Established at the Government Delegation for Poland, Żegota was the only state organisation in all Europe under German occupation created in order to save Jews. The organisation included representatives of various social and political circles, both Poles and Jews. It is estimated that tens of thousands of people of Jewish descent were aided by Żegota.

Outstanding pianist and composer living in Warsaw. During the Holocaust, he lost his entire family. He himself was hidden by Poles, including Janina and Andrzej Bogucki, with the support of Witold Lutosławski. At a critical moment in his life Wehrmacht captain Wilm Hosenfeld spared him his life.

For helping Jews, the Germans shot 31 Poles, including the Kowalski family of seven as well as members of the Kosior, Obuchiewicz and Skoczylas families. Almost all of them were burned alive.

One of the six children of Wiktoria and Józef Ulma from Markowa. Together with his siblings and parents, as well as the hidden Jews from the Goldman, Grünfeld and Didner families, he murdered by the German military police on 24th March 1944.

Diplomat and politician; Polish ambassador to Japan and the USSR. Minister of Foreign Affairs in Stanisław Mikołajczyk’s government. He arranged aid for Polish refugees of Jewish origin in Japan and Shanghai.

Over a dozen residents of Świesielice were murdered by the Germans for supporting the resistance movement and helping Jews in hiding.

The first German extermination camp on Polish soil, Kulmhof in Chełmno nad Nerem, was a mass extermination centre for Jews in Reichsgau Wartheland. Already in December 1941, about 700 Jews were killed there, poisoned with car exhaust fumes. It is estimated that between 150,000 and 350,000 victims were murdered during the camp’s operation.

The wife of Józef Ulma and mother of six children. She was in an advanced stage of pregnancy when she was murdered by German military police, together with her husband and children, for hiding the Jewish family of Goldman, Grünfeld and Didner, on 24th March 1944.

Actress and educator. During the German occupation she and her parents helped Józef Ochroń, Helena and Hanna Caspari, Dawid Epstein, Leon Feiner, Maria Nudel and an unknown lawyer. Recognised as Righteous Among the Nations.

Poet, essayist and translator. During the German occupation, he and his wife, Maryna Zagórska, hid several Jews at home in Warsaw, including the poet Tadeusz Hollender, teenager Janek Wilk and the Tenenbaum family. Both spouses were recognised as Righteous Among the Nations.

The Jews captured in roundups the day before were stored for the night in the basement of one of the houses in Markowa. In the morning German military policemen led everyone onto the so-called trench, on the outskirts of Markowa, and shot about 30 people in total.

Visual artist and publisher. Co-founder of the Provisional Committee to Aid Jews which was later transformed into the Żegota Council to Aid Jews.

Doctor; professor of paediatrics. During the German occupation he worked in Rozwadów. He often got into the ghetto to treat the Jews who were gathered there. When another doctor and a friend of his, Stanisław Matulewicz, discovered that positive result of typhus test could be obtained using certain harmless bacteria, Łazowski started to use the vaccine to simulate an epidemic and thus keep the Germans away from the local population. Thereby he saved many inhabitants of Rozwadów and the surrounding area including many Jews from the nearby ghetto.

Letter addressed to the head of the Catholic Church in Vatican, in which the President of the Republic of Poland in exile asks for intervention concerning mass murders of Poles and Jews in German occupied Poland.

Jesuit, administrator of the sanctuary in Żyrowice and chaplain to the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception in the Słonim Convent. During the Holocaust, he called for helping Jews. He collected donations for their benefit, issued false christening certificates and repeatedly made his way to the ghetto. He also smuggled Jews outside and hid them in the rectory, in the nearby houses and in the monastery of the Immaculate Conception. Together with Sisters of the Immaculate Conception Ewa Noiszewska and Marta Wołowska he was arrested by the Germans and then killed. Several dozen other Poles lost their lives with them.

Mountain lovers – both Kazimiera (Romance philologist and translator) and her son Jerzy Wawrzyniec (musicologist, writer and composer) were climbing enthusiasts. During the German occupation they saved at least seven people by hiding them in their Warsaw flat.

Diplomat, counsellor and deputy head of the Polish Delegation in Bern in the years 1938-1945; member of the so-called Ładoś Group which rescued European Jews during the Holocaust using false passports of Latin American countries.

Politician, diplomat, clerk and columnist. In Bern, where he was the Polish ambassador, he created an organisation, later known as the Ładoś Group, by bringing together several Polish diplomats and representatives of the local Jewish communities. The group saved Jews from all over occupied Europe by means of false passports from Latin American countries.

Journalist, Home Army soldier, participant in the Warsaw Uprising, veteran activist and author of war memoirs. During the German occupation he and his wife Barbara helped Anna Bajer Dratner and Irena Filozof as well as some others in Warsaw. After the war, both of them were recognised as Righteous Among the Nations.

During the German occupation, she rescued Jakub Berger and Laura Bogaczewska in Przemyśl.

Politician, diplomat, clerk and columnist. In Bern, where he was the Polish ambassador, he created an organisation, later known as the Ładoś Group, by bringing together several Polish diplomats and representatives of the local Jewish communities. The group saved Jews from all over occupied Europe by means of false passports from Latin American countries.

Writer, author of books for children, social activist and independence activist, member of Żegota. Together with Władysław Bartoszewski, in 1963 she planted a tree in honour of this organization in the Garden of the Righteous in Jerusalem.