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Code Name: Zegota: Rescuing Jews in Occupied Poland, 1942-1945: The Most Dangerous Conspiracy in Wartime Europe
Code Name: Zegota: Rescuing Jews in Occupied Poland, 1942-1945: The Most Dangerous Conspiracy in Wartime Europe tells the story of the only secret organization in occupied Europe set up for the sole purpose of saving Jews. The first book on the subject in English, it details the danger and complexity behind Zegota rescue attempts, clarifying the relationship of the Germans, who had total control; the Poles, who were relegated to sub-human status and treated as slave labor; and the Jews, designated nonhuman and collectively condemned to death.
Illuminating the moral dilemmas that arose as one life was pitted against another under the lawless apartheid conditions created by the Nazis, Code Name: Zegota explores the critical situation in occupied Poland and the personalities that responded to desperate conditions with a mix of courage and creativity. It profiles the key players and the network behind them and describes the sophisticated organization and its mode of operation. The cast of characters ranges from members of prewar Poland's cultural and political elite to Girl Guides and Boy Scouts, who worked as couriers. As this inspiring book shows, all of these brave souls risked torture, concentration camps, and death--and many paid the price.
Illuminating the moral dilemmas that arose as one life was pitted against another under the lawless apartheid conditions created by the Nazis, Code Name: Zegota explores the critical situation in occupied Poland and the personalities that responded to desperate conditions with a mix of courage and creativity. It profiles the key players and the network behind them and describes the sophisticated organization and its mode of operation. The cast of characters ranges from members of prewar Poland's cultural and political elite to Girl Guides and Boy Scouts, who worked as couriers. As this inspiring book shows, all of these brave souls risked torture, concentration camps, and death--and many paid the price.
216 pages, Hardcover
First published May 1, 2010
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
February 13, 2021
Oh wow, what a story! A dystopian writer would not be able to come up with a more gripping tale.
October 11, 2014
Zegota: A Secret Everyone Should Know
Why Poland? As Adolf Hitler expressly laid out in Mein Kampf, the populations to the east of Germany were considered Untermenschen, lower humans, of which the Jews were at the very botrtom. Therefore, these areas were to be occupied to provide Lebensraum, living space, for the Aryan populations. Most of the death camps during the Holocaust were in Poland.
In Part I, Irene Tomaszewski and Tecia Werbowski portray life and death on the Aryan side (i.e., the areas outside the Warsaw Ghetto) and the Jewish side, the Warsaw Ghetto itself, where the city’s Jews were confined in separate, sealed-off living quarters.
Part II describes Zegota and how it came to be. The Konrad Zegota Committee arose almost immediately after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939. By 1942, there was little doubt left among leaders of the Polish and Jewish underground movements that the German propaganda of agriculture communes in the east was false and that the Nazis planned nothing short of the total annihilation of the Jewish population. Aside from Nazi soldiers and officers, who had free license to kill anyone they pleased, there was an organized crime element of paid informers, szmalcowniks, as they were called. Two remarkable women, Zofia Kossak and Wanda Krahelska-Filipowicz assumed the critical leadership to unify the efforts with the Jewish Fighting Organization. Thus was born, with the help of two Jewish underground leaders, the Konrad Zegota Committee. It was, as the title of the book says, a code name.
In Part III, Tomaszewski and Werbowski chronicle individual first-hand stories of courage, both the rescuers and the rescued, of which one of the most famous was Irena Sendler. Incidentally, it is odd that the authors did not mention her when they interviewed Bieta Ficowska, the youngest of the children Irena Sendler rescued. Her future husband was, Jerzy Ficowski, a Gentile and one of the many heroes this otherwise extraordinary book recognizes.
Although both Polish and Jewish underground movements during the Nazi occupation have been known since the Second World War, when Jan Karski smuggled secret documents and offered his own eyewitness accounts to the Polish government-in-exile in London, the true extent of the underground movements in Poland and the Nazi atrocities would remain secret until after the end of the war. Among the network of underground organizations was Zegota. What we learn in this book was that each Jewish life saved relied on the heroic efforts of two members of Zegota.
And now, thanks to this remarkable book, we can learn these secrets that should be kept secret no longer.
Why Poland? As Adolf Hitler expressly laid out in Mein Kampf, the populations to the east of Germany were considered Untermenschen, lower humans, of which the Jews were at the very botrtom. Therefore, these areas were to be occupied to provide Lebensraum, living space, for the Aryan populations. Most of the death camps during the Holocaust were in Poland.
In Part I, Irene Tomaszewski and Tecia Werbowski portray life and death on the Aryan side (i.e., the areas outside the Warsaw Ghetto) and the Jewish side, the Warsaw Ghetto itself, where the city’s Jews were confined in separate, sealed-off living quarters.
Part II describes Zegota and how it came to be. The Konrad Zegota Committee arose almost immediately after the German invasion of Poland in September 1939. By 1942, there was little doubt left among leaders of the Polish and Jewish underground movements that the German propaganda of agriculture communes in the east was false and that the Nazis planned nothing short of the total annihilation of the Jewish population. Aside from Nazi soldiers and officers, who had free license to kill anyone they pleased, there was an organized crime element of paid informers, szmalcowniks, as they were called. Two remarkable women, Zofia Kossak and Wanda Krahelska-Filipowicz assumed the critical leadership to unify the efforts with the Jewish Fighting Organization. Thus was born, with the help of two Jewish underground leaders, the Konrad Zegota Committee. It was, as the title of the book says, a code name.
In Part III, Tomaszewski and Werbowski chronicle individual first-hand stories of courage, both the rescuers and the rescued, of which one of the most famous was Irena Sendler. Incidentally, it is odd that the authors did not mention her when they interviewed Bieta Ficowska, the youngest of the children Irena Sendler rescued. Her future husband was, Jerzy Ficowski, a Gentile and one of the many heroes this otherwise extraordinary book recognizes.
Although both Polish and Jewish underground movements during the Nazi occupation have been known since the Second World War, when Jan Karski smuggled secret documents and offered his own eyewitness accounts to the Polish government-in-exile in London, the true extent of the underground movements in Poland and the Nazi atrocities would remain secret until after the end of the war. Among the network of underground organizations was Zegota. What we learn in this book was that each Jewish life saved relied on the heroic efforts of two members of Zegota.
And now, thanks to this remarkable book, we can learn these secrets that should be kept secret no longer.
June 27, 2013
The word that kept repeating itself in my mind as I read this book was "insanity". I find my imagination so absorbed by the chaos of the violence of our present age that I had mostly forgotten the stories of systematic violence I heard in my childhood, first hand, from those unwilling participants who survived the occupation of Poland. Reading this book truly gave me pause. This is the story of how the fundamental laws governing society were overthrown and replaced by their exact opposite and how Jews and Christians struggled to resist this insanity and keep their vision of a sane and moral world intact.
The Zegota organization was a large network of individuals, both non-Jew and Jew who conspired to hide Jews and save them from extermination in the death camps. Historical data is garnered from participants through interviews conducted decades after the end of the war. There is really very little "official" record of the organization and the occupation since much of it was suppressed by the Soviets after the war and many of those who were integral to the organization were imprisoned or ostracized after the war. Additionally, there wasn't much official documentation of the organization during the war for fear that specific record keeping would prove dangerous to the network. Everything is told through interviews with participants and the book attempts, to not only define a historical record of events, but also, on an emotional level, bear witness to a valiant struggle in the face of overwhelming brutality. The interviews are not dressed up; they are simple, straight forward, and have the unmistakable tone of authenticity.
The Zegota organization was a large network of individuals, both non-Jew and Jew who conspired to hide Jews and save them from extermination in the death camps. Historical data is garnered from participants through interviews conducted decades after the end of the war. There is really very little "official" record of the organization and the occupation since much of it was suppressed by the Soviets after the war and many of those who were integral to the organization were imprisoned or ostracized after the war. Additionally, there wasn't much official documentation of the organization during the war for fear that specific record keeping would prove dangerous to the network. Everything is told through interviews with participants and the book attempts, to not only define a historical record of events, but also, on an emotional level, bear witness to a valiant struggle in the face of overwhelming brutality. The interviews are not dressed up; they are simple, straight forward, and have the unmistakable tone of authenticity.
November 25, 2012
Those wishing to read an amazing and historical story, one that is compelling from the first page to the last, then Code Name Zegota: Rescuing Jews in Occupied Poland, 1942-1945: The Most Dangerous Conspiracy in Wartime Europe is a must read for you.
The primary founders were two women. The well known writer, Zofia Kossak was a co-founder, along with Wanda Krahelska-Filopowicz. Kossak was initially deemed antisemetic because of her negative reactions to Jewish organizations prewar, and was a conservative nationalist. Krahelska-Flipowicz was heavily involved in the Underground prewar and very influential in the art community, with the AK and the Delegatura. She helped hide Jews in her own home. Kossak persuaded her own children to help save and rescue Jews, and emphasized the moral, ethical and humaneness of doing so. She felt the Nazi atrocities and crimes were “an offense against man and God, and their policies an affront to the ideals she espused for an independent Poland”. She used her published leaflet “Protest” to motivate the Polish people to come forward and help aid them.
Zegota had connections through the widely read Jewish underground newspapers such as the the Biuletyn Informacyjny (BI), whose editor was Aleksander Kaminski, and Henryk Wolinski who headed the Jewish section of the Underground Bureau of Information and Propaganda, which was the main contact between the AK and the Jewish liaison of The Jewish Fighting Organization (ZOB. These two men who were with the AK were instrumental in spreading the news throughout the underground, by using their foreign correspondents within Poland (especially in the Warsaw Ghetto) and in other countries, and spreading it to those other organizations and individuals connected to Zegota. Another important contact and member was Witold Bienkowski, who was a representative of the Delegatura which was the home delegation of the Polish Government in Exile.
I am in awe after reading Code Name Zegota: Rescuing Jews in Occupied Poland 1942-1945: The Most Dangerous Conspiracy in Wartime Europe. The story will linger with me for quite some time.
The primary founders were two women. The well known writer, Zofia Kossak was a co-founder, along with Wanda Krahelska-Filopowicz. Kossak was initially deemed antisemetic because of her negative reactions to Jewish organizations prewar, and was a conservative nationalist. Krahelska-Flipowicz was heavily involved in the Underground prewar and very influential in the art community, with the AK and the Delegatura. She helped hide Jews in her own home. Kossak persuaded her own children to help save and rescue Jews, and emphasized the moral, ethical and humaneness of doing so. She felt the Nazi atrocities and crimes were “an offense against man and God, and their policies an affront to the ideals she espused for an independent Poland”. She used her published leaflet “Protest” to motivate the Polish people to come forward and help aid them.
Zegota had connections through the widely read Jewish underground newspapers such as the the Biuletyn Informacyjny (BI), whose editor was Aleksander Kaminski, and Henryk Wolinski who headed the Jewish section of the Underground Bureau of Information and Propaganda, which was the main contact between the AK and the Jewish liaison of The Jewish Fighting Organization (ZOB. These two men who were with the AK were instrumental in spreading the news throughout the underground, by using their foreign correspondents within Poland (especially in the Warsaw Ghetto) and in other countries, and spreading it to those other organizations and individuals connected to Zegota. Another important contact and member was Witold Bienkowski, who was a representative of the Delegatura which was the home delegation of the Polish Government in Exile.
I am in awe after reading Code Name Zegota: Rescuing Jews in Occupied Poland 1942-1945: The Most Dangerous Conspiracy in Wartime Europe. The story will linger with me for quite some time.
September 7, 2022
Not particularly interesting. Refreshing to read of these things from Poland’s perspective though which is very uncommon in WW2 literature.
Want to read
March 23, 2010This title is difficult to find.
July 14, 2015
Phenomenal book
July 8, 2020
I picked this up at the Schindler Enamel Factory museum while I was in Poland last year. How did I not know about this? I am amazed.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews