In January 1940, the Germans murdered 440 patients of the local psychiatric hospital, including 17 children, as part of the "Aktion T4". In June 1940, during the "AB-Aktion", the Germans carried out mass arrests of Poles, who were then imprisoned in Lublin, and then often deported to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, while some were murdered in the region. The local Polish mayor was murdered in a massacre of over 115 Poles committed by the Gestapo in the nearby Kumowa Valley in 1940. In late 1940, Jews were confined to a small portion of Chełm, living in very overcrowded conditions, up to several dozen a room. Jews were conscripted for forced labor near Chełm and in other locations. The German Reich established 16 forced labor camps in the new Lublin district. Locals from neighboring villages and towns of Chełm also were forced to work in these camps. (also "Khelm" or "Kulm" in German), Some of the camps were connected to the main railroad line through a railroad branch line to the killing camps.