Szmul Zygielbojm
Szmul Mordechaj Zygielbojm , שמואל זיגלבוים, Alias Artur (born February 21, 1895 in Warsaw or Borowica ; † May 12, 1943 in London ) was a Jewish politician, member of the General Jewish Workers' Union , publisher of the magazine Arbeiterfragen , City Council of Warsaw and Łódź . Since 1942 he was a member of the National Council of the Republic of Poland in London.
Life
Zygielbojm was one of ten siblings in a family. He started working in a factory when he was ten years old. Then he started making money making gloves. After the end of the First World War and the establishment of the Second Polish Republic , he joined the General Jewish Workers 'Union in Chełm and became the manager of the metalworkers' union. From 1924 he was a member of the Central Committee of the Federation and was the managing director of the Central Council of Jewish Unions. In 1927 he was elected to the city council of Warsaw, in 1938 of Łodź. From 1936 he headed the federal regional office in Łódź. Zygielbojm was married and had one son. His wife and son were later victims of the Holocaust .
After the beginning of the Second World War he organized the Jewish resistance movement from Warsaw with members of the federal government. Zygielbojm was a member of the first Warsaw Jewish Council as a representative of the Federation. In 1940 he managed to escape to Brussels , where he took part in the conference of the social democratic parties of Europe.
After the attack of the Wehrmacht to Belgium he succeeded in September 1940 the flight over France to New York . From there he went to London in March 1942 , where he became a member of the National Council of the Republic of Poland. He tried to inform the Polish government in exile about the situation of the Polish Jews in order to organize an aid campaign for the Jewish people who were still alive. Zygielbojm's speech was broadcast by the BBC in early June 1942, in which he reported on the deportation of Polish Jews. His desperate activity was unsuccessful. The Allies did not believe the news of the Holocaust. His letter to the President of the United States was also unsuccessful.
After the suppression of the uprising in the Warsaw ghetto , he decided to suicide to commit in order to alert the conscience of the world. He left a farewell letter to the exiled President of Poland, Władysław Raczkiewicz and the Prime Minister Władysław Sikorski .
literature
- Aleksander Rowiński: Zygielbojm's journey: a search for clues . 2nd Edition. Fiber, Osnabrück 2004, ISBN 83-85049-77-0 .
- Israel Gutman (Ed.): Encyclopedia of the Holocaust - The persecution and murder of European Jews , Piper Verlag, Munich / Zurich 1998, 3 volumes, ISBN 3-492-22700-7
Web links
- Literature by and about Szmul Zygielbojm in the catalog of the German National Library
- The Last Letter From Szmul Zygielbojm, The Bund Representative With The Polish National Council in Exile (English)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Zygielbojm, Szmul |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Zygielbojm, Szmul Mordechaj (full name); Artur (pseudonym); Zygelboym, Szmul |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Polish Jewish politician, editor of the magazine "Arbeiterfragen" |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 21, 1895 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Warsaw or Borowica |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 12, 1943 |
| Place of death | London |