Belszan Maria

Belszan, Maria At the beginning of the war, two young Jewish doctors, the couple Stanisław and Barbara Wiczyk from Częstochowa, were fugitives in the city of Lwów (today L’viv). With the occupation of the city by the Germans in June 1941, which was accompanied by a cruel pogrom against the Jews, Stanisław came to the conclusion that the way to survive was to be swallowed up in the Christian population. However, all his efforts to receive employment as a doctor in Lwów under a false Christian identity were unsuccessful because he was recognized as a Jew. A senior Ukrainian doctor, aware of his distress, advised him to try his luck in the outlying rural areas. He gave him a letter of recommendation, without mentioning that he was Jewish, and directed him to the town of Łuck (capital of Volhynia District) in the hope that he would find work there. Stanisław left his wife in Lwów and went to seek a safe haven for them both. In Łuck he stayed with a Polish family and by chance met there a relative of the housewife, a middle-aged woman called Maria Belszan. From the first instant, Maria demonstrated a wish to help him in his new locality. From Łuck he was directed to the county town, Włodzimierz Wołyński (called Ludmir by the Jews, today Volodimir-Volinski, Ukraine), where it was possible that he might find employment. Belszan, who was from that town and was about to travel there, suggested that he accompany her so that she might help him if necessary. On the way there, she gained Stanislaw's trust and he revealed to her that he was Jewish, that he wished to settle somewhere and then send for his wife. It emerged that Maria Belszan has suspected from the outset that Stanisław was Jewish and when she saw his great need she had decided to help him survive. Maria Belszan was a devout Catholic, the wife of a Polish soldier who had been exiled to Siberia. When Stanisław asked her what motivated her to help him, she replied that her religion commanded her to help people in need without reference to creed. She took him under her protection and Stanisław was hired as a doctor in the nearby town of Uscilug (today, Ustilug in Ukraine). She presented him as a relative, and through her social relations she opened doors for him that allowed him to bring his wife from distant Lwów. Maria provided her with a forged identity document, and created around them a circle of loyal, influential people, who were able to protect them from the suspicions that abounded. On July 19, 2001, Yad Vashem recognized Maria Belszan as Righteous Among the Nations.