Kołłątaj Jan

Kołłataj-Srzednicki, Jan With the defeat of Poland in September 1939 and the subsequent Nazi occupation, thousands of Poles crossed into Hungary and settled there. The Polish refugees were followed by hundreds of Jewish families. More Jewish refugees arrived in 1942 and 1943, when the Polish ghettos were liquidated and Hungary was still relatively safe. Jan Kołłataj-Srzednicki, a Polish army general, served as chairman of the Polish Red Cross in Hungary. A doctor by profession, Kołłataj-Srzednicki was appointed by Henryk Sławik, the head of the Citizen's Committee for Help for Polish Refugees, as director of the medical services for Polish citizens exiled in Budapest. The Polish Civilian Committee, which was supported by Polish Government in-exile, worked closely with József Antall, from the Hungarian Ministry of Interior, and Countess Erzsébet Szapáry, who sponsored the Hungarian-Polish Committee.. As part of his duties, General Kołłataj-Srzednicki was responsible for refugees who escaped to Hungary from occupied Poland, including many Jews, some of whom escaped from forced labor camps. Not only did Kołłataj-Srzednicki not discriminate against them, but he supplied them with forged documents which enabled them to stay in Hungary or move to a neutral country. In March 1944, when Germany invaded Hungary, the Gestapo raided Kołłataj-Srzednicki’s office, where they caught the General in the process of destroying incriminating documents belonging to the Polish Committee. General Kołłataj-Srzednicki was shot by the Germans and died on the spot. On July 28, 1998, Yad Vashem recognized Jan Kołłataj-Srzednicki as Righteous Among the Nations. File 6645