Wartime Rescue of Jews by the Polish Catholic Clergy

As the situation steadily worsened, the Schorrs decided to send Sophie away to safety. With … [Show more]the help of his friend Franciszek Bajer, a young Catholic priest, Otto managed to obtain Christian birth certificates for Sophie and Mary. Sophie Schorr-Reiner later wrote that Bajer became the family’s “guardian angel,” helping them continually throughout their trials.

The Schorrs then approached their acquaintance Artur Bukartyk, a local district attorney, to help them find a family that would agree to shelter Sophie, who was now 15 years old. Bukartyk himself had been adopted into a family as an infant, and his sister, Romana (Roma) Iżycka-Fedorska, agreed to take in Sophie. Roma lived in Lwów, and as a social worker before the war was now deprived of work. She was in her late forties, newly married to Witold Fedorski and supporting both her daughter and her mother. Fearing the antisemitism of some of her family members, Roma told them that Sophie was the daughter of an imprisoned Polish officer, and that her mother had been threatened by Ukrainians and had sent Sophie away. A few months later, Mary appeared at the Fedorskis’ doorstep. Sheltering both Mary and Sophie would have been tremendously risky, because despite the similarities in their looks, they had different names according to their “Aryan papers,” and the Germans often carried out surprise checks in the area. Roma decided to find Sophie another place to stay. She placed her on a train to Kraków, then to Ojców, where the daughter of Romana’s friends, Joanna Morawska, lived. Sophie was presented to Morawska as a Catholic girl, and remained with her until late 1944.
Meanwhile, Otto was in a labor camp in Załoszce, but his job as a physician gained him permission to treat patients outside the camp because of the shortage of medical professionals in town. During such a trip one day in 1942, someone told him that the camp was to be liquidated, and warned him not to return. He escaped to the woods and made contact with Bajer, who prevailed upon Maria Szawłowska, the Schorrs’ former landlady, to harbor him. Schorr was hidden in Szawłowska’s attic, a small triangular space where Schorr could only sit or lie down. He stayed there for a year, with Szawłowska bringing him food twice a day and changing the slop bucket every day. Bajer provided Schorr with constant moral support, and encouraged Szawłowska to continue her good “Christian deeds.” At the end of the war, Otto had to learn to walk anew as the severely constricted space had damaged his legs.

After liberation, the family reunited and left Poland, first for Munich, where Sophie obtained a degree in medicine, and then to the US, where they settled in upstate New York. They stayed in touch with the Fedorskis, and Roma’s daughter visited them in their new home.
The assistance to Jews provided by Rev. Franciszek Bajer is described by the owner of the house in which the priest lived with his widowed mother. (The following account of Wiktoria Procyk, dated February 17, 1996, is in the author’s possession.)
I know for certain that Father Franciszek [Bajer] helped Jews. Perhaps I will begin with Chaja or Chajka, a Jewess who lived in the Old Town and owned a small general store. … The winter of 1943–1944 was terrible. The ghetto in Załoźce was already liquidated and the remainder of the Jews, who were not hiding with Poles, wandered through the forests where they were preyed upon by Ukrainian peasants with pitchforks, or the terrible butchers from the UPA [Ukrainian Insurgent Army], or the Ukrainian auxiliary police. Those caught were killed on the spot.

It was on such a night, when one would not turn out a dog, that someone knocked on our window. It was Chaja together with two of her daughters, Ryfcia and Gitla. One of them was about twelve years old; the other younger. They were frozen to the bone, in dire poverty, hungry and covered with lice. The priest took them in and hid them in the attic and later in a special shelter in the cellar. In doing so he risked his own life, the life of his [widowed] mother, and my life as well as that of my son and my two daughters. I agreed to this—commending my soul to God. [The home in question belonged to the narrator.] Our entire family would recite the rosary on a daily basis with the priest and pray that the Virgin Mary would protect us from Ukrainian denouncers and also that she would protect Chaja and her children. The Most Holy Mother heard our prayers and all three Jewesses survived. After the Soviets arrived, Father Franciszek provided them with false birth certificates so they could pass for Polish women. They left the Soviet paradise and came to Poland. They lived for a while in Bytom and later immigrated to the United States.

I know for certain that earlier Father Bajer had issued such certificates to many other Jews, especially young Jewish women, who then voluntarily, under false names, registered for work in Germany. …

… On many occasions I opened the front door at night to allow in persons who were very obviously Jewish. …

… When the numbers got too large, some of these Jews were directed to the pastor of the neighbouring parish in Kokutkowce who also issued such certificates to Jews.
Rev. Jan Dziuban, pastor of Barysz near Buczacz, Tarnopol voivodship, assisted the family of Dr. Max Anderman to survive the war. (Gutman and Bender, The Encyclopedia of the Righteous Among the Nations, volume 4: Poland, Part 2, pp.537–38.)
Dr. Max Anderman was of one of the few Jewish physicians in Buczacz, Eastern Galicia, who was allowed to practice outside the ghetto after the German occupation began. This came about because of the intercession of Dr. Anderman’s Ukrainian friend, the district physician, Dr. Banach. In the course of 1942, as the danger facing the Jews in this city mounted, Banach arranged a special work permit for Anderman in Barysz, a large village near Buczacz, where he served a rural population of Ukrainians and Poles. Dr. Anderman, who moved to the village with his family, established friendly relations with priests in the area—especially the Polish Catholic priest [Jan] Dziuban. When the Jewish community in Buczacz was liquidated. Dr. Anderman realized that his family would face the same bitter fare and, on Father Dziuban’s recommendation, turned to Franciszek Najbar and asked him to arrange shelter for himself, his wife, and their four-year-old son. After Franciszek consulted with his wife, Maria, the Najbars young peasants who owned a modest farmstead, agreed to accommodate the Jewish refugees in their loft. When Anderman asked how he could reward them, they answered that if the Germans discovered them they would share the same fate and if they survived they would discuss a reward at an appropriate time. The Najbars took in the Andermans unconditionally and concealed them for ten months despite the danger. They met all their wards’ needs and Maria, who had a young child of her own, provided the Andermans’ young son with the daily milk ration that he required. In the spring of 1944, the Red Army liberated Buczacz and the Andermans returned to their home. The Najbars sought no remuneration for their act of rescue, which they undertook out of virtue and humanitarianism. When Ukrainian nationalists burned the Najbars’ house after the war, the Andermans came to their rescuers’ assistance and accommodated them in their own home. Later, the two families—independently of each other—moved to Wroclaw [Wrocław] (within Poland’s new borders) … after the Andermans immigrated to Israel.
A number of Jews from Buczacz and other nearby localities took refuge in Puźniki, a Polish village in a largely Ukrainian area which was inhabited by about 1,000 Poles. The local pastor, Rev. Kazimierz Słupski, sheltered several Jews and helped many others. Rozalia Bauer, a Jewish pharmacist from Buczacz, who was passing as Teresa Krzyżanowska, stayed in the presbytery for more than three years without any remuneration. For part of this period the Germans installed an officers’ school on the ground floor of the presbytery, thus making the rescue more precarious. Some Franciscan Sisters of the Family of Mary also resided in the presbytery, and whenever the danger heightened, Mrs. Bauer would put on a nun’s robe. Rev. Słupski also provided a hiding place for Adolf Korngut, a high school teacher from Buczacz.³⁷⁴ Rev. Słupski approached trusted parishioners to take Jews into their care. Dr. Bernard Seifer from Buczacz, who was sheltered by the Kret family in the village of Gutyszyna, also frequented the presbytery. Jews living in the forest would often come to the presbytery, where they were fed by the nuns and given food to take away with them. (Bartoszewski and Lewin, Righteous Among Nations, pp.337–39.)
During the war I administered the parish of Puźniki (Buczacz County) … Being an eye-witness of the Gehenna of the Jewish people in the land along the Dniestr River during the anti-Jewish action, I not only felt a deep sympathy for the Jews but also tried to alleviate their sufferings and ordeal as much as I could. I approached my trusted parishioners with a request to take Jews into [their] safekeeping. I also kept Jews at my presbytery. Thus, when visiting a chemist’s in Buczacz, while buying medicines for partisan fighters, I made the acquaintance of Mrs Rozalia Bauer, a Jewish pharmacist, who asked me to find a hiding place for her among my parishioners. Before I could arrange for a safe place, she knocked at my door in the Puźniki presbytery one night in October [1941] and asked for shelter there and then. A harsh anti-Jewish action [Aktion] was on in Buczacz at the time in which Jews perished. I admitted her without hesitation. I could not do otherwise. She stayed with me for more than three years, until the Red Army came in 1945 [sic, 1944]. There was no fee, of course. There were nuns from the Congregation of the Family of Mary at my presbytery. Whenever the situation was dangerous Mrs. Bauer donned a nun’s frock. There were many dangerous moments over the year, especially when, for a certain period, the Germans installed their officers’ school on the ground floor of the presbytery. Spies and informants were rampant, too. At the most dangerous moments I always made it a point to face the danger dauntlessly. I would lead Sister Rozalia, broom in hand, to do some cleaning in the church. On one dangerous occasion, seeing the peril which constantly hung over my head (for providing a haven for Jews), the woman wanted to give herself up into German hands out of her own volition. I refused categorically. I reminded her then that I was an instrument in the hands of the Lord though which He meant to save her. And so it was. She stayed with me happily until the end.

I also provided a hiding place for Mr Adolf Korngut at the presbytery, a philologist and professor in a Buczacz secondary school. He was of Jewish extraction and, as we know, the Nazis did not fail to murder such people either. When ‘Jewish actions’ in Buczacz were intensified, the professor fled to Puźniki and found refuge in a small room next to my dormitory. During hunts for Jews and various searching operations, he went down to a shelter under the staircase. A Nazi major had his quarters in a ground floor room underneath Professor Korngut’s. He often drank too much, and one night, quite drunk, he fired his pistol into the ceiling. The bullet pierced through the bed on which Mr Korngut was sleeping, but luckily did not wound him. Doctor Seifert [Bernard Seifer], a Jewish specialist in internal diseases from Buczacz, also frequented my presbytery. He had his retreat with the Kret family in my parish, near the woods, at a place called Gotyszyn [Gutyszyna]. Very frequently and covertly, other Jews from the woods would come to the presbytery, including children. There, they were fed by our Sisters and provided with bread and other food for their return way, while Mrs Rozalia Bauer dressed their wounds and dispensed medicines.

There were frequent searches for Jews in the village. My parishioner from Zalesie near Monasterzyska, Jan Baszczij, former head of the hamlet, kept Jews from the Buczacz Judenrat at his home. They approached him when the final action was about to begin and they were next on the list for extermination. He prepared a hideout dug under the house for them. His house stood out of the way near a creek. Alas, when the Jews became inured to their situation they started venturing into the yard by daylight. Mr Baszczij also kept buying poultry for them in the village. That reckless behaviour gave rise to suspicion among local Ukrainian nationals who began to watch Baszczij’s farmstead. The hiding Jews were spotted and given away by Ukrainians: they called the Ukrainian police who arrested the Jews and extradited them to the Germans in Monasterzyska. Jan Baszczij was also arrested and transported to a jail in Czortków. The Ukrainian police took a rich booty—several sackfuls of gold. Jews from the Judenrat were very rich. A death sentence loomed over Baszczij’s head. I succeeded in rescuing him through a person who was very influential with the Germans (in Czortków). Alas, he perished at a later date at the hands of Ukrainian nationalists, all the same.
Rev. Słupski urged his parishioners to help those in need. Confirmation of his caring attitude is found in several testimonies. Antonina Działoszyńska, a very poor widow with two young children, sheltered fugitives from Tłumacz: Adela Krum, who pretended to be the wife of an imprisoned Polish officer from Buczacz named Kowalik; and her young daughter, Mira, who went by the name Marysia (later Mira Ledowski). They had been moving from village to village begging for food and sometimes hid in forests before arriving in Puźniki. Mira recalled that Działoszyńska invited them into her small cottage near the church in April 1944. “She sat us by the table, and there we saw the seventh, eighth and ninth wonder of the world—a huge bowl of steaming hot potatoes. We hadn’t seen hot food for a long time. After the meal my mother thanked her and wanted to leave, but Mrs. Działoszyńska insisted on us staying, and we finally slept amongst people, and not under the earth.” A devout Catholic, Działoszyńska believed that the Blessed Virgin Mary had protected the Jewish mother and her child and brought them to her home, so she had a duty to protect them from misfortune. She turned to Rev. Słupski to arrange for false documents for her charges. They lived openly, not in hiding, posing as relatives of the Działoszyńskis. When German troops were stationed in Puźniki in July 1944, the Krums stayed for several weeks with Działoszyńska sister, Maria Komarnicka, who lived in a nearby hamlet.³⁷⁵
Renata Tannenzapf (later Renate Krakauer), who was born in Stanisławów in 1941, was entrusted by her parents into the care of a villager by the name of Maria (Marynia) Koryzna. Her parents, Charlotte and Wilhelm (William) Tannenzapf, came to Puźniki later to join their daughter. They were sheltered by Joanna (Joasia) Krowicka, in a neighbouring cottage.³⁷⁶ Renata lived in the village openly, and Rev. Słupski was aware she was Jewish. (William Tannenzapf and Renate Krakauer, Memories from the Abyss / But I Had a Happy Childhood [Toronto: Azrieli Foundation, 2009], pp.113–16.)
Once outside the ghetto walls, my mother ripped off her blue-and-white Star of David arm band and ran down the cobblestone street [of Stanisławów], fully expecting a bullet in the back. By this time I was well trained to be quiet. … We reached the safety of the apartment of a former neighbour, who pulled us in quickly, no doubt fearing for her life. That night I was nestled in between my mother and Pani (Mrs.) Poliszowa on her bed.

My happiness didn’t last long. The next day, my mother handed me over to Józia, who had been a maid in her brother’s house, to take me to her widowed sister in Pozniki [Puźniki], a neighbouring village. Marynia and her two young sons were my new family for the next eighteen months. With my blond hair, blue eyes and button nose, I fit in easily as the baby sister. Suffering from malnutrition and one childhood illness after another, it took a while for me to become a healthy normal toddler.

Marynia treated me like her baby girl and I even began to call her Mama. I can imagine that her two boys, aged six and three, must have felt some resentment at this little Jewish impostor suddenly parachuted into their poor little home. But in the same way that my own preschool daughter used to trail her adored older brother, I can see myself following the boys around, perhaps to their annoyance, on my newly sturdy legs. They knew I was Jewish. …. the boys soon began to show their affection for me. The first and last serving in the communal bowl on the table was always reserved for me whether it was potatoes, pierogi or cabbage soup. At night they squeezed over on the bed they shared to make room for their new “little sister,” Tusia. I’m sure that it made the little boys feel important to be my protectors. They could have but didn’t betray me to the Nazis and Ukrainians who came on regular inspections of the village. And on Sundays, I can see us all trooping off to church as a family, the cute little blond girl holding the hand of each brother. The priest knew I was Jewish, and people found out after the war that he had been hiding a Jewish woman.

Unbeknownst to me, both my parents had escaped to the village before the ghetto was liquidated, one hidden in Marynia’s hayloft and the other in the attic of her neighbour [Joasia] on the other side of the creek. From their vantage points, they were able to see me through the cracks, running around barefoot all summer ….

There was great animosity between the Polish and Ukrainian people in this part of Poland. The Ukrainians had nationalist aspirations and had allied themselves with the Germans in the war. This left the Poles to face two enemies—the Nazis and their Ukrainian neighbours. One day [in September 1943] Ukrainians from a neighbouring village attacked Pozniki, which was a Polish village, by torching the straw roofs. All the homes went up in flames except Marynia’s. How was this one cottage spared? The peasants must have muttered and whispered that it was some kind of Jewish black magic.

The village priest knew that his people were frightened, uneducated and superstitious. … But the priest also believed that they were God-fearing people, so on the following Sunday he preached about the protective hand of the Lord, who shields the innocent from danger. Anyone who betrayed an innocent was courting the wrath of God. The villagers understood that the veiled reference to the Jewish child hidden among them and they kept silent.
A number of other Poles from Puźniki came to the assistance of Jews. The Koryzna family, consisting of Stanisław, his wife, Wiktoria, and their four children, rescued Shoshana Lederer (born in 1941 Rojza Szechner, known as Róża). This child’s presence was also known to Rev. Słupski. The Koryznas’ neighbour, Jędrzej Łacina, rescued a Jewish woman named Blima and her daughter, Bela. The rescue effort of the Komidzierski family, who hid Blima’s husband, ended in tragedy when the Germans found the hiding place and shot him as he was trying to escape.³⁷⁷ More than 100 Poles were murdered by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army in their attack on Puźniki on February 13, 1945.³⁷⁸
The Franciscan Sisters of the Family of Mary, who had a small convent in Puźniki, came to the assistance of Basia Geler Mandel, a fugitive from nearby Buczacz. (Elaine Landau, Holocaust Memories: Speaking the Truth in Their Own Words [New York: F. Watts, 2001], pp.31–32.)
Basia and [her fiancé] Meier hid in the woods for another five month. They knew that they could be captured or killed at any time. The couple agreed that if they were discovered and had to separate to escape, they would meet up at a specific bunker in the former Jewish ghetto [in Buczacz]. They hoped that by then it would be safe to back. The Nazi presence there was likely to have diminished since the ghetto had been cleared out. Eventually, their plan was put into action.

“We were spotted again and shot at. We had to run in different directions. I lost my balance on a steep cliff and rolled down it. I landed near a lake and hid behind some bushes. I stayed there until it was night. I did not know where to go. I was completely lost, and it had started to rain. I was drenched, but I kept on walking. I saw a church. I was desperate, so I took a chance and knocked on the door.

Some nuns answered it. They looked at me and knew I was Jewish, but they decided to help me. They took me in that rainy night and hid me for nearly a week. This placed them at great risk, and they were afraid to let me stay longer. The nuns dressed me in a nun’s habit before I left and pointed me in the direction of the old Jewish ghetto. I had to make it back. If Meier was still alive, I would find him there. …

As I walked, I carried a crucifix the nuns had given me. … I made it back to the bunker where I was supposed to meet Meier. He was there waiting for me. There were also others hiding there. … There were fifteen of us in that bunker. One was a year-and-a-half-old girl. All of us survived …”

Ewa Trauenstein (later Turzyńska) and her son, Leon, were sheltered in Tarnopol voivodship successively by three Polish priests: Rev. Mikołaj Ferenc, a Capuchin until 1943 and administrator of the Roman Catholic parish in the village of Markowa, in the county of Podhajce, until that village was attacked by Ukrainian nationalists in January 1944 and Rev. Ferenc was killed together with 56 Polish villagers; Rev. Antoni Kania, the pastor of Huta Nowa, near the town of Monasterzyska, in the county of Buczacz; and Rev. Grabowski, with whom they stayed briefly, in a nearby village, until the arrival of the Red Army. Rev. Kania, a Home Army chaplain, found hiding places for several Jews, among them Dr. Leon (Leizor) Bandler from Monasterzyska, who posed as the village wagon driver in Huta Nowa. Dr. Bandler settled in Wrocław after the war. Yad Vashem recognized Reverends Ferenc and Kania as Righteous Among Nations in 2013.³⁷⁹ (Mikołaj Ferenc, The Righteous Database, Yad Vashem, Internet: .)
Ewa Grus was born in 1913 and given up for adoption. Her new parents, Leon and Gustawa Segal, named her Lusia and took her to live with them in Rozwadów. They loved her very much and took care of her every need. When she finished her studies, she joined her father, Leon, working in his pharmacy. In 1933 she married Moshe Trauenstein, who was much older than she was. In 1935 they had a son whom they named Leon, in honor of Lusia’s by then deceased adoptive father.

When they learned that the Germans were about to bomb Rozwadów, … [Show more]Lusia and her mother, husband, and son ran away eastward with other Jews escaping the city. They tried to live in Lwów (today Lviv) for a while, attempting to live normally: Lusia worked in a pharmacy, and Moshe sometimes brought milk and potatoes from a friendly farmer in Zimna Woda.

Eventually life in Lwów became difficult, and the family wandered on. They moved to Gustawa’s relatives in Różyszcze [Rożyszcze]. Again Lusia found a job in a pharmacy. …

Moshe Trauenstein, Lusia’s husband, volunteered for the Judenrat (Jewish council), which soon ran into difficulties that resulted in all of its members being shot. Lusia decided she would not return to the ghetto, and she had her mother and son hide in the basement of the pharmacy. …

One day the officer returned and said that the family had to leave town. He provided them with identity papers and money but told them they had to find their own transportation. After he left, a woman Lusia recognized from the period of Russian occupation walked in. Her name was Leokadia Krajewska, and when Lusia shared her concerns, Krajewska promised to try to find transportation for her and her family, which she managed to do. Her brother, Edmund Krajewski, came to drive the Segal-Tauersteins [sic] to safety. The Krajewskis also gave them some money and took Lusia’s real papers for safekeeping.

Again they tried their luck in Lwów, but things did not work out for them there. Lusia went to Markowa to try to find Mikołaj Ferenc, a local priest who had promised her husband that one day he would help him out. Ferenc agreed to help, and Lusia and her son stayed in his house. Lusia’s adoptive mother, Gustawa, passed away during this period. Lusia and Leon spent about seven months in Ferenc’s house. Lusia helped around the house, and Leon tried his best as well.
In January 1944 Banderovists [Bandera followers] (members of the military wing of the Organization of Ukranian Nationalists) came into Markowa and murdered all the men, including Ferenc. It was then up to Lusia and Leon to find a new place to hide. They passed through several houses where people put them up until the Nazis came hunting for Jews. …

The next stop on the grueling journey was Nowa Huta and the home of Antoni Kania, a priest. Kania knew Lusia and Leon were Jewish, but he took them in anyway. The house was full of people who had escaped the destroyed village, and there was much housework to be done. Life was difficult, but it went on. Leon’s legs healed. Lusia decided she would go to Lwów to see about her papers. Kania put her in touch with a Jewish doctor he had helped previously. The doctor [Dr. Leon Bandler] aided her in moving about safely. She managed to find Leokadia Krajewska, who was living in her barn because her house had been burned down. When the house burned, Leokadia had kept Lusia’s papers on her body, thereby rescuing them from the fire. The reunion was joyful and full of memories, but there was still the question of getting back to Rozwadów. Fortunately, a Soviet officer who had a venereal disease struck a deal with Lusia—she would help him take care of his health, and he would provide fake documents for her and her son to get to Rozwadów. Lusia and Leon arrived there safe and sound and survived the remaining weeks of the war.
Rev. Stanisław Mazak, the pastor of Szczurowice parish near Radziechów, in Tarnopol voivodship, from December 1941, helped Jews and encouraged his parishioners to extend aid to them. He was personally instrumental in saving the lives of several Jews. Rev. Mazak was recognized by Yad Vashem as a Righteous Gentile.³⁸⁰ (Gutman and Bender, The Encyclopedia of the Righteous Among the Nations, volume 4: Poland, Part 1, p.500.)
Stanislaw [Stanisław] Mazak, a Roman Catholic priest, was the spirit behind the campaign to save a group of Jews from the village of Szczurowice in Radziechow [Radziechów] county, Tarnopol district. In his sermons in the local church, Father Mazak would call upon the faithful to take part in saving the persecuted, trying to convince them to do what they could, even at the cost of self-sacrifice. And indeed, the much-admired Father Mazak’s flock responded to his appeal and extended its assistance to the Jews hiding in the area. Under Father Mazak’s influence, even farmers who did not personally hide Jews in their homes volunteered to help them, providing food and keeping their hiding places secret from their Ukrainian nationalist neighbors. Mazak himself visited the hiding places, cheering up the Jewish fugitives and providing them with medicine as needed, all without asking for or receiving anything in return. In one case, the priest provided Scharlota Weksler [Wechsler] and her son with Aryan papers, accompanied them to Cracow [Kraków], and after learning that the mother had been sent to forced labor to Germany moved her son to a Catholic children’s home in Warsaw, where his life was saved. In early 1944, Ukrainian collaborators learned of Father Mazak’s efforts to save Jews and sentenced him to death. After he was warned of the danger to his life, the priest managed to flee from his village. He hid out in the nearby city of Lopatyn [Łopatyn] and after the war moved to Upper Silesia.
Rev. Stanisław Mazak is also mentioned in the rescue of Mendel Friedman, and his son Izaak, and Klara Kart, and her son Aleks by the Marciszczuk family, who lived in a village near Szczurowice. The Marciszczuk’s son Piotr recalled (“The Marciszczuk Family,” The Polish Righteous, Internet: ):
“During one round-up, a few people were able to escape to the woods. We learned that they were near our house. Father began taking food out to them in the evenings.

“One day, somebody knocked on our window. It was a group of Jews—people my father was acquainted with.” Mendel Friedman, his son Izaak, Klara Hart, and her five- or six-year old daughter asked the Marciszczuks for shelter.  “Our family expanded,” writes Piotr.

The Germans were spreading fear. “They often drove by to ask whether we were hiding Jews. ‘If we find any, then you’re all going to the grave along with them,’” They threatened. Fortunately, they didn’t search the house. Had they done so, they would easily have found what they were looking for: “at that time, the Jews were staying in the attic (right over the Germans’ heads), because we hadn’t prepared a proper shelter, yet.”

After these visits, an underground shelter was constructed. The situation remained precarious, however: a portion of the Ukrainian population became engaged in hunting Jews (“so as to loot their possessions and kill them off”).

Fifteen-year-old Piotr Marciszczuk served as a courier between those in hiding and a Roman Catholic priest named Mazak. Among other things, he conveyed information and news. “We all rejoiced at any adversity the Germans faced.” But just before the liberation, tragedy struck. The Marciszczuk’s home was burned to the ground … by Jews.

It was an accident. Someone knocked a lamp over in the shelter. The kerosene spilled, a fire broke out. Those inside managed to escape but “everything burned down.” All they were able to salvage was a pig and a horse. The Marciszczuks received assistance from family and from the priest. “Whatever father was able to obtain, he shared with the Jews [we were hiding].”

The Russians soon arrived on the scene, but not before Ukrainian nationalists had a chance to exact revenge upon the Marciszczuks. To punish them for hiding Jews, they killed Piotr’s father. The rest of the family, together with the Harts and Friedmans, took refuge in Łopatyn, which was already under Red Army control. For everyone involved, it was the start of a long journey. The Jewish families emigrated to America. The Marciszczuks, meanwhile, left for the so-called Recovered Territories of Poland.
In total, in addition to Rev. Mazak, five Polish families from Szczurowice were recognized as “Righteous Gentiles” by Yad Vashem: Bednarczyk, Jaśkiewicz, Łukasiewicz, Marciszczuk, and Miniewski.³⁸¹ Franciszka Łukasiewicz, one of those awarded, also recalled the encouragement and assistance she received from Rev. Mazak in sheltering the Sterling family.³⁸²
Michał Czuba, a seminarian from the town of Radziechów, in Tarnopol voidvodship, helped the Wajsman family to survive the war. He was awarded by Yad Vashem. (Gutman and Bender, The Encyclopedia of the Righteous Among the Nations, volume 4: Poland, Part 1, p.161.)
In 1941, the Wajsmans, their two sons, and their daughters, Helen and Ziona, escaped from Lwow [Lwów] to the town of Radziechow [Radziechów] in the Tarnopol district, where they were interned in the local ghetto. At her parents’ initiative, 13-year-old Ziona escaped from the ghetto and found shelter with peasants in the surrounding villages. A few months later, however, the Germans raided the area and Ziona had to be moved to another village. Although Ziona had Aryan papers, the local peasants were afraid to hide her and took her back to the deserted ghetto. Not knowing what to do Ziona made her way to the home of Polish acquaintances, where to her enormous surprise she came across her mother and sister, who were hiding there too. Although the hiding place was designed for one person only, room was made for Ziona, and later also for the girls’ father. Although the Polish landlord feared for his life, Michal [Michał] Czuba, the landlady’s brother and a graduate of a seminary, persuaded him to let them stay. Czuba himself took responsibility for looking after the Jewish fugitives and saw to their needs during the ten months of their stay. Although the Wajsmans paid his family for their upkeep, Czuba himself refused to take a cent. With the advance of the Soviets in 1944, all Poles were ordered to leave the area, but Czuba, disregarding the danger, stayed behind in order to look after the Wajsmans. When the Germans converted the house into a military post office, the Jews found a new hiding place in the deserted ghetto, where they stayed with Czuba until the Red Army liberated the town. After the war the Wajsmans emigrated.
The brother of Feiga Pfeffer was sheltered in a priest’s house in Przemyślany, in Tarnopol voivodship, for several months after his escape from a train transporting Jews to Bełżec. The priest, who was afraid to keep him longer, gave him some money when he left.³⁸³
Władysław Szela and his wife, from the town of Dunajów near Przemyślany, obtained a false birth certificate from the local Catholic pastor, Rev. Kazimierz Łoziński, for 7-year-old Janina, the Jewish girl whom they were sheltering. The Szelas subsequently moved with her to Lwów for about a year, and then to Czudec near Rzeszów. Janina survived the war. The account of Sender Szwalbenest is found in Bartoszewski and Lewin, Righteous Among Nations, at page 406.