Memoria [EN] No. 19 (04/2019) | Page 4

LINKING THE MEMORY OF THE WORLD

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Links to the most interesting and valuable articles dedicated to memory around the world (wide web)

The Museum Collection has been enriched with a unique object associated with Captain Witold Pilecki, co-founder of the resistance movement in the German Nazi Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp. It is a drawing made in the summer of 1943 in Nowy Wiśnicz immediately after his escape from the camp. It portrays Witold Pilecki and Tomasz Serafiński - the person whose identity Pilecki’s assumed as an Auschwitz prisoner. The Museum acquired the drawing from Tomasz Serafiński’s daughter - Maria.

Witold Pilecki’s false identity was a matter of coincidence. He found an identity card with the name Tomasz Serafiński while hiding in Warsaw in the flat of Dr. Helena Pawłowska. Pilecki used his name when he was arrested by the Germans in September 1940 during an attempt to enter the Auschwitz camp.

Pilecki and Serafiński met only after his escape from Auschwitz. Upon arrival in Bochnia, he asked to see the commander of the Home Army in the area. He was permitted to see the deputy commander of the outpost in Nowy Wiśnicz. The deputy commander turned out to be the man, whose identity he had assumed previously - Tomasz Serafiński. Then, they didn’t only have a meeting, which was allegedly a memorable experience for Pilecki. Pilecki found a safe haven for over three months in Tomasz Serafiński’s home, in the so-called Koryznówka in Nowy Wiśnicz, known as Jan Matejko’s favourite vacation spot. Pilecki wrote the first version of his report here. It was also here that Jan Stasiniewicz drew a double portrait of Witold Pilecki and Tomasz Serafiński.

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