# The Theresienstadt ghetto opens at Terezín (24 November 1941)

URL: https://allhistories.com/czechia/timeline/1941-the-theresienstadt-ghetto-opens-at-terezin
Themes: Key Events

On 24 November 1941 the first transport of Jewish men arrived at Terezín (Theresienstadt), an 18th-century garrison town north of Prague, to prepare it as a ghetto. Heydrich had chosen the site that autumn as a collection point for the Jews of the Protectorate. About 140,000 people passed through the ghetto, including elderly and prominent Jews from Germany, Austria and elsewhere. Some 33,000 died there of hunger and disease, and most of the rest were deported to Auschwitz and other killing sites. Of roughly 15,000 children held there, only a small number survived. Nazi propaganda presented Terezín as a model settlement; in June 1944 a Red Cross delegation was shown a staged 'beautified' ghetto. Prisoners maintained a remarkable cultural life of concerts, lectures and children's drawings that survives as testimony.

## Why it matters
Terezín was the centre of the Holocaust in the Czech lands, where most of the Protectorate's Jewish community was destroyed.

Ruler at the Time: [Reinhard Heydrich](https://allhistories.com/czechia/rulers/reinhard-heydrich)

Prime Minister of the Protectorate: Alois Eliáš (Independent / non-party)

## Sources
- [Wikipedia — Theresienstadt Ghetto](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theresienstadt_Ghetto)
- [Wikipedia — Terezín](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terez%C3%ADn)
- [Encyclopaedia Britannica topic lookup — The Theresienstadt ghetto opens at Terezín](https://www.britannica.com/search?query=The+Theresienstadt+ghetto+opens+at+Terez%C3%ADn)
- [Wikipedia — Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protectorate_of_Bohemia_and_Moravia)