Pauter Jan & Olga (Opacka)

Pauter, Jan Pauter, Olga Dan and Halina Fuchs lived in Czortków, in Eastern Galicia and had been friends with Jan and Olga Pauter even before they were married. Olga and Halina had been classmates and Dan studied music from Jan, and both were members of a local music club. In early 1943, before the liquidation of the Czortków ghetto, Dan turned to Jan and Olga Pauter and asked them to hide him and his wife. First to arrive at their home was Henryk Fuchs, Dan’s younger brother, and Dan and Halina followed soon after. Pauter built a well-concealed hiding place for them in the cellar of his home, and the three Jewish fugitives hid there for almost a year until the liberation of the area by the Red Army in March 1944. Throughout that entire period, despite the constant fear of informers, the Pauters provided for all the needs of their Jewish friends, motivated by pure altruism. After the war, the Fuchs family moved from Poland to Germany, and over time did whatever they could to provide the Pauters, who moved to an area within the new borders of Poland, with financial support. On June 8, 1986, Yad Vashem recognized Olga Pauter and her husband Jan Pauter as Righteous Among the Nations. File 3387