77th Anniversary of the “Żegota” Council to Aid Jews
“At the beginning, it was an intuitive scenario, created by a mother’s love for her child – my mother. Later, it was a chain of salvation. The few links in the salvation chain were visible to the rescued child. I heard about a few other, several years later. I will never know about others. But each link was necessary. The chain was never broken”.
– Katarzyna Meloch1.
Seventy-seven years ago, on 4th December 1942, “Żegota” Council to Aid Jews was established as the only state underground organisation, in occupied Europe, established with the aim of saving Jews. It continued the work of Provisional Committee to Aid Jews, which had been established on 27th September 1942 by the Government Delegation for Poland, through Zofia Kossak and Wanda Krahelska-Filipowiczowa. The help provided by “Żegota” consisted mainly of financial support, organising hiding-places and arranging false papers for Jewish children and adults in ghettoes and in the “Aryan side”.
Władysław Bartoszewski wrote:
“It was the first organisation in which Zionists, Bundists, Catholics, Polish democrats, Polish socialists and peasants – Poles and Jews – sat together at the same table in a conspiracy against Germany”.
» Read: the story of the “Żegota” Council to Aid Jews
For several years, to mark the occasion of “Żegotya’s” establishment, POLIN Museum has conducted educational events for young people. Initially, the guest of honour at these events was Władysław Bartoszewski, a member of “Żegota” and from 2015, the young people have met with Elżbieta Ficowska who, in 1942, as a child, was rescued from the Warsaw Ghetto.
An Educational Event of POLIN Museum
This year, POLIN Museum invited Katarzyna Meloch, a Holocaust Survivor, who survived the War with the help of Jadwiga Deneko (1912–1944), together with “Żegota”. The event took place with the participation of over 100 students from Warsaw primary and secondary schools, as well as primary school students from Kamionki (Wielkopolskie Province) where, only a few weeks ago, the school had decided to accept, as its patron, a Righteous Among the Nations. The meeting with Katarzyna Meloch was preceded by workshops of POLIN Museum’s Education Centre, during which students were told about her story.
Finially, all participants, together with POLIN’s Acting Director Zygmunt Stępiński, laid flowers of the “Żegota” monument, located near the entrance to Museum.
» Read: Katarzyna Meloch’s Story
The event was organised as part of POLIN Museum’s “Polish Righteous – Restoring Memory” project, together with the Museum’s Education Centre. We invite all to future meetings with the witnesses to history »
1 Katarzyna Meloch, Scenariusz mego ocalenia wymyśliła Matka [w] Kontury. Wybór prozy i poezji autorów piszących po polsku w Izraelu, Tel Aviv 1988, p. 23.
