Stech Franciszek

Stech, Franciszek Rozalia Nussbaum had been an active member of the Jewish youth organization Hashomer Hatzair before the war. She was married to David Spiess and lived in Lwow (today Lviv), then in Poland. When the Germans occupied the area, she returned to her hometown of Tarnopol. In in 1941 a ghetto was established there, and the family lived in the ghetto. In March 1942, there was a mass deportation of the elderly and disabled from the ghetto, including Rozalia’s parents. They were taken to the Janowski Forest and shot. Rozalia’s brother was also taken away, to the camp in Galubochki, and murdered as well. David, her husband, was also taken to a camp. The terrible Aktionen (mass executions) continued, with the Jews of the ghetto being deported and killed by the hundreds. Rozalia escaped the ghetto in the fall of 1942 and went to the Aryan side to try to save herself. She found a job working for a shoemaker, Franciszek Stech, who was already employing a Jew named Ruben Miller in his workshop. Franciszek was a kind man who could not bear what the Germans were doing to the Jews. He did everything he could to help them. Every time there was about to be an Aktion, he allowed his Jewish employees spent the night at the workshop. In June 1943, when the Tarnopol Ghetto was liquidated, Franciszek arranged for a hideout to be built under the rabbit hutch in his neighbor’s yard. David Spiess, who escaped the camp and came to find his wife, joined her in that hideout. Unfortunately, the place was compromised by suspicious neighbors, and the Spiesses went to hide in a marshy grove by the river. Franciszek Stech came to the grove and brought them food every ten days. At first they stayed in the dry part of the grove, but after an encounter with some hostile Ukrainians, they moved into the more dangerous wet marshlands. Soon, however, winter made it impossible to hide even there, and the Spiesses returned to the old hideout without telling anyone. After a while Stech discovered that they were back in the neighbor’s yard and, claiming it was too dangerous for them there, sent them to hide with a friend. It was about that time that the Russians took over the region. They were soon temporarily pushed back by the Germans, who were so threatening when looking for Russians there that David became reckless with fear, showed himself, and was shot to death by a Nazi soldier. Rozalia spent the remaining weeks of the war hiding, and soon the final liberation arrived. Both she and her rescuer immediately left the area—Rozalia went to Palestine, and Franciszek moved to Poland. They stayed in touch, and Rozalia sent letters and packages to Franciszek, but their correspondence was severed by the war in Israel in 1967. On April 8, 2014, Yad Vashem recognized Franciszek Stech as Righteous Among the Nations.