Ładoś Group and Those Who Worked With Them

The Ładoś Group also called the Bernese Group[119][120] (Aleksander Ładoś, Konstanty Rokicki, Stefan Ryniewicz, Juliusz Kühl, Abraham Silberschein, Chaim Eiss) was a group of Polish diplomats and Jewish activists who elaborated in Switzerland a system of illegal production of Latin American passports aimed at saving European Jews from Holocaust. As many as 10,000 Jews received such passports, of which over 3000 have been saved.[121] The group efforts are documented in the Eiss Archive.[122][123]

 From Wikipedia

Lados Group

Ładoś Group, Bernese Group (Polish: grupa berneńska or grupa Ładosia, French: groupe bernois) is a name given to a group of Polish diplomats and Jewish activists who during Second World War elaborated in Switzerland a system of illegal production of Latin American passports aimed at saving European Jews from the Holocaust.[1][2][3]

Composition of the group

The group consisted of four diplomats from the Polish Legation in Bern, a representative of the RELICO Assistance Committee for the Jewish Victims of the War established by the World Jewish Congress and a representative of Agudat Israel. Five out of six members had Polish citizenship, while half of them were Jewish.[4][5]

The members of the Ładoś Group were:

·       Aleksander Ładoś (1891–1963), Polish Envoy in Bern in the years 1940–1945

·       Abraham Silberschein (1881–1951), advocate, Zionist activist, pre-war deputy to the Sejm of the Republic of Poland, founder of the rescue committee RELICO

·       Konstanty Rokicki (1899–1958), Polish consul in Bern in 1939–1945

·       Chaim Yisroel Eiss (1876–1943), a merchant born in Ustrzyki,[6] leading figure of Agudat Israel residing in Zurich.

·       Stefan Ryniewicz (1903–1987), counselor of the Polish Legation in the years 1938–1945, Aleksander Ładoś’ deputy

·       Juliusz Kühl (1913–1985), attaché of the Polish Legation, expert on contacts with Jewish diaspora in Switzerland.

The Ładoś Group had a semi-informal structure and connections between its members were asymmetrical. It was Konstanty Rokicki who was most involved in acquiring blank passports and filling them out; Abraham Silberschein and Chaim Yisroel Eiss and Alfred Schwarzbaum (a Jewish rescue activist refugee from Bedzin [7]) dealt with smuggling of passports, photos and personal data between Bern and German-occupied Europe and provided a significant part of the financing of the operation. The role of Aleksander Ładoś and Stefan Ryniewicz was to ensure a diplomatic cover-up among the Bernese diplomatic corps and prevent Swiss authorities from breaking up the operation. Both Ładoś and Ryniewicz intervened in this case in 1943 and exchanged arguments with Swiss foreign minister Marcel Pilet-Golaz and the police chief Heinrich Rothmund. Juliusz Kühl, who at the outbreak of the war was a 26-year-old graduate of doctoral studies at the University of Bern, facilitated contacts between Jewish organizations and the Legation. In later years he was also nominated as the deputy head of the consular division. He probably also dealt with illegal transport of blank passports.[1][8][9]

Historical background

In September 1939, Poland was attacked by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union and divided into two occupation zones. Nearly 36 million Polish citizens, including over 3 million Jews, were subjected to German and Soviet rule. At the same time, the Polish government refused to surrender and on September 17, 1939 crossed the border with Romania, where was interned. In accordance with the constitution of 1935, President Ignacy Mościcki appointed Władysław Raczkiewicz as his successor. Also, a new Polish government-in-exile was formed in Paris and began to rebuild the armed forces in France. The government, headed now by general Władysław Sikorski, took control of the entire property of the Polish State abroad, including the network of its diplomatic missions. After the German invasion of France, the government moved to London, from where it continued to fight the Germans. In the continental part of Western Europe, the Polish government-in-exile was represented by the legations in Switzerland, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden. Other countries either came under German occupation or, under the pressure of the Germans, closed Polish diplomatic missions. In Switzerland Bern the Legation was located at Elfenstrasse in the diplomatic district of Kirchenfeld. Additionally, since 1940 another building housing a Consular Section, at Thunstrasse, was rented. Since April 1940, the Legation was headed by Aleksander Ładoś, a pre-war envoy to Latvia (1923–26) and a consul general in Munich (1927–31). Ładoś left Poland after invasion and served briefly as a member of Władysław Sikorski's government. When he took up the post in Bern, the other three diplomats – already worked there: Ryniewicz from 1938, and Kühl and Rokicki from 1939. Rokicki and Ryniewicz knew each other from their previous post in Riga (1934–36) and were probably close friends. Only in Bern they met Kühl and Ładoś. Abraham Silberschein, who was supposed to be the delegate for the 21 Zionist Congress, came to Geneva from Lviv shortly before the outbreak of the war. Chaim Yisroel Eiss had been staying in Switzerland since the beginning of the 20th century and had a store in Zurich. Both representatives of Jewish organizations did not know each other before the war and were politically very distant.[4][10]

Genesis and production model of passports

According to Juliusz Kühl, an idea of producing false passports was invented at the eve of 1940 and had no connection with the Holocaust. Several dozen of Paraguayan documents were produced with a view of enabling influential Jews from the areas occupied by the Soviet Union an escape through Japan. The legation identified an honorary consul of Paraguay, a Bernese notary Rudolf Hügli, who was ready to sell blank passports and bought about 30 of them. It is not known who filled them and how they were sent to the Soviet Union. Initially, it was assumed that such activities could be carried individually, since the scheme could be revealed. However, in later years production of similar documents continued. The most known example is the passport obtained by Eli Sternbuch for his future wife Guta Eisenzweig and her mother in November 1941. The Sternbuch family obtained it by contacting Juliusz Kühl. It is not known who filled out this document. 1957 Yad Vashem's study suggests there were more passports – in particular in 1941 during the German invasion of the Soviet Union and after the creation of Jewish ghettos. In some cases, bearers of such documents were released from the obligation to live in ghettos and wear a band with the Star of David. The production of passport on a mass scale begun in 1942, after Wannsee Conference, when the mass murder of European Jews was decided. From that moment, passports of Latin American countries protected from deportation to Nazi Germany Extermination camp, as their holders were sent to internment camps in Germany and occupied France. Initially, the operation was carried out chaotically, which increased the possibility of setback. This was the reason why the Legation reached out to Abraham Silberschein in 1942.[1][8][11][12]

Investigated by the police, Silberchein described it as follows: I had a meeting at the Polish Legation in Bern with Mr. I secretary Ryniewicz and Mr. Rokicki, who manages the consular section. Both gentlemen drew my attention to the fact that some people in Switzerland deal with providing passports of Latin American countries of for Poles in countries occupied by Germany. These passports enable their holders to improve their situation. We were having a real "black market" of passports. The gentlemen from the Legation expressed their desire that I would take responsibility for this matter, which I also did on behalf of RELICO.[13][4]

Passports of Paraguay

It was RELICO-Legation axis which constituted core of the scheme. Silberschein would send lists of people foreseen to become passport holders to Rokicki who would record them and had Paraguay's passports fabricated. A typical exchange of correspondence between Silberschein and Rokicki in 1942 and 1943 includes a letter from Silberschein with the list of persons to whom the documents were to be granted. Rokicki sent Silberschein in turn filled passports or their copies certified by a notary public and a letter from consul Rudolf Hügli in which holders of the passports were informed that they had received a Paraguayan citizenship. Apart from that, many separate confirmations of Paraguay's citizenship were issued. The lists of recipients of such documents contains several thousand names. At first glance it seems that the vast majority of Paraguay passports were issued between 18 and 30 December 1942 and none of them was filled in 1943. However, the correspondence between Silberschein and Rokicki available in the archives of Yad Vashem indicates that these passports were backdated (there is an evidence that several passports of 30 December 1942 were issued in the autumn of 1943). The vast majority of Paraguay's passports has the traces of handwriting of Konstanty Rokicki, but there are also several passports filled with a different character. The most probable version is that they are filled either by Juliusz Kühl or Stefan Ryniewicz, himself an experienced consul. Passports were issued for Jewish citizens of Poland, the Netherlands, Slovakia, and Hungary as well as for Jews deprived of their Germany citizenship. The ordinal numbers of passports found in the Silberschein archives in Yad Vashem suggest that at least three series of these documents had been produced, tallying altogether to least 1056 pieces. In many cases there are more than one or two people mentioned in the passports. It may be easily assessed that at least 2,100 people were beneficiaries of these documents. Each passport cost between 500 and 2,000 Swiss francs. The money was transferred to Rudolf Hügli by Polish diplomats – Rokicki, Kühl and Ryniewicz – and brought him enormous income. By comparison, the then monthly salary of Aleksander Ładoś equaled to 1,800 francs, and this of Juliusz Kühl – to 350 francs.[1][9]

Passports of Peru and El Salvador

In 1943 Silberschein established contact with the consul of Peru in Geneva, José Barreto. Baretto handed to Silberschein 28 passports for 10–12 thousand francs. The General Consul of Peru, who was informed about this maneuver, dismissed Barreto. In this case, an argument erupted between Silberschein and Ryniewicz, who accused former of acting on his own hand and giving the matter a resemblance of conspiracy. From this correspondence, it appears that the Polish Legation demanded full information on the action. Ryniewicz also took successful intervention to save Barreto and cover up the case and inspired similar action by the Polish Legation in Lima. In 1943, Silberschein established contact with a Jewish employee of the General Consulate of El Salvador in Geneva, George Mandel-Mantello. Mantello – most probably with the consent of his consul – Arturo Castellanos, handed him completed passports and citizenship certificates. The Polish legation was probably informed about the number of issued passports and about contacts between Silberschein-Mantello, but there is no evidence that it participated in the production of documents. Arturo Castellanos was declared in 2010 by Yad Vashem the Righteous Among the Nations.[1][9]

Passports of Honduras, Haiti, and other countries

In case of passports of Honduras Silberschein contacted directly with Anton Bauer, the former Honorary Consul of Honduras, who stole the seal and issued the documents illegally at his office in Bern. The recipient of Silberschein's letters was Bauer's daughter – Isabella. In one case, however, one can see traces of obtaining passports through Rokicki. On May 27, 1943, Silberschein asked him to organize a series of passports for the next day and at least two Honduran passports were issued shortly thereafter.[1][9]

Outcome of the rescue efforts

In January 1944 Silberschein reported that thanks to the action about 10 thousand people were saved from being sent to German extermination camps. According to him bearers of the Latin American passports were placed in internment camps in Tittmoning, Liebenau and Bölsenberg in Germany and in the Vittel camp in France. In March 1944, the Germans liquidated the latter, murdering from 200 to 300 prisoners, but those staying in other places were mostly spared. One of the documents from Silberschein's archive estimates that shortly before the liberation of Bergen-Belsen sub-camp there were over 1,100 holders of passports. Silberschein also wrote that he had met many of them met during his visit to Poland in May 1946.[4][14]

In December 2019 list of names of 3262 holders of passports issued by Ładoś Group was presented at the Pilecki Institute in Warsaw.[15] It is estimated though that from 5000 to 7000 names of the passports' bearers remains unknown. The research has been carried out by team led by Jakub Kumoch in Arolsen Archives - International Center on Nazi Persecution, Yad Vashem, and Archives of New Proceedings in Warsaw.[16]

Ładoś Group in literature

The majority of studies gives the credit of saving Jews to single members of the group. This is due to the fact that the group was acting in conspiracy and due to the lack of holistic memories written by any of its members. Aleksander Ładoś announced the description of the rescue action in the third, unfinished volume of memories, but he died without having written the story. Diplomats from the Ładoś Group – Ładoś, Rokicki, Kühl and Ryniewicz – were named in the letter of thanks from Agudat Israel from January 1945. In 2015 Agnieszka Haska published an article about saving Jews by the Polish diplomats in Bern. In August 2017 Markus Blechner, the Honorary Consul of Poland in Zürich, together with journalists Zbigniew Parafianowicz and Michał Potocki described the scheme, recognizing the contribution of all group members to the survival of passport holders. The matter of Latin American Passports was the subject of a poem by Władysław Szlengel, a Polish-Jewish poet, an author of the poem "Passports", written in the Warsaw Ghetto.[1][12][17]

Eiss Archive

A number of documents related to the Ładoś Group were acquired by the Polish Ministry of Culture, with the assistance of Honorary Consul Markus Blechner, from a private collector in Israel in 2018.[18] Named the Eiss Archive, they were displayed in the Polish embassy in Switzerland in January 2019, and later were transferred to the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Poland.[19]

Yad Vashem Controversy

In April 2019 the Yad Vashem's Righteous Among The Nations granted the title to Konstanty Rokicki and offered "appreciation" to Aleksander Ładoś and Stefan Ryniewicz arguing that Rokicki headed the Ładoś Group. The document erroneously called Ładoś and Ryniewicz "consuls".[20] The decision sparked outrage and frustration among the family members of the two other late Polish diplomats, and among survivors.[21] Thirty-one of them signed an open letter to Yad Vashem.[22] Rokicki's cousin refused to accept the medal until two other Polish diplomats, Rokicki's superior are recognized as Righteous Among The Nations, too. Polish Ambassador to Switzerland Jakub Kumoch who contributed to the discovery of Rokicki also refuted the Yad Vashem's interpretation stating that Rokicki worked under Ładoś and Ryniewicz.[23]

References

1.    Michał Potocki, Zbigniew Parafianowicz (8 August 2017). "Forgotten righteous. Polish envoy in Bern saved hundreds of Jews from the Holocaust". gazetaprawna.pl. Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

2.    "Karczewski: oddajemy cześć tym, którzy tworzyli łańcuch dobrych serc / we honor those who formed a chain of good hearts". pap.pl. Polish Press Agency.

3.    "Polish Legation in Bern. The unspoken history" - first monograph about the group led by Aleksander Ładoś". News / Museum / Auschwitz-Birkenau. 2020-09-11. Retrieved 2021-03-07.

4.    Petrović, Petar. "Ambasador Polski w Szwajcarii: Polacy pomagali przy wykupie Żydów z rąk nazistów. Alianci byli temu przeciwni / Ambassador of Poland in Switzerland: Poles helped with the purchase of Jews from the Nazis". polskieradio.pl. Polish Radio..

5.    "Archival documents concerning Aleksander Ładoś". aan.gov.pl. State Archive in Poland. Retrieved 15 March 2018.

6.    It is unclear whether he was born in Ustrzyki Dolne or Ustrzyki Górne. Both places fit the geographical description.

7.    "Researchers unlock the mystery of Polish diplomats who rescued Jews". 15 February 2019.

8.    Sternbuch, Gutta; Kranzler, David (2005). Gutta: Memories of a Vanished World. A Bais Yaakov Teacher's Poignant Account of the War Years with a Historical Overview. Jerusalem-New York. 

9.    Uszynski, Jedrzej. "Ambasador Ładoś i jego dyplomaci – niezwykła akcja ratowania Żydów z Holocaustu / Ambassador Ładoś and his diplomats - an extraordinary rescue action Jews from the Holocaust". berno.msz.gov.pl. Embassy of Poland in Bern.

10. Majchrowski, Jacek M. (1994). Kto był kim w Drugiej Rzeczypospolitej. Warsaw: BGW. p. 103. 

11. Eck, Nathan (1957). The Rescue of Jews with the Aid of Passports and Citizenship Papers of Latin American States. Yad Vashem Studies.

12. Haska, Agnieszka. ""Proszę Pana Ministra o energiczną interwencję". Aleksander Ładoś (1891–1963) i ratowanie Żydów przez Poselstwo RP w Bernie". holocaustresearch.pl. Zagłada Żydów. Studia i Materiały R. 2015, nr 11, ss. 299–309.

13. Abraham Silberschein’s interrogation, 9/1/1943, [in:] Swiss Federal Archives in Bern

14. "Embassy of the Republic of Poland in Switzerland: the consul issued in the 1940s passports for about 2 thousand. Jews". pap.pl. Polish Press Agency.

15. "Presentation of the "Ładoś List", Warsaw 12 December 2019". Institute of National Remembrance. 12 December 2019.

16. "Lista Ładosia: nazwiska 3262 Żydów objętych tow. "akcją paszportową" - Instytut Pileckiego". instytutpileckiego.pl (in Polish). 11 December 2019.

17. "Władysław Szlengel – Poems". zchor.org. Retrieved 15 March 2018.

18. swissinfo.ch, S. W. I.; Corporation, a branch of the Swiss Broadcasting. "Poland obtains archive of Bern diplomats' efforts to save Jews". SWI swissinfo.ch.

19. "Documents from the Eiss Archive on exhibition at the UN Office in Geneva". auschwitz.org. 26 January 2019.

20. Brazer, Jenni. "Poland's wartime consul named Righteous Among Nations for role in saving Jews". jewishnews.timesofisrael.com.

21. Beck, Eldad. "After Yad Vashem honors Rokicki, fight over Bernese Group continues". israelhayom.com.

22. "Holocaust survivors appeal to decorate 'all Ładoś Group members'". polandin.com.

23. Kumoch, Jakub. "The Polish Holocaust hero you've never heard of". timesofisrael.com.

Bibliography

·       Lecture by Polish Ambassador to Switzerland, Jakub Kumoch, delivered on 4 February 2018, at the Shoah Museum in Paris

·       Michał Potocki, Zbigniew Parafianowicz (8 August 2017). "Forgotten righteous. Polish envoy in Bern saved hundreds of Jews from the Holocaust". gazetaprawna.pl. Dziennik Gazeta Prawna. Retrieved 14 March 2018.

·       Michał Potocki, Zbigniew Parafianowicz (7 August 2017). "Polak na polecenie rządu ratował Żydów od Holokaustu. Świat się o tym nie dowiedział". gazetaprawna.pl. Dziennik Gazeta Prawna. Retrieved 14 March 2018.

·       "As the Bernese Group saved Jews. The Ambassador of the Republic of Poland presented the documents". tvp.info. public Polish Television. 5 February 2018. Retrieved 14 March 2018.

·       "Karczewski: oddajemy cześć tym, którzy tworzyli łańcuch dobrych serc / we honor those who formed a chain of good hearts". pap.pl. Polish Press Agency. Retrieved 14 March 2018.

·       Petrović, Petar. "Ambasador Polski w Szwajcarii: Polacy pomagali przy wykupie Żydów z rąk nazistów. Alianci byli temu przeciwni / Ambassador of Poland in Switzerland: Poles helped with the purchase of Jews from the Nazis". polskieradio.pl. Polish Radio. Retrieved 15 March 2018.

·       Sternbuch, Gutta; Kranzler, David (2005). Gutta: Memories of a Vanished World. A Bais Yaakov Teacher's Poignant Account of the War Years with a Historical Overview. Jerusalem-New York. 

·       Uszynski, Jedrzej. "Ambasador Ładoś i jego dyplomaci – niezwykła akcja ratowania Żydów z Holocaustu / Ambassador Ładoś and his diplomats - an extraordinary rescue action Jews from the Holocaust". berno.msz.gov.pl. Embassy of Poland in Bern. Retrieved 15 March 2018.

·       Eck, Nathan (1957). The Rescue of Jews with the Aid of Passports and Citizenship Papers of Latin American States. Yad Vashem Studies.

·       Haska, Agnieszka. ""Proszę Pana Ministra o energiczną interwencję". Aleksander Ładoś (1891–1963) i ratowanie Żydów przez Poselstwo RP w Bernie". holocaustresearch.pl. Zagłada Żydów. Studia i Materiały R. 2015, nr 11, ss. 299-309. Retrieved 15 March 2018.

·       "Embassy of the Republic of Poland in Switzerland: the consul issued in the 1940s passports for about 2 thousand. Jews". pap.pl. Polish Press Agency. Retrieved 15 March 2018.

·       Kumoch, Jakub; Maniewska, Monika; Uszyński, Jędrzej; Zygmunt, Bartłomiej (2020). The Ładoś List. Pilecki Institute.  Retrieved 2020-12-25.

Other sources

·       Abracham Silberschein archives, Yad Vashem digital collection

·       Swiss Federal Archives, Bern, E 2809/1/3, E 4800 (A) 1967/111/328, B.23.22. Parag-OV – dossier Hügli, C 16/2032 – dossier Silberschein, dossier A. Bauer

·       Unfinished memoirs by Aleksander Ładoś, IX.1.2.19, Military Historical Bureau, Warsaw, Poland

·       Documents regarding Aleksander Ładoś. The State Archive in Poland – Archiwum Akt Nowych

·       Metcalfe, Percy (2019-12-12). "New evidence of how Polish diplomats helped Jews survive Holocaust with fake passports". Notes From Poland.

Aleksander Ładoś

From Wikipedia

Born

27 December 1891

Lwów, Austro-Hungary

Died

29 December 1963

Warszawa, Poland

Resting place

Powązki Cemetery, Warszawa

Nationality

Polish

Alma mater

University of Lviv

Occupation

diplomat; author

Known for

World War I, Polish-Bolshevik War and the Holocaust rescue

Honors

“Aleksander Wacław Ładoś [alɛ'ksandɛr 'wadoɕ] (December 27, 1891 – December 29, 1963) was a Polish politician and diplomat, who 1940–45 headed the Legation of Poland to Switzerland. Ładoś was a member and de facto leader of the Ładoś Group, also known as Bernese Group,[1][2] a secret action by the Polish diplomats and Jewish organizations who helped save several hundred Jews from the Holocaust by providing them with illegal Latin American, mostly Paraguayan passports.

Early life

“Aleksander Wacław Ładoś was born in Lwów, Austro-Hungary (now Lviv, Ukraine). He was the younger son of Jan Ładoś, a postal clerk, and Albina née Kalous. Ładoś graduated from IV Classical Gymnasium in Lwów. In 1913 he joined the Polish People's Party "Piast" getting to know its leaders Wincenty Witos and Jan Dąbski. After the outbreak of the World War, I he joined the Polish Eastern Legion. Exiled by the Austro-Hungarian authorities, Ładoś escaped to Switzerland and continued his interrupted studies in Lausanne being politically active in the Polish diaspora at the same time.

Ładoś came back to newly independent Poland in spring 1919 to join the Polish diplomatic service. Until spring 1920 he served as plebiscite delegate at Cieszyn Silesia, Spiš and Orava. Finally, the voting aimed to regulate the border between Poland and Czechoslovakia was never held and a final line was set up at the Spa Conference in Belgium. Since April 1920 Ładoś worked in the headquarters of the Polish MFA in Warsaw and shortly became head of its Press Department.

“In 1920-21, Ładoś served as secretary of the Polish delegation to the peace talks with the Soviet Russia in Minsk and Riga which decided about future borders of the Second Polish Republic. After the war, Ładoś became head of the Central European Department at the MFA and October 9, 1923, he was nominated minister plenipotentiary to Latvia. Political enemy of Józef Piłsudski, Ładoś lost his post after the coup d’état in May 1926 but quickly was nominated Consul General of Poland to Munich. Shortly after Józef Beck became vice-minister of foreign affairs, Ładoś was dismissed and discharged from the service.

“Between 1931 and 1939, he worked as editor and columnist, writing for various opposition newspapers. He became a vocal critic of Józef Beck, who in the meantime replaced August Zaleski as foreign minister. Ładoś believed Poland should seek rapprochement with the Soviet Union as a possible ally against Nazi Germany and advocated closer cooperation with Czechoslovakia. Politically close to pro-democratic and pro-French Front Morges, he befriended General Władysław Sikorski, who would later become Prime Minister of the Polish Government in Exile, Commander-in-Chief of the Polish Armed Forces. After the German invasion of Poland, Ładoś headed to Romania to join the Polish Government in Exile as a minister without portfolio between October 3 and December 7, 1939. Between May 24, 1940, and July 1945 he was Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of Poland to Switzerland. Shortly after his nomination, Switzerland became fully encircled by the Axis Powers and the Vichy France. Due to the German pressure, Ładoś failed to deliver his credential letters and enjoyed a minor status of chargé d'affaires.

Ładoś Group and Holocaust rescue operation

“During his de facto ambassadorial post in Bern, Ładoś headed secret operation “Passport Issues” aimed to provide Jews in German-occupied Poland with Latin American passports [3] strictly co-operating with representatives of the Jewish organizations in Switzerland. The blank passports were bought between May 1940 and Autumn 1943 from the honorary consul of Paraguay Rudolf Hüggli and filled out by Ładoś’ sub-ordinates, consul Konstanty Rokicki and sometimes also by a Polish-Jewish diplomat Juliusz Kühl.[4][5][6]

“Ładoś himself intervened directly with the Swiss Federal Counselor Marcel Pilet-Golaz to turn a blind eye to the illegal procedure.[7] Other people included in the clandestine Ładoś Group included Ładoś’ deputy counsellor Stefan J. Ryniewicz and Jews Chaim Eiss and Abraham Silberschein, members of Jewish organizations whose main task was to smuggle lists of beneficiaries and copies of illegally-obtained passports between Berne and German-occupied Poland. Bearers of such passports were not sent to the Nazi death camps but instead interred in detention camps in Vittel, France or Bergen-Belsen, Germany. According to Zbigniew Parafianowicz and Michał Potocki at least 400 of them survived the war.[8] Ładoś also successfully urged in January 1944 the Polish Government in exile to help obtain official recognition of the passports by Paraguay[9] – the fact that finally happened in February 1944. The Polish Legation under Ładoś also enabled the Sternbuchs, Montreux-based Jewish family to use Polish cables and send notes to the members of the New York Jewish diaspora to inform them about on-going Holocaust.

Later life and death

“In July 1945 Ładoś officially supported the coalition Government in Poland and resigned as an envoy. Instead of coming back to Poland, he decided to stay in Switzerland, where he acted as a special envoy of the legal opposition PSL-party and its leader Stanisław Mikołajczyk. By Autumn 1946 he moved to Clamart near Paris. He came back to Poland in July 1960 being already seriously ill. Ładoś died in Warsaw, December 29, 1963, and was buried at Powązki Cemetery.

He left three tomes of unpublished and unfinished memoirs. 

Yad Vashem Controversy

“In April 2019 the Yad Vashem's Righteous Among The Nations granted the title to Konstanty Rokicki and offered "appreciation" to Aleksander Ładoś and Stefan Ryniewicz arguing that Rokicki headed the Ładoś Group. The document erroneously called Ładoś and Ryniewicz "consuls".[10] The decision sparked outrage and frustration among the family members of the two other late Polish diplomats, and among survivors.[11] Thirty-one of them signed an open letter to Yad Vashem.[12] Rokicki's cousin refused to accept the medal until two other Polish diplomats, Rokicki's superiors Ładoś and Ryniewicz, are recognized as Righteous Among The Nations, too. Polish Ambassador to Switzerland Jakub Kumoch who contributed to the discovery of Rokicki also refuted the Yad Vashem's interpretation stating that Rokicki worked under Ładoś and Ryniewicz.[13]

Honors

·       Officer of the Order of Polonia Restituta, Poland

·       Virtus et Fraternitas, Poland (2019) [14]

·       Commander of the Order of the Three Stars, Latvia

·       Grand Officers of the Order of the Crown, Romania

·       Grand Officers of the Order of St. Sava, Yugoslavia [15]

References

1.    "President Andrzej Duda and Survivors will pay tribute to a Polish diplomat who saved more than 800 Jews". chicago.mfa.gov.pl. Consulate General of the Republic of Poland in Chicago.

2.    Kumoch, Jakub. "How we let a Holocaust hero be forgotten". israelhayom.com. Israel Hayom.

3.    Zbigniew Parafianowicz, Michał Potocki, How a Polish envoy to Bern saved hundreds of Jews, SwissInfo.ch, August 9, 2017

4.    Zbigniew Parafianowicz, Michał Potocki, How a Polish envoy to Bern saved hundreds of Jews, SwissInfo.ch, August 9, 2017 [access Nov. 15, 2017]

5.    "Instytut Pileckiego: Odkryliśmy ślady najstarszego paszportu wydanego przez Grupę Ładosia, by ratować Żydów".

6.    See above

7.    Notice du Chef du Département politique, M. Pilet-Golaz, Berne, 13 October 1943, dodis.ch/47624

8.    Thank you letter from World Agudas Israel Organization 

9.    Ładoś to MFA, Jan. 4, 1944, Archiwum Akt Nowych, sygn. 404

10. Brazer, Jenni. "Poland's wartime consul named Righteous Among Nations for role in saving Jews". jewishnews.timesofisrael.com.

11. Beck, Eldad. "After Yad Vashem honors Rokicki, fight over Bernese Group continues". israelhayom.com. Retrieved 3 June 2019.

12. "Holocaust survivors appeal to decorate 'all Ładoś Group members'". polandin.com. Retrieved 3 June 2019., Jakub. "The Polish Holocaust hero you've never heard of". timesofisrael.com.

13. "Postanowienie Prezydenta Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej z dnia 28 maja 2019 r. o nadaniu odznaczeń". prawo.sejm.gov.pl (in Polish). 28 May 2019.

14. Łoza, Stanisław, ed. (1938). Czy wiesz kto to jest? Warszawa: Główna Księgarnia Wojskowa. p. 438.

External links

·       M. Potocki, Z. Parafianowicz, Polak na polecenie rządu ratował Żydów od Holokaustu. Świat się o tym nie dowiedział, gazetaprawna.pl [access: 8 VIII 2017]

·       Mark MacKinnon, 'He should be as well-known as Schindler': Documents reveal Canadian citizen Julius Kuhl as Holocaust hero

·       Agnieszka Haska, „Proszę Pana Ministra o energiczną interwencję”. Aleksander Ładoś (1891–1963) i ratowanie Żydów przez Poselstwo RP w Bernie, holocaustresearch.pl [access: 12.11.2017]

·       Agnieszka Haska, “Sir, I urge you to intervene at once.” Aleksander Ładoś (1891–1963) and Rescuing of Jews by the Polish Legation in Brno 

·       Portrait of Aleksander Ładoś at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum 

·       Ładoś’ files at the archive of the Swiss MFA 

Literature

·       Stanisław Łoza (red.): Czy wiesz kto to jest? Wydawnictwo Głównej Księgarni Wojskowej, Warszawa 1938

·       Kto był kim w Drugiej Rzeczypospolitej (red. Jacek M. Majchrowski), wyd. BGW Warszawa 1994, p. 103, 

·       Aleksander Ładoś [in:] Leksykon historii Polski, red. Michał Czajka, "Wiedza Powszechna", Warszawa 1995

·       Iwona Kulikowska: Aleksander Ładoś – konsul generalny II RP w Monachium, [in:] W nieustającej trosce o polską diasporę, Gorzów Wielkopolski 2012, pp. 263–279.

Konstanty Rokicki

From Wikipedia

Born

June 16, 1899

Warsaw

Died

July 18, 1958 (aged 59)

Lucerne

Nationality

POL

Occupation

consular officer, diplomat

Spouse(s)

Maria Goldman

Children

Wanda Rokicka

Honors

Righteous Among the Nations

“Konstanty Rokicki (16 June 1899 in Warsaw – 18 July 1958 in Lucerne) was a Polish consular officer, vice consul of the Republic of Poland in Riga and Bern, and a Holocaust rescuer. Between 1941 and 1943 he was a member of the Ładoś Group also called the Bernese Group. Rokicki used his diplomatic position of vice consul to produce false Latin American passports and had them smuggled to the German-occupied Poland and Netherlands where they saved lives of their Jewish bearers. For his efforts Rokicki was named Righteous Among the Nations by Israel in 2019.[3]

Childhood and early career

“Rokicki was born to Józef and Konstancja née Pawełkiewicz. Being a cavalry lieutenant, he got two awards for bravery, probably during Poland's war of independence, or the Polish-Soviet war, 1919–1920. In 1934, he was qualified as reserve officer for the 1st Regiment of Riflemen.[4] On August 17, 1936, Rokicki married Maria, née Goldman (Goldmanis). The couple had a daughter, Wanda Rokicka (1938–2008), who would become a UN employee in Geneva.

“In 1931, he joined the consular service of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Between 1932 and 1933, he was a contractual employee of the Polish Consulate in Minsk, at that time capital of the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic. In 1934–1936 he was vice-consul in Riga, and in the years 1936–1938 a contract employee of the Polish Legation in Cairo. From 1939 to 1945, he was the vice-consul of the Republic of Poland in Bern. He was working also for the Polish intelligence.[5]

Holocaust rescue action and "passport affair"

“It is estimated that between 1941 and 1943, Rokicki and his subordinate, Jewish diplomat Juliusz Kühl produced several thousands of illegal Paraguayan passports which served as protection documents for Jews stranded in the Nazi ghettos in German-occupied Poland and who were threatened with deportation from German-occupied Netherlands.[6][7][8]

“Rokicki and Kühl personally bribed the Paraguayan honorary consul, Bernese notary Rudolf Hügli to obtain blank passes which Rokicki filled out with the names of the Polish Jews. The lists of beneficiaries and their photos were smuggled between Bern and occupied Poland thanks to the network of Jewish organizations, in particular Agudat Yisrael and RELICO, headed by Chaim Eiss and Abraham Silberschein respectively. The passports of Paraguay – unlike the passports of other Latin American countries – had a special value, because this country – under the pressure of Poland and the Holy See – temporarily recognized (1944) their validity.

Later life and legacy

“Consul Rokicki left the diplomatic service in 1945, after the establishment of the pro-Soviet Provisional Government of National Unity and settled permanently in Switzerland. He died in Lucerne in July 1958, after several years of illness.[9] Rokicki's name was never mentioned by historians, despite the fact that Agudat Yisrael mentioned him in it a thank you letter to the Polish government alongside Aleksander Ładoś, Juliusz Kühl and Stefan Ryniewicz. The organization claimed in it that, without their activities, it would not be possible to save "many hundreds of people".[10]

“Only in August 2017, Canadian journalist Mark MacKinnon [11] and Polish journalists Zbigniew Parafianowicz and Michał Potocki wrote about the role of Rokicki in the rescue operation.[12]

Yad Vashem Controversy

“In April 2019 the Yad Vashem's Righteous Among the Nations granted the title to Konstanty Rokicki and offered "appreciation" to Aleksander Ładoś and Stefan Ryniewicz arguing that Rokicki headed the Ładoś Group. The document erroneously called Ładoś and Ryniewicz "consuls".[13] The decision sparked outrage and frustration among the family members of the two other late Polish diplomats, and among survivors.[14] Thirty-one of them signed an open letter to Yad Vashem.[15] Rokicki's cousin refused to accept the medal until two other Polish diplomats, Rokicki's superior are recognized as Righteous Among The Nations, too. Polish Ambassador to Switzerland Jakub Kumoch who contributed to the discovery of Rokicki also refuted the Yad Vashem's interpretation stating that Rokicki worked under Ładoś and Ryniewicz.[16]

Literature

·       Mark Mackinnon: He should be as well-known as Schindler': Documents reveal Canadian citizen Julius Kuhl as Holocaust hero, The Globe and Mail [1]

·       Zbigniew Parafianowicz, Michał Potocki: Forgotten righteous. How Aleksander Ładoś saved lives of hundreds of Jews [2]

·       Rachel Grünberger-Elbaz, Die bewegenden Enthüllungen des Eiss-Archivs: Über eine bisher unbekannte Schweizer-Rettungsaktion für Juden im 2. Weltkrieg Die bewegenden Enthüllungen des Eiss-Archivs: Über eine bisher unbekannte Schweizer-Rettungsaktion für Juden im 2. Weltkrieg: [3]

·       "President honors Polish consul for saving Jews during WWII". President of the Republic of Poland. president.pl.

References

1.    "President Andrzej Duda and Survivors will pay tribute to a Polish diplomat who saved more than 800 Jews". chicago.mfa.gov.pl. Consulate General of the Republic of Poland in Chicago.

2.    Kumoch, Jakub. "How we let a Holocaust hero be forgotten". israelhayom.com. Israel Hayom.

3.    Aderet, Ofer (17 April 2019). "Polish Diplomat Who Saved Hundreds of Jews During the Holocaust Named Righteous Among the Nations". Haaretz.

4.    Yearbook of Reserve Officers from 1934 p. 607

5.    Parafianowicz, Zbigniew; Potocki, Michał (2021-03-25). "Ludzie Ładosia szpiegowali dla Polski". www.gazetaprawna.pl (in Polish).

6.    Rudolf Hügli’s interrogation, 18.01.1943, Federal Archives in Bern

7.    Chaim Eiss’s interrogation, 14.05.1943, Federal Archives in Bern

8.    Abraham Silberschein’s interrogation, 1.09.1943, Federal Archives in Bern

9.    Konstanty Rokicki’s obituary, Życie Warszawy, July 1958

10. Harry A. Goodmann’s letter to Polish MFA, 02.01.1945, the Sikorski Institute, London

11. Mark Mackinnon: He should be as well-known as Schindler: Documents reveal Canadian citizen Julius Kuhl as Holocaust hero, "The Globe and Mail", 8.08.2017

12. Zbigniew Parafianowicz, Michał Potocki, Forgotten righteous. How Aleksander Ładoś saved lives of hundreds of Jews, "Dziennik Gazeta Prawna", 8.08.2017

13. Brazer, Jenni. "Poland's wartime consul named Righteous Among Nations for role in saving Jews". jewishnews.timesofisrael.com.

14. Beck, Eldad. "After Yad Vashem honors Rokicki, fight over Bernese Group continues". israelhayom.com.

15. "Holocaust survivors appeal to decorate 'all Ładoś Group members'". polandin.com.

16. Kumoch, Jakub. "The Polish Holocaust hero you've never heard of". timesofisrael.com.

Stefan Ryniewicz

From Wikipedia

Born

December 26, 1903

Tarnopol, Austria-Hungary

Died

March 9, 1988 (aged 84)

Buenos Aires, Argentina

Resting place

Boulogne, Buenos Aires

Nationality

Polish

Occupation

diplomat, entrepreneur

Known for

member of the Ładoś Group

Honors

“Stefan Jan Ryniewicz (26 December 1903 – 9 March 1988[1]) was a Polish diplomat and counselor of the Legation of Poland in Bern between 1940 and 1945. He was a member of the Ładoś Group also called as Ładoś Group [2][3] and played a crucial role in illegal manufacturing of thousands of Latin American passports to save Jews from the Holocaust. 

Early life and diplomatic career

“Ryniewicz was born in Tarnopol, south-east Poland, today west Ukraine. He attended a secondary school in Lwów. In the late 1920s, he married Zofia née Zasadni. The couple had two sons: Jan Christian (1931-1989) and Tomasz Maria (1934-1983). The descendants of Ryniewicz live today in Argentina and the United States.

“In 1928 Ryniewicz began his work as an employee and then as head of the consular department of the Polish Legation in Bern, where he worked until 1933. After that, he was an employee in the office of Polish Foreign Minister Józef Beck and from 1935 to 1938 he was consul and head of the consular department of the Polish Legation in Riga, Latvia. On December 28, 1936, he was one of the passengers of PLL LOT's Lockheed Electra, which crashed near Susiec killing three people. Ryniewicz – injured – survived the accident. Between December 1938 and July 1945, he again worked in the Polish Legation in Bern - first as the First Secretary and then as Counsellor. In the years 1940-45 he was deputy head of mission and close collaborator of minister Aleksander Ładoś.

Ładoś Group and Latin American passport ‘affair’

“Ryniewicz and his subordinates Konstanty Rokicki and Juliusz Kühl are supposed to have invented the Latin American passport scheme – a way to rescue Jews stranded in the ghettoes in German-occupied Poland. They successfully convinced Jewish leaders from Switzerland – Abraham Silberschein and Chaim Eiss to finance the operation. Thanks to the Paraguayan passports produced by the Polish diplomats, their owners were able to survive the dissolution of the ghettos - they were not taken to [death camps] but rather to internment camps in France and Germany, where they could be exchanged for Germans interned in Allied states.

“The blank passports were bought from the honorary consul of Paraguay, Bernese notary Rudolf Hüggli. Juliusz Kühl would bring them to the Polish Consular Section at Thunstrasse 21, where they were filled out by viceconsul Konstanty Rokicki with the names of Polish, German and Dutch Jews. Passport details - the lists of names with photos - were smuggled by Silberschein and Eiss. Ryniewicz and his superior Aleksander Ładoś provided diplomatic protection for the entire operation and intervened with the Swiss authorities and diplomatic corps. [4]

“According to journalists Zbigniew Parafianowicz and Michał Potocki, the German authorities did not investigate the operation until they had intercepted the last packet of forged passports following the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Another theory claims that one of the passport bearers tried to escape to Paraguay and alarmed its authorities which – in their turn – cancelled all passports signed by Hügli and informed in December 1943 the Nazi German government.

“The activity of the Ładoś Group was probably known to the Swiss police already in late 1942. In January 1943 the Swiss police interrogated Hüggli and after a few months also Eiss and Silberschein. They all admitted that the Paraguayan passports were produced by the legation of Poland and pointed at Ryniewicz and/or Rokicki.[5][6][7]

“After the group was uncovered by the police, Ryniewicz intervened with the head of Swiss police Heinrich Rothmund, who, at that time, was considered the main architect of the Swiss refugee policy. Although Rothmund underlined his strongly negative attitude to the operation in an interview with Ryniewicz ("I have very energetically explained to him the dangerousness and untenability of passport maneuvers.").,[8] Silberschein was released from custody and the Polish diplomats were not held accountable. The meeting between Ładoś and the Swiss Foreign Minister Marcel Pilet-Golaz could have also helped in the matter.[9]

“In early 1944, the Germans deported most of the holders of Paraguayan passports from the internment camp in Vittel to Auschwitz-Birkenau, where they were murdered. Poland and the Holy See called on the government of Paraguay and other Latin American governments to temporarily recognize the passports. After a long hesitation Salvador and Paraguay responded positively to this request, which was probably crucial for rescuing hundreds of passport holders who were still in the Bergen-Belsen internment camp.

“The exact number of people rescued thanks to the Ładoś Group, including Stefan Ryniewicz, is unknown. According to Agudat Yisrael, one can speak of "several hundred persons".[10]., while the journalists Zbigniew Parafianowicz and Michał Potocki estimate the number of rescued to be 400 people.").[11] These people were mostly religious Jews who barely had any chance of surviving in the Holocaust. The legend of the Latin American passports was widespread in the Warsaw ghetto, and they were even the subject of the poem "Passports" by Władysław Szlengel. The role that the Polish Legation in Bern played in the production of passports was hardly known. The participation of Ryniewicz and Rokicki in the operation was only proven in August 2017 by the journalists of Dziennik Gazeta Prawna (Poland) and The Globe and Mail (Canada).

Later life

“When the Polish Embassy in Bern was taken over by the pro-communist Government of Poland, Ryniewicz resigned from diplomatic work and remained loyal to the Polish government-in-exile. Later Ryniewicz moved to Argentina, where he became the chairman of the Polish Club (Club Polaco) in Buenos Aires. At the same time, he was a businessman and activist of the Polish diaspora.

“On December 31, 1972, Ryniewicz was awarded the Officer's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta. The certificate signed by the President Stanisław Ostrowski does not contain an explanation. Ryniewicz died in Buenos Aires in 9 March 1988 and was buried in the cemetery in Boulogne Sur Mer. 

Yad Vashem Controversy

“In April 2019 the Yad Vashem's Righteous Among The Nations granted the title to Konstanty Rokicki and offered "appreciation" to Aleksander Ładoś and Stefan Ryniewicz arguing that Rokicki headed the Ładoś Group. The document erroneously called Ładoś and Ryniewicz "consuls".[12] The decision sparked outrage and frustration among the family members of the two other late Polish diplomats, and among survivors.[13] Thirty-one of them signed an open letter to Yad Vashem.[14] Rokicki's cousin refused to accept the medal until two other Polish diplomats, Rokicki's superiors Ładoś and Ryniewicz are recognized as Righteous Among The Nations, too. Polish Ambassador to Switzerland Jakub Kumoch who contributed to the discovery of Rokicki also refuted the Yad Vashem's interpretation stating that Rokicki worked under Ładoś and Ryniewicz.[15] 

Literature

·       Agnieszka Haska - Proszę Pana Ministra o energiczną interwencję. Aleksander Ładoś (1891–1963) i ratowanie Żydów przez Poselstwo RP w Bernie; Zagłada Żydów. Studia i Materiały.

·       Stanisław Nahlik - Przesiane przez Pamięć, Kraków 2002 r. 

References

1.    "Nieznane zdjęcia i dokumenty na temat Stefana Ryniewicza". Embassy of Poland in Berno.

2.    "President Andrzej Duda and Survivors will pay tribute to a Polish diplomat who saved more than 800 Jews". chicago.mfa.gov.pl. Consulate General of the Republic of Poland in Chicago.

3.    Kumoch, Jakub. "How we let a Holocaust hero be forgotten". israelhayom.com. Israel Hayom.

4.    Julius Kühl’s interrogation, 22.05.1944, Federal Archives in Bern

5.    Rudolf Hügli’s interrogation, 1/18/1943, Federal Archives in Bern

6.    Chaim Eiss’s interrogation, 14.05.1943, Federal Archives in Bern

7.    Abraham Silberschein’s interrogation, 9/1/1943, Federal Archives in Bern

8.    Heinrich Rothmund’s note one meeting with Stefan Ryniewicz, 9/6/1943, Federal Archives in Bern

9.    note of Marcel Pilet-Golaz on exchange with A. Lados, 10/13/1943, Federal Archives in Bern

10. Harry A. Goodmann’s letter to Polish MFA, 1/2/1945, the Sikorski Institute, London

11. Zbigniew Parafianowicz, Michał Potocki: Forgotten righteous. How Aleksander Ładoś saved lives of hundreds of Jews, "Dziennik Gazeta Prawna", 8/8/2017

12. Brazer, Jenni. "Poland's wartime consul named Righteous Among Nations for role in saving Jews". jewishnews.timesofisrael.com.

13. Beck, Eldad. "After Yad Vashem honors Rokicki, fight over Bernese Group continues". israelhayom.com.

14. "Holocaust survivors appeal to decorate 'all Ładoś Group members'". polandin.com.

15. Kumoch, Jakub. "The Polish Holocaust hero you've never heard of". timesofisrael.com.

Other Sources

·       Mark Mackinnon: He should be as well-known as Schindler': Documents reveal Canadian citizen Julius Kuhl as Holocaust hero, The Globe and Mail.

·       Zbigniew Parafianowicz, Michał Potocki: Forgotten righteous. How Aleksander Ładoś saved lives of hundreds of Jews

·       Rachel Grünberger-Elbaz, Die bewegenden Enthüllungen des Eiss-Archivs: Über eine bisher unbekannte Schweizer-Rettungsaktion für Juden im 2. Weltkrieg Die bewegenden Enthüllungen des Eiss-Archivs: Über eine bisher unbekannte Schweizer-Rettungsaktion für Juden im 2. Weltkrieg.

Juliusz Kühl

From Wikipedia

“Juliusz Kühl also known as Julius or Yehiel Kühl (born June 24, 1913, in Sanok, Poland, died February 13, 1985, in Miami, United States) was a Polish diplomat, Holocaust rescuer and – after the World War II – Canadian construction businessman. Kühl was a member of the Ładoś Group also known as the Bernese Group [1][2] and he is particularly known for his role in the production of false Latin American passports by the Polish Legation in Bern, Switzerland, thanks to which between several hundred and several thousand Jews in German-occupied Poland and Netherlands survived the Holocaust.

“Juliusz Kühl was born shortly before the World War I in Sanok, southern Poland, which at that time was a part of Austro-Hungarian province of Galicia, into an orthodox Jewish family. When he was five years old Sanok became part of the Second Polish Republic and he himself – its citizen.

“According to Mark MacKinnon he was sent at the age of nine to live with his uncle in Zurich because his father had died when he was young, and his mother wanted him to get a good education.[3] Polish scholar Agnieszka Haska quotes Kühl's unpublished autobiographical note and claims he entered the University of Zurich to study economics, the subject he obtained a PhD in 1939.[4]

“In 1943 he married Yvonne Weill. The couple had two daughters and two sons. His oldest daughter, Janine, married Israel Weinstock, a businessman from Colombia S.A., and the younger daughter married Israel Singer, who, between 1986 and 2001 served as Secretary General of the World Jewish Congress.

Holocaust rescue operation and "passport" affair

“In March 1940 Kühl was employed in the Legation of Poland to Switzerland and Liechtenstein as an auxiliary employee. After the German and Soviet invasion of Poland and their subsequent occupation, the Legation remained loyal to the Polish government-in-exile headed by general Władysław Sikorski which pledged to continue the struggle against the Axis powers.

“Soon Kühl's superior, minister Tytus Komarnicki, was replaced by Aleksander Ładoś, former member of the Polish government in exile, who would later on become Kühl's protector and top collaborator and – after the war – personal friend and business partner. Kühl was tasked with working with Polish refugees coming in massive numbers from occupied France, Belgium and the Netherlands, vast majority of whom were Jews and Poles of Jewish descent escaping from Nazi persecution.

“Starting in 1941 Kühl and his superiors Stefan Ryniewicz and Konstanty Rokicki supervised the illegal market of Latin American passports bought by Jewish organizations for Jews in occupied Poland. The documents were bought from the consuls and honorary consuls of, among others, Honduras, Haiti and Bolivia or received gratis from the consulate of El Salvador.

“A particular case was the honorary consul of Paraguay, the Bernese notary Rudolf Hügli, who did not produce passports himself, but rather sold blank passes to the Legation of Poland.

“Consul Konstanty Rokicki would enter by hand the names and personal details of their beneficiaries – Polish and Dutch Jews who could thus claim they were citizens of neutral countries and were largely considered exempt from deportations to German Nazi-concentration camps. Particular help was provided to people inside the Warsaw Ghetto.[3]

“Funds to acquire the documents were raised mostly by World Jewish Congress represented by Abraham Silberschein and Agudath Yisrael and the leader of its Swiss branch Chaim Eiss. In 1943, the Swiss police broke the ring and brought Hügli, Kühl, Eiss and Silberschein in for questioning. In September the Federal Council took a decision not to recognize Kühl's status as an 'employee of the Polish diplomatic mission'.[5]

“Probably by December 1942, the Gestapo was aware that most Latin American passports were part of a larger conspiracy and may have been falsified.

The Swiss police identified Kühl and Rokicki as top perpetrators. A report signed by Swiss Federal Councillor Edmund von Steiger on 21 July 1943 stated the following:

“According to the records available, Messrs Konstanty Rokicki, a vice-consul at the Polish Diplomatic Mission in Berne, and Dr. Julius Kühl, employed at the same Diplomatic Mission at the time, were also instrumental in arranging a significant number of inaccurate citizenship certificates for Polish Jews in the Germany-occupied territory. Mr. Rokicki holds a blue card issued by you. Mr. Kühl's status was that of a tolerated foreigner, to whom a time limit for 'preparation of the departure' was granted, in combination with a ban on any gainful employment or taking up any work, in March 1940, when he was employed as a consular service assistant by the Polish Diplomatic Mission. We kindly request you to verify whether you should not issue a firm warning to Mr. Rokicki in an adequate manner, and further request Mr. Kühl's dismissal from the service of the Polish Diplomatic Mission.[6]

“In January 1943, while being interrogated by the police, Kühl admitted his part in the production of false passports and claimed that Paraguayan passports had been already in use in 1939, during which time they served to enable influential Polish Jews to leave the Soviet occupation zone.

“Let me start by saying that I was not involved in this matter of my own volition, but by order of my superior, Consul Rokicki, and Legation Councillor Ryniewicz. The question, how we could obtain foreign passports for Polish citizens arose for the first time after Poland had come under German and Russian occupation, in late 1939 and early 1940. Primarily, the issue at hand was to evacuate from the Russia-occupied part of Poland certain persons about whom we were concerned. We were able to do this through Consul Hügli, who provided us with Paraguayan passports for such persons. The passport forms would on each occasion be collected from Mr. Hügli and then filled out by Consul Rokicki, and subsequently returned to Consul Hügli for signature. The latter was carried out by myself on most occasions. For the issuance of the passports, we would pay Mr. Hügli the amounts between 500 and 2,000 francs, depending on the case and the number of persons. Neither the Diplomatic Mission nor the Consulate nor myself have benefited from this activity in any way.[6]

“Aleksander Ładoś refused to dismiss him and tried to extend his status.[6] He also intervened in Kühl's defense with the Swiss Foreign Minister Marcel Pilet-Golaz.[7] After the passport operation ended, the Polish government in exile granted Kühl in January 1944 full diplomatic status and the minor rank of attaché.

“According to Michal Potocki and Zbigniew Parafianowicz, the whole Polish Legation including Kühl contributed to issuing 4000 passports and saved the lives of 400 people.[8] Agudat Yisrael estimated the number of rescued people at 'many hundred'.[9]

Later life and emigration

“After the Communist take-over in Poland after the war, Kühl, Ładoś, Ryniewicz and Rokicki left the foreign service and remained in Switzerland. All but Rokicki, tried a business activity together. Ładoś and Kühl were also believed to be politically linked to the Polish Peasant Party, the only non-Communist opposition allowed between 1945 and 1947. After the fiasco of their business, they split and migrated to different countries. Later on, Kühl would often come back to Switzerland for business trips.

“At the end of the 1940s, Kühl migrated first to New York City and after a short period moved to Canada where he lived for decades in Toronto, where running a successful construction company. In 1980 he moved to Miami where he died five years later from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, an illness he had suffered for many years.[3] Shortly after that his private archive was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Juliusz Kühl practically never spoke in public about his role in the passport affair neither did much to commemorate his former colleagues. However, he gave much credit to Aleksander Ładoś to whom he referred as 'the real saviour'.[10]

Controversies

“The role of Kühl in filling out the passports is uncertain. MacKinnon claims he participated in the procedure along Rokicki,[3] but it seems of little probability given that Kühl himself admitted the main fraud had been generally perpetrated by his Polish superior. Most of the found Paraguayan passports contain the same handwriting which seems to belong to Rokicki rather than Kühl. Also, the leaders of Jewish organizations referred most frequently to Rokicki as their focal point. It is indisputable however that both played an important role in producing the passports and having them smuggled while Ryniewicz and Ładoś secured diplomatic coverage for their actions.

The details of a big part of activities of the Ładoś Group remains unknown because they had conspiratorial character and Ładoś did not inform the Polish government in exile about the details, probably out of fear of de-conspiring.

Recognition

“Being a Jew Dr. Kühl is not eligible to be declared Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem. Yad Vashem's declared policy is not to provide meaningful recognition, even in a possible new category, to Jews who rescued Jews, regardless of the number of people their activism saved. The stated reason is that Jews had an obligation to save fellow Jews and don't deserve recognition.[11][12]

“Dr. Kühl is however widely recognized as one of the heroes of the Jewish resistance to the Holocaust. His name appeared together with the ones of Ładoś, Rokicki and Ryniewicz in a thank you letter sent by Agudath Yisrael World Organization to the Polish government-in-exile.[9]

“Kühl was fluent both in speaking and writing in Polish and Yiddish, the language spoken at that time by the majority of the Polish Jews. The archives contain his correspondence and hand-written notes in both languages.

“He also used both versions of his name – the Polish one Juliusz and the Jewish one Yehiel being later on – due to his short stature – nicknamed "Little Hilek" (Polish Mały Chilek). According to his war-time colleague Stanisław Nahlik Kühl eagerly used the nickname himself.[13]

“During the World War II he personally befriended papal nuncio Filippo Bernardini with whom he played table tennis. After the War he got personal letters of recommendation from both Bernardini and Ładoś.

References

1.    "President Andrzej Duda and Survivors will pay tribute to a Polish diplomat who saved more than 800 Jews". chicago.mfa.gov.pl. Consulate General of the Republic of Poland in Chicago.

2.    Kumoch, Jakub. "How we let a Holocaust hero be forgotten". israelhayom.com. Israel Hayom.

3.    Mark MacKinnon, 'He should be as well-known as Schindler': Documents reveal Canadian citizen Julius Kuhl as Holocaust hero, "Daily Globe and Mail", August 8, 2017

4.    Agnieszka Haska "Proszę Pana Ministra o energiczną interwencję". Aleksander Ładoś (1891–1963) i ratowanie Żydów przez Poselstwo RP w Bernie, "Zagłada Żydów. Studia i Materiały". R. 2015, nr 11, ss. 299–309

5.    Note of the Political Department, September 29, 1943, Bundesarchiv Bern

6.    Responsibility of individual officials of the Polish Diplomatic Mission in the Hügli passport forgery case. The report of 21 July 1943 signed by Federal Councillor von Steiger, Bundesarchiv Bern

7.    Note of Mr. Pilet-Golaz, Director of the Political Department, E 2809/1/3, Bern, October 13, 1943, Bundesarchiv Bern

8.    Zbigniew Parafianowicz, Michał Potocki, 'Forgotten righteous. How Aleksander Ładoś saved lives of hundreds of Jews',

9.    A. Goodmann's letter to Polish MFA, January 2, 1945, the Sikorski Institute, London

10. Zbigniew Parfianowicz and Michal Potocki, 'How a Polish envoy to Bern saved hundreds of Jews', www.swissinfo.ch/eng/holocaust_how-a-polish-envoy-to-bern-saved-hundreds-of-jews/43398504

11. https://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Op-Ed-Contributors/Why-wont-Yad-Vashem-honor-Jewish-rescuers - by Dr. Mordecai Paldiel who directed the Yad Vashem Righteous department for decades

12. https://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Yad-Vashem-and-Jewish-rescuers-of-Jews-472621 

13. Stanisław Nahlik – Przesiane przez Pamięć, Kraków 2002 r.

Chaim Yisroel Eiss

From Wikipedia,

“Chaim Yisroel Eiss (1876–1943, Hebrew: חיים ישראל אייז‎) was an Agudath Israel activist and writer. He also was among the founders of the Agudath Israel in 1912.[1][2] During the First World War, Rebbe Eiss set up an aid system that located refugees, found out what they most needed and raised the required funds. During World War II, he worked on behalf of Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe, and he was a member of the Ładoś Group also called as Ładoś Group.[3][4]

“Chaim Yisroel Eiss was born in Galicia, Austria-Hungary, in the town of Ustrzyki Dolne,[5] now Poland; as one of 11 children of Rebbe Moshe Nissan Eiss and his wife Myria née Kessler. He was the only one of the children to survive an epidemic of diphtheria, an illness for which there was no treatment at the time. After the death of his other children, his father Rebbe Moshe Nissan Eiss took young Yisroel to the Sadigora Rebbe who blessed him and gave him an additional name, Chaim.

“Eiss got no secular education. ‘I taught myself to write at a later age. I did not learn any trade either as my father wanted me to be a rabbi. For this reason, I then only completed Jewish religious studies’, he declared in 1943. In 1900, he moved to Switzerland and came to Zurich where he wanted to study. However, having no money, he started working as a door-to-door vendor. Later, in 1901, Eiss acquired his own shop.

“Later on, he married Adele Holles. The couple had 10 children.

Agudath Israel

“Eiss was a founding member of Agudath Israel and one of its main activists. He operated mainly behind the scenes and every proposal that was brought to the presidium for ratification was first presented to him.

“During the First World War, Eiss set up a large aid system that located refugees, found out what they most needed and raised the required funds.

“Eiss was entrusted by the leading Rabbis of the time with the directorship of all Switzerland-based Agudath Israel funds. These included the Orphan Aid Fund, the Land of Israel Yeshiva Fund and the Polish and Lithuanian Yeshiva Fund [1]. He received contributions from all over the world and transferred the money to the recipients.

“Eiss was a writer and published the Agudath Israel publication Haderech. He wrote all the articles himself and was personally responsible for printing and distributing the paper.[6] He was also a regular contributor to the then Agudath Israel weekly Kol Yisrael, printed in Jerusalem, and used it to make his opinions known to the population of Eretz Israel.

Rescue work

“Eiss lived in Switzerland, which was neutral during World War II, and was therefore able to serve as the link between people living in countries under Nazi occupation and residents of the free world. He transferred information and requests for help to the Agudath Israel offices in London, New York City, and Istanbul, and facilitated the transfer of money, passport photographs, and requests to locate family members into Europe. He received hundreds of letters from Nazi-occupied countries and was one of the first to obtain a clear picture of the atrocities that were being carried out there.

“Interrogated by the Swiss police in May 1943, Eiss admitted to having worked together with Polish diplomats to illegally obtain a fake passport from a corrupted honorary consul of Paraguay Rudolf Hugli. ‘I always contact the Polish Consul, Rokicki, who then, in turn, contacts the Paraguayan Consul, Hügli in Bern, who issues the documents. Then, presumably, Rokicki must pay some amount to Mr. Hügli. The certificates are then be sent to Poland in the original, whereas the passports are to be photocopied and the copies notarised’. Eiss would then obtain the copies of the passports, presumably through the Polish-Jewish diplomat Juliusz Kühl, right-hand of the envoy of Poland Aleksander Ładoś and have them smuggled into the German occupation zone. The letters contained certificates showing that the person concerned had been granted Paraguayan citizenship. In many cases, Eiss provided the names of his acquaintances as the senders so as to make sure that his own name was not revealed to the censorship authorities. ‘All the addressees were religious Jewish persons living in Warsaw and Będzin’, he declared.

“The bearers of the Paraguayan passports would be placed in the internment camps in occupied France and Germany rather than sent to the Nazi death camps. Thus, hundreds of them managed to survive the war. In 1944, Poland forced Paraguay to temporarily recognize the validity of the passports.

The communications system that Eiss set up to have the documents smuggled was complex and not without danger. The unofficial postal service was conducted by non-Jewish residents of the occupied countries, people he referred to in his letters as pure Aryans, and the phraseology that was used was designed to pass muster with the censors while being understood by the intended recipients. An example of this can be seen in a letter that he wrote to Agudath Israel’s American branch at an early stage before people were yet aware of the Nazis’ extermination efforts. It stated: "Our friend Rav Alexander Susha Friedman wrote me a letter of thanks on behalf of Mr. Mekayem Nefesh" and that "Mr. Chalelei Raav (Dying of Hunger) is a permanent guest at our friends' homes."

“Sometimes he was able to be more explicit, and he wrote to the London branch of Agudath Israel, "The situation of our French brethren and even more, of our Polish brethren, is getting worse each day. In Warsaw the Jews are dying at a rate of 6,000 per month, mostly from hunger."

“Hundreds, maybe thousands of people were prevented from dying by Eiss’s efforts, but these were not the only people he helped. Thousands of Jews trapped in occupied Europe were given hope by his activities.

“Eiss died in November 1943 survived by his wife and eight out of ten children.

“Eiss Archive created in 2019 is named after him.[7]

Political Views

“Eiss was critical of the Mizrachi movement. He wrote that Mizrachi did not teach its children the Torah but instead had a new religion, that of labor. According to Eiss, the only reason that Mizrachi affiliated itself to the Zionists was in order to receive monetary gain.

“Eiss was also critical of the secular educational system. He wrote that "Forty thousand of the children of our people are being educated in schools which are such that the children will not turn out to be apikorsim (heretics), because they will not know enough Torah to be able to rebel against it, but will turn out to be ignoramuses."

References

1.     "Chaim Shalem". The Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority (YadVashem.org).

2.     Finger, Seymour (1984). American Jewry During the Holocaust. New York: Holmes & Meier Pub. p. 22. 

3.     "President Andrzej Duda and Survivors will pay tribute to a Polish diplomat who saved more than 800 Jews". chicago.mfa.gov.pl. Consulate General of the Republic of Poland in Chicago.

4.     Kumoch, Jakub. "How we let a Holocaust hero be forgotten". israelhayom.com. Israel Hayom.

5.     It is unclear whether he was born in Ustrzyki Dolne or Ustrzyki Górne. Both places fit the geographical description.

6.     https://web.archive.org

7.     "Documents from the Eiss Archive on exhibition at the UN Office in Geneva". auschwitz.org. 26 January 2019.

Other Sources

·       Chaim Yisroel Eiss’ Interrogation Report, 13 May 1943, Swiss Federal Archives E4320 (B) 1990/266, vol. 237

·       Chaim Yisroel Eiss, the Man at the Center of Orthodoxy’s WWII Rescue Activities

·       The Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority (Yad Vashem) article on Chaim Yisrael Eiss

Abraham Silberschein

From Wikipedia

Born

Adolf Henryk Silberschein

March 30, 1882

Lwów, Austria-Hungary

Died

December 30, 1951 (aged 69)

Geneva, Switzerland

Resting place

Jewish cemetery, Geneva

Nationality

Polish-Jewish

Occupation

lawyer, diplomat

Known for

member of the Polish Sejm (1922–27)
member of the Ładoś Group

Spouse(s)

Fanny Hirsch

Honors

“Adolf Henryk Silberschein, also known as Abraham Silberschein (born March 30, 1882, in Lwów, Austria-Hungary, today Ukraine, died December 30, 1951, in Geneva, Switzerland) was a Polish-Jewish lawyer, activist of the World Jewish Congress, Zionist, member of the Polish Sejm (1922–27). During the Holocaust he was a member of the Ładoś Group also called as Ładoś Group,[1][2] an informal cooperation of Jewish organizations and Polish diplomats who fabricated and smuggled illegal Latin American passports to occupied Poland, saving their holders and their families from immediate deportation to German Nazi death camps.[3][4]

Early life and political career

“Silberschein was born in Lwów as the son of Jakub Silberschein, a dentist, and his wife Anna née Polturak. He did his university studies in Lwów and Vienna, obtaining a PhD in law and in philosophy. After coming back, he opened a law practice in Lwów at Trybunalska Street (today Shevs'ka, ukr. Шевська). During the Interwar period, he was active in Zionist organizations, and part of the board of the short-lived Hitachdut Zionist Labor Party (Mifleget haAvoda haTzionit „Hitachdut", 1925–1938). Dr. Silberschein left for Geneva on August 9, 1939, three weeks before the German invasion of Poland.[5][6] 

Ładoś Group and Holocaust rescue action

“During the Holocaust, Silberschein took an active part in the attempt to save Jews by organizing passports of Latin American countries. He did so under the "RELICO" Assistance Committee established in Geneva and in full co-operation with the World Jewish Congress.

“Initially, these activities had an incidental character, but in 1942–43 began to be carried out on a massive scale. Silberschein remained in close contact with Polish diplomats Juliusz Kühl, Stefan Ryniewicz and Konstanty Rokicki. He raised funds to bribe corrupted Latin American honorary consuls and had the lists of beneficiaries smuggled from and into the ghettoes of the German-occupied Poland. He also collaborated with Peruvian Consul José María Barreto, later recognized as Righteous Among the Nations, and probably also – independently – with consuls of Honduras and Haiti.

“In the autumn of 1943, he was briefly arrested by the Swiss police. He then testified that he had acted on behalf of Ryniewicz and Rokicki, from whom he had learned about the passport mechanism itself and who had asked him to coordinate the activities. This way, passports could be bought in bulk, which reduced their price. Silberschein said:

"A few months ago, I had a meeting in Bern, at the Polish Legation, with Mr. Ryniewicz, first secretary of the Legation, and with Mr. Rokicki, who heads the consular section in Berne. They drew my attention to the fact that certain persons in Switzerland had taken on the task of providing passports from South American countries to Poles who found themselves in various countries under German occupation. Those passports enabled those concerned to obtain an improvement in their lot.

“It was a case of a real "black market" in passports, and those gentlemen of the Legation made known to me their desire that I should take charge of the matter; I accepted the proposal in the name of RELICO. That way, those concerned could avoid having to pay enormous sums of money. I can state that 80% of the passports were paid for by the Universal Committee of Jewry.

“I reached an agreement with Mr. Rockicki of the consular section of the Polish legation in Bern, who took on the task, which he still has, of handing passports from Paraguay over to me".[6]

“The bearers of the passports were interned by the Germans as citizens of neutral countries, and not deported to the death camps as most of the Polish Jewish population. "I must say that the difference in treatment was enormous, and that one could even say that often, in that way, the person concerned escaped death",[6] he testified.

“According to the Swiss police reports Rokicki hand-filled the Paraguayan passports and delivered the bribes to Hügli sometimes helped by his Jewish subordinate, attaché Juliusz Kühl.[7] The head of the Legation, Aleksander Ładoś and his deputy Stefan Ryniewicz would secure the diplomatic coverage of the action and intervened with the police.[8]., the MFA of Switzerland.[9] and the Legation of the US1.[6]

“Silberschein stated he had acted 'only for a charitable end' and 'in full cooperation with the Polish diplomatic authorities in Switzerland' [10] Silberschein also testified to have obtained a number of passports from the consulates of Peru, Honduras, and Haiti. After the arrest of Silberschein, counsel Stefan Ryniewicz successfully intervened in his defense with police chief Heinrich Rothmund.[8]

Legacy and later life

“It is estimated that the actions of the Ładoś Group have saved the lives of hundreds of people [11] – mostly Polish and Dutch Jews who survived as holders of Paraguay's passports after Paraguay – pressured by Poland and the Holy See recognized the validity of the latter. In the case of Silberschein, this number should also include some of the survivors thanks to other passports, mostly Honduran ones. The role of the Legation of Poland in producing and obtaining the latter is unclear.

“After the war Silberschein remained in Geneva, where he married Fanny Schulthess-Hirsch, the Director of the International Committee for the Placement of Intellectual Refugees.[12] He died on December 30, 1951, in Geneva and is buried in the local Jewish cemetery.

References

1.    "President Andrzej Duda and Survivors will pay tribute to a Polish diplomat who saved more than 800 Jews". chicago.mfa.gov.pl. Consulate General of the Republic of Poland in Chicago.

2.    Kumoch, Jakub (2018-10-26). "How we let a Holocaust hero be forgotten". israelhayom.com. Israel Hayom. Retrieved 13 February2019.

3.    "EHRI - Abraham Silberschein". portal.ehri-project.eu. Retrieved 2017-12-17.

4.    Marcus, Joseph (1983). Social and Political History of the Jews in Poland, 1919-1939. Walter de Gruyter. 

5.    See above

6.    Silberschein's interrogation, 9/1/1943, Federal Archives in Bern

7.    Julius Kühl's interrogation, 5/22/1944, Federal Archives in Bern

8.    Heinrich Rothmund's note one meeting with Stefan Ryniewicz, 9/6/1943, Federal Archives in Bern

9.    Marcel Pilet-Golaz's note on exchange with Aleksander Lados, 10/13/1943, Federal Archives in Bern

10. Abraham Silberschein's letter to the Papal Nuncio Filippo Bernardini 8/27/1943, Federal Archives in Bern

11. Thank you letter from World Agudas Israel Organization, January 1945, 

12. "Diplomatic Documents of Switzerland 1848-1975" (in French).

Recha Sternbuch

From Wikipedia

“Recha Sternbuch (née Rottenberg; 1905–1971), a Swiss woman of Jewish heritage, a Holocaust era Jewish rescuer.

“Born in Krakow, Poland in 1905, Sternbuch moved to St. Gallen in 1928, with her husband, Yitzchak Sternbuch, a businessman in Montreux, Switzerland. Moving to St. Gallen, her husband's hometown, was a culture shock for Recha, who had grown up in a religious community and was unprepared for the small community of Swiss Jews who were more liberal than the community she had been raised in. [1]

“Her father was Markus Rottenberg, a prominent Rabbi and scholar who was widely known in Europe. Rottenberg in 1912 had moved to Antwerp from Poland with his family, including 7-year-old Recha, to become Chief Rabbi for the city's Haredi community, per a request from the religious leaders of Antwerp's growing Jewish population for a Rabbi who would preserve the religious traditions of Antwerp's Jewish community.[1]

“There was no opportunity for formal religious education in her community and no Jewish schools for young girls in Belgium, so she attended public school, where she learned French. At home with her family, she spoke German. Her home was a meeting place for community scholars, and she informally continued to learn from these events where her father would interpret the midrash. As a teenager, she even participated in some discussions herself, to the surprise of visitors, who often traveled a long way to seek her father's council.[1]

“Her husband moved to Switzerland when he was 10 years old with his family from the United States. The Sternbuchs had moved to the US after the Kishinev pogrom but had found life in New York City difficult as newly arrived immigrants. When the Sternbuchs moved to Basel, Isaac's father became a community leader for newly arriving Orthodox, in a city where Jews were mostly assimilated and had even hosted the secular Theodor Herzl at the First Zionist Congress. In this aspect, Isaac's childhood in Switzerland shared similarity with Recha's in Belgium, as his home became a meeting point for religious men and scholars to meet with his father. In fact, Abraham Isaac Kook, one of the founders of religious Zionism, was staying with the Sternbuchs in 1914 when World War I started, an experience which likely influenced the Sternbuch family's views on Zionism. Unable to find a wife in the mostly assimilated Swiss-Jewish community, Isaac met Recha after he heard the daughter of a great Rabbi was seeking a marriage.[1]

“She was an Orthodox woman, with children, and pregnant when she spent nights in the forested region by the Austrian border attempting to smuggle refugees while trying to evade Swiss border guards who had orders to turn back anyone over sixteen and under sixty. She worked with a Swiss police captain, Paul Grüninger, who in 1938 helped her smuggle over 800 refugees into Switzerland.

“After a Jewish leader in Switzerland informed on them,[2] Recha Sternbuch was arrested and jailed, and she lost her child. Grüninger lost his job and pension for his help to Jews and was later helped by the Sternbuchs.

“After her release from prison Recha Sternbuch continued her activism largely alone and arranged rescue of over 2,000 Jews. At great risk she smuggled forged Swiss visas to many Jews across the German and Austrian borders. Later she obtained Chinese entry visas which enabled their holders to traverse Switzerland and Italy to ports from where they could be smuggled into Palestine.

“On the day of her son's Bar-Mitzvah she was informed that some Jews are in danger in Vichy France. Instead of going to the synagogue she took a train to France on Sabbath and rescued the Jews in danger.[3] Although travel on Sabbath is forbidden in Judaism Pikuach Nefesh (Hebrew: פיקוח נפש) describes the principle in Jewish law that the preservation of human life overrides virtually any other religious consideration and almost any mitzvah lo ta'aseh (command to not do an action) of the Torah becomes inapplicable.

“She had access to the Polish diplomatic pouch and was able to send coded cables to her contacts in Va’ad Hatzalah (Rescue Committee) in the United States and Turkey. One important use of this channel was the Sternbuchs alerting the New York branch of Va’ad Hatzalah, on 2 September 1942, to the horrors of the Holocaust, a message reinforced by the subsequent 8 August 1942 Gerhardt-Riegner cable. It was sent to alert American Jewry to the reality of the Holocaust and led to a meeting of 34 Jewish organizations. The Polish diplomatic pouch was also used to send secret messages, money to Jews in Nazi occupied Europe and as bribes for rescue.

“Recha Sternbuch also developed good connections with the Papal Nuncio to Switzerland, Monsignor Phillippe Bernadini, dean of the Swiss diplomatic community. He gave her access to Vatican couriers for sending money and messages to Jewish and resistance organizations in Nazi occupied Europe. Recha Sternbuch was among the first to obtain South American identity papers and distribute them to Jews whose life was endangered by the Nazis.

“In September 1944 she contacted Jean Marie Musy, former Swiss president and an acquaintance of Himmler. At Recha Sternbuch’s request Musy, with help from his son Benoît Musy, negotiated with Himmler, who was willing to release Jews then in concentration camps for ransom of one million dollars. On 7 February 1945 Musy delivered the first 1,210 inmates from Theresienstadt and more were promised at two-week intervals. Unfortunately, this initiative too was apparently obstructed by a Jewish leader in Switzerland.[4]

“The Sternbuchs kept negotiating through Musy to the end of the war. There was an agreement to turn over four concentration camps essentially intact to the Allies in return for a USA guarantee to try the camp guards in court as opposed to shooting them on the spot. This saved the lives of large numbers of camp inmates. The Sternbuchs also negotiated release of thousands of women from the Ravensbrück camp and release of 15,000 Jews held in Austria.

References

·       Kranzler, David (1991). "Three who tried to stop the Holocaust". Judaica Book News. 18 (1): 14–16, 70–76. On Rabbi Michael-Ber Weissmandl, Recha Sternbuch and George Mantello

·       Kranzler, David and Friedson, Joseph, Heroine of Rescue: The Incredible Story of Recha Sternbuch Who Saved Thousands from the Holocaust, Artscroll History Series, Mesorah Publications Ltd, 

·       Moriah Films, Unlikely Heroes, documentary, includes chapter on Recha Sternbuch (USA)

·       The remarkable Recha and Yitzchak Sternbuch: they fought from Switzerland to save Jews in World War II [3]

1.    Wallace, Max (2018). In the Name of Humanity. New York: Penguin. 

2.    Kranzler, David (1991). "Three who tried to stop the Holocaust". Judaica Book News. 18 (1): 14–16, 70–76. On Rabbi Michael-Ber Weissmandl, Recha Sternbuch and George Mantello

3.    Moriah Films, Unlikely Heroes. Documentary includes chapter on Recha Sternbuch

4.    David Kranzler, Three who tried to stop the Holocaust

George Mantello

From Wikipedia

Born

György Mandl          

11 December 1901

Lekence, Kingdom of Hungary

Died

25 April 1992 (aged 90)

Rome, Italy                                   

Resting place

Jerusalem, Israel

Known for

Rescue of Jews during the Holocaust

Children

3                                                 

“George Mantello (11 December 1901 – 25 April 1992), a businessman with various diplomatic activities, born into a Jewish family from Transylvania, helped save thousands of Hungarian Jews from the Holocaust while working for the Salvadoran consulate in Geneva, Switzerland from 1942 to 1945 under the protection of consul Castellanos Contreras, by providing them with fictive Salvadoran citizenship papers. He publicized in mid-1944 the deportation of Hungarian Jews to the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp, which had great impact on rescue and was a major contributing factor to Hungary's regent Miklós Horthy stopping the transports to Auschwitz.

“During Mantello's youth, Transylvania was part of Hungary, itself part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire; after the First World War it became part of Romania, but in 1940 Hungary recovered the northern part of the historical region, including Mantello's birth region, thanks to the Second Vienna Award. Both Hungary and Romania were allies of Nazi Germany, and Mantello had to first use all his remarkable skills and connections to save himself, his wife, and his child from Nazi deportation by escaping to Switzerland.

“Mantello is buried in the Jerusalem Har Hamenuchot cemetery.

“Mantello was born György Mandl to Orthodox Jewish parents – Baruch Yehudah Mandl and Ida Mandl (née Spitz) – in Lekence, Kingdom of Hungary (today Lechința, Romania), in the historical region of Transylvania, with mainly Romanian, Hungarian and German ethnic inhabitants, which changed hands three times between Hungary and Romania during the 20th century. His paternal grandfather was a rabbi, R. Yitzchak Yaakov Mandl, that his father owned a mill, and that the family was regarded as well-to-do. Mantello had three sisters and two brothers, one of whom, Josef Mandl, became involved in Mandl-Mantello's rescue work.[1]

Second World War

“Mantello became a textiles manufacturer in Bucharest, where he met Salvadoran consul Colonel José Arturo Castellanos in the 1930s. After escaping to Switzerland from Romania, he went to work for Castellanos at the Salvadoran consulate in Geneva as First Secretary. He and Colonel Castellanos issued a large number of Salvadoran certificates which were smuggled into Nazi occupied territories and saved many Jews.

“In 1944 he became involved in the effort to halt the deportation of Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz. Mantello sent his friend, a diplomat from Romania, Florian Manoliu, to Hungary, in order to find out what was happening there. Manoliu went to Budapest, obtained reports from Swiss vice-Consul Carl Lutz on 19 June 1944,[2] and immediately returned with the reports to Geneva. One of the reports was probably Rabbi Chaim Michael Dov Weissmandl's abridged 5-page version of the full 33-page Auschwitz Protocols: both the Vrba–Wetzler report and Rosin-Mordowicz report. The reports described in detail the operations of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp.[3]

“The second report was a 6-page Hungarian release that detailed the ghettoization and deportation, town by town, of the 435,000 Hungarian Jews, updated to 19 June 1944, to Auschwitz.[4]

“In contrast to many leaders who received these reports and failed to act on them, with much help from Swiss Pastor Paul Vogt Mantello publicized the details within a day of receiving them.[4] This triggered a significant grass roots protest in Switzerland, including Sunday masses, street protests, and the Swiss press campaign; over 400 headlines in the Swiss press demanded (against censorship rules) an end to the deportations. Pastor Paul Vogt wrote a bestseller Soll ich meines Bruders Hütter sein? (Am I my brother's keeper? - reference to Cain and Abel in the Bible).

“The report's publication and large scale very vocal protests in Switzerland resulted in Winston Churchill's letter: “There is no doubt that this persecution of Jews in Hungary and their expulsion from enemy territory is probably the greatest and most horrible crime ever committed in the whole history of the world...." [5] As a result of the press coverage, world leaders issued appeals and warnings to Hungary's Regent, Miklós Horthy, and the mass transports, which had been deporting 12,000 Jews every day since 15 May 1944, ended on 9 July 1944. The lull in deportations made it possible to organize significant rescue activities in Hungary, such as the Raoul Wallenberg and Carl Lutz missions.

Recognition

“In recognition of his great contributions to his rescue activities, Mantello received an honorary doctorate from Yeshiva University, New York.[6] Nota bene: the fact that György Mandl/George Mantello was Jewish made him ineligible for the title "Righteous Among the Nations" conferred by Israel to non-Jews who saved Jews during the Holocaust. 

References

1.    Kranzler, David (2000). The Man Who Stopped the Trains to Auschwitz: George Mantello, El Salvador, and Switzerland's Finest Hour. Syracuse University Press. pp. 9–10. 

2.    Tschuy, Theo (1998) [1995]. Carl Lutz und die Juden von Budapest. Zürich: NZZ-Verlag. pp. 145–159. 

3.    "George Mandel-Mantello" The International Raoul Wallenberg Foundation

4.    Kranzler (2000). The Man Who Stopped the Trains to Auschwitz: George Mantello, El Salvador, and Switzerland's Finest Hour. Syracuse University Press. p. 87. 

5.    Winston Churchill, in a letter to his Foreign Secretary dated July 11, 1944, wrote, "There is no doubt that this persecution of Jews in Hungary and their expulsion from enemy territory is probably the greatest and most horrible crime ever committed in the whole history of the world...." "Winston Churchill's The Second World War and the Holocaust's Uniqueness" 

6.    Daniels, Lee A. (6 May 1992). "George Mandel-Montello Is Dead; Special Envoy, 90, Rescued Jews (Published 1992)". The New York Times.

Further reading

·       Burns, Margie. "El Salvador, a rescuing country" (profile of Mantello), International Raoul Wallenberg Foundation.

·       Embassy of El Salvador in Israel. "El Salvador and the Holocaust: An almost unknown chapter in the history of El Salvador."

·       Kimche, Jon. "The war's unpaid debt of honor: How El Salvador saved tens of thousands Of Jews," Jewish Observer and Middle East Review.

·       Kranzler, David (1991). "Three who tried to stop the Holocaust". Judaica Book News. 18 (1): 14–16, 70–76. On Rabbi Michael-Ber Weissmandl, Recha Sternbuch and George Mantello

·       Lamperti, John. "El Salvador's Holocaust Hero", personal website.

·       Lévai, Jenö. Zsidósors Európában, Budapest, 1948 (Hungarian)

·       Lévai, Jenö. "Abscheu und Grauen vor dem Genocid in aller Welt", Toronto 1968 (German)

·       Meyer, Ernie. "The Unknown Hero: One sympathetic foreign diplomat saved thousands of Jews in Europe by providing them with foreign citizenship papers."

·       Meyer, Ernie. "The greatest rescue of the Holocaust."

·       Pineda, Rafael Ángel Alfaro. "El Salvador and Schindler's list: A valid comparison," Raoul Wallenberg web site.

·       The Forgotten Suitcase- The Mantello Rescue Mission

·       Holocaust Encyclopedia- Escape from German-occupied Europe

Monsignor Phillippe Bernadini
Filippo Bernardini

From Wikipedia

“Filippo Bernardini (11 November 1884 – 26 August 1954) was an Italian prelate of the Catholic Church. He spent almost his entire career in the diplomatic service of the Holy See and was given the rank of archbishop in 1933. He was Apostolic Delegate to Australia for two years before taking up the position of Apostolic Nuncio to Switzerland where he served from 1935 to 1953. During World War II, he was active in the Catholic resistance to Nazism and aided Jews during the Nazi Holocaust. He served briefly as Secretary of the Congregation for Propagation of the Faith just before his death. Before entering the diplomatic service, he spent 19 years as a teacher and administrator at the Catholic University of America.

“He was the nephew of Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Gasparri (1852-1934), one of the leading Church figures of his era.[1]

“Bernardini was born in Pieve di Ussita, in the province of Macerata, Italy, on 11 November 1884. He was ordained as a Catholic priest on 12 March 1910. He taught in Rome at the Pontifical Athenaeum of Sant'Apollinare before becoming Professor of Canon Law at the Catholic University of America in 1914 and left 19 years later as Dean of the Faculty of Canon Law there.[2][3][4] He spent the last two of his years associated with Catholic University on sabbatical in Rome helping to edit his uncle's two-volume treatise on marriage and other writings. While teaching he had also served as secretary of the pontifical commission that produced the 1917 Code of Canon Law.

“Pope Pius XI appointed him Apostolic Delegate to Australia and Titular Archbishop of Antiochia in Pisidia on 20 March 1933[5] and consecrated on 21 May. In 1935 he was posted to Switzerland as Apostolic Nuncio. In this capacity, he served as a Vatican diplomat in a neutral country during the period of the Second World War and Nazi Holocaust. He was among the many Vatican diplomats who acted honorably to assist Jews during the Holocaust. He sent intelligence to the Vatican about the Nazi plans against the Jews.[6] In 1944, he was instrumental in maintaining the lines of communication between Lelio Vittorio Valobra, head of the clandestine DELASEM Jewish rescue organization (settled in Zurich) and the organization’s Fr. Francesco Repetto, who was still in Genoa. At the Genoa Curia many letters arrived from Jews in the Vatican seeking news of their relatives and acquaintances in northern Italy.[7] The flow of money between Switzerland (where Valobra and Raffaele Cantoni operated) and the DELASEM headquarters in Genoa always remained active due in part to the assistance of Bernardini.[8]

“He was mentioned as a possible choice for appointment as Vatican Secretary of State in 1945.[9]

“Bernardini was appointed Secretary of the Congregation for Propagation of the Faith on 15 January 1953. He died of a heart attack on 26 August 1954 while visiting the village where he was born.[4]

References

1.    "40,000 Tickets Out for Papal Crowning" (PDF). New York Times. 11 February 1922. Retrieved 

2.    "Gasparri has Jubilee" (PDF). New York Times. 31 May 1927.

3.    "n.a." (PDF). New York Times. 3 March 1933.

4.    "Msgr. Bernadini, Vatican Official" (PDF). New York Times. 27 August 1954.

5.    "Pope to Honor Professor" (PDF). New York Times. 30 March 1930.

6.    ^ Phayer, Michael (2000). The Catholic Church and the Holocaust 1930-1965. Indiana University Press. pp. 83, 87.

7.    Antonini, Sandro (2005). L'ultima Diaspora. Soccorso ebraico durante la seconda guerra mondiale. Genoa: De Ferrari.

8.    Enzo Collotti (a cura di), Ebrei in Toscana tra occupazione tedesca e RSI, 2 vol. (Carocci: Roma 2007)

9.    "Call to Cardinals Likely This Year" (PDF). New York Times. 3 September 1945.

Updated November 26, 2021