Persecution For Providing Help to Jews in Occupied Polish Territories During World War II, Volume 1

This publication by Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance presents the preliminary results of work carried out within the “Index of Poles murdered or persecuted for helping Jews during World War II” program. The main, and at the same time, overriding aim of the activities undertaken as part of the “Index” project is to establish the names of Polish citizens of various ethnic origin not covered by the Nuremberg legislation, living in the territory of the Republic of Poland within the borders of 31 August 1939, who experienced persecution for helping Jews during World War II.

The present publication contains 333 short descriptions of the persecution of 654 individuals who helped Jewish people in occupied Polish territories. The term of persecution is meant as the activities of the military and civil authorities of the Third Reich, including, in particular, courts and prosecutor’s offices, police and security services with cooperation of the Nazi party and its affiliated and collaborative organizations, against people who violated the rules of contact with the Jewish population as stipulated by the occupier’s law.

The authors have tried, first of all, to reconstruct the circumstances and causes of the persecution, taking into account factors such as motivation and type of help.

Rich source material of multiple origins formed the basis for compiling the list of people who were persecuted. The collected material consists of documents produced during World War II, such as documents of the German administration, courts and the terror apparatus, German press, Jewish testimonies written during the war, and press and materials produced by the Polish and Jewish underground resistance. Also of value for the project were the trial files of persons suspected of collaboration with the German occupiers, which are materials collected since 1945 by the Główna Komisja Badania Zbrodni Niemieckich w Polsce (GKBZNwP; Chief Commission for the Study of German Crimes in Poland) and its continuators.

This volume is the first in the series “Persecution for Helping Jews during World War II”.