WW 11: 2 Polish non-Jewish sisters save a Jewish family of 13

PETER FELDMAN

Some of the stories have been well documented, each raising the issue of what motivates an individual to place this/her own life in jeopardy in order to save another.

A new TV series, “True Movies’,’ (DStv channel 138), investigates this phenomenon with “Hidden in Silence”, a remarkable true life event in which 13 members of the Diamant family were hidden by two Polish orphans in their attic. 

“Hidden in Silence” tells of the orphaned Catholic sisters Stefania and Helena Podgorski, ages 16 and 9, who hid the Diamant family in the attic of their home during the Second World War. Stefania had worked in the Diamant family’s grocery store before the Nazi invasion of Poland.

The Diamants remained in the attic for two-and-a-half years and survived the Holocaust. In 1979, the Podgorski sisters were honoured as Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem.

Last year the Times of Israel revealed that a private entrepreneur plans to establish a museum in the same house located on Tatarska Street in Przemysl, which hid the members of the Diamant family.

The house, which is in disrepair and poor condition, was purchased by Polish businessman, Maciej Piorkowski.

“You can call it a whim, but I wanted this historic building saved from death so I could show its history,” Piorkowski told the Virtual Shtetl portal, according to Polish Radio Rzeszow.

“At this stage, I do not have more specific plans. I would like the facility to be available for visitors, so that they can, for example, watch a movie about the history of the hiding.”

Winner of the Writers Guild of America Award for Best Original Long Form – Television, this production will be aired on Friday, March 18, and again on Wednesday, March 23, at 19:00.