Its heroism remembered too late.
The name of Oskar Schindler, who saved from the death of 1300 of the Jews, known throughout the world. And the woman who risked her life during the Nazi occupation of Poland was taken from the Jewish ghetto of 2,5 thousand children, all learned only in 1999, when the first publication about it. In Israel Irena Sendler was awarded the title of Righteous among the Nations, along with Oscar Schindler.
Irena Sendler (maiden name – Krzyzanowska) was born in Warsaw in 1910 Her father was a doctor, and when Irena was 7 years old, he died, having caught typhoid from a patient. He treated those who refused the other – representatives of the Jewish community. After his death they offered to the family doctor financial assistance. Irena remembered the words often repeated her father: “If you see someone drowning, you need to jump into the water to save, even if you do not know how to swim.”
While studying at the University of Warsaw Irena railed against the “bench ghetto”: the Jewish students were instructed to take a seat on a separate bench in the back of the auditorium. In the scoring books on the right side put “Aryan” print to the poles, and the left – to the Jews. After Irena was a witness to the beating of a Jewish girl of Polish nationalists, she crossed the seal, confirming its non-Jewish origin. It is of 3 years was suspended from school.
When in 1939 Nazi Germany invaded Poland, Irena got a job in the municipality of Warsaw. Within two years she secretly wore the inhabitants of the Jewish ghetto food, medicine and money. In 1940, all citizens of non-Jewish origin are banned from entering the ghettos, and then the girl went to work for the Department of health: the Nazis were afraid of epidemics, so the nurses had access to the ghetto.
Stills from the film *the courageous heart of Irena Sendler*, 2009
In 1942, Irena joined the underground Organization helping Jews “Zegota”. Since then it has been organizing the export of children from the ghetto of all legal and illegal ways. Legally managed to take only a small part of the seriously ill were given permission to leave. The rest of the kids were taken through the sewers and basements of the houses, were taken in carts in the garbage, carried in bags for tools in drawers and boxes. Young children have to enter the sedative that they did not give herself cry during transportation.
Irena later recalled how difficult it was to convince parents to trust in the Savior and give children. Of course, no one could give any guarantees – at any time of the underground could expose and capture. Often happened that the very next day after the removal of children and their parents were sent to Auschwitz or killed. Therefore, all that could promise this is the fact that ghetto kids would wait for certain death, and after escaping they have at least some chance to survive. Toddlers were first placed in Polish families, and then distributed to orphanages and monasteries.
In 1943, someone wrote to Irene a denunciation, with the result that she was arrested and tortured. The fact that she is one had information about the Jewish and new Christian names of the children, their parents and present residence – the entire “filing Cabinet” woman kept in glass jars, buried in the garden. While they tortured her, broke her arms and legs, but this she kept secret, because it was the only clue, which in the future parents could find their children.
For helping Jews was immediate execution. When Irena Sendler was led to execution, the guard suddenly told her to run – for this he received considerable money from the leadership of the “Zegota”. It was included in the list of victims, until the end of the war she was hiding under an assumed name. And later, the Communist government has accused Irene of collaboration and ties with the Nazis!
After the war Irena gave information about rescued children in the Central Committee of Jews in Poland. Kids was looking for and returned to the relatives, orphans arranged in children’s homes, and then transported to Israel. As it turned out, the list was saved 2.5 thousand children. Only in 1965 the heroism of Irena Sendler was officially recognized and she received the title of the Righteous of the world. And only in 2003 it was awarded at home – she was awarded the order of the White eagle (the highest state award in Poland). In 2006 she was nominated for the Nobel peace prize, but the winner was a different person. After his death in 2008, Irena Sendler was declared a national heroine of Poland.
