Roman Józef Kantor (15 March 1912 – 1943) was a Polish

Olympic Olympic or Olympics may refer to Sports Competitions * Olympic Games, international multi-sport event held since 1896 ** Summer Olympic Games ** Winter Olympic Games * Ancient Olympic Games, ancient multi-sport event held in Olympia, Greece b ...

épée The ( or , ), sometimes spelled epee in English, is the largest and heaviest of the three weapons used in the sport of fencing. The modern derives from the 19th-century , a weapon which itself derives from the French small sword. This contain ...

fencer.

Early life

Kantor was born in Łódź, Poland, and was Jewish. He was the son of Elchanan and Barbara (née Bekier) Kantor. After finishing local primary school, he left for Paris in 1924 to continue his education. He played tennis, and was captain of the school soccer team.

Fencing career

He also started to train in fencing. Shortly after, he received 3rd place in fencing at the academic championship of Paris, and 6th place at the Open Championship of France in 1929. He then trained in England from 1931–32 under the supervision of fencer Lefevre’a, and in Germany under the supervision of Italian coach Gatzera. In 1934 he returned to Łódź and joined the fencing section of the Army Sport Club, twice winning the team title of City Champion. In 1935 he won the title of

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...

, and contributed to the Polish victory over Germany. After receiving 2nd place at the Open Championship in

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 ...

, he was nominated a member of the Olympic delegation for the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin in 1936. There, at the age of 24, he won seven bouts in the quarterfinals in épée (defeating eventual silver medal winner

Saverio Ragno Saverio Ragno (6 December 1902 – 22 April 1969) was an Italian fencer. He competed at the 1932, 1936 and 1948 Olympics and won a gold and three silver medals. He also won 14 medals at the world championships and five Italian titles. His da ...

) and four in the semifinals (defeating eventual gold medal winner

Franco Riccardi Franco Riccardi (13 June 1905 – 24 May 1968) was one of the greatest Italian fencer and Olympic champion in épée competition. Biography He received a gold medal in ''épée individual'' at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin Berlin ( , ...

), but did not get to the finals. He did, however, contributed to receiving an 8th spot finish by the Polish épée team. In December 1936 he moved to Łódzki Klub Sportowy. He was twice champion of the city, both in individual and team fencing (1938 and 1939). He won the Nordic countries championship in 1938, and received a 2nd place in 1939 in the last Championship of Poland before the outbreak of

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 ...

. On 14 May 1939, he took the Olympic oath with other Łódź Olympians before the planned 1940 12th Summer Olympic Games. When the Germans took over Poland, however, he escaped to

, where in 1940, in

Kharkiv Kharkiv ( uk, wikt:Харків, Ха́рків, ), also known as Kharkov (russian: Харькoв, ), is the second-largest List of cities in Ukraine, city and List of hromadas of Ukraine, municipality in Ukraine.Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

Concentration camp and death

When Lviv was taken over by the Germans, to escape the Nazis because he was

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

, he obtained a passport and citizenship of a South American country, and waited for the German authorities' permit to leave for a neutral country. In this time, he lived in a building on Sapieha Street. It turned out that the Germans were misleading the inhabitants of the building, and they were all later arrested and transported in 1942 to the

Majdanek Majdanek (or Lublin) was a Nazi concentration and extermination camp built and operated by the SS on the outskirts of the city of Lublin during the German occupation of Poland in World War II. It had seven gas chambers, two wooden gallows, a ...

concentration In chemistry, concentration is the abundance of a constituent divided by the total volume of a mixture. Several types of mathematical description can be distinguished: '' mass concentration'', ''molar concentration'', '' number concentration'', ...

and

extermination camp Nazi Germany used six extermination camps (german: Vernichtungslager), also called death camps (), or killing centers (), in Central Europe during World War II to systematically murder over 2.7 million peoplemostly Jewsin the Holocaust. The v ...

. There, Kantor was forced to do work for Ostindustrie, and was mentioned in the 1943 register of prisoners. He was murdered there in 1943. The Jewish Polish swimmer

Ilja Szrajbman Lejzor Ilia (also "Ilja") Szrajbman (April 25, 1907 – 1943) was a Polish Olympic freestyle swimmer. In 1935, he was the Polish 400m freestyle champion. He competed in the 1935 Maccabiah Games in Mandatory Palestine, and for Poland at the 1936 ...

, who had also participated in the

1936 Berlin Olympics The 1936 Summer Olympics (German: ''Olympische Sommerspiele 1936''), officially known as the Games of the XI Olympiad (German: ''Spiele der XI. Olympiade'') and commonly known as Berlin 1936 or the Nazi Olympics, were an international multi-sp ...

, was also murdered by the

Nazis Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in N ...

that year. Kantor was one of approximately 3 million Polish

Jews Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

murdered during the

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...

Notes

External links

* *
Holocaust Museum bio
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Kantor, Roman 1912 births 1943 deaths Polish male fencers Jewish Polish sportspeople Jewish épée fencers Olympic fencers for Poland Fencers at the 1936 Summer Olympics Polish civilians killed in World War II People who died in Majdanek concentration camp Sportspeople from Łódź People from Piotrków Governorate Polish Jews who died in the Holocaust 20th-century Polish people

Early life

Fencing career

Concentration camp and death

See also

Notes

External links