Henryk Lubelski

Henryk was raised in a religious Jewish family. His father was a cantor, and his parents placed an emphasis on education. In 1916 the Lubelskis moved to Rawicz, a town in German-occupied Poland. Henryk was first in his class in secondary school, where he also excelled in wrestling and soccer. After graduating, Henryk became an apprentice in a business.

1933-39: In 1935 Henryk's father secured a good position in the city of Katowice. There, Henryk worked in the sausage business. Since Katowice was close to the German border, many there spoke German fluently. When the war broke out in September 1939, he fled east towards the USSR, but he turned back when he realized that he didn't know if conditions there would be any better than they were in Poland. His route back took him through many small Polish towns.

1940-44: Henryk was in Kolomjya when the Germans set up a ghetto there. In 1942 he was deported by train with hundreds of others. En route he decided to escape, but before he jumped from the train, a family begged him to go to Budapest to find their daughter, Erzebeth, to tell her goodbye for them. Henryk jumped, and escaped. In 1944 he joined Czechoslovak partisans in rebellion against the Germans. In the Carpathian Mountains he sabotaged the Germans by supplying Soviet troops with information about German artillery positions.

After the war, Henryk traveled to Budapest to keep his promise to look for Erzebeth. Henryk and Erzebeth married, and in 1951 they immigrated to the United States.