Russ Janina (Opałka)

Russ - Opałka, Janina Janina Opałka, a young woman from Lesko (Lwów District), grew up with Jews, among whom she had friends. In 1941, when the expulsion of the Jews to the ghettos and labor camps commenced, she tried to help these friends as much as possible, carrying out various missions for them. In the fall of 1942, in the midst of the deportation of the local Jews for extermination, she moved to the town of Borysław (Drohobycz County), to live with her aunt, Michalina Balogh. There, she got involved in saving Jews: Zygmunt Kron and four members of the Fleischer family, the parents Herman and Rena and their two daughters, Nina and Ludmiła. All were hid in the Balogh home. Opałka helped prepare a hiding place for them, served as their contact and sold their belongings to buy staples for them. In that period, she made the acquaintance of Gustaw Russ, the nephew of the Fleischer couple who, as a Jewish camp inmate, worked in the local oil facilities under German supervision and had a permit to be outside the camp. She also helped him in every way required when he was in the town. In April 1944, before the Germans exterminated the last Jewish inmates still working in the oil facilities, she managed to smuggle Russ to the hiding place in the Balogh home. In August 1944, the Red Army liberated Borysław. All six Jews in hiding survived. After the war, Gustaw Russ married his rescuer, Janina Opałka. On March 27, 2000, Yad Vashem recognized Janina Russ-Opalka as Righteous Among the Nations. File: 8376