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STORIES OF POLISH RESISTANCE

Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski

About half of the six million European Jews killed in

the Holocaust were Polish. In 1939 a third of the

capital city Warsaw, and 10% of the entire country was

Jewish. By 1945 97% of Poland's Jews were dead.

These eleven examples of Polish resistance do not proport to give an overview of what happened in

Poland during The Holocaust. They have been chosen

to reflect the unimaginably difficult choices made by

both Jews and non-Jews under German occupation –

where every Jew was marked for death and all non-

Jews who assisted their Jewish neighbours were subject

to the same fate.

These individuals were not typical; they were

exceptional, reflecting the relatively small proportion

of the population who refused to be bystanders. But

neither were they super-human. They would recoil

from being labelled as heroes. They symbolise the

power of the human spirit – their actions show that in

even the darkest of times, good can shine through…



Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski

Irena Sendler

IRENA SENDLER 1910 - 2008

Irena Sendler was an exceptional woman who

coordinated an Underground Network of rescuers

that enabled many Jewish children to escape the

Warsaw Ghetto and survive The Holocaust. Her

father was a doctor who died during a typhus

epidemic in 1917 after helping many sick Jewish

families who were too poor to afford treatment. Out

of gratitude, members of the community offered to

support Irena’s family after his death and

consequently there was a strong bond of friendship

between Irena’s family and her Jewish neighbours.

As a result she learnt to speak Yiddish, a skill that

was invaluable in her later work. “My parents taught me, that if

a man is drowning, no matter what his religion or nationality, you must help him, whether or

not you can swim yourself.”

UNDER OCCUPATION & THE WARSAW GHETTO

Irena was incapable of ignoring injustice and joined Warsaw’s Social Services

department. She was a natural leader and became the heart of a network of women

who had the shared aim of helping Warsaw’s poorest residents. Under German

occupation it was illegal for Warsaw’s Social Services department to help Jews, so Irena

altered client documents to continue supporting them. Although this was a very risky

thing to do neither Irena nor her colleagues were deterred by the dangers.

Irena’s network distributed food and medicines to the poorest members of Warsaw’s Jewish community.

When the Warsaw Ghetto was created

Irena gained entry by obtaining a Health

Inspector pass so she could continue to smuggle in much needed supplies.

Irena was distressed to see so many children suffer from

starvation and was determined to do something

more to help them.

RESCUE

When residents of the Warsaw Ghetto stared to be

deported to Treblinka death camp, Irena’s network

stepped up their rescue operation by smuggling

children out of the ghetto. This was dangerous as

Germans killed those who helped Jews. Babies were

sedated and hidden in tool boxes or medical bags and

older children were smuggled out through the sewer

system. But the risk remained, even after a child was

living in a secret safe-house. If their real identities

were suspected by a neighbour they would have to be

relocated. This happened quite frequently. “How

many mothers do most children have?” one child

asked Irena. “So far I’ve had three.”

Children were taken to ‘safe houses’ and given non-Jewish identities where they acclimatised to their new circumstances.

It was desperately difficult to hand over a child to

a stranger and Jewish families agonised over such

a painful decision . Those who agreed felt it was

the only chance their child had of surviving. Irena

described this heart-wrenching sacrifice as a

parent’s final act of love. “The real heroes were

the mothers” she would say. She hoped to reunite

the Jewish families after the war and kept

meticulous records of each child, burying lists of

their names in jars next to a friend’s apple tree.

In October 1943 she was arrested by the Gestapo and was driven away for interrogation. Although she was brutally tortured,

Irena refused to provide any information and was sentenced to death, but on the morning of her execution she was pulled

out of line and told to run. Her escape had been bought with a bribe from the Polish Underground.

The tree beside which were buried the real names of the hidden children.

DESPERATE CHOICES

RECOGNITION

“I’ve tried to live a human life, which isn’t always easy”

Irena was recognised as Righteous Among the Nations

by Yad Vashem in 1965. Her close friend Lili Pohlman

spoke widely in the UK about Irena’s work and in 1999

students from Kansas made a play about her life -

finally the world got to learn about this amazing woman

and the network she coordinated.

The tree of righteousness planted in Israel in Irena’s honour with the medal she

received

Lili Pohlman, a Holocaust survivor who was born in Krakow and hidden as a child in Lvov, championing the

work of her close friend Irena Sendler.



Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski

Maximilian Kolbe

Father Maximilian Kolbe 1894 - 1941

Raymond Kolbe was born in Zdunska Wola, Poland, to a devout Roman

Catholic family. When he was 12 he had a vision of the Virgin Mary which

changed his life, when he learned that he was to become a martyr. He entered

a seminary at Lvov in 1910 and was ordained as a priest in 1918. He formed a

group called “Knights of the Immaculate” which was dedicated to fighting for

goodness, encouraging people to have an interest in religion and to perform

charitable works. They published a journal which was designed to ‘illuminate

the truth and show the way to true happiness.’ In 1930 he travelled to

Nagasaki, Japan and published the journal in Japanese. Here, he did not try to

impose Christianity, but respected Buddhism and Shintoism looking for ways

to engage in dialogue. He returned to Poland in 1936 and three years later,

when the Germans invaded, he resumed his pamphleteering work and offered

assistance to Polish refugees, both Jewish and non-Jewish.

Kolbe with student priests

His work agitated the Nazi regime and he was imprisoned on many

occasions, eventually being deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau. This was the

most notorious concentration camp that the Nazi’s built on Polish soil –

more than a million of the six million European Jews that were murdered in

the Holocaust died there. It was also were approximately 70,000 non-Jewish

Poles were murdered. Although it was a terrible place of death, many

remarkable stories of heroism have emerged from the testimony of

survivors, - one such example is that of prisoner 16770 - Maximilian Kolbe.


Kolbe was incarcerated in a part of the camp where Polish non-Jewish

prisoners were kept. Even in these dreadful surroundings his instinct was to

reach out to his fellow men. Auschwitz Survivors have reported that he shared

his rations of soup or bread with others and, at night-time, moved from bunk

to bunk, saying: 'I am a Catholic priest. Can I do anything for you?'

The prisoner bunks at Auschwitz (this photo was taken many years after the war)

After the war the prisoner that Kolbe replaced said 'I could only thank him with my eyes. I was stunned and could

hardly grasp what was going on. The immensity of it: I, the condemned, am to live and someone else willingly and

voluntarily offers his life for me - a stranger. Was this some dream?’


When it was reported that another prisoner had escaped from the camp, the Nazis decide to starve 10 others in

retaliation. One of the selected men broke down and cried “My wife! My children! I will never see them again!”

Hearing this, Maximilian Kolbe stepped forward and asked to die in his place. The Germans granted this request,

probably because the young prisoner was more useful to them as a slave labourer than the much older, frailer Kolbe.

Father Maximilian Kolbe died on 14 August, 1941 and his

body was removed to the crematorium, without dignity or

ceremony, like hundreds of thousands who had gone before

him, and hundreds of thousands more who would follow.

Another survivor declared that the when the news and

circumstances of Father Kolbe's death became known it was

like 'a shock filled with hope - like a powerful shaft of light in

the darkness of the camp.'

The cell in Auschwitz where Father Kolbe died is now a shrine

and he was made a saint by Pope John Paul II in 1981. His

story continues to inspire many people today.




Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski Emanuel

Ringelblum

EMANUEL RINGELBLUM 1900 - 1944

Emanuel Ringelblum was born in Buczacz, Poland

(now Ukraine) in 1900 and studied history at the

University of Warsaw. In November 1938 he went to

the border town of Zbaszyn, where 6,000 Jewish

refugees from Germany, with Polish nationality, were

being held. He spent five weeks caring for these

destitute people, who had been expelled by Germany

but whose entry into Poland was being blocked by the

Polish Government, and his experiences had a great

impact. Consequently, after the Germans invaded

Poland, he set up welfare programmes and soup

kitchens for his fellow impoverished Jews who had

been forced to into the Warsaw Ghetto.Emanuel Ringelblum and his son Uri

Polish Jews, expelled from Germany but denied

entry into Poland, being held at the border town

of Zbaszyn in dreadful conditions

In 1939 he started to keep a detailed diary and also encouraged others to gather as much information of day-to-day life

under German occupation possible, to create an account of events from the perspective of the victims of the Nazis.

This had to be a secretive activity, as any recording of German crimes was strictly forbidden by the oppressors. The

group were code-named “the Oneg Shabbat” (The Joy of the Sabbath) as its members met in secret on Saturday

afternoons to collate the reports and testimonies they had collected from Jews who had come to the ghetto.


Ringelblum with Rachel Auerbach (right) who became

an important contributor to the Oneg Shabbat Archive

Ringelblum and his co-conspirators knew that what was happening to the Jews was

unprecedented and were determined to record a complete description of the time and

place for future historians. They collected data and wrote articles about towns, villages,

the ghetto, and the resistance movement. They also documented the deportation and

extermination of Polish Jewry. Near the end of the ghetto's existence, the information the

group had collected about the mistreatment of Jews was passed on to the Polish

underground, which in turn smuggled it out of the country. This led to a radio broadcast

by the BBC, helping to expose the Nazis' atrocities to the wider world – although a plea

for the Allies to intervene to prevent the genocide went unheeded…

As Ghetto conditions became more desperate

it was decided to secure the materials by

burying them in the cellar of an apartment in

metal milk cans and boxes (right).

1

2

3 4

5

6 1

2

3

4

5

6


The archive contained over 30,000 separate documents and artefacts. Here is a selection of just some…

A wrapper from a sweet making factory in

The Ghetto.

One of a collection of 300 paintings by

Gela Seksztajn

Sign showing the families that are sharing

rooms in one Warsaw apartment.

First sketch of the Treblinka Death Camp,

smuggled into the ghetto by an escapee.

A ghetto ration card

One of the thousands of handwritten

documents that make up the archive.

In March 1943, Ringelblum and his family escaped the ghetto and went into hiding in

the non-Jewish area of Warsaw. A month later he returned to the ghetto, which was

in the midst of an uprising, and was captured and deported to a Trawniki labour

camp. He was able to escape, and re-join his family in hiding. However, in March

1944, just months before the end of the war, their hideout was discovered and he

and his family were taken to the ruins of the ghetto and murdered by the Germans.

After the war two sites where the archive had been

buried were uncovered, in 1946 and 1950; a third

stash of documents has never been located. The

archive materials constitute the most comprehensive

and valuable source of information concerning the

Jews in German-occupied Poland and the

significance of the events that took place.The Archive being retrieved in 1946

Rachel Auerbach and Hersz Wasser, two

Oneg Shabbat survivors inspect the archive

after it’s recovery from the ground



After the war The Jewish Historical Institute was established, in what was previous a

library next to The Great Synagogue of Warsaw (which was destroyed by the

Germans at the end of the Warsaw Uprising). This is where the contents of the

archive was painstakingly restored and documented to make it one of the most

important sources of information on The Holocaust. A revamped digital exhibition

has been opened there, enabling more people to learn from its contents.

A book about the archive by Samuel Kassow,

entitled Who Will Write Our History?, was

made into a film in 2018.

The Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw The new digital exhibition



Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski Mordechai

Anielewicz

MORDECHAI ANIELEWICZ 1919–1943 & The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

Mordechai Anielewicz was the leader of the Jewish Resistance fighters that

fought back against the German Army between 19th April and 8th May in what

remained of the Warsaw Ghetto. By that time the vast majority of the ghetto’s

residents had been sent to Treblinka death camp and it was when the

Germans attempted to deport the rest that Anielewicz’s fighters attacked.

There was no realistic hope of a military victory – this Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

was purely a final act of resistance in response to the atrocious violence that had

been inflicted on the Jews of Warsaw over the previous three and a half years. It

was an opportunity to get some revenge for the murderous attacks that had been

visited upon their fellow Jews – a change to die with some dignity


Anielewicz was 20 when the Germans invaded Poland in

September 1939. Aware of the dangers that Polish Jews were

going to be subjected to, he joined an organisation that tried to

set up an escape route through Romania, which shared a

border with Poland at the time. However, he was imprisoned

by Soviet troops and, on release, returned to Warsaw. By mid-

1941 he had began to train youth groups in the ghetto in

armed resistance and reached out to other underground

movements to help supply weapons for a possible uprising.

Mordechai Anielewicz (top right) with other members of the

youth movement he was part of before the war which became a

crucial part of the Ghetto Uprising in April 1943.


Anielewicz was engaged in underground work in southern

Poland when he learnt about the deportations from Warsaw. He

immediately returned to the capital with the intention of

organising an armed resistance movement against the Germans.

Previously the leaders of the Warsaw Ghetto were reluctant to

sanction attacks on the occupiers for fear of inciting even more

reprisals. But attitudes changed after the deportations – few

realistically expected to survive the war.

The deportations to Treblinka during the summer of 1942 reduced the population of The

Warsaw Ghetto drastically. As a result, the southern part of the former ghetto was subsumed

into the rest of the city and most of the wall that had previously separated the Jewish

population from the rest of the city was demolished. Consequently, during the winter of 1942

the surviving Jews were crammed into the northern section of the former ghetto – close to

where the transports departed from Warsaw to Treblinka. The residents knew it was only a

matter of time until the Germans would complete the liquidation of the ghetto…

Mordechai Anielewicz (circled) with a group of Jewish resistance fighters


…this happened in January 1943. But to the Germans' surprise they were

met by Anielewicz’s resistance fighters. Twelve fighters secretly slipped

themselves into the lines off people being led into the loading area (the

Umschlagplatz) and, at a signal, each shot the nearest soldier. In the

confusion many Jews were able to escape back into the ghetto. Although

all 12 fighters died, this first act of resistance was seen as a victory and

was a source of great encouragement to Anielewicz’s organisation.

The Germans were forced to abandon the planned

final liquidation of The Ghetto and the fighters

used that lull to prepare for the inevitable final

attack. They prepared as much home-made

ammunition as possible and did all they could to

smuggle in weapons as well. In preparation for

what was inevitably going to be an ambush-based

attack, the fighters set up cells in the basements of

the what remained of the ghetto.

Many female couriers posed as non-Jews to

establish lines of communication with other

underground organisations. They past on messages

and smuggled in weapons and ammunition, often

paying for such bravery with their lives.

A basement bunker that housed a fighting unit.


In the days leading up to the final battles of The Ghetto Uprising, German troops began

to encircle the area and they made their move in the early hours of April 19th. The

resistance fighters predicted that the Germans would enter through an entrance near to a

brush-making factory – which is where they decided to set their trap. Armed fighters

positioned themselves on roof tops and others, with improvised “Molotov cocktail”

bombs, crouched below windows that looked down at the street below. The German’s had

no idea that as their column of tanks and trucks slowly made its way into the ghetto that

they were about to be ambushed. It was when the first tank was over a landmine-bomb

that had been buried in the road, that the attack happened. The explosion that set the tank

on fire was the cue for the hidden fighters to start their attack and the German’s retreated.

Compared to the German troops the Uprising

fighters were poorly armed. They relied mostly

on petrol-bombs known as “Molotov

Cocktails” and had a limited number of

weapons with very little ammunition.

Anielewicz wrote in a letter a few days later –

It is impossible to put into words what we have been through. One thing is clear, what happened exceeded our boldest dreams. The Germans ran twice from the ghetto. One of our

companies held out for 40 minutes and another for more than 6 hours. The mine set in the "brushmakers" area exploded. Several of our companies attacked the dispersing Germans. Our losses in manpower are minimal… the dream of my life has risen to become fact. Self-

defence in the ghetto will have been a reality. Jewish armed resistance and revenge are facts. I have been a witness to the magnificent, heroic fighting of Jewish men in battle.


The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising lasted 28 days.

Eventually the Germans resorted to systematically

burning the ghetto, building by building, to finally

quell the resistance. They flushed out any remaining

cells by dropping grenades into the basement

bunkers - Mordechai Anielewicz, along with the

surviving fighters he was hiding with, chose to kill

themselves rather than be captured by the Germans.

Some of the ghetto residents managed to

escape through the sewer system, but most

of the remaining Jews were either executed

in Warsaw or sent to Treblinka.


It’s unlikely that the events that took place in the Warsaw Ghetto in the early months of 1943 resulted in

many more Jews surviving the war. But the symbol of resistance against what was perceived to be an

invincible enemy had a hugely significant impact. The Ghetto Uprising, which took place two years

before the end of the war, was seen by surviving Jews as an expression of resistance and showed that

world that, in the words of Mordechai Anielewicz, not all Jews “went to their deaths like lambs to the slaughter”.

Monuments in Warsaw that remember the Ghetto Uprising. The structure on the left commemorates where in Warsaw the fighting took

place and the monument on the right signifies the location, in Mila 18, of the bunker where Anielewicz died.



Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski

Witold Pilecki

WITOLD PILECKI 1901 - 1948

Pilecki was born on 13 May 1901 in Olonets – a small town in

what was then the Russian Empire. After serving in the Polish

Army, he married Maria Ostrowska, a schoolteacher, in 1931 and

had two children, Andrzej and Zofia. He devoted himself to

running the family farm and enjoyed painting and writing poetry.

Witold Pilecki is the only inmate known to be voluntarily

imprisoned at Auschwitz. His incredible story of self- sacrifice

remained hidden for over 40 years after his execution.


In August 1939, when Poland was invaded by Germany, Pilecki was called up to the army. After Poland’s defeat he

made his way to Warsaw to fight with the underground resistance. In August 1940, news arrived of the death of a

group of Polish political opponents who had been imprisoned in Auschwitz. This caused alarm within the Polish

underground and Pilecki volunteered to investigate. On 19 September 1940, he intentionally allowed himself to be

arrested by the Nazis and was detained nearby for two days with an estimated 1,800 Polish political prisoners before

being transported to Auschwitz. He remained there for the next two and a half years as prisoner 4859. Pilecki’s

mission was to raise the morale of Polish political prisoners by bringing news from outside the camp, as well as to

report on camp conditions to the Home Army in Warsaw. In October 1940, he successfully sent out his first report

with a released inmate. It reached the Polish Government-in-exile in March 1941, who passed it onto the Allies.


While imprisoned in the camp Pilecki witnessed the horrifying mistreatment of inmates. His reports described the

early experiments conducted on Soviet prisoners of war, who were murdered with poisonous gas. This laid the

foundations for the mass-murder of many Jews in the purpose-built gas chambers and crematoria. Pilecki also

reported on the suffering of the Roma and Sinti prisoners undergoing sterilisation experiments against their will;

many of who died from their injuries. Pilecki eventually created an underground organisation within Auschwitz.

They built a radio transmitter from parts smuggled in by civilians who worked at the camp. This enabled him to

report on camp conditions and the number of deaths until the risk of discovery became too high.

Pilecki’s bravery and will-power cannot be overstated.

In his report he describes the hunger as ‘the hardest

battle of his life’ and was overwhelmed by the task he

had set himself but refused to admit this to his

colleagues in case it damaged their morale.

The English translation of the sign above the gates of Auschwitz is “Work Liberates”. The aim was to give the impression that this German

concentration camp was only a labour camp.


At first escape attempts were discouraged because of the group punishment inflicted on the inmates left behind.

However, once group punishment was abandoned, the organisation actively assisted escapees. On one occasion, Pilecki

gave his own planned escape route to an inmate in more imminent danger. He eventually escaped in April 1943 - he and

two companions successfully removed the bolts from a heavy door whilst the guards’ backs were turned. They journeyed

for 100km on foot which took them a week. He returned to Warsaw and fought in the Warsaw Uprising of 1944 but that

defeat led to Pilecki’s further imprisonment in POW camps in Germany, where he earned the nickname ‘Daddy’ from the

younger inmates he looked after. When the camps were liberated at the end of the war, Pilecki was sent to Italy where he

joined the Polish Armed Forces and wrote comprehensively about his time in Auschwitz.

‘The game which I was now playing in

Auschwitz was dangerous. This sentence

does not really convey the reality; in fact, I

had gone far beyond what people in the

real world would consider dangerous…’


Despite his relative safety in Italy, Pilecki returned

once again to Warsaw to gather intelligence on the

newly established Polish Communist government.

The Nazis had been overthrown, but so had the

Polish Government-in-exile. To Pilecki and the

Home Army, Poland was subservient to their

Soviet liberators and therefore still not free. Witold

Pilecki was captured by the Communist Polish

authorities on 8 May 1947 and accused of spying

and of planning to assassinate key figures in the

Polish police. He was tortured into signing his

‘confession’ and put through a sham-trial, where he

was not permitted to testify, and no witnesses were

called. The trial was used to deter any other

opposition to the Soviet Communist regime.


He was subsequently executed

on 25 May 1948. In 1990,

shortly after the collapse of

the Soviet Union and the

Communist regime in Poland,

Pilecki was finally exonerated

and recognised for his actions

during World War Two.



Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski

Janusz Korczak

JANUSZ KORCZAK 1878 - 1942

Janusz Korczak was the pen name of Henryk Goldszmit. He

was born in Warsaw, to an assimilated Jewish family.

After school he became a medical doctor, doing his best to help

the poorest in society. He also began to write prolifically, and his

first books aroused great interest. Both as a doctor and a writer,

Korczak was drawn to the world of the child. He worked in a

Jewish children’s hospital and took groups of children to

summer camps, and in 1908 he began to work with orphans.


In 1912 he was appointed director of a new and spacious Jewish

orphanage in Warsaw. Throughout his life, his partner in his work was

Stefania Wilczynska, who dedicated her life to the care of orphans and

greatly influenced Korczak and his career as an educator.

In the orphanage, Korczak developed an approach to child

care that called for an understanding of the emotional life of

children and urged that children be respected. A child was not

to be regarded as something to be shaped and trained to suit

adults, but rather as someone whose soul was rich in

perception and ideas, who should be observed and listened to

within his or her own autonomous sphere. Korczak

maintained that every child should be seen as an individual.


After the war he returned to the newly independent Poland. He resumed his

role in the Jewish orphanage but was also asked to take charge of an

orphanage for Polish children. Thus the 1920’s were a period of intensive and

fruitful work in Korczak’s life – he was in charge of two orphanages and

served as an instructor at other boarding schools and summer camps, as well

as being a lecturer at universities and seminaries. In the late 1920’s, he

established a weekly newspaper for children that was also written by children,

who related their experiences and their deepest thoughts.

In 1914 Korczak was called up for military service in the

Russian army, and it was in military hospitals and bases

that he wrote his important work Loving Every Child.


But in the mid-1930’s, Korczak’s public career underwent a change.

Following the death of the Polish leader, Jozef Pilsudski, political

power in the country fell into radical nationalistic and openly anti-

Semitic hands. Korczak was removed from many of the positions in

which he had been active, including an extremely popular radio

broadcast that had made him famous across the country.

He visited Palestine twice, in 1934 and 1936, showing particular interest

in the state of education, especially the educational achievements of the

kibbutz movement. On the eve of World War Two Korczak was

considering emigration, but his idea failed to reach fruition.


As the situation got worse and the Jews of Warsaw were imprisoned in the

ghetto, Korczak concentrated all his efforts on the orphanage. The only

thing that gave him the strength to carry on was the duty he felt to preserve

and protect his children. Polish friends of Dr Korczak tried to persuade

him to escape from the ghetto but he refused to abandon the children.

On Thursday 6 August 1942 the Germans deported Korczak, his assistants

and the two hundred children. A witness described the scene as follows:

“This was not a march to the railway cars - this was an organised, wordless

protest against the murder. The children marched in rows of four, with

Korczak leading them, looking straight ahead, and holding a child’s hand

on each side. Another column was led by Stefania Wilczynska, her children

carrying blue knapsacks on their backs.”

From the very beginning of the war, Korczak dedicated himself to the welfare of

children. At first, he refused to acknowledge the German occupation and heed its rules,

even refusing to wear the Jewish star, which earned him a prison sentence.


After the war, associations bearing Korczak’s name were formed in Poland, Israel,

Germany and other countries, to keep his memory alive and to promote his

message and his work. Books, plays and films have all been produced about

Korczak, and his own writings have been translated into many languages.

Korczak, his assistants and all of the children, were killed in Treblinka.



Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski

Jan Karski

JAN KARSKI 1914 - 2000

Jan Karski was born Jan Kozielewski to a

Roman Catholic family in Lodz in 1914.

After completing his university studies,

Karski joined the Polish diplomatic service.

At the outbreak of World War II in September 1939, he joined the Polish army but was taken

prisoner by the Soviets and sent to a detention camp. Karski managed to conceal the fact that

he was an officer, which enabled him to avoid the Katyń massacre where 22,000 Polish officers

were executed. He eventually escaped and joined the Polish underground movement.


With his knowledge of geography and foreign languages and a

remarkable memory, Karski became a resourceful courier. He

conveyed secret information between the resistance and the

Polish government-in-exile. In late 1940, while on a mission, he

was captured by the German police and tortured in prison. Afraid

that he might give away secret information he attempted to kill

himself. He was found alive and transferred to a hospital where

he managed to make contact with a fellow undercover agent, who

told him that his escape was being planned. Karski feigned illness

until the night of his rescue was scheduled.


In late 1942 Karski was smuggled in and out of the Warsaw ghetto and

a transit camp at Izbica, where he saw for himself the horrors suffered

by Jews under Nazi occupation, including mass starvation and

transports of Jews to the Belzec death camp. Karski then travelled to

London where he delivered a report to the Polish government-in-exile

and to senior British authorities including Foreign Minister Anthony

Eden. He described what he had seen and warned of Nazi Germany’s

plans to murder European Jews. In July 1943 Karski went to

Washington and met with American President Franklin D. Roosevelt to

give the same warning and plead for action. Much to his dismay, Allied

governments were focused on the military defeat of Germany, and

Karski’s message was greeted with disbelief or indifference. Karski’s report – one of the earliest comprehensive descriptions of what was happening to the Jews of Poland


Disheartened, Karski remained in the United States. He wrote a

book about his time during the war called The Secret State.

He refused to return to Communist Poland and

remained in Washington promoting Polish freedom

and serving for many decades as a professor at

Georgetown University. When Poland regained it’s

freedom from communist rule he was honoured by the

then Prime Minister Lech Wałęsa.


He is seen as a pillar of humanity all over the world. There are

many “Karski Benches” to commemorate his memory.

Jan Karski is honoured by Yad Vashem as Righteous

Among the Nations. He was also granted honorary

citizenship of Israel in honour of his deeds during the war.



Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski Zofia Kossak-

Szczucka

ZOFIA KOSSAK-SZCZUCKA & THE ZEGOTA NETWORK

The story of Zofia Kossak-Szczucka illustrates the complex relations between Jewish and

non-Jewish Poles were before and during the German occupation of the country. Before

the war she was well known for her intolerant views towards Jews but eventually became

one of the main co-ordinators of an organisation that helped many hundreds of Jews

escape the dangers of the Nazi regime and continue to support them when in hiding.

In 1936, three years before the German occupation, she wrote –

“Jews are so terribly alien to us… they are a race apart… Their argumentativeness, the set of

their eyes, the shape of their ears, the winking of their eyelids, the line of their lips,

everything…”

In 1942, after the Nazis commenced the extermination of the inhabitants of the Warsaw

ghetto, she wrote –

“The world is watching the most horrible crime that has ever taken place in history, and

keeps silent. The slaughter of millions of defenceless people is being carried out amidst

general and ominous silence… We must not tolerate this silence any longer. He who keeps

silent in the face of slaughter becomes an accomplice to murder. He who doesn’t condemn,

complies with the murder.”

ZOFIA KOSSAK-SZCZUCKA 1890 -1968

ZOFIA KOSSAK-SZCZUCKA & THE ŻEGOTA NETWORK

The organisation that Zofia Kossak-Szczucka helped to set up was known as “Żegota” – the codename for

the “Council to Aid Jews”. This was a secret underground network that resisted the German occupation in

Poland. Żegota was linked to the Polish Government in Exile, which was made up of Polish political

leaders who had escaped occupied Poland and who remotely coordinated acts of resistance in their

homeland. When Żegota was formed the Polish Government in Exile was based in London.

(left) British Prime Minister Winston

Churchill with Władysław Sikorski, the

Prime Minister of the Polish Government

in exile, until he tragically died in an air

crash in July 1943.

Members of the Polish Government in Exile that was based in London for most of the war


Julian Grobelny (whose code name was Trojan) was the president of Żegota since its

establishment in 1942. Together with his wife, Halina, he 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 into a temporary

shelter for Jewish children until they could move into more permanent accommodations.

The Grobelnys were in close contact with Irena Sendler, who by then was the head of

the children’s section of Żegota. They also helped Jewish adults who fled from the

ghetto, by supplying them with “Aryan” documents, money and medicines.

At considerable personal risk, Zofia Kossak-Szczucka devoted her time and energy to bringing together

a wide range of people to help organise rescue and assistance to Jews in occupied Poland. Half of the 6

million Jews who died during The Holocaust were Polish and in that context, despite Żegota’s best

efforts, only a tiny number of people could be helped. But rather than judge its impact on purely

numerical terms (approximately 5,000 people received, financial assistance, forged identity documents or

a safe place to hide) it should be remembered that, in a time of such hopelessness, where the Jews of

Europe felt abandoned, Żegota was a symbol of humanity and resistance…

Here are some of the prominent members of this remarkable organisation…


Another important figure in the organisation was Wanda Krahelska-Filipowicz. She was not

new to underground resistance activities, as in 1906, during the time when Poland was still

partitioned among Russia, Germany and Austria, she participated in a bombing attack on the

then Russian Governor-General of Warsaw. She was a Socialist activist and the wife of a

former Ambassador to the United States. She used her considerable influence to persuade

others to support the rescue operation both with their time and, if they were based outside

Poland, with their financial support. Using the code-name ”Alicja,” as well as helping to

coordinate the wider organisation, she offered shelter to Jews in her own home.

Leon Feiner was chairman of Żegota from August ‘44 to January ‘45. He was imprisoned in the USSR

when the Germans invaded in June 1941 and escaped to Warsaw where he joined the underground

network. In October 1942 he managed to send a telegram to the Polish Government-in-Exile in London,

with information of what was happening to Poland’s Jews. He also met with Jan Karski and made the

following appeal - " The Germans are not trying to make us slaves as they are doing with other peoples -

we are being systematically murdered. Our entire people will be destroyed. A few can probably be saved,

but the fate of three million Jews is sealed… the earth should be shaken to its very foundations and the

world needs to be roused. Maybe then, it will wake up, understand and see".


Władysław Bartoszewski was in Auschwitz as a Polish prisoner from the autumn of 1940 to

the spring of 1941. From then on her resolved never to turn his back on suffering. Zofia

Kossak persuaded him to join the underground and he began to use his close contacts in the

Jewish community to help ghetto escapees find employment and obtained medical assistance

for children. He also organised over 50,000 forged identity documents. “Did every document

save a life? Who knows? We didn’t keep those statistics. People needed to be rescued. We did

whatever we could”. After the war he worked as a historian, journalist and diplomat and when

Poland regained independence he served as Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Until the deportations to Treblinka in the summer of 1942 Dr Adolf Bermann was

involved in providing help for Jewish children in the Warsaw Ghetto. He managed to

escape to the “Aryan” side of the city and forged links between the Polish and Jewish

Underground networks. Although he had a new non-Jewish identity it was still highly

risky to move about the city. Eventually he was denounced to the Germans by

blackmailers and captured by the Gestapo. Zegota paid a bride to secure his release

and Bermann resumed his clandestine work. After the war he devoted his time to

supporting fellow Holocaust survivors and eventually moved to Israel.


A memorial to Żegota is situated outside POLIN, the Museum to the History of Poland’s Jews in Warsaw and a

special tree of remembrance has been planted in the Garden of the Righteous at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem.



Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski Father Marceli

Godlewski

FATHER MARCELI GODLEWSKI 1865 - 1945

When the German Army invaded Poland in September 1939 Father Marceli Godlewski had

been the parish priest of the All Saints' Church in Warsaw for almost 25 years and was

planning to spend his retirement in Anin, a small town just east of the Polish capital.

All Saints’ Church dominated Grzybowska Square in Warsaw

since its completion in 1883

Between the end of World War One, when Poland

regained it’s independence, and the eve of World War Two,

Warsaw’s population grew by 30%. The city struggled to

cope with this increase in humanity and many families lived

in unsanitary, over-crowded conditions, relying upon the

charity of the Catholic Church to alleviate the effects of

the such poverty. Father Godlewski considered it to be his

duty to do everything he could to help his parishioners,

but although about a third of the city was Jewish he refused to extend a helping hand to

them. Both in sermons from the pulpit and in his many newspaper articles he urged his

fellow Catholics to avoid any dealing with Jews. “ ‘Each to his own’ is a wonderful slogan”

he once said. In fact his anti-Jewish views were widely known, which makes the acts of

rescue and resistance he embarked upon during the German occupation of Poland all the

more remarkable. This one-time hater of Jews was to risk his life to save hundreds…

THE CHURCH IN THE GHETTO

In the weeks prior to The Warsaw

Ghetto being sealed, in November

1940, there was a massive forced

movement of people – Jews who

lived outside the boundaries had to

move inside and non-Jews who lived

where The Ghetto was to be, had to

leave. There were also about 2000

“baptised Jews”, who had converted

All Saints’ Church was situated within The Warsaw Ghetto

to Christianity. Although they no longer considered themselves to be

Jewish, the Germans did and so they were forced to live within The

Ghetto walls as well. All Saints Church was now located within The

Ghetto and Father Godlewski chose to remain inside as well, so that

this small group of people could continue to worship.

Part of The Ghetto wall being built

But Father Godlewski was providing much more than just the chance for people to pray…

Movement into and out of the ghetto was restricted to those who had been

issued with official passes from the German authorities. As priests Father

Godlewski and his staff were able to obtain these passes, which enabled them

to smuggle in much needed food and medicine. At first such assistance was

specifically for the parishioners of the church, but as starvation and disease

claimed more and more lives, Father Godlewski decreed that, as all life is of

equal worth, then all residents of the ghetto were deserving of help.

RESCUE AND RESISTANCE

A soup-kitchen was established in the church where starving ghetto

residents could supplement their meagre diet and part of the

building was turned into a temporary shelter for those who could no

longer afford to rent their own homes. And as conditions

deteriorated, and more and more desperate Jewish ghetto residents

decided to risk escape, Father Godlewski issued false baptismal and

identity documents to help them survive.

Starvation ravaged the ghetto residents

A queue outside a ghetto soup-kitchen

Father Godlewski was particularly concerned with the plight of

orphaned children begging on the streets. At first he organised

a kindergarten in the grounds of the church, but later, through

his contacts in convents around Warsaw, he arranged for

children to be secretly taken out of the ghetto and placed in the

care of the Franciscan Sisters. Many of these convents were

run by Sister Matylda Getter, who never refused to take on

another child despite the considerable risks. Father Godlewski

eventually gave the building he was planning to retire to in

Anin to the Franciscan Sisters who established an orphanage.

Sister Matylda Getter

When the daily transports of Jews to the Treblinka Death Camp began in July 1942, the boundaries of the ghetto

shrunk. Eventually All Saints Church was no longer in the restricted area of the city, but Father Godlewski

continued to support the many people he knew who were in hiding, despite the fact that if he had been discovered

by the Germans he would have been killed. It is impossible to say how many people benefited from the work that

Father Godlewski undertook, as most of them would have died in Treblinka. But those who managed to survive

the Holocaust because of his efforts always emphasised how much they owe him.

Orphaned Jewish child in The Warsaw Ghetto

RESCUE AND RESISTANCE

Father Godlewski and many of the Priests and Sisters who worked with him have

been recognised as Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem. It is particularly

significant that a person who was once openly antisemitic was able to alter his views

and put himself in considerable danger by devoting his life to saving Jews.

LEGACY

All Saints Church was extensively damaged during the 1944 Warsaw Uprising In 2017 All Saints Church was declared a “House of Life” due tot he work that Father Godlewski undertook.



Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski Jan & Antonina

Zabinski

JAN (1897-1974) & ANTONINA (1908-1971) ZABINSKI

By the mid-1930's the Warsaw Zoo had

become one of Europe's largest zoos and

when war broke out in 1939 Jan Zabinski was

the zoo director. Over the course of the

German occupation of the city Jan, along with

his wife Antonina, provided refuge for many

Jews in the bombed out cages and the empty

basement rooms in their villa. During the

bombardment many animals were killed and

lions and tigers that had escaped from their

cages had to be shot as they roamed the streets.

After the Germans entered Warsaw many of

the surviving animals were taken to zoos in

Austria and Germany by German zoologists. .

The Zabinski villa, where many Jews were

hidden from the Nazis. It is now a museum that

tells the story of the events that took place there.

The first victims of the German

occupation that Jan and Antonina

Zabinski helped were physically

disabled Poles, who were the first

vulnerable group targeted by the Nazis.

The Warsaw Zoo

THE LOCATION OF THE WARSAW ZOO

The zoo was situated on the east bank

of the Vistula river in the Praga district

of Warsaw. By the time the Warsaw

Ghetto was established, in late 1940, it

was no longer a functioning zoo.

This illustration made by Jan Zabinski in 1940 shows that much of the zoo, by then, was used to grow vegetables and breed pigs for local consumption.

Szymon Tenenbaum was a fellow zoologist and close friend of

Jan Zabinski who specialised in the study of insects. His beetle

collection was being stored in the zoo for safety when, to his

complete surprise, one of the occupying German officers asked

Szymon to show it to him. When he took the officer to the zoo to

view the collection, Jan immediately befriended him and exploited

this contact to obtain permission to enter the ghetto.

Szymon Tenenbaum and part of his huge collection of beetles.

To begin with Jan would smuggle food and supplies into the ghetto,

but as conditions worsened he decided to offer shelter to Jews who

were willing to risk escaping. On several occasions he personally

smuggled Jews out where, because of the friendly relationships he had

cultivated with German guards, he was able to casually walk Jews out

of the ghetto without raising suspicion.

The Warsaw Ghetto, which covered 1.3 square miles and held over 400,000 Jews, was the most populace of the many

ghettos created in Poland by the Germans.

GAINING ENTRY TO THE GHETTO

As part of the Polish Underground Jan and Antonina decided to provide temporary shelter at the

zoo for escapees from the ghetto until a more permanent place of refuge could be found and forged

identity documents could be produced. They were helped in this dangerous undertaking by their

young son, Ryszard, who supplied food and looked after the needs of the many “guests”.

Ryszard on the zoo’s baby

elephant, Tuzinka

The Zabinskis bred pigs on the zoo grounds and supplied

them to local Nazi officers. It wasn’t uncommon for these

Germans to visit the villa to negotiate their sale. When this

happened a special code-tune was played on the piano to

warn the Jews hidden in the basement below that there was a

Nazi in the building and not to make a sound.

IN HIDING

Jan Zabinski was injured during in the Warsaw Uprising

in August and September 1944 and was taken as a

prisoner to Germany. His wife continued his work,

looking after the needs of some of the Jews left behind in

the ruins of the city. The Zabinskis were honoured by

Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations in 1965.

RECOGNITION



Józef &

Wiktoria

Ulma

Irena

Sendler

Maximilian

Kolbe Emanuel

Ringelblum

Mordechai

Anielewicz

Witold

Pilecki

Janusz

Korczak

Jan

Karski

Father

Marceli

Godlewski

Zofia

Kossak-

Szczucka

Jan &

Antonina

Zabinski Józef & Wiktoria

Ulma

JÓZEF (1900-42) & WIKTORIA (1912-42) ULMA

Rzeszów

Markowa

Despite the fact that the

occupying German Army

executed Poles who gave shelter to

Jews, they hid eight Jewish people

in the attic of their home for over

a year. On 24th March 1944, after

this act of rescue was reported to

the local Gestapo by a vindictive,

antisemitic neighbour, they were

shot, along with their six children

and the hidden Jews.

Józef and Wiktoria Ulma lived in Markowa, in the

Podkarpackie Province, in the south east of Poland.


The Ulmas were farmers who lived in a remote part of the countryside.

They produced a wide range of vegetables and nuts and kept many

beehives as well as silkworms. Józef was very active in the local

community, but his biggest passion was photography. Consequently, there

are many images of life on the Ulma farm before and during the war.


By the summer of 1942 most of Markowa’s 1000 Jews

had either been shot by German death squads or were

deported to Bełżec extermination camp. From July the

Germans led hunts in the surrounding forests to search

for any Jews who were hiding there. For the few who

remained the only option was to hope that a friendly

Polish family would agree to offer them shelter. One

such family was the Goldmans. They had previously

leant their home to a Polish policeman called

Włodzimierz Leś in return for supplies, but Leś deceived

the family and claimed the property for himself.

One evening in the autumn of 1942, Saul, the father of

the family, arrived at the farm with his four sons. He had

known the Ulmas before the war and knew them to be

humane principled people. Józef agreed to offer them

shelter in their attic. A few weeks later they were joined

by Saul’s two daughters and a granddaughter.


A neighbour, Stanislaw Niemczak, testified after the war that - “They stayed on the premises and slept in the attic of the house...

They never hid in particular, since all of them were busy helping to run the farm. They helped in tanning animal hides and chopped

wood from the nearby forest for fuel.” This went on for over a year. Józef even photographed them at work (above).

But this act of rescue was tragically brought to an end on March 24th 1944…


The Goldman family contacted Włodzimierz Leś, who had taken up residence in

their home, to request that he at least return some of their property. Instead of

agreeing to this request, Leś responded by reporting the Ulma family to the local

German authorities. Consequently, German police came to Markowa, found the

Jews on the Ulma farm and executed them.

Afterwards they summoned the entire Ulma family to stand beside their murdered

guests and they too were shot - Józef, Wiktoria, who was seven months pregnant, and

their children - Stanislawa, Barbara, Wladyslawa, Franciszka, Maria, and Antoni.


The German’s brought local people to see the bodies in order to warn other

family’s who were sheltering Jews of the consequences of being caught.

News of the Ulma atrocity spread fear amongst the local population and

there is evidence that this terror-tactic had a profound and tragic effect on

the population. Yehuda Erlich, a Jewish man who was hiding in a village a

couple of miles from Markowa, wrote after the war - “Searches were

conducted both by the Germans and the Polish peasants themselves, who

wanted to find the hiding Jews. In spring 1944 a Jewish family (the Goldmans)

was discovered hiding with Polish peasants (the Ulmas). The Polish family –

eight souls, including the pregnant wife – was killed with the hiding Jews. As

a result, there was enormous panic among the Polish peasants who were

hiding Jews. In the days after these murders the bodies of 24 other Jews

were discovered in the fields - they had been murdered by the peasants who

had been sheltering them for the past two years”.

The fact that rescuers could so quickly become murderers illustrates how terrified the local population were of the

German authorities – they decided that the only certain way of hiding the fact that they had been sheltering Jews was

to silence the very people they had been hiding and anonymously leave their remains in a field. But many other

family’s in Markowa and the surroundings continued to shelter the Jews.

A monument to the Ulma Family in Markowa


A museum in honour of the Ulmas and other Polish rescuers in the region,

opened in 2016. It teaches about the compassionate and self-sacrificing rescuers

who helped Jews during World War II, as well as the more shameful aspects of

Polish-Jewish relations during German occupation. The aim of this museum is

to promote honest dialogue and mutual respect against the background of the

tragic events experienced by Poland and Europe during World War II.

The Ulma family are recognised as Righteous Among the Nations by Yad

Vashem and there is a process underway to have Józef and Wiktoria

recognised as saints by The Vatican. In March each year the museum in

Markowa marks the National Day of Remembrance of Poles who saved

Jews from the Holocaust during World War Two.

stories of polish resistance - learning from the righteous€¦ · the holocaust were polish. in...

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