Brown leather wallet with inlaid floral decorations handcrafted and used in the Lodz Ghetto

Hand decorated wallet crafted and used in the Jewish ghetto in Lodz, Poland. Nazi Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, and one week later occupied Lodz. They renamed it Litzmannstadt and in February 1940 relocated all the Jews, roughly 100,000 people, into a sealed ghetto. Prewar Lodz was a thriving industrial city and the ghetto continued to be an important manufacturing center. Daily life and social and economic activity in the ghetto was handled by a Council of Jewish Elders who reported to the German authorities. There were continual food shortages and, with the severe overcrowding, death from starvation and disease was common. By September 1942, the Germans had deported the majority of the residents to Chelmno killing center. The ghetto was destroyed in May 1944.