The Germans began to terrorize the Jews, kidnapping them for forced labor, and then at the end of 1939, forcing many to leave the town. Most of those who left went to Lublin or Warsaw. Some fled east across the Soviet border. In late 1939, the Germans also expelled many Poles, including families of the mayor, parish priest, teachers, doctors, notaries, merchants and pharmacy owner. Further expulsions of Poles were carried out in March 1941 and April 1944. In March 1941 hundreds of Poles were expelled and deported to a transit camp in Łódź, where they were held for several weeks and subjected to brutal searches. Poles were then deported to the General Government (German-occupied central Poland). In November 1941, in Złoczew Germans conducted segregation of nearly 800 Poles expelled from nearby villages, who were then deported to slave labor either to Germany or to German colonists in occupied Poland. In April 1944, the Germans expelled 184 Poles, who were then deported to forced labor in Germany and German-occupied France. Each time the expellees' houses were handed over to German colonists as part of the "Lebensraum" policy. The Germans operated a prison in Złoczew that was subordinate to the prison in Sieradz. In 1940, the Germans forced the remaining Jews into a ghetto and brought several hundred Jews from neighboring villages there too. In all, about 2,500 Jews lived in the ghetto. Early in 1942, about 100 men and teen aged boys were sent to forced labor camps. In May or June 1942, the remaining residents, probably more than 2000, were assembled in a local church where they were held for several days with minimum food and water. They they were forced into trucks and taken to Chełmno extermination camp where they were immediately gassed. There were no survivors from this last round up and perhaps 20 Jewish survivors in total from Złoczew.