Irena Cymerman Wojcik collection

Irena Wojcik (born Irka Cymerman, 1925-2008) was born to Abram Szymon and Pesa (Kohn) Cymerman in Warsaw, Poland, and had three brothers and two sisters. Her parents owned a factory and wholesale business located at 32 Nalewki Street. During the German occupation they remained in their own apartment because it was already within the confines of the ghetto. In June 1941 Irena and her sister Ala snuck out of the Warsaw ghetto and went to Ala's in-laws in Liw, 70 km from Warsaw. Their stay was prolonged when Irena fell ill. During this period the sisters befriended Władysław Wojcik (1918-1998), a Christian. The sisters returned to the ghetto in July of 1941. Irena was forced to work in the Toebbens factory sewing military uniforms for the Germans. Władysław law visited the Cymerman family several times, often bringing them food and medication. He told Abram and Pesa that if Irena was able to leave the ghetto he would help her. Irena lived in the ghetto until Yom Kippur of 1942 when she escaped and went into hiding with the help of Władysław. After a couple of months in hiding she was forced to return to the ghetto after several Polish people exposed her Jewish identity to the Gestapo. Upon her return to the ghetto, she resumed her work at Toebbens. She escaped the ghetto again a few weeks before the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of April 1943. Władysław continued to place her in different hiding places. She was on a farm in Sadolesie and later returned to Warsaw and lived in hiding on the Aryan side. She often was recognized and was always on the run, often staying in one location for only a couple of days. After liberation Irena married her rescuer, Władysław. Yad Vashem formally recognized Władysław as Righteous Among the Nations in 1966 for helping several Jewish people, including a four year old girl, and for recognizing the value and securing the Ringelblum Archive after Polish workers uncovered the documents. Władysław also smuggled the Chaim Kaplan diary out of the Warsaw ghetto. Irena's parents, three brothers, and two sisters perished during the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. The collection includes photographs relating to Irena Wojcik (born Irka Cymerman) and her relatives during the Holocaust and in hiding in Sadoleś, Poland; her rescuer and future husband Władysław Wojcik; life before the war at a public school in Węgrów and during the war in Poland; and their daughter visiting the site of the former death camp of Treblinka circa 1960. Additional individuals depicted in the photographs include Irena’s brother-in-laws Mietek Rubinsztajn and Franciszek Wojcik, her sister Henia, and her friend Jadwiga Worowicz. The collection also includes an affidavit issued by the Żydowski Instytut Historyczny w Polsce Jewish Historical Institute of Poland stating that Władysław Wojcik helped Jews during the war and that he was instrumental in finding the second part of the Ringelblum archive.