The video was recorded by the Pilecki Institute as part of the “Witnesses to the Age” project.
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Our today’s interviewee:
Krystyna Budnicka (born in 1932 in Warsaw as Hena Kuczer), Polish social activist of Jewish origin, member of the Children of the Holocaust Association, honorable citizen of Warsaw. Krystyna, her two brothers and sister-in-law found shelter at a hiding place in a tenant building at Mokotowska Street 1. Unfortunately, her younger brother Jehuda died two weeks later - most likely due to accidentally drinking water while drowning for a while in the sewers. He suffered from a blood infection and the doctors were helpless. Krystyna Budnicka and her sister-in-law continued to move from one hiding place to another, while Krystyna’s brother Rafał, who cooperated with the underground resistance, remained at Mokotowska Street 1. One day the Gestapo came to search the house and arrested Rafał and the caretaker, Mr. Grochowski. They were both killed during an execution at the Gestapo headquarters on Szucha Avenue. It turned out that they had been denounced by Kazimierz Grochowski, the caretaker’s son. He turned his own father in, knowing that the he would be killed. The Germans also caught and shot liaison Józio during an escape attempt. The liaison had been aiding Jews who fled from the ghetto. None of the men gave up Krystyna’s whereabouts. She managed to hide until the outbreak of the Warsaw Uprising. She was in the Powiśle district at the time. In September 1944 she left Warsaw along with children from an orphanage run by a convent. They all ended up at the Pruszków transit camp, from where they were released following an intervention of a priest. The children were taken to the village of Bobrowce, where they stayed in a former school building until the liberation. Krystyna Budnicka was able to start a normal life - she could continue her education and no one was trying to kill her only because she was Jewish.
Copyright by Instytut Solidarności i Męstwa im. Witolda Pileckiego.
22 апр 2021
