, his "giftaE?. Located in a scenic community, Theresienstadt had broad streets and a large square surrounded by two large parks and two smaller ones. Here within an area five blocks wide and seven blocks long, over 140, 000 Jews would spend the last months of their lives, and only a few handfuls would survive.

The first Jewish prisoners entered Theresienstadt on November 24, 1941. In the beginning, when the Fuehrer first presented the city to the Jews, many came willingly to the ghetto because life as a Jew was becoming

intolerable and dangerous elsewhere with the rise and spread of anti-Semitism. The Jews wanting to enter Theresienstadt merely had to sign a contract turning over all remaining assets and property to the S. S, and in return the S. S pledged to take care of them as long as they inhabited Theresienstadt.

Theresienstadt was un-like any other ghetto in the fact that Hitler planed to use the ghetto as a "modelaE? ghetto. It was a model that was supposed to represent all the ghettos set up across Europe. Theresienstadt was a place the Nazis and Hitler showed to comfort and reassure the world as to the overall treatment of the Jews. It was a ploy to try to cover up the real horrors and massacres of the Jews that were breaking out across Europe. Theresienstadt was a ghetto designed to divert all attention away from the dying and suffering, Hitler wanted to hide the truth from the world and create a hoax. With thousands of Jews being transported and murdered, among them were people who would be recognized and missed in communities. These were people that were famous; musicians, writers, painters, actors, and well-known scholars. All of these sudden disappearances of these famous people would raise questions among the countries in which they disappeared. Hitler's solution was Theresienstadt.

Like most ghettos, there was an obsession with food in Theresienstadt. Meals consisted of old bread, some potato's turnips, watery soup, and possibly meat; which was more than likely horseflesh. If a person were lucky, they would receive a small amount of margarine or sugar. Once a week rations would be handed out fluctuating in consistency; some week people received 4 ounces of turnips and others potatos, sometimes horsemeat, sometimes nothing but bread. Usually 8 ounces of skim milk were rationed once a week along with the solids, but almost all of the people in Theresienstadt saw much less food than what was recorded. Shortages of kitchens made it so that people would have to stand for hours waiting in line for their small ration of food.

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Approximate Word count = 3367
Approximate Pages = 13 (250 words per page double spaced)