Jozef Walaszczyk, Poland’s oldest rescuer of Jews during the Holocaust, died on Monday at the age of 103, according to the Polish Institute of National Remembrance.

Walaszczyk rescued over 50 Jews during the Holocaust after falling in love with a Jewish woman during the Nazi occupation.

He was honoured by Israel as a Righteous Among the Nations in 2002, which is the title for non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews from the Holocaust. He was thought to be Poland’s oldest living Righteous, a title that now belongs to Stanisław Wróbel, born six months after Walaszczyk, who hid Jews in his attic.

In 1941, Walaszczyk was in a hotel near Warsaw with his Jewish girlfriend, Irena Front. Suddenly, Nazi officers barged in to inspect the papers of the guests. Front told Walaszczyk that she was Jewish as officers approached the room, so he hid her in a closet and left the room, pretending to have a bout of vomiting to distract the officers.

irena na wakacjach

Jozef Walaszczyk and Irena Front pictured after 1939

Later, he married her and organised a non-Jewish fake identity for her, but she was arrested nonetheless with 20 other Jewish women in hiding.

Walaszczyk bribed Polish police officers to release them, and helped at least 30 other Jewish people find places to hide, and even continued to support them after the war.

In Rylsk near Łódź, Walaszczyk ran a production plant and employed three dozen Jews, of whom most would survive the war.

irena front z lat 40 z jw

Jozef Walaszczyk and Irena Front pictured after 1945

In Warsaw later on, he rescued a further 21 Jews using solid gold as bribe payments, and he also supplied the ghetto with food.

Speaking at his 100th birthday celebration in 2019, Walaszczyk said: “I did what I did because it was the right thing to do. I never did it thinking of credit or praise.”

Walaszczyk is not very well-known because of this aversion to being celebrated as a hero.

He and his wife, Irena Front, divorced after World War II and he remarried and had a son with his second wife. He then divorced again, and remarried for a third time, having another son.

INS Jozef Walazczyk

Jozef Walazczyk (Photo via Institute of National Remembrance / Facebook)

Walaszczyk revealed that he was afraid of Polish people betraying him to the Nazis, and speaking in an interview with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in 2020, he denounced new laws in Poland that censor what can be taught and discussed about collaboration during the Holocaust.

He said: “There were many rescuers. There were also traitors. I know because some of my friends were killed because of traitors.

“We need to speak about both at the same time because the existence of each one of those groups helps us understand the significance of the actions of both.”