Schalkház Sára

Salkaházi, Sára Sister Sára Salkaházi was a nun in the order called the Sisters of Social Service headed by Margit Slachta*. The “gray sisters” – so called because of the gray habits they wore – rejected the anti-Jewish edicts of the time, and placed their institutions at the service of the persecuted Jews. In 1943, the “Social Sisters” in the city of Kassa / Košice (today Slovakia) hid Mirjam Grosz (later Shlomi), a Jewish refugee from Slovakia, together with her son. Later, after the German occupation of Hungary, the order’s house, in which they and other Jews were hiding, was searched by the Gestapo. Salkaházi managed to smuggle Grosz and her son out of the building, and traveled with them to Budapest. This surely saved their lives; three other Jews who were caught in the basement of the building were shot on the spot. Grosz, equipped with forged papers, and disguised in a gray nun’s habit, and her son, found shelter with the Social Sisters of Budapest. A job was arranged for Grosz within the framework of the order, but as the danger for Jews in the city increased, she and her son were smuggled back to Kassa. Salkaházi remained in Budapest, where she was appointed director of the Home for Working Catholic Women, located on Bokréta Street. During the Arrow Cross period, this house, under Salkaházi’s direction, was filled with hidden Jewish women and children. Nearly all these fugitives were put to work at various jobs, equipped with Aryan documents and were given uniforms of the “gray sisters” so as not to arouse the suspicions of the Arrow Cross gangs. In addition to the Catholic girls, the staff and the hidden Jews, there were also Hungarian soldiers staying in the residence. One day, a Christian woman who was employed at the residence was warned by Salkaházi to stay away from the Hungarian soldiers. Angered by what she saw as an inappropriate intrusion into her personal affairs, the worker denounced Salkaházi to the Arrow Cross, informing the party that Salkaházi was hiding Jews at the residence. On December 27, 1944, the Arrow Cross invaded the residence, searching for Jews. They checked documents, and arrested a number of Jews whose papers aroused their suspicions. Together with Salkaházi and Vilma Bernovits, one of the teachers, these suspects were taken for “interrogation” – in fact, all of them were shot dead on the banks of the Danube. On February 18, 1969, Yad Vashem recognized Sára Salkaházi as Righteous Among the Nations