Poloz Maria ; Daughter: Romanova Tamara (Poloz); Daughter: Sokolova Valentina (Poloz)

Poloz (Repina), Mariya Romanova (Poloz), Tamara Sokolova (Poloz), Valentina Mariya Poloz (later Repina), a Russian, lived with her daughters Tamara and Valentina in Zhitomir (today Zhytomyr). During the war, all three of them made a living by exchanging their possessions for food or by sewing and mending clothes. One night in September 1941, the Poloz family heard a knock on their window. Sheindel Shteinberg and her daughter Klara, acquaintances of Tamara, who had been at school with Klara, were standing there. The mother and daughter had left the ghetto when they heard rumors of its imminent liquidation, and the Polozes offered them shelter in their home for a few days. During this time, the ghetto was liquidated and house searches were intensified for Jews hidden with locals in the area. In order not to endanger the Polozes’ lives, Shteinberg and her daughter decided to leave their home and head for Kiev, thinking it would be easier to survive in a big city where no one knew them. Before they left, Valentina gave her identity papers to Klara, which subsequently helped her survive the occupation. Sheindel had a strong Yiddish accent and so she pretended to be dumb. A few months later, Shteinberg and her daughter returned to Zhitomir and Poloz and her daughters again agreed to afford them shelter. After some time, the Jewish mother and daughter headed for Berdichev (Berdychiv), where Klara found work. They settled there until the liberation, in January 1944. After the war, the Shteinbergs maintained contact with the Poloz family, but over time the girls all married and the relationship waned. It was not until the 1990s, when Klara (by then Zaltsman) was living in Israel that she located Valentina and renewed contact with her. On July 15, 1998, Yad Vashem recognized Mariya Poloz (Repina) and her daughters, Tamara Romanova and Valentina Sokolova, as Righteous Among the Nations.