"For a Jew hiding out on the 'Aryan side,' the frontline runs along the city’s streets and squares, although they are a long way from bullets and bombs... The frontline accompanies an escapee every step of the way, whether he stops in a store to buy some bread, or before a stall to buy a book, or in a gateway to tie up a loose shoelace, or finally on the stairs in front of a stranger’s door before he manages to run to the apartment which will swallow him up and which will give him shelter that day."
Szymon Gliksman
In her publication Such a Beautiful Sunny Day: Jews Seeking Refuge in the Polish Countryside 1942-1945 (Yad Vashem Publications, 2017), Prof. Barbara Engelking, an eminent scholar of the Holocaust in Poland, tells a story of Jewish struggle for survival in a complex landscape of fear, betrayal and death. In the latest volume (48: 1-2) of Yad Vashem Studies, which is now under the new editorial directorship of Dr. Sharon Kangisser-Cohen, Prof. Engelking looked at the lesser known phenomenon of Jews helping other Jews hide out on the "Aryan side" in Warsaw.
"After the liquidation of the Warsaw ghetto, a total of around 20,000 Jews were in hiding, for longer or shorter periods, on the city’s so-called 'Aryan side,'" explains Prof. Engelking. "Some of them had never moved into the ghetto; some had escaped by one way or another; and others had come to the capital counting on the fact that a large city would provide them with greater anonymity and thus increase their chances of survival. Survival was possible if you had a number of resources — and not just material ones, such as money and possessions to sell. Non-material resources included courage, determination, an awareness of danger and quick reactions; biological assets (a 'good appearance'); cultural basics, such as a very good command of Polish, and a knowledge of customs and the Catholic religion; and a social network, such as family, friends, and contacts. Survival did not depend on having all of these resources, or even most of them, but survivors’ accounts usually relate to a combination of some of them."
In her article, Prof. Engelking presents several stories of survival in Warsaw that focus on one of these resources listed; namely, social ties among Jews in hiding. The examples she brings are of Jews helping one another within the framework of spontaneous networks, unconnected with any institution or organization, and are based on ties linking family members, friends, or neighbors from one small town. They present self-sufficient Jewish help, which operated more or less without any Polish involvement — or, to be more precise, without any conscious Polish involvement. Poles may have played a passive role in Jewish activities – they rented out apartments, offered employment, and sold documents – yet they were often unaware that they were dealing with Jews. The Jews were the active ones seeking help, while the Poles were the passive ones who had access to resources needed for survival, which were often bought from them.
Many Jews in hiding assumed additional danger by helping their families, friends, and complete strangers, taking far greater risks than Poles who were helping Jews, since they were not being hunted on the streets by the shmaltsovniks (wartime extortionists).
Prof. Engelking's article shows how Jews hiding out in Warsaw handled a great many problems on their own, how much they helped one another, and just how much they did not fit the stereotype of passive victims.
In her testimony, for example, Madzia Teichner recalls a Jew from Krosno, Mosze Haftel, who, as Jan Krupiński, took advantage of his Aryan appearance and did not go into hiding. He was thus able to do a great deal of good for his fellow Jews, producing forged papers for them. It was that much easier for him, since he was also a printer by trade. Haftel not only made her forged documents, but then stayed in touch with Madzia, supporting and helping her at critical moments. After the outbreak of the Warsaw Uprising in 1944, he took Madzia, her young son Gabriel, and her friend Wanda Rozenberg to Kraków and then to Zakopane, where they sat out the occupation.
One of the more well-known illustrations of survival thanks to Jewish solidarity and mutual assistance is a group of over a dozen orphans aged between eight and sixteen who sold cigarettes on Trzech Krzyży Square. "Most of these children had been involved in smuggling into the ghetto beforehand, and they knew all the hiding and crossing places; they were independent, plucky, and knew how to run away fast," explains Prof. Engelking. "They got by in various ways, singing on the streetcars and on the street, buying and selling, peddling newspapers, vodka, moonshine, and anything they could to German soldiers going on leave."
The children met on the streets, recognized one another, and helped each other through difficult patches; they shared information about friendly people and safe houses. Over time Józef Zysman, who worked for the Jewish National Committee (ŻKN), became interested in them and, after breaking down their initial mistrust, began helping the children, supporting them financially, finding them somewhere to stay for the night, and getting them papers. “We were very excited about the papers,” recalls Peretz Hochman. “We would walk around the square and at every opportunity we would let our papers drop on the ground so that young Poles could see that we were not just any old ragamuffins or Jews.”
Most of the “cigarette kids” survived thanks to solidarity, mutual assistance, intuition, and acquired experience. The camaraderie of fate, mutual trust, and solidarity were the group’s key resource in helping them to survive.
Aid was extended not only to family, friends, or prewar neighbors, but also to complete strangers. This solidarity is even more astonishing given that it took place under circumstances of enormous risk, as contact with other Jews increased the danger considerably. Irena Meizel, who lived on the "Aryan side" as Janina Lewandowska, testified that Jews in the area had to behave as if they did not know one another at all. "If you bumped into your best friends and acquaintances on the street, you looked the other way and did not make eye contact, so as to avoid the suspicion that you knew each other."
Nevertheless, Janina Pańska, a Jew who helped a great many in hiding, had “a truly Aryan appearance and name, thanks to which she hardly needed forged papers, since all that had to be changed was her religion from Jewish to Roman Catholic.” She worked as a courier for over a dozen Jews who never came out of hiding, selling off their belongings hidden in a number of places, and supplying them with food, money, medicine, and books.
"The realization of the potential peril arising from contact between Jews in hiding imposed a need to take even greater care," comments Prof. Engelking.
"Thus, the courage of those Jews who risked providing aid not only to those close to them, but also to complete strangers, deserves great respect. There were those who even did it with panache and on a large scale."
One spectacular example of such aid was the actions of Wilhelm Bachner, an engineer from Bielsko. Speaking fluent German and with a "favorable appearance" and an engineering degree from the University of Brno, he was hired immediately by a fast-growing architectural and building firm in Dresden, which was seeking lucrative military contracts. Bachner convinced his boss that materials from demolished buildings could be bought cheaply in the ghetto, and with the appropriate pass he shuttled between the ghetto and the "Aryan side," delivering false identity papers and work permits, and bringing out trapped Jews. As the firm began to need additional construction workers and office staff, Bachner subsequently employed a great many Jews at its offices. Surviving a number of close calls and unforeseen threats, he displayed courage, sometimes daring, and, when needed, steely nerves and self-control.
By fighting the Nazi enemy on this front through helping other Jews, Bachner, Pańska, Haftel and countless others displayed exceptional bravery, determination, and a will to resist. They often found unexpected reserves of courage within themselves. Not the passive subjects of aid by Poles, they were active, resourceful people, brave and full of initiative, who saved not just themselves, but also members of their own families and others – even strangers – all linked by a common fate. Although the threat of death lay at every step, they risked their own lives in order to save other Jews, and their inspiring stories deserve to be told to the world.
The publication of this volume of "Yad Vashem Studies" was made possible through the generous support of Mrs. Johanna (Hannie) Catherina Kiprono Biwott in memory of the members of her community in Amsterdam who did not survive the Holocaust.
This article originally appeared in the "Yad Vashem Jerusalem Magazine," volume 93.
