Leopold "Poldek" Socha (August 28, 1909 – May 12, 1946) was a Polish sewage inspector in the city of Lwów (now
Lviv
Lviv ( uk, Львів) is the largest city in western Ukraine, and the seventh-largest in Ukraine, with a population of . It serves as the administrative centre of Lviv Oblast and Lviv Raion, and is one of the main cultural centres of Ukrain ...
,
Ukraine
Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...
). During
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
, Socha used his knowledge of the city's sewage system to shelter a group of Jews from
Nazi persecution and their supporters of different nationalities. In 1978 he was recognized by the
State of Israel as
Righteous Among the Nations
Righteous Among the Nations ( he, חֲסִידֵי אֻמּוֹת הָעוֹלָם, ; "righteous (plural) of the world's nations") is an honorific used by the State of Israel to describe non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to sa ...
.
Biography
Socha lived in a poor neighborhood of Lwów, Poland and worked for the municipal sanitation department and secretly as a burglar and thief. In 1943, he began hiding twenty one Jewish refugees in sewage canals in
German-occupied Lwów. The Jews had fled through their floorboards to evade German capture.
Initially the Jews paid their benefactors a fairly expensive price, but eventually ran out of money. Socha, his wife Magdalena, and a co-worker named
Stefan Wróblewski continued feeding and sheltering the refugees with their own resources. They aided the group for fourteen months of the German occupation of Lwów. Ten of the twenty one Jewish refugees survived.
In 1946 Socha and his daughter were riding their bicycles when a Soviet military truck came careening toward them. He steered his bicycle in her direction to knock her out of the way, saving her but dying in the process. After his death the Jewish people Socha had sheltered returned to pay their respects.
Legacy
On May 23, 1978,
Yad Vashem
Yad Vashem ( he, יָד וַשֵׁם; literally, "a memorial and a name") is Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. It is dedicated to preserving the memory of the Jews who were murdered; honoring Jews who fought against th ...
of
Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
recognized Leopold and Magdalena Socha as
Righteous Among the Nations
Righteous Among the Nations ( he, חֲסִידֵי אֻמּוֹת הָעוֹלָם, ; "righteous (plural) of the world's nations") is an honorific used by the State of Israel to describe non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to sa ...
. In 1981 Stefan Wróblewski and his wife Anna received the same honor.
Socha was portrayed by
Robert Więckiewicz
Robert Więckiewicz (born 30 June 1967) is a Polish film and television actor from Nowa Ruda, Poland. In 2013, he received Best Actor Award at the Chicago International Film Festival for his role in film ''Walesa: Man of Hope''.
Selected filmogra ...
in the 2011
Agnieszka Holland
Agnieszka Holland (born 28 November 1948) is a Polish film and television director and screenwriter, best known for her political contributions to Polish cinema. She began her career as assistant to directors Krzysztof Zanussi and Andrzej Wajda, ...
film ''
In Darkness'', which was nominated for
Best Foreign Language Film
This is a list of categories of awards commonly awarded through organizations that bestow film awards, including those presented by various film, festivals, and people's awards.
Best Actor/Best Actress
*See Best Actor#Film awards, Best Actress#F ...
at the
84th Academy Awards
The 84th Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), honored the best films of 2011 in the United States and took place on February 26, 2012, at the Hollywood and Highland Center Theatre in H ...
.
Survivor Krystyna Chiger recounted her time as a child in the sewers being aided by Socha to the
, as well as in her 2008 memoir, ''
The Girl in the Green Sweater: A Life in Holocaust's Shadow''.
See also
*
List of Poles
This is a partial list of notable Polish or Polish-speaking or -writing people. People of partial Polish heritage have their respective ancestries credited.
Science
Physics
* Czesław Białobrzeski
* Andrzej Buras
* Georges Charpa ...
*
Polish Righteous among the Nations
The citizens of Poland have the world's highest count of individuals who have been recognized by Yad Vashem of Jerusalem as the Polish Righteous Among the Nations, for saving Jews from extermination during the Holocaust in World War II. There ...
* ''
The Girl in the Green Sweater: A Life in Holocaust's Shadow'', a memoir by one of those Mr. Socha saved
References
1909 births
1946 deaths
People from Lviv
Polish Righteous Among the Nations
Thieves
Road incident deaths in Poland
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