Czaplińska Helena

Czaplińska, Helena Before the war, Helena Czaplińska worked as a maid for the Szulcs*, Polish aristocrats who lived near the city of Czortkow, in Eastern Galicia. After Czortkow was annexed to the Soviet Union early on in the war, the Szulces fled to Warsaw, taking Czaplińska, whom they considered one of the family, with them. In 1942, seven-year-old Marta Winter was sent from Czortkow to the Szulces’ home in Warsaw, where Czaplińska soon took the little child under her wing. Despite being a devout Catholic and taking Marta to church, Czaplińska made sure that Marta never forgot her Jewish origins. Later, Marta recounted how Czaplińska had slapped her when she told her how she and her Polish friends had rejoiced when the Warsaw ghetto went up in flames: “Outdoors,” said Czaplińska, “you must behave like everyone else. But in this house, you must never forget that the Jews are a good people, that your parents are Jewish, and that when this Hell is over, you too will once again be Jewish.” In 1944, when the Szulces moved east, Czaplińska again assumed responsibility for Marta’s safety and defended her with her own body during the Warsaw Uprising. After the uprising, she left Warsaw with Marta, and scraped together a living by doing odd jobs on local farms. After the area was liberated, Czaplińska and Marta returned to Warsaw. Although her home was destroyed, Czaplińska still made sure that Marta attended school. One day, Marta’s grandfather and uncle turned up to reclaim her. Marta, however, refused to be parted from Czaplińska, to whom she had grown very attached. She was later transferred to a Jewish orphanage in Chorzow, and in 1946, immigrated to Israel together with a group of children from the orphanage. In risking her life to save Marta, Czaplińska was prompted by humanitarian considerations, which overrode considerations of personal safety or economic hardship. On February 22, 1989, Yad Vashem recognized Helena Czaplińska as Righteous Among theNations.