Student Profile: Basia Koltun

When we searched for "Basia Koltun” in the Lodz Ghetto Inhabitants Database, we did not find any exact matches. However, once we searched for names that sounded similar to Basia Koltun, we found Pesa Koltim. Pesa Koltim was born on June 29, 1930, making her a perfect candidate for School #5, the school “Basia Koltun” attended. Thus, we concluded that Basia Koltun and Pesa Koltim are indeed the same student.  

Although we cannot determine to where, exactly, Pesa was deported, there are multiple possibilities. There were no deportations made on the 18th of May, as it reads in the database, however in May of 1942, there were three camps to which the Lodz Ghetto inhabitants were deported. From May 4 to May 15, inhabitants were deported to Chelmno, and on different transport, inhabitants arrived at Auschwitz on May 14. Moreover, on page 7 of the database it states that in May of 1942 inhabitants were deported to Poznan/Posen work camps, however, these were primarly males, so Pesa was most likely not in a deportation to Poznan/Posen. Thus, it is likely that Pesa ended up at either Chelmno or Auschwitz. If she ended up at Chelmno, she would have been killed in a gas van. However, if she ended up at Auschwitz, she could have been assigned a prison number, as the May transport from Lodz to Auschwitz had 298 people that registered as prisoners.