Polish Righteous Among the Nations - Part 1
From Wikipedia with citations from Yad Vashem
PART 1: Adamowicz - Gut - See Below
PART 2: Iwanski - Krepec
PART 3: Latoszynski - Rudnicki
PART 4: Sendler - Zagorski
The citizens of Poland have the world's highest count of individuals who have been recognized by Yad Vashem of Jerusalem as the Polish Righteous Among the Nations, for saving Jews from extermination during the Holocaust in World War II. There are 7,112 (as of 1 January 2020) Polish men and women recognized as Righteous Among the Nations,[1] over a quarter of the 27,712 recognized by Yad Vashem in total.[2] The list of Righteous is not comprehensive and it is estimated that hundreds of thousands of Poles concealed and aided hundreds of thousands of their Polish-Jewish neighbors.[3] Many of these initiatives were carried out by individuals, but there also existed organized networks of Polish resistance which were dedicated to aiding Jews – most notably, the Żegota organization.
In German-occupied Poland, the task of rescuing Jews was difficult and dangerous. All household members were subject to capital punishment if a Jew was found concealed in their home or on their property.[4]
Activities
Further information: Rescue of Jews by Poles during the Holocaust and The Holocaust in occupied Poland
Before World War II, Poland's Jewish community had numbered between 3,300,000[5] and 3,500,000 people – about 10 percent of the country's total population. Following the invasion of Poland, Germany's Nazi regime sent millions of deportees from every European country to the concentration and forced-labor camps set up in the General Government territory of occupied Poland and across the Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany.[6] Most Jews were imprisoned in the Nazi ghettos, which they were forbidden to leave. Soon after the German–Soviet war had broken out in 1941, the Germans began their extermination of Polish Jews on either side of the Curzon Line, parallel to the ethnic cleansing of the Polish population including Romani and other minorities of Poland.[6]
As it became apparent that, not only were conditions in the ghettos terrible (hunger, diseases, executions), but that the Jews were being singled out for extermination at the Nazi death camps, they increasingly tried to escape from the ghettos and hide in order to survive the war.[7] Many Polish Gentiles concealed hundreds of thousands of their Jewish neighbors. Many of these efforts arose spontaneously from individual initiatives, but there were also organized networks dedicated to aiding the Jews.[8]
Most notably, in September 1942 a Provisional Committee to Aid Jews (Tymczasowy Komitet Pomocy Żydom) was founded on the initiative of Polish novelist Zofia Kossak-Szczucka, of the famous artistic and literary Kossak family. This body soon became the Council for Aid to Jews (Rada Pomocy Żydom), known by the codename Żegota, with Julian Grobelny as its president and Irena Sendler as head of its children's section.[9][10]
It is not exactly known how many Jews were helped by Żegota, but at one point in 1943 it had 2,500 Jewish children under its care in Warsaw alone. At the end of the war, Sendler attempted to locate their parents but nearly all of them had died at Treblinka. It is estimated that about half of the Jews who survived the war (thus over 50,000) were aided in some shape or form by Żegota.[11]
In numerous instances, Jews were saved by entire communities, with everyone engaged,[12] such as in the villages of Markowa[13] and Głuchów near Łańcut,[14] Główne, Ozorków, Borkowo near Sierpc, Dąbrowica near Ulanów, Głupianka near Otwock,[15] Teresin near Chełm,[16] Rudka, Jedlanka, Makoszka, Tyśmienica, and Bójki in Parczew-Ostrów Lubelski area,[17] and Mętów, near Głusk. Numerous families who concealed their Jewish neighbours were killed for doing so.[13]
Risk
Further information: Jewish ghettos in German-occupied Poland
During the occupation of Poland (1939–1945), the Nazi German administration created hundreds of ghettos surrounded by walls and barbed-wire fences in most metropolitan cities and towns, with gentile Poles on the 'Aryan side' and the Polish Jews crammed into a fraction of the city space. Anyone from the Aryan side caught assisting those on the Jewish side in obtaining food was subject to the death penalty.[18][19] The usual punishment for aiding Jews was death, applied to entire families.[4][20][21] On 10 November 1941, the death penalty was expanded by Hans Frank to apply to Poles who helped Jews "in any way: by taking them in for the night, giving them a lift in a vehicle of any kind" or "feed[ing] runaway Jews or sell[ing] them foodstuffs". The law was made public by posters distributed in all major cities. Polish rescuers were fully conscious of the dangers facing them and their families, not only from the invading Germans, but also from betrayers (see: szmalcowniks) within the local, multi-ethnic population and the Volksdeutsche.[22] The Nazis implemented a law forbidding all non-Jews from buying from Jewish shops under the maximum penalty of death.[23]
Gunnar S. Paulsson, in his work on history of the Warsaw Jews during the Holocaust, has demonstrated that, despite the much harsher conditions, Warsaw's Polish residents managed to support and conceal the same percentage of Jews as did the residents of cities in safer countries of Western Europe, where no death penalty for saving them existed.[24]
Numbers
There are 7,177 officially recognized Polish Righteous – the highest count among nations of the world. At a 1979 international historical conference dedicated to Holocaust rescuers, J. Friedman said in reference to Poland: "If we knew the names of all the noble people who risked their lives to save the Jews, the area around Yad Vashem would be full of trees and would turn into a forest."[3] Hans G. Furth holds that the number of Poles who helped Jews is greatly underestimated and there might have been as many as 1,200,000 Polish rescuers.[3]
Father John T. Pawlikowski (a Servite priest from Chicago) [25] remarked that the hundreds of thousands of rescuers strike him as inflated.[26]
Notable Rescuers
See also: List of Polish Righteous and Category: Polish Righteous Among the Nations
Irena Adamowicz, liaison between several Jewish ghettos providing communication and moral support [27]
Irena Adamowicz (11 May 1910 – 12 August 1973), was a Polish-born scout leader and a resistance member during World War II. She was a courier for the underground Home Army (Armia Krajowa). In 1985, Adamowicz was posthumously bestowed the title of the Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem in Jerusalem for her activities involving providing information to a number of Jewish ghettos in occupied Poland.
Adamowicz was born in Warsaw, to a Polish noble family and held a degree in social work from the University of Warsaw before World War II.[1] She served as one of the leaders of the Polish Scout movement (Harcerz Polski) coordinating its activities as a Senior Girl Scout. A Polish Roman Catholic, Adamowicz provided counseling and educational services not only for the Catholic Scouts, but also for the Jewish youth movement called Hashomer Hatzair (Ha-Shomer ha-Tsa'ir) in the 1930s, working in close co-operation with Arie Wilner.
Following the German invasion of Poland, Adamowicz became a member of the underground Home Army (Armia Krajowa) as a clandestine courier. She delivered messages and provided aid and moral support for the Jewish ghettos in several distant cities.[2]
In 1985, Adamowicz was posthumously bestowed the title of the Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem in Jerusalem for her heroic stand against the Nazi Holocaust.[2][3]
Due to her work for both Polish and Jewish youth before the invasion of Poland, and her close contact with the Jewish Zionist movement, Adamowicz, a devout Christian, was able to come to the aid of Jewish Fighting Organization's efforts to establish a channel of communication between the ghettos of different cities. At a meeting in Warsaw in late 1941 a decision was made to embark on this perilous effort, by the representatives of AK including Irena Adamowicz and Stanislaw Hajduk, and, on the Jewish side, by Mordechaj Anielewicz, Icchak Cukierman, Josef Kaplan and Cywia Lubetkin. Throughout the summer of 1942 Adamowicz went on a daring trip across Poland and Lithuania to establish contact between clandestine organizations in the ghettos of Warsaw, Wilno (now Vilnius), Białystok, Kovno (now Kaunas) and Shavle (Šiauliai). Her visits became a source of both vital information and moral encouragement, such as her inspirational presence in Kovno Ghetto in July 1942. She earned a Jewish nickname "Di chalutzishe shikse", the Pioneering Gentile.[2][4][5][6][7][8]
Following the end of World War II, Adamowicz remained in close contact with the survivors of the Holocaust, with whom she had worked in the Jewish underground. Thanks to their efforts, she was named Righteous among the Nations in 1985. Her personal experience became a part of the book by Bartoszewski and Lewin entitled Righteous Among Nations; How Poles Helped the Jews, 1939–1945.[9][10]
Notes
1. Irena Adamowicz: Sprawiedliwy wśród Narodów Świata.
2. Shoah Resource Center, The International School for Holocaust Studies, Adamowicz, Irena at www.yadvashem.org
3. Righteous Among the Nations Recognized by Yad Vashem as of 1 January 2010.
4. Abraham J. Edelheit (1994). History of the Holocaust: A Handbook and Dictionary. Avalon Publishing. p. 218.
5. "March of the Living Canada 2008".
6. Kovno Righteous Gentiles
7. Yitzhak Zuckerman, Barbara Harshav, A Surplus of Memory: Chronicle of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising p. 493 1993 University of California Press.
8. Month in Holocaust: August 2004 Yad Vashem The Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority
9. Bartoszewski & Lewin, Righteous Among Nations; How Poles Helped the Jews, 1939–1945. London, Earlscourt Publications Ltd, 1969.
10. Holocaust Survivors and Remembrance Project: "Forget You Not", Irena Adamowicz Holocaust Remembrance, Sanctuary, and Beyond ...
Irena Adamowicz: "Di chalutzishe shikse". History of the Holocaust By Abraham J. Edelheit.
Adamowicz, Irena
Irena Adamowicz, a devout Catholic and daughter of Polish nobles, was a graduate of the University of Warsaw with a degree in social work. Until the outbreak of World War II, she held a leading position with the Polish Scouts in Warsaw. In the course of her activities, she developed close and friendly relations with the Hashomer Hatzair movement and participated in its educational and social enterprises. During the occupation, she now only maintained contact with the Jewish youth movements but actually strengthened the relationship. Adamowicz placed herself at the disposal of th Jewish underground and served as a liaison among the ghettos of Warsaw, Vilna, Bialystok, Kaunas, and Siauliai. Meeting surreptitiously with the underground leaders, Adamowicz passed on information about the situation in the ghettos and for many months she supplied arms to the Warsaw ghetto. In June 1942, Adamowicz set out for Vilna in the service of the Hashomer Hatzair, to inform the leaders of the Jewish underground about the onset of the mass destruction of the Jews in the Generalgouvernement and to apprise them of the youth movements’ plans. She entered the sealed Vilna ghetto with great difficulty and, after completing the mission, was asked to deliver the bitter news to the Jews of Kaunas and Siauliai so that they, too, could form resistance groups in the cities of Lithuania. Adamowicz agreed to undertake this mission and, at mortal danger, completed it with great devotion and loyalty.
She considered it her supreme duty in life, and most publications on Jewish armed resistance in Warsaw, Vilna, and Bialystok refer to her in glowing terms. After the war, Adamowicz maintained her relationship with the remnants of the Zionist pioneering youth movements in Poland, which were preparing Jews to immigrate to Israel, and with her friends in the movements. In 1958, Adamowicz came to Israel for an extended visit as the guest of the Hakibbutz Ha’artzi movement. On January 14, 1985, Yad Vashem recognized Irena Adamowicz as Righteous Among the Nations.
Wincenty Antonowicz with wife Jadwiga and daughter Lucyna, food and transport [27]
Wincenty Antonowicz (May 1, 1891 – 1984), along with his wife Jadwiga (1896–1942) and daughter Lucyna Antonowicz-Bauer (b. 1927), were the Polish family from Wilno (now Vilnius, Lithuania) who sheltered the 20-year-old Jewish woman Bronisława Malberg (b. 1917) in their house after the liquidation of the Wilno Ghetto during the Nazi German occupation of Poland in World War II, as well as two other Jewish families including Henia and Adi Kulgan. For their heroism, Wincenty and his wife Jadwiga were posthumously bestowed the titles of Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem on June 14, 1998.
Antonowicz, Wincenty
Antonowicz, Jadwiga
Bauer-Antonowicz, Lucyna
When Joanna Malberg escaped from the Vilna ghetto to the Aryan side of the city in the summer of 1942, she made her way to the home of Wincenty and Jadwiga Antonowicz, casual acquaintances from before the German occupation. The Antonowiczes gave Malberg a warm welcome and prepared a hiding place for her behind a closet in their daughter’s bedroom, where they took good care of her. Later, when the Germans began rounding up local Jews, Malberg was sent to Wincenty’s mother’s home, where their daughter Lucyna took excellent care of her. In the winter of 1943, after the Antonowiczes obtained “Aryan” papers for Malberg, she was transferred to the nearby town of Niemenczyn, where she worked as a private French teacher until the area was liberated in July 1944. After the war, Malberg emigrated to France, while the Antonowicz family moved to central Poland. In risking their lives to save Malberg, the Antonowiczes were guided by altruistic, humanitarian motives. In addition, during 1943-1944 the Antonowiczes assist in rescue efforts to additional 24 Jews who fled from the Vilno HKP labor camp.
On June 14, 1998, Yad Vashem recognized Jadwiga Antonowicz and Wincenty Antonowicz and their daughter, Lucyna Bauer-Antonowicz, as Righteous Among the Nations. File 5834
Ferdynand Arczyński, took care of 4,000 Jews on the "Aryan" side of Warsaw (Zegota treasurer) [27]
Ferdynand Marek Arczyński (December 8, 1900, in Kraków – 1979 in Warsaw), cryptonym "Marek" or "Lukowski", was one of the founding members of an underground organization Żegota (Council for Aid to Jews) in German-occupied Poland, from 1942 to 1945. Żegota's express purpose was to help the country's Jews survive the Holocaust; find places of safety for them, and provide relief payments to thousands of families.[1] Poland was the only country in occupied Europe with such an organization during World War II.[2]
Born in 1900, Arczyński participated in the Silesian Uprisings (1919–21) during the formation of the sovereign Second Polish Republic. He was a member of the Polish Democratic Party and an editor of the Polish Daily (Dziennik Polski, pl) in Kraków. Following the Nazi-Soviet invasion of Poland, Arczyński worked tirelessly for Żegota, serving not only as treasurer but also as head of its "legalization" department, which produced forged documents distributed to Jews in the care of Żegota. He also acted as a liaison with branches of Żegota [3] in Kraków, Lwów and Lublin. He was an unofficial, but successful recruiting officer.
As Żegota treasurer and head of the Legalization Bureau, Ferdynand Arczyński produced daily hundreds of false IDs, work cards, Roman Catholic birth and marriage certificates which were given out free of charge to some 4,000 Jews hiding on the "Aryan" side of the ghettos. He arranged for places to live, medical help, and monthly cash disbursements. He helped with providing aid to Jews in concentration camps. Arczyński, "Marek", was also a founding member of Kraków and Lwów branches of Żegota.
After the war, Marek Ferdynand Arczyński served as Member of Parliament (Sejm) from 1947 until 1952,[4] in the Department of Communication, and worked as a journalist.[5]
In 1965, Ferdynand Arczynski visited Israel, where on May 18, 1965, Yad Vashem recognized him as righteous.
Notes
1. David Cesarani, Sarah Kavanaugh, Holocaust Published by Routledge. Page 64.
2. Andrzej Sławiński, Those who helped Polish Jews during WWII. Translated from Polish by Antoni Bohdanowicz. Article on the pages of the London Branch of the Polish Home Army Ex-Servicemen Association. Last accessed on March 14, 2008.
3. "Arczynski Marek". The Righteous Among The Nations. Retrieved 2021-05-26. (in Polish) Polscy posłowie: Sejm Ustawodawczy kadencja 1947 - 1952
4. "Kalendarz wydarzen (calendar of events): born December 8, 1900". Stanislaw Wronski, Maria Zwolakowa: "Polacy Zydzi, 1939-1945". Warszawa, Książka i Wiedza Publishers, 1971. (illustrated, 462 pages) including copies of many original documents.
Irene Tomaszewski and Tecia Werbowski, Zegota: The Council for Aid to Jews in Occupied Poland 1942-1945. Price-Patterson Ltd. Montreal, Canada. Reprinted with authors' permission at Project In Posterum, Preserving the Past for the Future.
Teresa Prekerowa, Konspiracyjna Rada Pomocy Żydom w Warszawie, 1942-1945, Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, Warsaw, 1982.
Arczynski, Ferdynand Marek
In December 1942, Ferdynand Marek Arczynski, known to the underground as “Marek,” became a member of the board of Zegota (The Council for Aid to Jews). Ferdynand acted as the organization’s treasurer, and from 1943 was one of a select group of Poles who distinguished themselves in their attempts to rescue the surviving Jews on Polish soil. A representative of the underground Democratic Party (SD - Stronnictwo Demokratyczne), Arczynski dedicated himself courageously to the rescue of his Jewish countrymen. He headed the “Legalization Department” (Referat legalizacyjny), which produced forged documents – work permits, identity cards (Kennkarten), passes, marriage certificates, etc. – which were distributed to Jews in the care of Zegota. As an inhabitant of Krakow, Arczynski acted as liaison and coordinator between the organization’s local branches and the headquarters in Warsaw. The testimonies of Jewish underground activists who were in direct contact with Marek show that the latter scorned the risks to which he was exposed and that many Jews owe their lives to him. In 1965, Ferdynand Arczynski visited Israel.
On May 18, 1965, Yad Vashem recognized Ferdynand Marek Arczynski as Righteous Among the Nations.
Zofia Baniecka and her mother rescued more than 50 Jews in their Warsaw apartment in 1941–1944
“Zofia Baniecka (12 May 1917 in Warsaw – 1993) was a Polish member of the Resistance during World War II. In addition to relaying guns and other materials to resistance fighters, Baniecka and her mother sheltered over 50 Jews in their home between 1941 and 1944.[1] Later, Baniecka was an activist with the Intervention Bureau of the Polish Workers' Defence Committee (Polish: Komitet Obrony Robotników, KOR) in 1977.[2] She and her husband were active participants in the Solidarity movement in the 1980s, distributing underground press.[3][4] In her professional capacity, Baniecka was a long-time member of the Warsaw chapter of the Association of Polish Artists and Designers (ZPAP).[5]
“Born fifteen years after her parents' wedding, Zofia Baniecka was the only child of a sculptor father and a teacher mother from Warsaw. Her parents were not religious, but she went to a Catholic school. She then studied at the Warsaw University, before the Nazi German and Soviet invasion of Poland. Zofia had many Jewish friends from assimilated homes just like her own intellectually inclined parents. In late 1940 the Nazi occupiers ordered the family to relocate when their home fell within the boundaries of the newly established Warsaw Ghetto.[3]
“All three family members began to work for the Polish underground. In Zofia's case, she became affiliated with the Bataliony Chłopskie. Zofia's inconspicuous grey-haired mother was transporting weapons in her shopping bag for the Resistance, while Zofia's father smuggled food and books to friends in the Ghetto. Thanks to help from their underground contacts, the family soon moved to a large apartment with four rooms and a kitchen — near the walls of the ghetto — and began taking in Jewish refugees. The apartment was divided by curtains with a different Jewish family behind each one. Nobody was ever refused: friends, strangers, acquaintances. Zofia got involved with the underground press and also, helped the Jewish Committee find hiding places for the children. As a courier, she distributed underground newspapers and relayed orders around the General Government.[1][6]
“Even though in 1941 Zofia's father was killed in a Soviet air-strike on Warsaw — from winter of 1941 till August 1944 (when the Warsaw Uprising started) — the two women managed to rescue at least fifty (50) Jews in their home, including a family of ten, escaping the Ghetto firestorm in April 1943 following the failed Ghetto Uprising. When their house was full, the Banieckis helped Jews find other places to hide.[6]
“After the Soviet takeover of Poland at the end of World War II, Zofia was arrested by the Communist authorities as a member of Resistance, but she was ultimately released. She got married. Years later, with her husband, Baniecka got involved with the anti-communist Komitet Obrony Robotników (KOR), undeterred by the threat of repressions. Ultimately, she also became an active participant in the Polish Solidarity movement of the 1980s. [1]
“She was recognized as a Righteous Among the Nations, posthumously, in 2016.[7]
Notes
1. Garry Buff,
2. (in Polish) Komitet Obrony Robotnikow, KOR, Kalendarium 1977. Narodowe Centrum Kultury.
3. PBS Frontline, An interview with Zofia Baniecka
4. (in Polish) Narodowe Centrum Kultury, Slownik, "Niezalezni dla kultury 1976-1989".
5. (in Polish) Slownik Biograficzny,
6. Rochelle L. Millen, Jack Mann, Timothy Bennett, New Perspectives on the Holocaust page 256, NYU Press 1996
7. "Baniecka Zofia". The Righteous Among the Nations Database.
Wojtarek Edward
Wojtarek Elżbieta
Godlewska-Wojtarek Elżbieta Józefa
“One day in April 1943, Ruth (Irena) Brzeziński (later, Kurtin) knocked on the door of the home of Edward and Elżbieta Wojtarek in Warsaw. The young woman, who had escaped from the ghetto in Częstochowa, asked the family for shelter. Their daughter, Elżbieta, her classmate and good friend from the government teachers’ institute had given her the address. The Wojtareks welcomed her and made her one of the family. A few days later, Ruth’s sister, Celina, arrived with her husband, Marek, and room was found for them as well, despite the overcrowding in the house and the danger lurking outside. Elżbieta, who was on the directorate of the [Polish] Central Welfare Council (RGO), set about finding hiding places and employment for the three fugitives. She arranged “Aryan” papers for Ruth, and her mother taught Ruth Christian prayers and customs. Ruth helped with the household chores and remained with the family until the fall of 1943. Elżbieta found Celina work as a teacher in an RGO orphanage and found a haven for Marek with one of her girlfriends, Zofia Baniecka. One day, Ruth was arrested on the street by the Germans, who suspected her of being a Jew, and incarcerated in the Pawiak prison. There she engaged in sewing and knitting, and her vibrant nature kept her from being deported to Auschwitz time and again. All the while that Ruth was imprisoned, Elżbieta did not desert her: she remained in touch with her friend and tried to get her conditions improved.
“The entire Wojtarek family took part in rescuing the young Jews, though they knew the personal risk this entailed. Ruth was incarcerated until the outbreak of the Warsaw Uprising and lived to survive the war. Her brother-in-law, Marek, was seized and sent to Auschwitz, where he perished. Elżbieta’s parents were also sent to Auschwitz, apparently during the revolt in Warsaw. Her father was murdered there, and only her mother, who was transferred to Ravensbrück concentration camp, returned after the war. On March 31, 2003, Yad Vashem recognized Edward and Elżbieta Wojtarek, and their daughter, Elżbieta Józefa Wojtarek-Godlewska, as Righteous Among the Nations. File: 9973
Władysław Bartoszewski, Jewish Uprising assistance (Delegatura) [28][29]
“Władysław Bartoszewski ([vwaˈdɨswaf bartɔˈʂɛfskʲi] 19 February 1922 – 24 April 2015) was a Polish politician, social activist, journalist, writer, and historian. A former Auschwitz concentration camp prisoner,[1] he was a World War II resistance fighter as part of the Polish underground and participated in the Warsaw Uprising. After the war he was persecuted and imprisoned by the communist Polish People's Republic due to his membership in the Home Army (Armia Krajowa, AK) and opposition activity.[2]
“After the collapse of the communist regime, Bartoszewski served twice as the Minister of Foreign Affairs from March through December 1995 and again from 2000 to 2001.[3] He was also an ambassador and a member of the Polish Senate. Bartoszewski was a close ally and friend of Polish anti-Communist activist and later president Lech Wałęsa.[4]
Bartoszewski was a chevalier of the Order of the White Eagle, an honorary citizen of Israel, and a member of the International Honorary Council of the European Academy of Diplomacy.[1]
Bartoszewski gwas born in Warsaw to a Catholic family.[5] He studied at Saint Stanisław Kostka Secondary School.[5] In 1939 he graduated from The Humanist High School of the Roman Catholic Future Educational Society in Warsaw.[3]
In September 1939, Bartoszewski took part in the civil defense of Warsaw as a stretcher-bearer.[4] From May 1940, he worked in the first social clinic of the Polish Red Cross in Warsaw.[4] On 19 September 1940, Bartoszewski was detained in the Warsaw district of Żoliborz during a surprise round-up of members of the public (łapanka), along with some 2,000 civilians (among them, Witold Pilecki).[4][6] From 22 September 1940, he was detained in Auschwitz concentration camp (his inmate number was 4427). Due to actions undertaken by the Polish Red Cross, he was released from Auschwitz on 8 April 1941.[4]
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After his release from Auschwitz, Bartoszewski contacted the Association of Armed Struggle (Związek Walki Zbrojnej). In the summer of 1941, he reported on his concentration camp imprisonment to the Information Department of the Information and Propaganda Bureau of the Home Army (Armia Krajowa, or AK, a reformed version of the Association of Armed Struggle and the largest resistance movement in Poland).[7] In 1942, he joined the Front for the Rebirth of Poland (Front Odrodzenia Polski), which was a secret, Catholic, social-educational and charity organization founded by Zofia Kossak-Szczucka.[7] From October 1941 until 1944, Bartoszewski studied Polish studies in the secret Humanist Department of Warsaw University. At this time, higher education of Poles was outlawed by the German occupational authorities.[7]
In August 1942, Bartoszewski became a soldier of the Home Army, working as a reporter in the "P" Subdivision of the Information Department of its Information and Propaganda Bureau.[2] His pseudonym "Teofil" was inspired by Teofil Grodzicki, a fictional character from Jan Parandowski's novel entitled The Sky in Flames. He cooperated with Kazimierz Moczarski in the two-man P-1 report of the "P" subdivision.[7]
From September 1942, Bartoszewski was active on behalf of the Front for the Rebirth of Poland in the Provisional Committee for Aid to Jews and its successor organization, the Council for Aid to Jews (codenamed Żegota). Żegota, a Polish World War II resistance organization whose objective was to help Jews during the Holocaust, operated under the auspices of the Polish Government in Exile through the Delegatura, its presence in Warsaw.[5] He remained a member of Żegota until the Warsaw Uprising. In 1943, he replaced Witold Bieńkowski in the Jewish Department of the Delegatura.[8]
From November 1942 to September 1943, Bartoszewski was an editorial team secretary of the Catholic magazine Prawda (The Truth), the press organ of the Front for the Rebirth of Poland.[5] From fall of 1942 until spring of 1944, Bartoszewski was the editor-in-chief of the Catholic magazine Prawda Młodych (The Youth's Truth), which was also connected with the Front for the Rebirth of Poland and aimed at university and high-school students. In November 1942, Bartoszewski became a vice-manager of a division created in the Department of Internal Affairs of the Delegatura, whose remit was to help prisoners of Pawiak prison.[7] In February 1943, Bartoszewski became a reporter and vice-manager of the Department's Jewish Report. As a part of his activities for Żegota and the Jewish Report, he organized assistance for the participants of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in April 1943.[5]
On 1 August 1944, Bartoszewski began his participation in the Warsaw Uprising.[7] He was an aide to the commander of radio post "Asma" and editor-in-chief of the magazine The News from the City and The Radio News.[7] On 20 September, by orders from the commandant of the Warsaw District of the AK, General Antoni "Monter" Chruściel, Bartoszewski was decorated with the Silver Cross of Merit.[5] This was the result of a proposal put forward by the chief of the Information and Propaganda Bureau in General Headquarters of the Home Army, Colonel Jan Rzepecki). On 1 October, he was appointed Second Lieutenant by the AK commander general Tadeusz "Bór" Komorowski (also due to a proposal by Rzepecki). He received the Cross of Valor order on 4 October.[7]
Post-World War II
Bartoszewski left Warsaw on 7 October 1944.[2] He continued his underground activity in the Information and Propaganda Bureau of the Home Army at its General Headquarters in Kraków. From November 1944 to January 1945, he held a position as editorial team secretary for Information Bulletin.[2] At the end of February 1945, he returned to Warsaw, where he began his service in the information and propaganda section of NIE resistance movement.[3] From May to August 1945, Bartoszewski was serving in the sixth unit of the Delegatura (he was responsible for information and propaganda) under the supervision of Kazimierz Moczarski). On 10 October 1945, he revealed that he had served in the AK.[4]
In Autumn 1945, Bartoszewski started his cooperation with the Institute of National Remembrance at the presidium of the government and the Head Commission of Examination of German Crimes in Poland.[4] His information gathered during the occupation period about the Nazi crimes, the situation in concentration camps and prisons, as well as his knowledge concerning the Jewish genocide, appeared to be very helpful.[3]
In February 1946 he began his work in the editorial section of Gazeta Ludowa (People's Gazette), the main press organ of the Polish People's Party (Polskie Stronnictwo Ludowe, PSL). Soon, he joined the PSL, at that time the only influential party in opposition to the communist government.[4] In the articles published in Gazeta Ludowa, he mentioned the outstanding figures of the Polish Underground State (the interview with Stefan Korboński, the report from the funeral of Jan Piekałkiewicz), and the events connected with the fight for liberation of the country (a series of sketches presenting the Warsaw Uprising entitled Dzień Walczącej Stolicy).[4]
Due to his collaboration with the PSL, Bartoszewski became subject to repressions by the security services. On 15 November 1946, he was falsely accused of being a spy, resulting in him being arrested and held by the Ministry of Public Security of Poland.[4] In December, he was transferred to the Mokotów Prison; he was released on 10 April 1948, with the help of Zofia Rudnicka (a former chief of Żegota, then working in the Ministry of Justice).[3] Although Bartoszewski was accepted into the third year of Polish Studies in December 1948, his arrest in 1949 and the resulting five years' imprisonment rendered him unable to finish his studies.[4]
Bartoszewski was again arrested on 14 December 1949.[2] On 29 May 1952, he was sentenced by the Military District Court to eight years in prison due to the false charge of espionage.[4] In April 1954, he was moved to the prison in Rawicz and in June to the prison in Racibórz. He was released in August 1954 on a year's parole due to his bad health condition.[2] On 2 March 1955, during the wave of de-Stalinization, Bartoszewski was informed he was wrongly sentenced.[2][4]
Literary, Academic and Journalistic Activity
After Bartoszewski was found wrongly sentenced and released from prison, he returned to his journalistic activity. Since August 1955, he was the editor-in-chief of specialist publishing houses of the Polish Librarians Association.[9] Since July 1956, he was publishing his articles in Stolica weekly, and since January 1957 he was a member of an editorial section. From the Summer of 1958 to December 1960, he held the position of the secretary of the editorial section.[9] In August 1957, Bartoszewski began working with Tygodnik Powszechny (Universal Weekly). Since July 1982, he was a member of the editorial section.[4] In November 1958, Bartoszewski was again accepted by the Linguistic Department of Warsaw University, in extramural mode. He submitted his master's thesis written under the supervision of Professor Julian Krzyżanowski.[10] However, by decision of the vice-chancellor, he was expelled from the university in October 1962.[9]
On 18 April 1963, Bartoszewski was decorated with the Polonia Restituta medal for his help to the Jews during the war.[9] The proposal was put forward by the Jewish Historical Institute.[9] Between September and November 1963, he resided in Israel at the invitation of the Yad Vashem Institute. In the name of the Council for Aid to Jews, he received the diploma of the Righteous Among the Nations. In 1966, he received the medal of the Righteous Among the Nations.[11] In memoriam, former Israeli Ambassador Govrin will later write: "Władysław Bartoszewski will always be remembered as an individual who greatly contributed to the strengthening of Polish-Israeli ties, well before diplomatic ties were renewed and well after.[12]
From November to December 1963, Bartoszewski lived in Austria, where he entered into communication with Austrian intellectual and political societies.[10] In November 1963, he begun his cooperation with Radio Free Europe.[4] In the next years, he was traveling to the Federal Republic of Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Israel and the United States, where he got in touch mainly with some of the representatives of Polish emigration (among others with Jan Nowak-Jeziorański, Jan Karski, Czesław Miłosz and Gustaw Herling-Grudziński).[9] In 1969–73, Bartoszewski served as the chairman of the Warsaw Department of the Society of Book Lovers (Towarzystwo Przyjaciół Książki) and in December 1969 he was appointed a member of the board of the Polish PEN.[3] From 1972 to 1983, he served as the chief secretary of the Polish PEN.[3] In 1973–82, and again in 1984–85, Bartoszewski lectured as a senior lecturer (the counterpart of vice-professor).[3] His lectures concerned modern history (with the special emphasis on the war and occupation) in the Institute of Modern History on the Humanistic Science Department of KUL (Catholic University of Lublin). In December 1981, he was an active participant in the First Polish Culture Congress, which was interrupted by the enforcement of martial law in Poland.[3]
References
1968 Warsaw Death Ring: 1939–1944, Interpres.
1969 Righteous Among Nations: How Poles Helped the Jews 1939–1945, ed. with Zofia Lewin, Earlscourt Pub, UK.
1970 The Samaritans: Heroes of the Holocaust, ed. with Zofia Lewin, Twayne Publishers, New York.
1988 The Warsaw Ghetto: A Christian's Testimony, Beacon Press.
1991 The Jews in Warsaw: A History, ed. with Antony Polonsky, Blackwell Publishing.
Bartoszewski, Władysław
From September 1942, even before the establishment of Zegota (the Council for Aid to Jews), Władysław Bartoszewski was a loyal and devoted member of the Provisional Committee for Aid to Jews. When Zegota was established in December 1942, Bartoszewski (whose undercover name was “Ludwik”) threw himself wholeheartedly into working for the organization, as well as helping many Jewish refugees on a personal basis. In Zegota, Bartoszewski represented "The Polish Revival Front,” a clandestine Catholic organization, and served as deputy-director of the Jewish Section of the Department of Internal Affairs of the Polish government-in-exile in London. Bartoszewski saved the lives of many Jews who fled from the Warsaw ghetto and hid on the Aryan side of the city or elsewhere. Throughout his underground activities, Bartoszewski maintained close ties with Jewish representatives of Zegota, including Leon Feiner, the Bund representative and Adolf Berman, representative of the Jewish National Council. As part of his underground activity, Bartoszewski sent information to England and the United States on the situation of the Jews in Poland under the German occupation. The author, Rachel Auerbach, and Dr. A. Berman subsequently testified that, after the war, Bartoszewski, who was, by then, a reputed journalist and publicist, tried hard to bring the heroism of Polish Jewry to the notice of the Polish public. He published many articles and essays noted for their objectivity and sympathy toward the Jewish people and helped promote harmony between Poles and Jews.
On December 14, 1965, Yad Vashem recognized Władysław Bartoszewski as Righteous Among the Nations.
Anna Borkowska, saved 17 young Jewish Zionists in her Vilna convent [30]
Mother Bertranda, O.P. (née Janina Siestrzewitowska; 1900–1988), later known as Anna Borkowska,[1][2] was a Polish cloistered Dominican nun who served as the prioress of her monastery in Kolonia Wileńska near Wilno (now Pavilnys near Vilnius, Lithuania).[nb 1] She was a graduate of the University of Kraków who had entered the monastery after her studies. During World War II, under her leadership, the nuns of the monastery sheltered 17 young Jewish activists from Vilnius Ghetto and helped the Jewish Partisan Organization (FPO) by smuggling weapons. In recognition of this, in 1984 she was awarded the title of Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem.
Vilnius (Vilna) was taken over by the Germans on 24 June 1941, in Operation Barbarossa, and the killing of the Jews began almost immediately. Mother Betranda first inquired about saving Jews following the start of the Ponary massacre in July 1941. She initially sought to gain the support of the Wilno Catholic leadership, but they rebuffed her efforts out of fear that the Nazi German occupation forces would destroy church property and kill any Christians found to be aiding Jews.[3]
Acting on her own initiative, Mother Betranda then took in 17 members of Hashomer Hatzair, a local Zionist group, and hid them within the grounds of her monastery. The activists included Abba Kovner, the movement's leader, Abraham Sutzkever, Arie Wilner and Edek Boraks. They helped the nuns with working their fields, while Kovner, realizing the goals of Hitler's Final Solution, worked on organizing a political resistance to the occupation and writing his manifesto for the later uprising.[2] When several of her nuns objected, Mother Bertranda reportedly threatened them with expulsion from the monastery and excommunication from the faith. Some of the Hashomer Hatzair members later decided to leave their monastery hideout and to return to the Jewish Ghetto in Vilnius, where they organized an underground resistance movement, the Fareynikte Partizaner Organizatsye (FPO).[3]
Soon after that, Mother Bertranda left the monastery and went to the Ghetto to volunteer her services.[2] She was dissuaded from this by Kovner, who asked that she organize the procurement of supplies instead. She and the other Dominican nuns then took it upon themselves to help the Jewish resistance by smuggling in arms and ammunition. The other nuns of the community included Sister Bernadeta (Julia Michrowska), Sister Cecylia (Maria Roszak), Sister Diana (Helena Frackiewicz), Sister Imelda (Maria Neugebauer), Sister Jordana (Maria Ostrejko), Sister Małgorzata (Irena Adamek) and Sister Stefania (Stanisława Bednarska). In this they became among the first to supply hand grenades and other weapons to the Vilnius Ghetto underground. Between August and September 1943, the ghetto was liquidated, and some 12,000 men, women and children were deported to camps in Estonia. The uprising, organized by FPO on 1 September 1943 was crushed. The final Nazi destruction of whatever remained of the Ghetto followed.
In September 1943, Mother Bertranda was arrested by the Nazi German occupation authorities and sent to a labor camp at Perwejniszki near Kovno (Polish: Kowno, now Pravieniškės near Kaunas, Lithuania). [nb 2] The monastery was closed and the community of nuns was forced to disperse. After the war, Mother Bertranda asked for a dispensation from her vows and left the monastery, where she adopted the name Anna. Notes
In 1984, Borkowska, now living alone in a small apartment in Warsaw, was awarded the title of Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem. Abba Kovner, one of the young Jews who had been saved by Borkowska, personally presented a medal to her at a ceremony in Poland. She and [Sister] Cecylia Roszakcan were two members of this monastic community to be honored, to the statistics given by Yad Vashem.[5]
Notes
1. The monastery was established in 1938 in the pre-war Second Polish Republic. It was closed in 1948 in the post-war Lithuanian SSR. It continued to function in secret and was officially reestablished in 1996. It is located in the present-day Kalvos street 17 Source: Jagminas, Leonardas (2004-02-02). "Dominikõnės". Visuotinė lietuvių enciklopedija (in Lithuanian). Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidybos centras.
2. Prior to the Second World War, Kaunas had a significant Jewish population. According to the Russian census of 1897, the population of Kovno (Ковно, or Kaunas in Lithuanian) was 25.8 percent Russian, 22.7 percent Polish, and only 6.6 percent Lithuanian. Source: Blobaum, Robert (1984). Feliks Dzierzynski and the SDKPIL: A study of the origins of Polish Communism. East European Monographs. p. 42.
"Historia pomocy - Borkowska Anna | Polscy Sprawiedliwi" (in Polish). Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich.
Yad Vashem (2012). "Anna Borkowska, Poland". The Righteous among the Nations. Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority. Retrieved 25 November 2012. ...only in 1984 was contact with her reestablished. By that time, she was 84 years old.
Gross, David C. (1981). The Jewish People's Almanac. Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company. pp. 465–66.
Porat, Dina (2010). The Fall of a Sparrow. Translated by Elizabeth Yuval. Stanford University Press. p. 51.
Borkowska, Anna
Ostreyko, Jordana
Roszak, Cecylia Maria
Neugebauer, Imelda
Bednarska, Stefania
Adamek, Malgorzata
Frackiewicz, Helena-Diana
“In 1941, during the German occupation, Anna Borkowska (Sister Bertranda), mother superior of a Dominican convent in Kolonia Wilenska, about 15 kilometers from Vilna, together with six other nuns, helped save a group of Hashomer Hatza‘ir members looking for a hiding place in the area. Through the mediation of Jadwiga Dudzic, a representative of the Polish Scouts, Borkowska offered them temporary shelter in the convent. Among the fifteen Jews taken into the convent by the nuns were many who later became members of the underground in the Bialystok, Warsaw, and Vilna ghettos, such as Arie Wilner, Aba Kowner, Israel Nagel, Chuma Godot, Chajka Grosman, and Edek Boraks. Borkowska (who was affectionately known as “Mother”) did all she could to ensure the safety of the Jews in her care. In the winter of 1942, a group of young activists left the convent and returned to the ghetto in order to organize an underground resistance cell. During their stay, the young activists had, with the knowledge and agreement of Borkowska and six other nuns, turned the place into a hive of activity for the Jewish underground. Aba Kowner was subsequently to relate that the first manifesto calling for a ghetto revolt was drawn up in the convent. After leaving the convent, the members of the underground maintained close ties with Borkowska, their “mother,” who visited them in the ghetto, helped them obtain weapons, and brought them their first hand grenades.
“After rumors that Jews were hiding in the convent reached the ears of the Gestapo, Borkowska was interrogated, and the convent shut down. The ties between the surviving members of the underground and Borkowska continued after the war, until her death. They even invited her to visit them in Israel, but due to ailing health, she was unable to take up their offer. On March 29, 1984, Yad Vashem recognized Anna Borkowska and the nuns Imelda Neugebauer, Stefania Bednarska, Malgorzata Adamek, Jordana Ostreyko, Helena-Diana Frackiewicz and Cecylia Maria Roszak as Righteous Among the Nations. File No. 2682 Borkowska's helping hand was never forgotten by the Zionist pioneers who had immigrated to Israel after the war, but only in 1984 was contact with her reestablished. By that time she was 84 years old and living in a small apartment in Warsaw. The same year Yad Vashem awarded the title of Righteous Among the Nations to Anna Borkowska and six nuns of her convent, and Abba Kovner planted a tree in her honor in the Avenue of the Righteous on the Mount of Remembrance. Abba Kovner traveled to Warsaw to present Anna Borkowska with the medal. "Why do I deserve this honor?" asked Borkowska, to which Kovner answered: "You are Anna of the angels". He went on to explain: "During the days when angels hid their faces from us, this woman was for us Anna of the Angels. Not of angles that we invent in our hearts, but of angels that create our lives forever."
Franciszek and Magdalena Banasiewicz with children, saved families of 15 in a bunker near Przemyśl [31]
“The family of Franciszek and Magdalena Banasiewicz with sons: Jerzy, Tadeusz, Antoni, and daughter Maria lived on a farm in Orzechowce near Przemyśl during the Nazi German occupation of Poland in World War II. In July 1991 they were bestowed the titles of Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem for rescuing fifteen Jews escaping the Holocaust from the ghetto in Przemyśl.[1][2]
Franciszek Banasiewicz (2 April 1884 – 5 February 1954) was a decorative painter before the war. His wife Magdalena née Lenar (7 July 1884 – 28 September 1957) was a homemaker. Two Banasiewicz sons, Antoni and Tadeusz, were sent by the Nazi Germans to forced labour in the Third Reich when the war broke out. Tadeusz escaped and after returning home lived in hiding in barns and in the fields. His father, Franciszek, organised many heroic rescue missions with his aid.[1]
Initially, Franciszek Banasiewicz was approached by Salomon Ehrenfreud, who escaped the ghetto massacre of June 1942 having witnessed the death of his wife and children. He was hiding at the home of Jan Kościak a bit earlier. Tadeusz—already staying out of sight—took it upon himself to hide along with Salomon around the farm. Meanwhile, Franciszek started taking in other Jews including Salomon's brother, Izaak—previously helped by other Poles—his cousin Jakub Nassan and their friends Marcel Teich and Junek Frenkiel. Helped by his own son, Franciszek brought from the ghetto Nassan's wife, Eugenia, and her friend Fejga Weidenbaum. A week later he rescued Edmund Orner.[3][4]
Banasiewicz family and the fugitives began constructing a bunker under the house in the fall of 1943 in preparation for the cold Polish winter. The new hiding area enabled Banasiewiczs to rescue more people. In October 1943, on request of Salomon Ehrenfreud, Tadeusz smuggled out from the ghetto Bunia Stamhofer and Fela Szattner, then in January 1944, he rescued Samuel Reinharz with his brother Beniamin and their mother Bertha. He attempted to rescue Jozef Weindling, however, Jozef's brother, a ghetto policeman, arrested Tadeusz at that time, and passed him over to the Nazis. The German commander released him nonetheless, bribed by Samuel Reinharz, who then escaped with Tadeusz and Jozef back to the farm where all fifteen Jews were hiding.
Maria Banasiewicz recalls how shocked though undeterred they were to learn that, in the nearby village of Tarnawce, farmer Kurpiel who sheltered 27 Jews in a bunker similar to theirs was discovered in May 1944.[3][5] All fugitives were murdered. Kurpiel with his wife and family was executed in Lipowica. Several months earlier, a similar fate met Banasiewiczs liaison with the Ghetto, Michał Kruk.[5] He was executed on 6 September 1943, during the first public execution in Przemyśl, along with several other people punished by death for the assistance they had rendered to the Jews.
In Przemyśl: 15,210 Jews lost their lives during the Holocaust, including 568 non-Jewish Poles killed because they were attempting to save them. Only 675 Jews remained, among them 415 Jews saved directly in the town including 60 children. — Leszek M. Włodek [6]
In May 1944 German gendarmes came to recapture one of the Banasiewicz sons. They surrounded the house but were unsuccessful. The bunker was not discovered either.[4] The Red Army retook the town from German forces on July 27, 1944. All family members and Jewish escapees survived. In 1988 (or, on July 17, 1991, sources vary) the Banasiewicz family including Franciszek, Magdalena, Maria, Tadeusz, and Jerzy were given the titles of Righteous among the Nations for their heroic stance against the Nazi German Holocaust.[7]
1. The Banasiewicz Family. Museum of the History of Polish Jews.
2. "Banasiewicz Franciszek & Magdalena; Son: Tadeusz; Daughter: Jurek Maria (Banasiewicz)". The Righteous Among The Nations.
3. Władysław Bartoszewski, The Blood Shed Unites Us: Pages from the History of Help to the Jews Page 213 — 1970 — 243 pages
4. Bartoszewski, Zofia Lewin, The Samaritans: Heroes of the Holocaust Published by Twayne Publishers, 1970, 442 pages
5. Lukasz Biedka, Chris Webb, Przemysl Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team 2007
6. Leszek M. Włodek, historian (2002). "Zagłada Żydów przemyskich (The destruction of Przemyśl Jews)" (PDF). Bulletin No 28 – January 2002(in Polish). Przemyśl: Katolickie Stowarzyszenie „Civitas Christiana”. p. 2. Życie utraciło 15,210 Żydów i 7,123 Polaków w tym 568 za ukrywanie Żydów [...] pozostało 675 osób: 415 spośród nich, w tym 60 dzieci, ukrywało się na terenie miasta i najbliższej okolicy.
7. (in Polish) Muzeum Niepodległości w Warszawie, Rada Ochrony Pamięci Walk i Męczeństwa (Poland) (1939–1945), Polskie państwo podziemne wobec tragedii Żydów 1939–1945. Page 24, 1993 — 82 pages
References
Władysław Bartoszewski, Zofia Lewin, Righteous Among Nations Earlscourt Publications Ltd., 1969 Page 780
Commission for the Investigation of Crimes against the Polish Nation (Główna Komisja Badania Zbrodni Hitlerowskich w Polsce) Instytut Pamięci Narodowej, Those who Helped: Polish Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust Page 94. Published by Mako, 1993, 145 pages, Biblioteka Narodowa (Poland), Instytut Bibliograficzny, 1984
Władysław Bartoszewski, Zofia Lewinówna, The Samaritans: Heroes of the Holocaust Published by Twayne Publishers, 1970, 442 pages
Władysław Bartoszewski, The Blood Shed Unites Us: Pages from the History of Help to the Jews Page 213 — 1970 — 243 pages
Muzeum Niepodległości w Warszawie, Rada Ochrony Pamięci Walk i Męczeństwa (Poland) (1939–1945), Polskie państwo podziemne wobec tragedii Żydów 1939 – 1945. Page 24, 1993 – 82 pages. See, 1988: BANASIEWICZ Franciszek, Magdalena i dzieci: Maria, Tadeusz, Jerzy.
Yad Vashem File 4950
Banasiewicz, Franciszek
Banasiewicz, Magdalena
Banasiewicz, Tadeusz
Jurek-Banasiewicz, Maria
“Maria Franciszek and Magdalena Banasiewicz and their children, Maria and Tadeusz, saved some 15 Jews during the German occupation. In their postwar testimony, Jakub and Eugenia Nassan spoke of the Banasiewicz family’s courage and humanitarian motives, stating that it is unlikely that the money or other items that the family received sufficed for the maintenance of 15 persons. Franciszek and Magdalena owned a small farm in the village of Orzechowce, in the Przemyśl district. In July 1942, all the Jewish workers on the Mackowice estate were shot by the Germans, with the exception of Salomon Erenfreund and Junek Frenkiel, who succeeded in escaping the murderers’ bullets. Erenfreund wandered through fields and forests, obtaining assistance from local peasants, and was subsequently joined by Tadeusz Banasiewicz, Franciszek, and Magdalena’s son, who had escaped from a labor camp in Germany. During the liquidation of the Przemyśl ghetto, Jews who had succeeded in fleeing came to the Banasiewicz family for help, including some to whom Franciszek himself had offered refuge. All were hidden in a hideout that had been dug in the granary. Among them were Erenfreund’s brother, Izaak, and his wife, Janina; their cousin, Jakub Nassan, and his wife, Eugenia; an acquaintance, Marcel Teich (later Uminski; Ominski); and subsequently Feiga Weidenbaum and Edmund Orner.
“Tadeusz Banasiewicz, who initiated the rescue of several Jews, brought to his parents’ home Fela Schattner; Samuel Reinharz and his parents, Izaak and Berta; and Józef and Lotka Weindlinger. Tadeusz was arrested at the ghetto fence while trying to smuggle Samuel Reinharz out, but owing to the latter’s quick thinking, the two succeeded in escaping. Other peasants in the area were also involved in smuggling Jews out of the ghetto. Among them was Michał Kruk, who was discovered in his farmyard by Franciszek Banasiewicz after he had been hanged by the Germans as a punishment for his activities. Jews were also discovered hiding in a forester’s home in a nearby village, and both they and their rescuers were shot. Franciszek and Magdalena were not deterred by these tragedies, however, and neither they nor their children, Maria and Tadeusz, curtailed their endeavors to save Jews. Tadeusz was arrested for the second time when the Germans searched the house for arms, but the hiding place was not discovered and the Jewish fugitives remained with the family until their liberation in July 1944. After the war, some of the survivors kept up a correspondence with the Banasiewicz family, to whom they owed their lives. On July 17, 1991, Yad Vashem recognized Franciszek and Magdalena Banasiewicz, their son, Tadeusz, and daughter, Maria Jurek-Banasiewcz, as Righteous Among the Nations.
Szczepan Bradło and family, saved three families of 16 in a dugout [32]
“Szczepan Bradło (From Wikipedia) (died 1960) was a Polish farmer who lived in Lubcza, a village in Tarnów Voivodeship, with his wife Klara (d. 1953), daughter Franciszka and sons: Antoni, Eugeniusz and Tadeusz. Together, they saved thirteen Jews during the Holocaust in German-occupied Poland. In 1986, the Bradło family were awarded the honorary title Righteous Among the Nations. Szczepan and his wife were recognized posthumously.
“During World War II, Bradło lived on a three-hectare farm. According to the Yad Vashem deposition, two Jews from Slotowa who were forced to leave their hideout at the home of a peasant named Ryba asked Bradło for shelter for themselves and their families. Their families consisted of six Bochners, three Reichers, Izrael Hamel, Abraham Einspruch, and Bochna and Beniamin Dereszewicz With the aid of the Bradłos, the families created a dugout in which they spent over two years, until the end of the war. According to the testimony of one of the survivors who, in the words of Gustavo Jalife, performed the "patient and agonizing count,",[1] this amounted to 26 months, 10 days and eight hours. Franciszka aided the refugees by cooking for all of them. Although poor, the Bradło family shared what they had.
“All thirteen refugees survived the war, five of whom signed the deposition through which the Righteous Among the Nations title was bestowed on the Bradło family including Szczepan, Klara, their three sons and daughter Franciszka Bradło-Kozioł.
“Antoni Bradło became a priest and for many years rendered his services in Argentina.
Bradło, Szczepan
Bradło, Klara
Bradło, Antoni
Bradło, Tadeusz
Kozioł-Bradło, Franciszka
Bradło, Eugeniusz
“In the autumn of 1942, Avram Einspruch and Benjamin Dereszewicz arrived at the home of Szczepan and Klara Bradło, a peasant couple who lived in the village of Lubcza, near Tarnow, asking for shelter for them and their relatives. The Bradłos, who were humble and simple folk, decided to save their Jewish neighbors. Together with their children, Tadeusz, Eugeniusz, and Franciszka, and even their little boy Antoni, they dug a large hideout under the floor of the hayloft, installed wooden bunks, and arranged a special hatch for serving food and removing waste. From the moment the thirteen Jewish refugees entered the hideout, the Bradłos looked after them devotedly. Since purchasing food for thirteen people would have aroused suspicion, the children took to grounding grains of rye themselves with a grindstone. Franciszka in particular, baked bread, cooked and washed the clothes of the refugees. The strain of hiding and caring for so many refugees took its toll on the mother, Klara, and until her death, she suffered from psychological ailments. In risking their lives for the Jewish refugees, the Bradłos, who were devout Catholics, were prompted by religious-humanitarian considerations only. In January 1945, after the Red Army liberated the area, the survivors – the three members of the Reich family, the six members of the Bochner family, the Dereszewicz couple, Avram Einspruch and Israel Hamel – left Poland.
Most of them continued corresponding with the Bradłos’ children, after the parents passed away. The Bradłos’ trials did not end with the refugees’ departure. At the end of the war, when their rescue venture became public knowledge, a gang of nationalist thugs accused the Bradłos of “betraying the homeland,” robbed the family, and demanded a ransom. On February 6, 1986, Yad Vashem recognized Klara and Szczepan Bradło, their sons Antoni, Tadeusz and Eugeniusz,and their daughter, Franciszka Kozioł (née Bradło), as Righteous Among the Nations.
Krystyna Dańko, hid and supplied a Jewish family of four with food, clothing, and money [33]
“Krystyna Dańko, née Chłond (9 July 1917 – 6 August 2019[1]), was a Polish orphan from the town of Otwock, daughter of Karol Chłond – a respected city official in prewar Poland – who was awarded the title of Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem in 1998, for saving the lives of Polish Jews during the Holocaust while risking her own life at the time of the Nazi German occupation of Poland.[2][3]
“Krystyna Dańko received her medal at the request of Maryna (Maria) Bartoń, née Kokoszko, whom she "smuggled" into a safer place from Otwock to Warsaw, where Maryna's extended family could take care of her. Unafraid of endangering her own life, Krystyna helped her Jewish friends by giving them food she bought, clothing as well as money, and by fulfilling their 'heartfelt requests.[4]
“Several years before the outbreak of World War II, Krystyna Dańko established a close friendship with Lusia, the eldest daughter of the Kokoszko family, who was her high school classmate. Krystyna spent a great deal of time in their home. Once the Holocaust began, she did everything in her power to help the family survive the Nazis. "I was never afraid of anything", she said.[5]
“After the Kokoszkos' successful escape from the ghetto, Krystyna helped to hide them, including the father, mother, and Helena (Lusia), in a secret location at a nearby village. She took the youngest daughter, age 11, on a train to the capital, where the girl was placed in a Polish orphanage in Warsaw under an assumed name.[2]
Krystyna became the liaison between the family and their youngest child, delivering messages and information back and forth. Krystyna asked nothing in return for her heroic effort, stating that helping others was her moral obligation as a human being.[2] Otwock Ghetto was liquidated on 19 September 1942, when 75% of its Jewish population, numbering around 8,000, was assembled at a layover yard in Otwock (pictured) and shipped to the Treblinka death camp.[6] Jews who remained were summarily shot on Reymonta Street thereafter.[7]
In 1951 Krystyna Dańko, née Chłond, married Mieczysław Dańko, a social activist from Otwock persecuted by the Stalinist regime. He died in 1982.[8] She turned 100 in July 2017.[9] Krystyna was honoured in Jerusalem as Righteous Among the Nations on 13 December 1998 for helping to save the lives of Eugenia, Helena, Maria, and Dr. Michał Kokoszko who settled in Warsaw after the war. The eyewitness testimony came from the youngest daughter of the Kokoszko family, Maria Kokoszko-Barton who submitted her deposition to Yad Vashem.[2]
Two other members of Dańko family were awarded their medals posthumously on 16 December 2008: Jadwiga Dańko, née Wojciechowska, (1904–1968) and her husband Mieczysław Dańko (1905–1982) who separately saved the Weczer family in Otwock.[3] When members of the Weczer family arrived in the United States, the immigration office incorrectly wrote Wecer in the entry documents. Thus, Weczer which was pronounced (Wɛčər), went on to be pronounced as (Wɛsər).[10]
Notes
1. "Nie zastanawiałam się nawet dlaczego – tylko robiłam" (in Polish).
2. Yad Vashem, 2008, Featured Stories: Krystyna Danko, Poland The Righteous Among the Nations at The Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority
3. "Dańko family," at the Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich webpage (Museum of the History of the Polish Jews) (in Polish)
4. (in Polish) Sprawiedliwi wśród Narodów Świata (Otwocczanie): Krystyna Dańko. Source: Muzeum Ziemi Otwockiej. Internet Archive
5. Pawel Chadzynski, "Righteous Ones" Nowy Dziennik - New York Polish daily, December 13, 1999
6. Sabina Bauman, "Czwarty marsz" (The Fourth March of the Living).
7. (in Polish) Społeczny Komitet Pamięci Żydów Otwockich i Karczewskich (webpage), 2002-2007, featuring photo of Krystyna Dańko with Toronto writer Marian Domański (2007). Otwock Branch of Polska Rada Chrześcijan i Żydów Poland’s Advisory of Christians and Jews). Sekcja terenowa; Zbigniew Nosowski, President.
8. Mieczysław Dańko, of "Dańko family," at the Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich webpage (Museum of the History of the Polish Jews) (in Polish)
9. Krzysztof Czubaszek (2017-07-10). "Pani Krystyna Dańko, mieszkanka Śródmieścia, skończyła 100 lat". Facebook.
10. Weczer, Maria (2002). Powroty. Kraków, Poland: Kraków: Wydawn. i Drukarnia Towarzystwa Słowaków w Polsce. p. 54.
Dańko, Krystyna
Before the war, Krystyna Dańko, an orphan, was friendly with Helena, the eldest daughter of the Kokoszkos, from the town of Otwock, near Warsaw, and was a frequent visitor at their home. During the occupation, Dańko repaid their kindness by helping them escape from the ghetto. She found a hiding place for the parents and Helena, and arranged for their 11-year-old daughter Maria to be placed in an orphanage in Warsaw under an “Aryan” identity – no mean feat at the time. Throughout the occupation, Dańko liaised between Maria and her parents and sister, and her visits were a source of hope and encouragement to the anxious parents. As well as acting as messenger between them and their daughter, Dańko also brought them food, clothes, and money. In risking her life to save the Kokoszkos, Krystyna acted out of true friendship and humanitarian considerations, which overrode all thoughts of personal safety or economic security. After the war, the survivors remained in Poland and kept up regular contact with their rescuer.
On December 13, 1998, Yad Vashem recognized Krystyna Dańko as Righteous Among the Nations. File 8287
Jan Dobraczyński, placed several hundred Jewish children in Catholic convents [34]
Jan Dobraczyński (Warsaw, 20 April 1910 – 5 March 1994, Warsaw) was a Polish writer, novelist, politician and Catholic publicist.[1] In the Second Polish Republic between the two world wars, he was a supporter of the National Party and Catholic movements. During the 1939 Nazi–Soviet invasion of Poland, he was a soldier of the Polish Army and member of Armia Krajowa until the end of World War II. Dobraczyński participated in the Warsaw Uprising of 1944. After the war he supported the Polish communists. He was a member of parliament Sejms, as activist of the PAX Association and of the Patriotic Movement for National Rebirth from 1982 to 1985. He held the rank of general in the Polish military.
During World War II, as the head of the Division for Abandoned Children at the Warsaw municipal welfare department, Jan Dobraczynski helped Żegota activists with procuring forged documents and placed several hundred Jewish children in Catholic convents.[2] He was imprisoned in Bergen-Belsen following the Warsaw Uprising.[3]
In 1985 Dobraczyński was awarded the Cross of Virtuti Militari. In 1986 he published his memoir titled Tylko w jednym życiu (Of One Life Only). In 1993 he was bestowed the title of the Polish Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem in Jerusalem.[3]
References
Jan Dobraczyński, Tylko w jednym życiu (Of One Life Only, memoir). Wspomnienia, 1986
Aleksander Rogalski, Dobraczyński, 1986 (fr)
Aleksander Rogalski, Jan Dobraczyński, 1981 (en)
Jerzy Ziomek, Jana Dobraczyńskiego Księgi (bez) Wyjścia, in Wizerunki polskich pisarzy katolickich, 1963.
Zygmunt Lichniak, Szkic do portretu Jana Dobraczyńskiego, 1962
Jan Dobraczynski, "Najezdzcy" - Les Envahisseurs translated by Jean Nittman 1960
Dobraczyński, Jan
“During the occupation, Jan Dobraczyński, director of the Warsaw Municipality’s Social Welfare Division, helped Żegota (the Council for Aid to Jews), by supplying forged documents for Jewish children testifying that they were orphaned, destitute, or learning-disabled, to qualify for admission to various Christian institutions. At Dobraczyński’s instructions, his employees made up fictitious reports for the Jewish children, to which he lent his official stamp. Although, in most cases, the staff and directors of the institutions (usually convents) knew that the children were Jewish, they agreed to take them in. Dobraczyński, who considered his work as part of the struggle against the enemy, placed several hundrets Jewish children in various Christian institutions, without ever expecting anything in return. Thanks to the strict precautions he took, none of the children were discovered.
“On September 12, 1993, Yad Vashem recognized Jan Dobraczyński as Righteous Among the Nations. File 5618
Maria Fedecka, saved 12 members of close Jewish families in Wilno [35][36]
“Maria Aniela Fedecka (1904, Moscow - 21 December 1977, Warsaw) was a Polish social worker, member of Workers' Defence Committee. During World War II she was an activist in the Polish Underground and Polish anti-Holocaust resistance in Wilno (now Vilnius, Lithuania). During German occupation she helped save many Jewish children as well as the poverty-stricken peasants of Lebioda, her husband's hometown situated near Lida (now in Belarus). In 1987, Maria Fedecka was honoured by Yad Vashem as Righteous among the Nations for the help she had brought to Jewish children and their families.
“After the war, in 1945, Fedecka took part in the "repatriation action" (the return to Poland of Poles who did not want to remain in the territories annexed by the Soviet Union). She also came to the aid of those young people who were threatened with prison and deportations to "gulags" in the USSR.
“In PRL she lived mainly in Sopot (near Gdańsk in Poland). In 1947 she took the initiative of creating, with Zdzisław Grabski and Michał Pankiewicz, the League for the Struggle Against Racism quickly dismantled by authorities for political reasons. The League was composed of a small number of Polish intellectuals, aware of the moral threat for the country's renewal in the aftermath of Kielce and other anti-semitic incidents. In the 1970s Fedecka was active in the anti-communist opposition in People's Republic of Poland.
References
Jędrychowska Anna - “Zygzakiem i po prostu”, (In zigzag and straight ahead), Czytelnik,1965, p. 320-321 and 338-339.
Kac Daniel - “Wilno Jerozolimą było - Rzecz o Abrahamie Sutzkeverze” (When Wilno was Jerusalem – in praise of Abraham Sutskever) Fundacja Pogranicze,16-500-Sejny 2003, , p. 98-99 and 144-145.
Wawer Pola - “Poza gettem i obozem”, (Outside the ghetto and the camp). Wydawnictwo Myśl, Warszawa 1993, p. 96-97.
Wroński Stanislaw & Zwolakowa Maria, “Polacy i Zydzi, 1939-1945” (Poles and Jews, 1939-1945). Ksiązka i Wiedza, Warszawa 1971, p. 320.
“The Encyclopedia of the Righteous Among the Nations, Rescuers of Jews during the Holocaust, Poland.” Volume editors: Sara Bender and Shmuel Krakowski. Yad Vashem, Jerusalem 2004, p. 212.
Fedecka, Maria
“Maria Fedecka, who lived on the Lebioda estate in the village of Lipowka, near Vilna, began saving Jews immediately after the Germans occupied the area in 1941. The gates of her estate were open to Jewish fugitives, who received provisional shelter, moral and material support, and forged documents. In risking her life for her charges, Fedecka was guided by humanitarian motives, which overrode considerations of personal safety. Among those who found refuge on Fedecka’s estate were Susana Szabad, her six-year-old daughter, Amalia, and her sister, Irena Pruzan. After Fedecka provided them with “Aryan” papers, the three left the estate and lived under assumed identities until the area was liberated in 1944. Another protégée of Fedecka’s was Adlena Smilg, born in 1942 to Adolf and Lena Smilg, in the Vilna ghetto. The baby’s parents, after abortive attempts to save her, were about to give up hope when Fedecka agreed to take her in. Fedecka looked after the baby with true devotion, and after the liberation returned her safe and sound to her parents. Aleksander and Emilia Sedlis, after escaping from an Aktion in the Vilna ghetto in 1941, also hid on Fedecka’s estate, before being transferred to her acquaintances, with whom they stayed until the liberation. In 1941, Gabriel Sedlis also hid on the Lebioda estate, returning to it in 1943, before joining the partisans. Other Jews helped by Fedecka were Roza Chwoles, her daughter, Anna, and Wolodia Zalkind. After the war, Avraham Suzkever, ex-partisan and famous poet, wrote a poem dedicated to Maria Fedecka, the savior of Jews.
“On January 4, 1987, Yad Vashem recognized Maria Fedecka as Righteous Among the Nations.”
Mieczysław Fogg, hid a Jewish family in his apartment till the end of World War II [37]
“Mieczysław Fogg (born Mieczysław Fogiel; 30 May 1901, Warsaw – 3 September 1990, Warsaw) was a Polish singer and artist. His popularity started well before World War II and continued well into the 1980s. He had a characteristic way of staying very serious yet slightly emotional on stage when singing. Fogg had a lyric baritone voice and can be compared to French Tino Rossi in style.
“Mieczysław Fogiel was born 30 May 1901 in Warsaw, then a province guberniya capital in Imperial Russia. He spent his childhood there and, after graduating from a local gymnasium in 1922, he started working as a railway worker. About that time, he also joined the choir of the St. Anne's Church. There his friend, Ludwik Sempoliński, made him join the classes of music organized by Jan Łysakowski, Eugeniusz Mossakowski, Wacław Brzeziński, Ignacy Dygas and many other notable Polish musicians of the epoch. Initially a hobbyist, in 1928 he met Władysław Daniłowski Dan, who chose him as a soloist for his newly formed Dan's Choir. The choir became extremely popular the following year when Jerzy Petersburski's song Tango Milonga became an international hit. This and other tangos and romances performed by the choir in the famous Qui pro Quo theatre led Fogiel to become one of the most popular Polish singers. After 1932, Fogiel, under a new pseudonym of Fogg, toured a number of countries, including Germany, Latvia, the Soviet Union, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Austria and Italy. In the United States, the group toured over 31 states.
“His popularity was increased by the fact that Fogg was keen on languages and was able to sing in local languages of the countries he toured. He also appeared in a number of duos with other popular artists of the time, including Hanka Ordonówna, Stefcia Górska, Zula Pogorzelska and Adolf Dymsza. He also appeared in 11 films. After the Dana Choir was disbanded in 1938, Fogg started a solo career. The same year, he was chosen as the most popular Polish singer by the Polish Radio. He toured the country with a trio composed of himself, Mira Zimińska and Tadeusz Sygietyński. Among the authors of his songs was also Marian Hemar.
“After the outbreak of World War II, Fogg remained in Warsaw, where he joined the underground Armia Krajowa. He gave concerts in the few cafes available to Poles under German occupation. During the Warsaw Uprising, he gave countless concerts both on the barricades, in hospitals and in the bomb shelters beneath the city. For his efforts to keep high the morale of the soldiers and civilians of the fighting city, he was awarded with some of the highest Polish decorations. Fogg was also one of the Polish Righteous among the Nations. He hid a Jewish family of Ivo Wesby in his apartment until the end of World War II.[1][2]
“After the war, in 1945, he opened up his own cafe in the ruins of Warsaw. The cafe, located at 119 Marszałkowska Street, was the first music theatre opened after the war in the destroyed city and served as one of the very few centres of culture. However, the following year, it was nationalized by the new communist authorities of Poland and closed soon afterwards. Fogg continued to give hundreds of concerts in all parts of Poland and also headed his private music record firm Fogg Records, which shared the fate of Fogg's cafe in 1951. His popularity as a singer remained high and in 1958, he was again chosen the most popular Polish singer by the audience of the Polish Radio – 20 years after he was given the same title for the first time.
“He continued to give concerts almost until his death in 1990. Throughout his 60-year long career, he gave more than 16,000 of them in all countries of Europe, Brasil, Israel, Ceylon, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and the US. His everlasting popularity led to the creation of a number of anecdotes. In one of them, the Polish archaeologists supposedly discovered an Egyptian mummy. After they unfolded it, they were surprised by the mummy asking a short question: "Is Fogg still giving concerts?"
Mieczysław Fogg died in Warsaw on 3 September 1990 and is buried at the Bródno Cemetery.
Fogg, Mieczysław
“Mieczysław Fogg of Warsaw, one of the most famous Polish singers before the war, did not abandon his Jewish friends during the German occupation. It was at Fogg’s initiative that Ignacy Singer (known as Ivo Wesby), conductor of the political cabaret band “Quid pro quo,” escaped from the Warsaw ghetto with his wife, Lola, and their daughter. Fogg put up the Singers in his apartment until the end of the war when they immigrated to the United States. Fogg also hid in his apartment for a few days his friend Stanisław Tempel, a recording engineer from Wilno. Despite Fogg’s warnings, Tempel went back into the ghetto to stay with his family. His fate is unknown. Stanisław Kopf, a singing teacher, also received assistance from Fogg. Ignac Zalcsztain, another Jewish friend of Fogg’s, hid in the janitor’s apartment of Fogg’s building, where Fogg provide him with food and money. After the war, Zalcsztajn immigrated to Belgium. Fogg was known in enlightened Polish circles for his liberal views and humanitarian values, which prompted him to help his Jewish friends in their darkest hour.
“On October 26, 1989, Yad Vashem recognized Mieczysław Fogg as Righteous Among the Nations.
Andrzej Garbuliński and son, killed for sheltering Alfenbeins family [38]
“Andrzej Garbuliński was a Polish farmer who lived in the village of Czerna with his family – Władysław, Eleonora, Marian, Helena, Kunegunda, Stanisław, Kazimierz, and Jan – during the Nazi German occupation of Poland in World War II. He and his eldest son Władysław were executed by the Nazis in late 1943 for aiding and sheltering Jews.
“In 1940, Sarah Alfenbein, her daughter Hanna and son Meir (a neighboring Jewish family from the same village of Czerna) escaped from the Płaszów concentration camp and asked the Garbulińskis for help and shelter. Before arriving at the farm, they hid at the nearby home of Stanisław Owce. The Garbulinskis took the Jews in and cared for them for the next two years.
“In late 1943, the Gestapo gendarmerie came to the village. As they headed for the farm, Andrzej Garbuliński asked the Alfenbeins to run. However, they were spotted in a field while escaping. The mother and son were killed on the spot. The daughter Hanna managed to keep running, chased by the Germans, until she too was murdered. Andrzej Garbuliński and his son Władysław were immediately arrested and taken to the Jasło prison. The father was sentenced to death and executed there. Władysław was transferred to a separate prison where he was also killed. The only family members who survived the war were Eleonora, Helena, Kunegunda, Marian, Stanisław, Kazimierz and Jan.
“In 1997 the Garbuliński family was recognized as Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem in Jerusalem for their daring attempt at saving a Jewish family from the Holocaust; Andrzej and Władysław, for giving their lives in the process”.[1][2]
Garbuliński, Andrzej
Garbuliński, Władysław
Garbuliński, Marian
Owca, Stanisław
“During the occupation, Sara Elfenbein, her daughter, Chana, and son, Maier, were driven out of their house in the village of Czermna, in the county of Jasło, in the Rzeszłw district, and suffered many trials and tribulations before returning in early 1943 to their village. In Czermna, the Elfenbeins hid first on Stanisław Owca’s farm, and afterwards in the Garbulińskis’ granary. Both the Garbulińskis and Owca, imbued with an unwavering sense of loyalty and altruism, looked after the Elfenbeins devotedly. Andrzej Garbuliński’s two sons, Władysław and Marian, also took part in the rescue operation. On the morning of April 4, 1944, members of the German police, alerted by villagers, raided the Garbulińskis’ farm. Upon hearing Andrzej’s cries, Elfenbein and her children tried to escape, but in vain, and were shot on the spot. Andrzej Garbuliński, his son Władysław and Stanisław Owca were arrested and did not return from the the prison.
“On May 21, 1997, Yad Vashem recognized Andrzej Garbuliński, his sons, Władysław and Marian, and Stanisław Owca as Righteous Among the Nations”. File 7522
Antoni Gawryłkiewicz, saved three Jewish families consisting of 16 members [39]
“Antoni Gawryłkiewicz (1922-2007) living in Płock since 1957, he was awarded the title of Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem from Jerusalem in July 1999, for saving the lives of 16 Polish Jews during the Holocaust, between May 1942 and July 1944, at the time of the Nazi German occupation of Poland.[1]
“During World War II, 18-year-old Gawryłkiewicz lived in the village of Korkuciany in Eastern Poland where he worked as laborer on a farm of Kazimierz Korkucz and his mother. In 1942 Kazimierz Korkucz was approached by a Jewish family-man Moshe Sonenson with a plea for help following the 1941 Ejszyszki massacre, which he escaped with his wife Zipporah, 10-year-old son Yitzhak and 6-year-old daughter Sonia (Scheinele). Their baby brother, Shaul, did not survive. Kazimierz Korkucz agreed to hide the Sonensons around his house as well as the other two families who came along: Kabaczniks and Solominanskys. Antoni Gawryłkiewicz, a shepherd employed by Korkucz, took it upon himself to do most of the caring. "To him," states Yitzhak Sonenson, "we all owe our lives," for he was the person most intimately involved with the care of the 16 Jews in hiding, including digging underground shelters, preparing food, removing bodily wastes, transfer from one locality to another, and no-less – warning them of approaching danger." Zipporah Sonenson, while in hiding, gave birth to her fourth child, Hayyim, in June 1944.[1]
“According to one account, at one point during the war Gawryłkiewicz's family was brutally interrogated by Lithuanian Nazi collaborators, who killed his father and brother, demanding information on hidden Jews. Antoni Gawryłkiewicz refused to give the refugees up.[2] According to another account, quoting Gawryłkiewicz himself, his father and brother died after the war, in 1948, through he confirms they were killed by Lithuanians as a "revenge on friends of the Jews".[3] After the war the village of Ejszyszki became annexed by the Soviet Union, and many local Poles were resettled west to Poland. Gawryłkiewicz moved to Płock in 1957 during the second repatriation.[2][3] In 1999 he received the Righteous among the Nations recognition from Yad Vashem.[4] He died in 2007.[5][2]
“The members of the Sonenson family, who survived the war thanks to Gawryłkiewicz and his employer as well as their numerous neighbors, emigrated to the United States. Sonia Sonenson became Professor Yaffa Eliach of New York's Brooklyn College. She collaborated with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC, and in 1998 published a book There Once Was A World, tracing the history of Jews from Ejszyszki. She also successfully appealed to Yad Vashem to grant its medal of honor to Antoni Gawryłkiewicz, which he received in 1999.
Notes
1. Yad Vashem, 2008, Featured Stories: Antoni Gawrylkiewicz, Poland The Righteous Among the Nations at The Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority
2. Białkowska, Monika (2017). "Ocalił ich piec i Antoni". Przewodnik Katolicki (in Polish).
3. Anna Ferens (27–28 May 2000). "Głowy na wietrze (Heads in the Wind)" (in Polish). Gazeta Wyborcza.
4. "Gawryłkiewicz Antoni (1926 -? )".
5. "Opowieść o ojcu, który dotrzymał słowa… [FOTO]". Dziennik Płocki (in Polish).
6. Marek Jan Chodakiewicz, The Last Rising in the Eastern Borderlands: The Ejszyszki Epilogue in its Historical Context. English translation by Polish American Congress.
Gawryłkiewicz, Antoni
“Sixteen Jewish men, women and children, mostly from the town of Ejszyszki, in the Nowogrodek district, found shelter on the nearby Korkuciany estate, which belonged to Kazimierz Korkuć *. They were Moshe and Tzipora Sonenson, and their four children Yitzhak, Shalom, Gitla and Yaffa; the four members of the Kabacznik family – Meir, Shabtai, Miriam and Sara; the three members of the Sołomiański family – Chaya, Yakub, and Mula; Ita Simińska; Sonia Kowarska; and Yitzhak Lewin. During their stay on the Korkuciany estate, the refugees had several narrow escapes and were almost discovered by the Gestapo who, alerted by hostile villagers, frequently raided the area. On such occasions, 18-year-old Antoni Gawryłkiewicz, a local shepherd, made a point of warning the refugees. He also acted as a courier between them and the partisans operating in the area, and gave them food and clothes. One day, Gawryłkiewicz and Korkuć were arrested but, despite being brutally interrogated, did not betray their friends, and were released. At Gawryłkiewicz’s advice and with his active help, the refugees were moved to another hiding place in a nearby village. Despite the danger, Gawryłkiewicz continued to watch out for their safety until the area was liberated in July 1944. After the war, the survivors founnd new lives when they resettled in various countries. Gawryłkiewicz, who moved to an area within the new Polish borders, kept up ties with Yitzhak Sonenson, who immigrated to Israel.
“On July 4, 1999, Yad Vashem recognized Antoni Gawryłkiewicz as Righteous Among the Nations”.
Matylda Getter, hid 550 Jewish children from the Warsaw ghetto in Polish orphanages [40]
“Matylda Getter (1870–1968) was a Polish Catholic nun, mother provincial of CSFFM (lat. Congregatio Sororum Franciscalium Familiae Mariae) - Franciscan Sisters of the Family of Mary in Warsaw and social worker in pre-war Poland. In German-occupied Warsaw during World War II she cooperated with Irena Sendler and the Żegota resistance organization in saving the lives of hundreds of Jewish children from the Warsaw Ghetto.[1] She was recognized as Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem.[2] for her rescue activities.
She started social work before World War II, and she received a number of the highest national distinctions in honor of her achievements in her educational and social work. She had founded over twenty education and care facilities for children in Anin, Białołęka, Chotomów, Międzylesie, Płudy, Sejny, Wilno and others.[2]
From the beginning of the war the Franciscan Sisters of the Family of Mary, “in the spirit of Christian love and Franciscan joy,” brought aid to those in need, both civilians and members of the Polish underground. Sisters arranged work, provided shelter and distributed false documents. During the Warsaw Uprising in the provincial house at Hoża St. 53, the sisters ran a paramedical station and a soup kitchen, later turned into a hospital.[2]
“I’m saving a human being who’s asking for help” - Matylda Getter
Mother Matylda Getter declared that she would take in every Jewish child she could. During the occupation, the Order's Sisters rescued between 250 and 550[3] Jewish children from the ghetto. Mother Matylda risked her life and the lives of her Sisters by taking the children into her orphanages and hiring adults to work with them, caring for the children in facilities scattered around Poland. As the superior of the Warsaw Province of the Franciscan Sisters of the Family of Mary, she took on the responsibility of obtaining birth certificates for the children and hiding them in the order’s educational institutions.[2]
References
Mordecai Paldiel "Churches and the Holocaust: unholy teaching, good samaritans, and reconciliation" p. 209-210, KTAV Publishing House, Inc., 2006,
“Siostry Zakonne w Polsce. Słownik biograficzny”, t. 1, p. 93.,
"Kościół katolicki na ziemiach Polski w czasie II wojny światowej", t. XI, Warszawa 1981
"Siostry Rodziny Maryi z pomocą dzieciom polskim i żydowskim w Międzylesiu i Aninie", Biblioteka Wawerska, Warszawa 2006,
"Za cenę życia", "Ład", Warszawa, 1983 nr 17 1983,
"Wspomnienie... o Matce Matyldzie Getter "Matusia", "Słowo Powszechne", 1968, nr 35
Getter, Matylda
“(Mother Matylda) Matylda Getter (Mother Matylda) was head of the Franciscan order “Mary’s Family” (Zgromadzenie Siostr Rodziny Marii), in the Warsaw district. In her capacity as Mother Superior, Matylda ran a number of children’s homes and orphanages in the locality, where she hid many Jewish children during the occupation. In 1942-1943, Mother Matylda contacted the workers of “Centos,” an organization which arranged care for orphans and abandoned Jewish children in the Warsaw ghetto. Many of these children, after being smuggled out of the ghetto, were sent directly to Matylda’s institutions. Although we do not know exactly how many Jewish children were saved by the institutions of “Mary’s Family,” we do know that about 40 Jewish girls – including Wanda Rozenbaum, Margaret Frydman, and Hanna Zajtman – found refuge in the Pludy branch alone. All 40 survived. Mother Matylda was fond of saying that it was her duty to save those in trouble. Spurred on by her religious faith, she never demanded payment for her services, although some parents, and a few relatives, paid for their children’s upkeep. Despite the fact that most of the Jewish children were baptized while in the institutions, they all reverted to Judaism after the liberation.
“On January 17, 1985, Yad Vashem recognized Matylda Getter as Righteous Among the Nations”.
Zofia Glazer, saved Cypora with her baby from the Siedlce Ghetto before massacre [41]
“Zofia Glazer née Olszakowska (12 April 1915 – 20 November 2007) and Cypora Zonszajn née Jabłoń (1915–1942) were two close friends from the prewar Gymnasium of Queen Jadwiga in the city of Siedlce,[1] in the Second Polish Republic.[2] Cypora (Cypa) was a Polish Jew born into an affluent family.[3] Zofia was the daughter of a local Catholic pharmacist in Siedlce. They studied together for their final matura exam, after which the two girls went their separate ways until the Holocaust in occupied Poland.[4]
During the September 1939 Nazi–Soviet invasion of Poland both women were in Siedlce, separated by circumstances beyond their control. At the end of November, the new German administration ordered the creation of a Judenrat. On Christmas Eve the Nazis set fire to the synagogue and burned it to the ground, with Jewish refugees inside.[5] Cypora and her family were forced into the newly formed Nazi ghetto in Siedlce around August 1941. Over a year later, she wrote a first-person account of its murderous liquidation. Cypora committed suicide in November 1942 when her husband Jakub was put on a death train to Treblinka death camp.[3] Her baby daughter Rachela survived the war in the care of Polish Righteous from Siedlce; whisked to a different town in the summer of 1943 by the same friend Zofia who adopted the child (temporarily) under the false Christian name of Marianna Tymińska given by a Catholic priest.[4] In 1988 Zofia Glazer was awarded the medal of Righteous among the Nations in Jerusalem,[3] a certificate of honor, and the privilege of having her name added to the Garden of the Righteous. Subsequently, on 10 October 2007 during a ceremony at the Grand Theatre, Warsaw, she received the Commander's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta from the President of Poland Lech Kaczyński for her rescue efforts, along with 52 other World War II rescuers of Jews during the Holocaust.[6]
After her high school graduation Zofia enrolled at the Warsaw School of Economics, where she studied the cooperative movement. She was one of the protesting students against the Numerus clausus form of segregation introduced by the Sanacja government. She continued her studies in Sweden until the invasion of Poland and came back to Siedlce as soon as the war began. She made contacts with the Polish underground resistance movement and became associated with the Bataliony Chłopskie partisans.[7]
Also, from Siedlce,[3] Cypora was one of five Jewish teenagers in Zofia's class.[4] Upon graduation, Cypora enrolled at the Institute of Agriculture in Warsaw. Back in Siedlce, she married Jakub Zonszajn, a typesetter. Following the 1939 invasion of Poland, Cypora and her family were forced to move into the Siedlce Ghetto created by the occupational authority formally on 2 August 1941 and closed off from the outside on 1 October 1941.[8] On that day, Cypora gave birth to her baby girl Rachela (Rachel). In order to provide for the family, her husband Jakub joined the Jewish Ghetto Police organized by the Judenrat Council on the orders of the Nazi administration in the ghetto. His decision helped them survive the ghetto liquidation action, but only for several months.[3]
The Siedlce Ghetto liquidation action began on Friday, 22 August 1942.[9] Around 10,000 Polish Jews from three transit ghettos were rounded up at the town square. [a] The next morning the men, women and children were marched to the Umschlagplatz and sent to Treblinka aboard awaiting Holocaust trains. An additional 5,000 to 6,000 Jews were forced into the cemetery and sent away to their deaths the following day by train.[11] Cypora with her one-year-old Rachela (pictured) found refuge in the so-called 'small ghetto' (a.k.a. 'the little ghetto', or Drojek) thanks to Jakub, who organized their transfer, but the ultimate fate of the remaining Jewish prisoners could easily be guessed.[12] Cypora joined a group of Jewish refugees at a house inside the little ghetto.[4] There, she took care of another Jewish girl, Dorota Monczyk (Maczyk). Three days later Cypora learned about the hospital massacre by Orpo and left the Drojek ghetto under the cover of night. They came to the house of another one of Cypora's high school friends, Irena Zawadzka, on the Aryan side of the city.[4]
Zofia Glazer and Cypora met again at the Zawadzkis house. The baby Rachela remained with the rescuers, but the two girlfriends found a different place on the outskirts of town. Cypora wrote a secret account of the liquidation of the ghetto while in hiding.[4] After a few days she met with Mrs. Sabina Zawadzka once more and formally entrusted her daughter to her. She gave Mrs. Zawadzka her ghetto notebook, and returned to Drojek to join her husband Jakub and her parents; they stayed there for two months.[5]
On 25 November 1942 the 'small ghetto' was liquidated by the Orpo battalion who arrived in Siedlce for that express purpose along with a squad of Trawniki men.[13] The Jews were forced to walk to nearby Gęsi Borek colony under the pretext of the reemerging threat of a typhus epidemic and waited there for the "relocation train", bound for Treblinka. Three days later, on 28 November, some 2,000 Jews were massacred by automatic gunfire along the railway tracks at Gęsi Borek.[5] Their bodies were not buried, but sent to Treblinka in a freight train consisting of 40 wagons of corpses, which outraged the SS at the extermination camp.[14] The last two box cars were filled with the victims' clothing, containing nothing of any value.[14] The incident was described by Sonderkommando prisoner Samuel Willenberg who successfully escaped during the perilous Treblinka revolt.[14] According to witnesses Cypora took a poison pill and died before the massacre, but her husband Jakub, was murdered in the process.[3]
The Zawadzki household of Polish Righteous included Sabina Zawadzka, her daughter Irena age 27 in 1942, and her grown-up son Kazimierz with his wife Krystyna.[15] The family changed Rachela's name to a Catholic-sounding name – Maria Józefa – so she could live with them openly. After two months Irena Zawadzka attempted to get a "legitimate" birth certificate for Rachela and arranged for the local Catholic convent to take her in. However, the little girl soon fell sick and was taken back home. Rachela remained with the Zawadzkis until 1943, even though the house was in close proximity to the Gestapo office in Siedlce.[3]
In the summer 1943, while the murderous Aktion Reinhard was coming to a close elsewhere, Zofia Glazer came to Zawadzkis, and took Rachela with her. They travelled to the town of Zakrzówek near Lublin. Zofia placed the child with her own sister, Irena (Olszakowska) Egerszdorff. She went to a Catholic priest and obtained a new birth certificate for Rachela in the name of Marianna Tymińska.[16] They remained in Zakrzówek for six months. In the early winter of 1944 Zofia took Rachela to Sobieszyn, near Puławy. The Soviet army liberated the area in July 1944. Zofia and Rachela stayed there until June 1945. They returned to Siedlce after the war ended. Rachela went back to live with the Zawadzkis for a time; meanwhile, Zofia Glazer wrote a letter to Szymon Jabłoń (Jablon) in Palestine with the intention of adopting her.[4] Szymon Jablon was Cypora's older brother and Rachela's maternal uncle who survived the Holocaust. He requested that the 4-year-old Rachela be separated from the rescuers and transferred to a Jewish orphanage in Warsaw for the purpose of her reunification with him as soon as possible, but circumstances had changed.[3]
In the fall of 1945 Zofia Glazer took Rachela to Warsaw in tears and entrusted her to a Jewish organization in charge of transferring Jewish children to Mandate Palestine. Rachela was taken to France and put on a ship to Palestine with a group of Jewish orphans, but the ship was turned back by the British. The children were returned to an orphanage in France.[4] Irena Zawadzka went to visit Rachela (now Rachel) there in 1947 and found her disoriented and very sad, which made Zofia regret this for the rest of her life.[4] Little Rachel reached Palestine after two years in late 1947 and lived with her uncle for just one year. She was placed in a boarding school and since 1953 lived in Kibbutz Ma'abarot. Rachel Zonszajn married in 1960. She stayed in close contact with Zofia Glazer and Irena Zawadzka in Poland.[3]
Zofia Glazer first settled in Lublin in late 1945 and obtained a position with the state-run "Społem" organization (pl). From there, she was transferred to Łódź and taught cooperative movement at the Higher School of Economics for two years. She got married and relocated to Warsaw. Zofia and Irena Zawadzka were invited by Szymon Jablon to come to Israel for a visit in 1966 when Rachel was 25; however, Rachel did not remember much from her own childhood.[3] Rachel visited Poland for the first time in the 1980s.[4] On 25 May 1988 Zofia Glazer along with Irena Zawadzka and her mother Mrs. Sabina Zawadzka were awarded titles of the Righteous.[15] Rachel died of brain cancer in 2002, leaving two sons behind.[4] Zofia died on 20 November 2007 in Łódź, interviewed for the last time by Zuzanna Schnepf from the Shalom Foundation just before her death.[15] She was outlived by her daughter. Irena Zawadzka died on 12 March 2012.[15]
Notes
a. The out-of-town Jews came from the transit ghettos set up at the following locations: for the Łosice area, one in Łosice holding local Jews and families from Huszlew, Olszanka, and Świniarów; the second one for the Sarnaki area with Jews from Sarnaki, Górki, Kornica, Łysów; and third for the Mordy area, with prisoners from Mordy, Krzesk-Królowa Niwa, Przesmyki, Stok Ruski, and Tarków.[10]
1. Muzeum Regionalne w Siedlcach (1930s). Liceum Ogólnokształcące im. Św. Królowej Jadwigi [Gymnasium of the Queen Jadwiga] (Postcard). Second Polish Republic: CiekawePodlasie.pl – via gallery of historical photographs, Siedlce.
2. Zuzanna Schnepf (October 2007), Glazer Zofia. Sprawiedliwy wśród Narodów Świata. Tytuł przyznany. POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews. Retrieved 5 November 2015.
3. Cypora (Jablon) Zonszajn in Siedlce, Poland. Photo Archives, #71475. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Zofia Glazer. Retrieved 5 November 2015. The particulars of the story of rescue was confirmed using source in the Polish written by Jolanta Waśkiewicz in Warsaw.
4. Waśkiewicz (5 May 2005), Losy pani Zofii Olszakowskiej-Glazer, jej przyjaciółki Cypory Jabłoń-Zonstein i jej córki Racheli (The Lives of Mss. Zofia Olszakowska-Glazer, her friend Cypora Jabłoń-Zonstein and her daughter Rachela).
5. Edward Kopówka with English translation by L. Biedka (2007), Siedlce Ghetto. H.E.A.R.T, Holocaust Research Project.org. Retrieved 30 October 2015.
6. Chancellery of the President of Poland (2007), Current events. Uroczystość odznaczenia przez Prezydenta RP tych, którzy ratowali Żydów w czasie Zagłady: Krzyżem Komandorskim Orderu Odrodzenia Polski, 10 października 2007. (in Polish)
7. Schnepf Zuzanna (2007). Przywracanie pamięci Polakom ratującym Żydów w czasie Zagłady (PDF). Wywiad z Zofią Glazer, Warszawa 2007. Warszawa.
8. Edward Kopówka, Appendix 5. Map of the Ghetto in Siedlce. The Jews in Siedlce 1850–1945, pp. 175–226. Yizkor Book Project. Retrieved 30 October 2015.
9. Edward Kopówka, Ghetto in Siedlce at the Virtual Shtetl of the Museum of the History of the Polish Jews. See also: statistical data at "Getta Żydowskie," by Gedeon, and "Ghetto List" by Michael Peters of ARC.
Zawadzka, Irena
Zawadzka, Sabina
Olszakowska-Glazer, Zofia
Rzewuska, Lucyna
“Irena Zawadzka, Lucyna Rzewuska, and Zofia Olszakowska-Glazer, school friends, lived in Siedlce. Irena was living with her mother Sabina. During the war, another schoolmate, Cypora Zonszajn (née Jabłoń), approached Irena, along with her one-year-old daughter Rachela and a younger friend named Danuta Mączyk (seventeen at the time), who escaped from the Warsaw ghetto. They were in search of a shelter. The Zawadzkas happily accepted the three Jews into their home. Irena’s mother joyously welcomed them, saying, as Mączyk recalls: “My dear Cypora, I waited for nights and days, I felt that you were going to come.” After a few weeks in the Zawadzkas’ apartment, Cypora returned to the Siedlce ghetto (where her husband was staying) and left her daughter and young friend behind in the Zawadzkas’ care. Irena, with the help of one her schoolmates, Lucyna Rzewuska, placed the child in the Siedlce orphanage, which was run by nuns. When they came to visit the child a few months later and found her ill, they took her home where Irena along with her mother treated her until she was well again. When keeping the child became too dangerous (the local Gestapo branch was located nearby), the Zawadzkas put Rachela under the care of Zofia Olszakowska, who lived in Zakrzówek, near Kraśnik, in the Lublin area. The girl stayed there using “Aryan” documents until the liberation in the summer of 1944.
“The girl then returned to the Zawadzkas in Siedlce. After the war, the Zawadzkas managed to find the child’s uncle and at his request, the girl moved to France and finally found her way to Israel. During the war, Dantua Mączyk also found refuge with the help of Lucyna, and Zofia. At one point, Lucyna even managed to obtain a kennkarte for her under the name of Danuta Malinowska and for some time she was able work for a friend of Lucyna’s as a nanny. One day, Danuta was captured during a raid and sent, as aPole, to perform forced labor in Germany. She turned to Lucyna and asked for help. Lucyna reached the conclusion that Dorota’s leaving for Germany - where nobody would suspect that she was a Jew - would be her best chance of survival, even more so considering that the Germans in Siedlce began suspecting that Lucyna and her friends were helping Jews. Lucyna explained to Danuta that in the worst-case scenario, she would meet the same fate as other Poles. Danuta then left for Germany, where she survived the war. Later she immigrated to France and then to Israel. On May 25, 1988, Yad Vashem recognized Irena Zawadzka, her mother, Sabina Zawadzka, and Lucyna Rzewuska and Zofia Olszakowska-Glazer, as Righteous Among the Nations”.
Julian Grobelny with wife Halina, rescued a large number of Jewish children (President of Zegota) [42]
“Julian Grobelny (16 February 1893 – 5 December 1944[1]) was an activist in the Polish Socialist Party (PPS) from 1915, in the lead-up to Poland's return to independence. During the interwar period he was a social activist. After the German-Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939, and the ensuing Holocaust, he became President of Żegota (Council for Aid to Jews) active in the General Government territory of occupied Poland. The clandestine organization was named after a fictional character Konrad Żegota born on the exact day of its inception in 1942. Grobelny served as president of Żegota until the end of hostilities.[2]
“Born in Brzeziny, about 20 kilometres (12 mi) east of Łódź, Grobelny took part in the Silesian Uprisings and worked as an activist among the workers of Łódź in the Second Polish Republic before the war broke out. As soon as the Nazis entered the city however, the Grobelnys found themselves listed as enemies of the Third Reich; went into hiding and relocated to Warsaw.[3]
“Despite suffering from tuberculosis, Grobelny – together with his wife Halina (born 1900) – was personally involved in the rescue of a large number of Polish Jews during the German occupation of Poland. The couple was famous for their preoccupation with saving particularly Jewish children from the Holocaust by entering the Warsaw Ghetto and walking out with them as their own.[3][4] They harbored over a dozen Jewish PPS activists in their home, and worked in close co-operation with Irena Sendler, head of the children’s section of Zegota. Julian (pseudonym "Trojan") and Halina turned their modest house in Cegłów near Mińsk Mazowiecki into a temporary shelter for Jews until they could be moved into a more permanent place. They offered protection to whoever needed it most, especially those who fled from the Ghetto in Warsaw. The Grobelnys devoted most of their time and energy to rescue work, but also helped Jewish adults by supplying them with “Aryan” papers, money, and medicines.[4]
“In March 1944 the Gestapo arrested Grobelny without knowing about his clandestine work. He survived, thanks to help from physician friends, Dr. Z. Franio, Dr. M. Ropek, Dr. J. Majkowski and Dr. J. Rutkiewicz who were aiding him in prison.[4] Soon after the war ended, Grobelny became mayor of Mińsk Mazowiecki, the location of the Mińsk Mazowiecki Ghetto in German-occupied Poland (not far from Warsaw) but died there of tuberculosis on 5 December 1944.[5] He is buried at a cemetery in Mińsk Mazowiecki. The names of Julian and Halina Grobelny figure prominently in books about humanitarian aid to the Jews of Warsaw and elsewhere during the occupation.
“On 8 March 1987 Yad Vashem recognized Halina and Julian Grobelny as Righteous Among the Nations.[6]
Notes
1. https://encyklopedia.pwn.pl/haslo/Grobelny-Julian;3907930.html
2. Władysław Bartoszewski (2002), "Help people, don't be afraid!" (Part One), (Part Two) [Nie bój się, pomagaj ludziom (I & II).] Interview with Władysław Bartoszewski by Marian Turski. Polityka Nr 47/2002, Warsaw.
3. The RelatioNet Project, Life of Julian Grobelny (Życie Juliana Grobelnego). International reunion of the younger generation with World War II Survivors, October 3, 2007 (in Polish).
4. Irena Sendlerowa (2007), "Julian Grobelny i jego żona Helena." FKCh "ZNAK" - 1999-2008.
5. https://encyklopedia.pwn.pl/haslo/Grobelny-Julian;3907930.html
6. Julian Grobelny – his activity to save Jews' lives during the Holocaust, at Yad Vashem website
Grobelny, Julian
Grobelna, Halina
“Julian Grobelny (whose code name was Trojan) was an activist in the Polish Socialist Party (PPS) and president of Zegota (Council for Aid to Jews) since its establishment in 1942. Despite suffering from tuberculosis, Grobelny, together with his wife, Halina, was personally involved in the rescue of a large number of Jewish children. Both Julian and Halina devoted most of their time and energy to their rescue work, turning their small house in Ceglow, near Minsk Mazowiecki, into a temporary shelter for Jewish children until they could move into more permanent accommodations. The Grobelnys were in close contact with Irena Sendler*, head of the children’s section of Zegota. The Grobelnys also helped Jewish adults who fled from the ghetto, by supplying them with “Aryan” documents, money, and medicines. In March 1944, the Gestapo arrested Grobelny, but during a furlough to receive medical care, he escaped. Grobelny died of tuberculosis on December 4, 1944. The names of Julian and Halina Grobelny figure prominently in books about humanitarian aid to the Jews of Warsaw and elsewhere during the occupation.
“On March 8, 1987, Yad Vashem recognized Halina and Julian Grobelny as Righteous Among the Nations.
Irena Gut, rescued sixteen Jews by becoming Nazi [43]
“Irene Gut Opdyke (born Irena Gut, 5 May 1922 – 17 May 2003) was a Polish nurse who gained international recognition for aiding Polish Jews persecuted by Nazi Germany during World War II. She was honored as a Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem for risking her life to save twelve Jews from certain death.
“Irena Gut was born into a Catholic family with five daughters in Kozienice, Poland, during the interwar period. The family moved to Radom, where she enrolled at the nursing school before the Nazi-Soviet invasion of 1939. At the age of 20, Gut witnessed a German soldier kill an infant in 1942.[1] This event transformed her life. During the German occupation, Gut was hired by Wehrmacht Major Eduard Rügemer to work in a kitchen of a hotel that frequently served Nazi officials.[2] Inspired by her religious faith, Gut secretly took food from the hotel and delivered it to the Tarnopol Ghetto.[3]
“Gut smuggled Jews out of the ghetto into the surrounding forest and delivered food for them there. Meanwhile, Rügemer asked Gut to work as a housekeeper in his requisitioned villa. She hid 12 Jews in the cellar.[4] They would come out and help her clean the house when he was not around. Rügemer found out about the Jews she was hiding. At risk to all their lives, Rügemer kept Gut's secret, on the condition that she became his mistress.[5] Rügemer fled with the Germans in 1944 ahead of the Russian advance. Gut and several Jews also fled west from Soviet occupied Poland to Allied-occupied Germany. She was put in a Displaced Persons camp, where she met William Opdyke, a United Nations worker from New York City. She emigrated to the United States and married Opdyke shortly thereafter. They raised a family together.[3]
“After years of silence regarding her wartime experience, in 1975 Opdyke was convinced to speak after hearing a neo-Nazi claim that the Holocaust never occurred.[6] Opdyke began a public speaking career which culminated in her memoir In My Hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer.[6] In 1982, Irena Opdyke née Gut was recognized and honored by Yad Vashem as one of the Polish Righteous Among the Nations.[7]
Opdyke's memoir, In My Hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer was arranged by her then-manager Alan Boinus and published in 1999”.
“Irena Franka Wilner, together with 300 other Jews, was sent from the Tarnopol ghetto to a camp near a military garage (Heeres Kraftsfahr park), where she was put to work in the laundry room of the officers’ club. The local employment office (Arbeitsamt) appointed Irena Gut, a young Pole, as supervisor of the laundry. From the day she started her job, Gut helped the Jewish inmates, supplying them with food and cigarettes, which she obtained by exploiting her position as principal purchaser for the club. One of Gut’s functions was to look after the German commander, Major Eduard Ruegemer (recognized as Righteous in 2012). Through him Gut obtained passes for Jews, to allow them to make purchases on the Aryan side of the city. The commander also allowed the families of his Jewish prisoners to move into the camp, thereby sparing them the Aktionen that took place from time to time in the ghetto. Even after 1943, when the camp became a Judenlager (Jewish camp) and was made into a subsidiary of the Janowska camp in Lwow, Ruegemer and Gut continued to look after the Jews. When, on July 23, 1943, the Germans began liquidating the camp, Gut helped many of the inmates find hiding places. Ruegemer drove others to the forest, where they dug a bunker for themselves and survived with the help of Gut who brought them provisions and maintained contact with them. Others – including Franka Wilner and her husband, and the Heller couple – were hidden in the laundry room. Others were hidden in a villa that had been requisitioned by the German major.
“Gut saw to all their needs, and courageously defied the threats of various blackmailers who suspected she was helping Jews. In March 1944, shortly before the Red Army liberated the area, the Gestapo arrested Gut, but she escaped. After the war, most of the survivors immigrated to Israel and in 1982, invited Gut to come and visit them in Jerusalem. On July 8, 1982, Yad Vashem recognized Irena Opdyke (née Gut) as Righteous Among the Nations”.
Updated October 24, 2021