The Jewish Cemetery in Warsaw has
more than 200 thousand graves. And it’s here
of all places, that researcher Natalia Romik is looking to uncover
historic hideouts — concealed under
gravestones. Secret hiding places
that helped to save many lives during
the Holocaust. After invading Poland in
1939 and occupying Warsaw, the Nazis began forcing
Jews into one neighborhood, which became known as
the Warsaw Ghetto. Most of the half-million people sent
there died of starvation or disease, or were murdered in forced
labor and death camps. But a few managed to escape
by going into hiding. Natalia Romik is looking to
uncover the hideouts they used. Warsaw give me this glimpse,
that this is the last chance. And of course, those hiding
places are still full of erosion, so this is really
the last moment to think from this
architectural perspective, how we can
preserve them, how we can really dig
deep into history. An apartment block now stands
on the site of the former Great Synagogue that was
blown up by SS guards. Directly opposite is the
Jewish Historical Institute. This building
survived, although damage to the
floor caused by fire, testifies to the devastation
wrought by the Nazis. The institute holds the largest
collection of documents relating to Jewish
history in Poland. They include eyewitness
testimony from the predominantly Jewish
towns called “Shtetl”. For Natalia Romik,
it’s a treasure trove. The main source
that we have here — they are Pinkas
Ha-Kehilot books, which were written
by the people who survived Holocaust
in the small towns. Here we not only can find testimony
how the Shtetl looked like, the urban tissue,
but also testimony for example how the
people hide and where. Natalia Romik is an architect
and a political scientist. Her research here shows her
where to get started in her search for
hiding places. It is only the
beginning, because we know for example
where was the place, in which village, but then I
need to approach the next step — to go there, speak with the
local people and not only work with the Jewish
Historical Institute but also with the
other Institutions. So it’s always a story
within the story. It was this research
that directed her to the Jewish Cemetery in
Warsaw’s Okopowa Street. Natalia is meeting with a
specialist for 3D scanning. The two of them
plan to examine the hideout beneath
the gravestones. First, we need to know the
scale and also maybe there was a kind of secret stairs to
the other small hiding place — so that would be
the first step. I would like to have exact
measurements because I would love to build a 3D
model and not only a 3D model but also to make a
cast from one wall. It’s a high-tech approach to
history that’s very revealing. A 3D laser scanner
is used to survey the entire area
surrounding the bunker. It’s accurate to within one
hundredth of a millimeter. The aim is to use digital
technology to first document the hideout in its
current state. The initial results
reveal a hastily built chamber beneath
the gravestones. Constructed at a time when
Jews were being deported daily from the Warsaw Ghetto to the
Treblinka extermination camp. With the help of anthropologist
Aleksandra Janus, they found one of the
survivors in Israel. Abraham Carmi was 14
when he hid here. In my view this experience of being
with others was very important. He didn’t say that
directly, but when he was describing the process of hiding
in different places — also here — he always mentioned other
people who were with him. So I think that was like the
core of the experience, of like also being
with others. Natalia Romik studies video
recordings of interviews conducted with
Abraham Carmi, where nearly 80 years
after his ordeal, he talks about what
he experienced. He identifies the bunker
at the cemetery as one of the hideouts that he used,
describing it exactly. The entrance was made up of
Jewish gravestones or Mazevot, that could be
pushed aside. The walls were
reinforced with bricks, that were originally intended for
a mausoleum for Jewish soldiers killed in the
First World War. Railway tracks formed the
roof, which the Mazevot — or gravestones
then rested on. They concealed
the hideout. But what was it like
inside the bunker? Abraham
Carmi said, that was of course quite
chaotic during the Holocaust. So some people jumped inside,
and they used few mazevot, he even remembered
exact the names and surnames written
on the mazeva. They tried to
pull on and off, of course it’s really heavy
so that was not easy for women and girls
hiding there. And there were days there were,
he said, 30 people inside. The very idea
seems shocking. The bunker
is so small, there’s hardly enough room
for the scanning equipment. How could 30 people
survive here? Daily food rations
in the Warsaw Ghetto amounted to just
184 calories, according to Michał
Laszczkowski from the Cultural
Heritage Foundation. That’s less than a
hundred grams of bread. It’s not known how
many of those who used the hideout
actually survived. Elsewhere there were other,
even more unlikely hideouts. Natalia Romik is on her way
to south-eastern Poland, where two Jewish brothers
are said to have survived the Holocaust by
hiding inside a tree. That was at least
the story that she stumbled on
during her research. In the grounds of a mansion
in the Wisniowa region, there are oak trees that have
stood here for centuries. The mansion itself has been
turned into a cultural center. The director takes us
through the exhibition. He’s especially proud of
an old 100 Zloty bill. It shows a tree
affectionately named Józef, that’s located
in the grounds. And that’s exactly what’s
brought Natalia Romik here. The trunk of the 650-year-old
tree is where the Hymi brothers are said
to have taken refuge. Once again, Natalia turns
to modern technology to unlock the secrets
of the past. This time her aim is to peer
inside the old oak tree, to see if it could indeed
have been used as a hideout. We are using site-specific
equipment, not only this one, but also a special camera
to find any traces of the moment where the two
brothers called Hymi were hiding in this
place for a few years. The sense of anticipation
is huge as she joins the tree specialist to get
a look further up? She gets her first glimpse
inside the trunk. It is like a metal
shelf inside. They continue their ascent.
Józef is 30 meters tall. At its widest point, the trunk
is nearly seven meters. A horizontal plank
passes right through the middle of the
hollow trunk. Clearly the
work of humans. The higher
they go, the more evidence they
find that the tree could indeed have been
used as a hideout. Another plank. It can’t
be a coincidence. We saw at least five shelves, 4
wooden shelves and one metal. Probably that the
Hymi brothers, the archival research
is still ongoing, used them as stairs to come
to observation points. Just to observe the
situation from the holes. We have like
1,2,3 4. So it is incredible that
this survived the war. Additional drone footage
helps to document one of the most incredible hideouts used
during the Nazi occupation. It would appear, that this majestic
looking tree helped to save lives. A borescope camera could help
to turn up more evidence to support the legend
of the Hymi brothers. Because the tree is living
and constantly changing, the openings in the
trunk that would have once provided access
to the inside, have grown over
in some areas. The borescope camera will
allow the researcher to get a detailed
look inside. The images show that
the tree has been systematically
adapted inside. This one shows
an iron screw. Natalia is now convinced that the
story of the Hymi brothers is true — although she found no proof
for the existence of anyone under that
name in the archives. They survived
the Holocaust. One of them was here,
probably in the late 50s. The name in my opinion
was not Hymi, maybe Hryniewicz may
be another name. We will prove this and maybe the
family is still living somewhere, in Israel or
the States. It is a long story, but
we are closer and closer. Living inside a tree was
a desperate measure, necessitated by a
desperate situation. It’s very hard to imagine,
our methodology of surviving every day
is psychology. To live in a tree is out
of our imagination. So we should use different tools
to think about this time. New tools to bring to life
the horrors of that time and make them accessible
for a new generation. Natalia Romik wants to reflect
on that and has come to Pelkinie Palace for
some time out. The palace belongs to
the Czartoryski family, who are well known
Polish aristocrats. The Czartoryskis have always
been great art collectors. Art and architecture interest
the researcher because they can help us relate
to events of the past. Under the communist time this
place was totally destroyed. It was a part of
the hospital. The family Czartorysky like
5, 6 years ago started to renovate this place and they
established an art foundation, which is supposed
to be, and will be, one of the best art
foundations working with young artists
in the future. In this castle during the
Holocaust and during the Second World War everything
was destroyed by the Nazis. This is also a very
tragical story, but the real tragical story was
in the Ghetto here in Pelkinie, which changed
everything. Almost all Jews from
this area were killed. The German occupiers annihilated
the Jewish community. Even the
gravestones at the local Jewish cemetery
were plundered. The cemetery was destroyed,
very hardly destroyed, during the Holocaust
time in the 40s. The Nazis took some mazevot to
build part of the Gestapo place, like offices nearby the
cloister in Jaroslaw. Yeah,
it‘s sad. In the neighboring
town of Jaroslaw, Natalia Romik has come across
another wartime hideout. Nuns at a local monastery are
said to have had a secret door leading to a basement
where they hid Jewish children
from the Nazis. And here
it is. Hidden behind a
normal door, the secret door was disguised
as a storage rack. It still looks just as
it did eighty years ago. The rack could just
be flipped open, providing access to
the basement hideout. The nuns provided the
Jewish children with food, allowing them to
survive the Holocaust. Today the Catholic nuns
teach schoolchildren. “My question is, if the
children are aware, that inside of the cloister is this
secret place going to the cellar. Probably
no. So also one of my goals will
be to protect this place and to renovate but also to find
an idea how to make a cast. Again, the
same — I was in the Jewish
Cemetery and at the Jozef Oak Tree
but also here. Her next stop is the city of
Gliwice near the German border. Before the Second
World War, it was part of Germany
and known as Gleiwitz. The city is famous for being
the starting point of the war. SS guards staged
an attack here, which Hitler then used as a
pretext to invade Poland. For the region’s large Jewish
community, it was to spell disaster. Today all that remains of Jewish
life here is a few buildings, like the former
Jewish mortuary. They kindly asked me to redesign
this place and there was a big issue how we can change
the place although there are no Jews in
Gleiwitz anymore. So we thought with
a new function, like how we can
implicate a new spirit. For children — this
multicultural school — for an Upper Silesian
Jewish Museum, because personal history
is not visible anymore. Making what was lost visible
again is the aim of the exhibition
put together by Natalia Romik and
Karolina Jakowenko, an expert on Poland’s
Jewish history. The exhibition highlights
Jewish influence on society. One of the inventers of NIVEA cream
came from here, for example. And many of the men
fought and died for Germany during the
First World War. We should remember
that we are living in the ruins of
Jewish architecture, actually it’s a ghost
architecture mostly. So actually we have
ghosts of memory. Natalia Romik and Karolina
Jakowenko drive further east. They’re heading to the mining
town of Siemianowice Slaskie, where they’re keen to research
another extraordinary story of Jews managing
to hide from the Nazis. Jolanta Kobylec-Cyganek
is descended from a Polish mining family that
hid Jews in their home. In so doing, they put
their own lives at risk. But she says stories of
such heroism were swept under the carpet
after the war. At various points, the government
actively cultivated anti-Semitism, so there was a need
to be cautious. Communist propaganda probably
had a lot to do with why people didn’t talk
about it anymore. And felt reluctant to share
their experiences and stories. Natalia Romik is fighting to
remove the silence that still surrounds Poland’s
Jewish history. And to publicize the
stories of Jews in hiding. This is the house where the Kobylec
family gave refuge to Jews. The two researchers are
visiting Jadwiga Kobylec who experienced that
time as a child. She invites the researchers
into her bedroom. This used to be the
kitchen, she says. And during the war they would
often sit there together. Underneath the
kitchen was an underground hiding place
for 10 to 15 people, built by Jadwiga’s
father-in-law Piotr Kobylec. A trap door led to the chamber.
With the help of neighbors, they kept their Jewish
guests supplied with food. That too was
dangerous, as not all Polish neighbors
could necessarily be trusted. Those people who were for money
or for different sources — they were selling
basically Jews, yeah. And of course, in the Polish
histography it is still tabu. And of course, we
should talk about it. But the family of the
Kobylec were heroes. A representative of the
family was honored by the state of Israel as
“Righteous Among the Nations”, a title used to distinguish
non-Jews who risked their lives to protect Jews
during the Holocaust. But Jadwiga Kobylec says
the family has received almost no recognition
in Poland. So she’s keen to support
Natalia’s work. There are a lot of hiding places
that nobody’s taking care of. Of course, we are talking
about people, also medals, how the Poles were
really brave. That is
fine. But I think we need also
to show the other side. Back to
Warsaw. Without the support of
international organizations, Natalia Romik couldn’t
continue her work. Germany’s Gerda
Henkel Foundation is among those funding
her research. As is the Taube
Center Foundation for the Renewal of Jewish
Life in Poland. The center’s Halise Lieberman
says commemorating the old Jewish
hideouts is key. The question is in
a world like ours, in a continent
— of Europe — where there are so
many hiding places and killing places
and saving places. How do you create memorials which
really speak to people today? Give people the honour
who created them, for those who saved those
in these hiding places? A creative approach
is needed. The basement refuge in the
Kobylec home has long since been incorporated into the
house and no longer exists. So Natalia Romik, who’s
also an architect, plans to create a
model of the house, bringing to light the refuge
that was hidden for so long. And telling the life-saving
stories that it enabled. Next, we visit the
neighboring town of Bedzin. Up until the
Holocaust, its Jewish community numbered
twenty thousand people. Piotr Jakowenko is committed
to safeguarding the last remaining traces
of Jewish life here. Together with others, he
set up a small foundation. In this apartment
block, the group has managed to rescue
a former Jewish prayer room. The original frescoes are
still largely intact. The place had been due to
undergo major renovations. Had the work
gone ahead, the very last trace of
Jewish life in Bedzin would have
disappeared. But the foundation’s
intervention changed all that. Natalia is now working
with them to preserve this last piece of living history
from Bedzin’s Jewish past. We believe that this is an
important part of Bedzin history, this is an important
part of Polish history. In pre-war Bedzin there
were about 80 such places, in the area there had to be
hundreds of such places, in Poland there were
thousands of such places. And almost everything was destroyed
with people during the war. Together, they’re working to
challenge the culture of denial, refusing to let the past
be forgotten any longer. The foundation has
produced a map, showing sites that highlight
Bedzin’s Jewish history. Natalia wants to know if any
wartime hiding places may have survived
in the town. Piotr Jakowenko believes
there’s unlikely to be anything in
the town center, for one simple
reason. All the population was
resettled to the ghetto, which was the poorest
neighborhood of Bedzin. Before it became a ghetto, it was
a neighborhood of Polish workers, very poor favela kind
of part of the city. So the two of them head to
the former ghetto in Bedzin. Beginning in
May 1942, Jews were deported from
here to Auschwitz. Piotr remembers hearing
one story from a Polish woman whose
family was allowed to continue living
in this house, while more and more Jews were being
resettled in the neighborhood. She was just a small
child at the time. She was seeing these Jewish people
going in and out to their barn, the family barn, which
was standing over there, and taking some bags full
of something from the barn. And she was
asking her mother “what are these people
taking from our barn?” Her mother said “Do not ask these
questions, this is dangerous. This is none of our business.
It’s better not to ask”. And later on, she understood
that these people were constructing a shelter, a
hiding place under the barn. The barn has long
since disappeared. Piotr Jakowenko
thinks it probably stood where the
garage is today. A few old bricks in the hedge
could have been part of it. But with so little to go on,
it’s impossible to know. One thing is certain,
in August 1942, the Germans began deporting
people from here en masse. The whole area was
searched, every house. And all the people
were deported. Those who were not cooperating
were killed on the spot. And this hiding place
was discovered by Germans during
the “Aktion”. One of the two entrances
was through the oven. And one of the German
soldiers accidentally pushed one of the
tails of the oven, it fell down and some voice
from downstairs was heard. And that is how they
were discovered. Then water and gas was pumped
into this hiding place and all the people
were murdered. A brutal and
tragic ending. Natalia is determined to
try to locate the hideout. Probably will be possible
to via georadar to try the traces and the colour
could also show us where was exactly the
hiding place With creative ideas, Natalia
Romik and those around her are seeking new ways of making
the past accessible, even for those who don’t want
to hear about the Holocaust. Jadwiga Kobylec needs
no convincing. Instead Natalia’s here to show
her the model of her home with the basement
hideout. They plan to exhibit this model
to the public and tell the stories of those who survived
thanks to the hideout. Up to 30 people squeezed
into the bunker, twice as many as it
was designed for. They had very little air
and whenever they heard an unfamiliar voice at the door,
they were gripped with fear. Had they been
discovered? Would they
be betrayed? Natalia Romik says
the hideouts are the “architecture
of survival”. Her role is to bring
them to life, whether it’s a
650-year-old oak tree ? ?the ground beneath
a barn in Bedzin? ?or an underground bunker at
the Warsaw Jewish Cemetery, concealed under
the gravestones. Natalia Romik has come
here with a colleague to produce a silicon mold
of one of the walls. The walls provided protection
from the dark threats posed by the world
outside, she says. And threats to freedom and human
rights still exist today, right here
in Europe. So Natalia Romik isn’t
interested in creating monuments that simply look
back to the past. Instead, using
her imagination, she wants to illustrate
the parallels between the past and the
present-day. They will be open
boxes of the memory. And together with
archival research they will show us not
only the fear, the tragedy of the
Holocaust but also the architectural tools that
they used during the time and a specific narration that we
know only from down, deep down. The mold of the wall doesn’t
just symbolize the horrors. Natalia Romik says it is
also a testament to courage, resourcefulness, and sheer
determination to survive — and the altruistic actions of a
few, taken at great personal risk.
