Zofia Praussowa (3 September 1878 – 27 January 1945) was a Polish politician, activist of the

Polish Socialist Party The Polish Socialist Party ( pl, Polska Partia Socjalistyczna, PPS) is a socialist political party in Poland. It was one of the most important parties in Poland from its inception in 1892 until its merger with the communist Polish Workers' P ...

, member of Polish

Sejm The Sejm (English: , Polish: ), officially known as the Sejm of the Republic of Poland (Polish: ''Sejm Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej''), is the lower house of the bicameral parliament of Poland. The Sejm has been the highest governing body of t ...

(1922–1930), labor inspector and

feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...

Early life and political career

She was born in a family of landowners, she was taking lessons in junior high schools in

Częstochowa Częstochowa ( , ; german: Tschenstochau, Czenstochau; la, Czanstochova) is a city in southern Poland on the Warta River with 214,342 inhabitants, making it the thirteenth-largest city in Poland. It is situated in the Silesian Voivodeship (admin ...

and

Kazan Kazan ( ; rus, Казань, p=kɐˈzanʲ; tt-Cyrl, Казан, ''Qazan'', IPA: ɑzan is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Tatarstan in Russia. The city lies at the confluence of the Volga and the Kazanka rivers, covering a ...

. In 1904 she finished so called

Bestuzhev Courses The Bestuzhev Courses (russian: Бестужевские курсы) in Saint Petersburg were the largest and most prominent women's higher education institution in Imperial Russia. The institute opened its doors in 1878. It was named after Konst ...

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

on the Mathematics Department. From 1899 she has been involved in the activity of PPS. After finishing studies, she came back to

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

and became a PPS activist in the area of

and

Zakopane Zakopane ( Podhale Goral: ''Zokopane'') is a town in the extreme south of Poland, in the southern part of the Podhale region at the foot of the Tatra Mountains. From 1975 to 1998, it was part of Nowy Sącz Voivodeship; since 1999, it has been par ...

. In 1907 she started her mathematical studies on the parisian

Sorbonne Sorbonne may refer to: * Sorbonne (building), historic building in Paris, which housed the University of Paris and is now shared among multiple universities. *the University of Paris (c. 1150 – 1970) *one of its components or linked institution, ...

which she finished in 1911. After that, she came back to Zakopane and started a

coeducational Mixed-sex education, also known as mixed-gender education, co-education, or coeducation (abbreviated to co-ed or coed), is a system of education where males and females are educated together. Whereas single-sex education was more common up to t ...

high school. She got arrested for the first time in 1905 for the distribution of appeals against the conscription to the tsarist army. For this act she was sent to

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

however, she quickly escaped from there. In 1906 she was arrested again and imprisoned in the

Pawiak Pawiak () was a prison built in 1835 in Warsaw, Congress Poland. During the January 1863 Uprising, it served as a transfer camp for Poles sentenced by Imperial Russia to deportation to Siberia. During the World War II German occupation of ...

prison. In 1922 she was elected to

, from the list of PPS. In 1928 she was chosen again to be a part of

, but in 1930 she didn't receive a parliamentary mandate 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 opposin ...

, Zofia Praussowa was a part of

Związek Walki Zbrojnej Związek Walki Zbrojnej (abbreviation: ''ZWZ''; Union of Armed Struggle;Thus rendered in Norman Davies, ''God's Playground: A History of Poland'', vol. II, p. 464. also translated as ''Union for Armed Struggle'', ''Association of Armed Struggl ...

- AK. On 10 November 1942 she got arrested by the Germans and imprisoned in the

prison. Later, she stayed in the

Majdanek concentration camp 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 ...

and

Auschwitz Auschwitz concentration camp ( (); also or ) was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It con ...

. She was murdered shortly before the camp was liberated.

Private life

She was a wife of Ksawery Prauss. Daughters: Jadwiga i Ewa Prauss-Płoska, wife of Stanisław Płoski and mother of Zofia Romaszewska.

Bibliography

*E. Zając. ''Zofia Praussowa inspektor i polityk''. "Atest". 648, page 54, maj 2001. Warsaw: SIGMA. . *J.M. Majchrowski, K. Stepan, G. Mazur: ''Kto kim był w drugiej Rzeczypospolitej''. Warsaw: Polska Oficyna Wydawnicza "BGW", 1994.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Praussowa, Zofia 1878 births 1945 deaths People from Radomsko County People from Piotrków Governorate Polish Socialist Party politicians Members of the Sejm of the Second Polish Republic (1922–1927) Members of the Sejm of the Second Polish Republic (1928–1930) Polish socialist feminists Home Army members Polish people who died in Auschwitz concentration camp Resistance members who died in Nazi concentration camps Politicians who died in Nazi concentration camps

Early life and political career

Private life

See also

Bibliography

References