The Polish History Museum receives the mementoes of Jan Karski

Maria Zawadzka, 16 November 2016
The mementoes of Jan Karski were handed over to the Polish History Museum by the Courier’s friend Kaja Marecka-Ploss. Among the objects is a copy of the first edition of the famous book „Story of a Secret State” by Jan Karski and a cross from the courier’s apartment.

These objects were handed over in Washington DC to the director of the Polish History Museum, Robert Kostro.

Apart from the book and the cross, the Museum has received numerous photographs depicting both Karski’s private life and his public activity.

The Polish History Museum has also received books of various authors with special dedications for Karski, among them a book given to him by Tadeusz Wittlin.

The Polish History Museum together with the Head Office of Training Schools in America is planning to conduct an educational project. Its main goal is to present the figure of Jan Karski to students from schools of the Polish community in the US.

Jan Karski (born Kozielewski) was born in Łódź in 1914. He graduated from the Faculty of Law and Diplomacy at the Jan Kazimierz University in Lwów. In November 1939 he reached Warsaw and started his underground activity.

Twice he went in secret to the Warsaw Ghetto, to document the dramatic situation of the Jews. To gather evidence proving the Nazi crimes, he entered a camp, which he then identified as the Bełżec death camp – later it turned out it was the transit camp in Izbica Lubelska.

In the end of 1942 Karski began his mission of informing the world about the structures of the Polish Underground State, the situation in Poland and the dramatic fate of the Jews. He met many Jewish, Polish and British politicians, journalists, writers and influential representatives of the public opinion.

In mid-1943 he left to the United States, where he presented his report to American politicians. In July he met the President of the United States Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

In 1944 in the US appeared the book “The Story of a Secret State”– autobiography of Karski from the time of the Nazi occupation. After the war he decided to stay in America.

In 1982 Jan Karski was awarded with the title of the Righteous Among the Nations, and in 1995 he was honored with the Order of the White Eagle. He was nominated to the Nobel Peace Prize. He died on July 13th, 2000 in Washington.

More about Jan Karski, Righteous Among the Nations: ”Polish Righteous”.