Vale Hanna Gałązka, née Skowronek (1933–2018)

Mateusz Szczepaniak / English translation: Andrew Rajcher, 9 November 2018
It is with deep sorrow that we advise of the passing of Hanna Gałązka (née Skowronek) in Warsaw on 5th November 2018. She passed away on her 85th birthday. She was a Righteous Among the Nations, honoured with the Knight's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta. Her funeral service will take place at 12 noon on Thursday 15th November at St. Karol Boromeusz Church on Powązkowska Street, following which she will be interred in her family's grave at the Powązkowski Cemetery.

She was a seamstress and had a good reputation. We saw her a couple of times in Biała Rawska, at my cousin's home, and so we had some connection with her. Later, she ended up in the local ghetto. It seemed that, as a woman with a small child, no one would harm her. In the end, she had to go into hiding. But, in a small-town environment, that was impossible. Afer all the attempts at finding refuge with someone, she came up with the brilliant idea that Warsaw was a city where one could lose oneself and go unnoticed. 

– recalled Hanna Gałązka (née Skowronek) in an interview for POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews.

During World War II,  Hanna Gałązka, together with her parents Stanisław (d. 1997) and Janina (d. 1996) Skowronek amd sister Basia (b. 1929), lived in Warsaw on Łucka Street and then at 64 Żelazna Street. When, in January 1943, the ghetto in Biała Rawska (Łódzkie Province) was liquidated, Zysla Kuperszmid and her daughter Hania fled to Warsaw and asked the Skowronek family for help. They gave her refuge – they stayed in the apartment on Żelazna Street until September 1944.

Read the story of the Skowronek Family »

On 4th June 1973,  in recognition of the help they offered, Stanisław and Janina Skowronek were honoured with the title of Righteous Among the Nations. Hanna Gałązka was also honoured with that title on 11th July 2001. Their story is told on our website through an interview given by Hanna Gałązka to POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews on 14th February 2009. Their story has also been included in our virtual exhibition The Right Address – Hiding Jews in Occupied Warsaw. 

Hanna Gałązka passed away in Warsaw on 5th November 2018 at the age of 85.