Film Collection
Maria Lebiedzińska née Szemiot
Excerpts from an interview with Maria Lebiedzińska
Transkrypcja
(...) I was being brought up in the patriotic atmosphere, since it was soon after we had regained independence, and, naturally, all the best values were conveyed to me. Antisemitism did not exist at our home, on the contrary, various people visited us, some of them were Jewish. (...) I dreamed about being a nurse, so I enrolled in the Red Cross Nursing School in Smolna Street. And there, in that school I was recruited by the underground resistance ZWZ… Yes, first it was ZWZ and later Home Army. When I was collecting money for wounded soldiers, I met three young girls, in an appartment in the same building that we lived. I liked them very much, especially one – I became great friends with her. (...) I go running upstairs, and the housekeeper says: “Do you know what’s happened, Miss Maria?!” I ask: “What?” – “Those Zawadzkis were taken, because they were Jewish.” I say, “What are you talking about?” – “Yes, they were Jewish and they were taken.” (...) In the evening, at home, it is about 5 minutes till curfew, when the doorbell rings. There came the sister of that friend of mine, Niuńka. That’s what we called her, she was really Alicja. And she aks: “Maria, will you help me?” Now tell me, what can you say to that? A decent person can only say: “Yes, of course.” And so I said: “Come in, come in at once.” (...) Once we had walked into a round-up in Aleje Ujazdowskie. Nearly everyone was being stopped. My God, they took off people’s hats, searched their hair, told them to take off their socks, everything. And Alicja says to me: “Look, you are carrying leaflets, give them to me, since I am Jewish, they’ll kill me anyway.” And I said: “I couldn’t possibly live at such a price.” And we just kept on walking, and nobody had stopped us. Maybe they thought we were too young or whatever, nobody knows what Nazis may think.