Irena Sendler
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
See www.irenasendler.org
Irena Sendler or Irena Sendlerowa (born February 15, 1910 at Otwock) was born to a Polish family living in a suburb of Warsaw.
Her father was a physician whose main clients were poor Jews. During the World War II German occupation of Poland, she lived in Warsaw while working for the city's Social Welfare Department. She started helping Jews from the time the Warsaw Ghetto was established. In December of 1942, the newly created Zegota, a council to aid Jews, nominated her to head its children's department. As an employee of the Social Welfare Department, she had a special permit to enter the Warsaw Ghetto, where she wore a Star of David.
She cooperated with the Children's Section of the Municipal Administration, linked with the RGO (Central Welfare Council), a Polish Relief Organization remaining under German supervision. She organized the smuggling of Jewish children from the Ghetto, carrying them out, and placing them with either Polish families, the Warsaw orphanage of the Sisters of the Family of Mary, or Catholic convents such as the Sisters Little Servants of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Mary at Turkowice and Chotomowo. She kept lists of the names, hidden in jars, in order to keep track of original and new identities.
Arrested in 1943 by the Gestapo, she was severely tortured and sentenced to death. Zegota saved her by bribing the German guards on the way to her execution. Officially, she was listed on public bulletin boards as among those executed. Even in hiding, she continued her work for the Jewish children.
In 1965, she was recognized by Yad Vashem as a Righteous Among the Nations, confirmed in 1983 by the Israeli Supreme Court.
On October 10, 2003, Sendlerowa received the Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest civilian decoration.
[edit] Bibliography
- Anna Mieszkowska, Die Mutter der Holocaust-Kinder, DVA 2006, ISBN 3-421-05912-8 [1]
- "Zegota: The Council to Aid Jews in Occupied Poland 1942-1945", Tomaszewski, Irene & Werblowski, Tecia, ISBN 1-896881-15-7, Price-Patterson
