As part of assisting the Żegota – the Polish Council to Aid Jews, the Koźmiński family harboured three Jews beginning in September, 1942. One of them, a man named Roman Kon, supported himself by working as a watchmaker. While on a run to the ghetto to obtain some watch parts for Kon, the nineteen-year-old Jerzy met the Glazer family, who asked him for help.
The Koźmińskis decided to hide the Glazers in a house they rented explicitly for this purpose in the Warsaw suburb of Wawer, where they moved in 1943. One of Jerzy’s runs coincided with the outbreak of the uprising in the ghetto. He was fortunate to get out, but before he did, he first made sure to help the Schliferstein brothers.
Next, he helped his stepmother Teresa move the members of the Glazer, Kryszek, Sejfman and Chwat families to the Wawer safehouse. Jerzy also led four people to a bunker at the address Hoża 38. He remembers how hard it was to keep a group of 14 to 22 people quiet, let alone invisible. Jerzy was also active in the ZWZ. When he was caught and interrogated at the Pawiak facility, he did not give up any information on anybody. He was sent to Auschwitz, and from there to Mauthausen. He survived.
After the liberation, he returned to Łódź, where he met up with the people from Wawer. In 1964, the Glazers invited Jerzy’s stepmother, Teresa, to stay with them in Israel. There, she got married again and converted to Judaism. To this day, Jerzy participates in workshops with Jewish youth groups.
