On 17 October 1939, the Reich Security Main Office issued a decree under the heading ‘Gypsy Census’. Known as the Festsetzungserlass, the decree was formulated in preparation for the deportation of all Sinti and Roma from the German Reich, which was already being planned at that time. The express letter in which it was communicated reads: ‘By order of the Reichsführer-SS and Head of the German Police, the Gypsy question will soon be settled on a fundamental basis in the entire Reich territory and on a Reich scale. I therefore request that the following measures be taken immediately […].’1Schnellbrief des Reichssicherheitshauptamtes – Tgb. Nr. RKPA. 149/1939 -g- – vom 17.10.1939 betr. Zigeunererfassung, in: Reichskriminalpolizeiamt (Hrsg.), Vorbeugende Verbrechensbekämpfung. Erlasssammlung (= Schriftenreihe des Reichskriminalpolizeiamtes, Bd. 15), Berlin o.J., 156–156R, quote 156.
Via the Regional Criminal Police Headquarters [Kriminalpolizeileitstellen, KPLSt]—i.e. the intermediate authorities responsible between the Reich Criminal Police Office [Reichskriminalpolizeiamt, RKPA] and the subordinate police authorities—all regional and local police authorities and gendarmeries were instructed to order the Sinti and Roma living in their area ‘not to leave their place of residence or the place where they are current staying from now until further notice.’ It was explicitly pointed out that in the event of a violation of this condition, the decree on the Preventive Fight against Crime was to be applied, which provided for incarceration in a concentration camp. The RKPA drew up a separate wanted list of those who violated the order.
In order to achieve the most rapid and comprehensive registration possible, nationwide ‘search days’ [Fahndungstage] were set for 25 to 27 October 1939. The recording of personal data had to be carried out family by family following a fixed protocol. At the same time, the identity of the registered persons was to be checked on the basis of existing ‘Gypsy identity papers’. If an individual did not yet have such an identity card, one was to be issued during the operation.2Vgl. LHAK, 517, 1/209, Geheimes Rundschreiben der KPLSt Köln betr. Zigeunererfassung, 20.10.1939, 10–13. The material collected locally was to be copied by the lower authorities to the Criminal Police Departments and the RKPA. It was the task of the clerks in the criminal police divisions [Kriminalpolizeistellen, KPSt] to supplement the reports (with identification material, among other things), to sort them by area and to send them to the RKPA via the ‘Dienststellen für Zigeunerfragen’ at the Regional Criminal Police Headquarters.
The RKPA evaluated the material ‘in cooperation with the Reich Department of Health’. This meant that the Racial Hygiene Research Unit was also called in to carry out the racial categorisation of each individual in the course of the registration. The combination of restrictions on freedom of movement with simultaneous racial-biological registration indicates that this decree was motivated by racial policy.
After the registration had been carried out, Sinti and Roma had to sign a declaration with the following wording: ‘I have been formally advised today that I and my relatives are not allowed to leave my place of residence or the place where I am currently staying until further notice and that in case of non-compliance with this order I will be placed in a concentration camp. I must notify the local police authority of any change of address at my place of residence or the place where I am staying prior to the change. I acknowledge by my signature and that of my family members that I have been advised of this restriction.’ 3Examples in State Archives North Rhine-Westphalia, Abt. R, BR 2034/20, 344 and 1127. The signed declaration was not handed to the signatories but kept on file, and could thus be deployed by the criminal police to invoke sanctions and initiate prosecutions.
The decree also informed the Criminal Police Departments that assembly camps [Sammellager] were to be set up for ‘the Gypsies who are to be arrested later’ until their ‘final removal’ and that the police should ‘even now’ be creating all the necessary conditions for this (security, vehicles, food). The KPLSt had to decide for themselves where and how many such camps were to be set up, depending on the local circumstances.
The project of the immobilisation of Sinti and Roma, which involved a great deal of bureaucratic effort, was carried out throughout the Reich under high pressure for weeks and months in anticipation of the deportation that had been announced. Contrary to the expectations of the persecuting authorities, no further deportations followed at first, except for the May deportation of 1940, which involved about 2,500 people. Even after that, however, the police authorities issued a ban on moving whenever they came across someone they identified as a ‘Zigeuner’ or ‘Zigeunermischling’. The restriction on freedom of movement remained in force until the end of the war. The stipulation proved to be a ‘provisional measure lasting several years’ (Michael Zimmermann), which allowed the persecuting authorities close control of and comprehensive access to Sinti and Roma. As soon as an individual was found to have violated the residence restriction, internment in a concentration camp usually followed.
