Angelus News | September 22, 2023, Vol. 8, Issue No. 19

A PORTRAIT OF CHARITY
Eighty years ago, the Ulmas died protecting
Jews in Nazi-occupied Poland. Now declared
“blessed,” their witness has something to tell us.
BY MICHAEL O’SHEA
This month, the illustrious ranks
of beatified Poles grew by nine.
On Sunday, Sept. 10, Józef
and Wiktoria Ulma and their seven
children — Stanisława, Barbara,
Władysław, Franciszek, Antoni, Maria,
and an infant whose name isn’t known
to history — were officially declared
“blessed” in a special ceremony
in their home village of Markowa,
Poland.
German gendarmes murdered the
entire family in March 1944 in retaliation
for the Ulmas’ sheltering of Jews.
Their beatification process began in
2003, and Pope Francis declared them
“venerable” last year.
The Ulma family owned a modest
farm in Markowa in the Subcarpathian
(currently southeastern) region
of Poland, to this day a stronghold
of Polish Catholicism. Józef was an
amateur photographer and active
member of community and church
organizations. His photographs offer
precious insights into the life of this
family of martyrs.
The children knew only a world at
war. The oldest, Stanisława, was just
three when the Germans and Soviets
carved up her homeland.
At the Wannsee Conference in 1942,
Priests raise their hands during the consecration of
the Eucharist at the Sept. 10 beatification Mass of the
Ulma family Markowa, Poland. In the background is a
photo of the Ulmas taken shortly before their death, in
which Wiktoria is seen visibly pregnant. | CNS PHOTO/
JUSTYNA GALANT
senior German leadership resolved
to deport and murder Europe’s Jews.
Later that year, the Ulmas began to
hide eight Jews on their farm, an act
punishable by death in occupied Poland.
Additionally, Józef helped build
a shelter in a nearby ravine, to which
Wiktoria delivered food to four Jewish
women in hiding. German authorities
discovered and murdered those
women in December 1942. The eight
endured with the Ulmas until March
1944, just four months before Soviet
forces arrived in the area.
A local man, Włodzimierz Les,
informed the German authorities
sanctity of life is particularly relevant
in Poland. Abortion has been a key
issue in this year’s contentious election
campaign, with opposition leader
Donald Tusk announcing that candiabout
the Ulmas’ charity, likely due
to a personal dispute. Les previously
sheltered one of the Jews in hiding
in exchange for valuables. A dispute
over the possessions likely spurred his
denunciation. Elements of the Polish
underground observed Les for the
remainder of the war. They tried and
shot him in September of that year.
After the denunciation, a patrol of
German gendarmes arrived at the
Ulma farm in the early hours of
March 24, 1944. After shooting some
of the fugitives in their sleep, they led
the remaining inhabitants outside.
First they shot the remaining Jews,
then they murdered Józef and Wiktoria
in front of their children. Initially
unsure what to do with the children,
the Germans soon shot them as well,
“so there would be no trouble.” Later
examination of the bodies suggested
Wiktoria had partially given birth (the
Vatican has clarified that this child,
too, will be officially counted among
the beatified).
“Look how the Polish pigs that
shelter Jews are dying!” exclaimed one
of the German perpetrators during
the proceedings. The gendarmes
proceeded to loot the farm and drown
their consciences in vodka. A hidden
photograph of two Jewish women was
found with stains of a victim’s dripping
blood.
That stained photograph proved
symbolic of a time and place: The
leadership of Poland’s Nazi occupiers
envisioned a future in which a portion
of the Slavs would survive as a slave
race with minimal education; the rest
would be exterminated, along with
the Jews.
Of the numerous
countries that Germany
occupied during the war,
only in Poland did civilians
face execution for
aiding Jews. Whereas the
occupied peoples of Western
Europe maintained a
semblance of normal life,
Poles could take nothing for granted.
Ultimately, 6 million people — onefifth
of the country’s prewar population
— perished during the war.
The German occupiers’ official suppression
of human dignity unleashed
a barbaric tide throughout society.
The Holocaust was a central part of
it but not the only one. Ukrainian
paramilitaries murdered tens of thousands
of Poles in the Polish-Ukrainian
borderlands. Scoundrels thrived.
Some — ostensibly including the
neighbor who reported the Ulmas —
were willing to play the executioner
for little in return.
These conditions also kindled the
best in humanity, as demonstrated by
this now-beatified farm family. The
underground organization Zegota,
unique in German-occupied Europe,
existed for the purpose of saving Jews.
Tens of thousands benefited from the
organization’s aid. Poles comprise the
largest nationality of the Righteous
Among Nations.
Nearly 80 years later, Poland’s Sejm
(Parliament)
announced the
Ulma family
would be among
its patrons for the
year 2024.
But the Ulmas’
beatification
comes at a time
when their
witness to the
From left: Franciszek, Stanislawa,
Barbara, and Wladyslaw Ulma in an
undated photo before their death. |
INSTITUTE OF NATIONAL REMEM-
BRANCE
Chief Rabbi of Poland
Michael Schudrich at the
Sept. 10 outdoor beatification
Mass of the Ulma
family. He said the Ulmas
are “mentors.” | OSV
NEWS/POLISH BISHOPS
CONFERENCE
dates on his party’s parliamentary list
must support abortion. A large-scale
pro-abortion rally is being planned in
Warsaw two weeks before the October
elections.
Meanwhile, following the postwar
redrawing of borders, the Ulmas’
Markowa now sits very close to the
Poland-Ukraine border, across which
hundreds of thousands have fallen
victim to the region’s greatest conflagration
since World War II.
But the Ulmas’ beatification reminds
us how the simplest and smallest
among us can testify to Christ’s love.
History offers few details of what
went through Józef and Wiktoria’s
minds when deciding to undertake
their selfless acts of charity. Likewise,
the modern observer knows little of
the hardship they undoubtedly faced.
What do remain are photographs of
a beautiful family, a testament to life
and love.
In one of these surviving photographs,
taken soon before the family’s
death, a visibly pregnant Wiktoria
tends to an infant, a loving sister feeds
her young sibling, and the remaining
children cast their gazes in every
which direction. Józef stares knowingly
into the camera, as if to say, on
behalf of the family, a humble yes.
Michael O’Shea is a visiting fellow at
the Danube Institute and a dual citizen
of the United States and Poland,
and a board member of the Pittsburgh-area
pro-life organization People
Concerned for the Unborn Child. His
great-grandparents, Jan and Waleria
Lech, sheltered Jews on their farm in
Poland.
22 • ANGELUS • September 22, 2023 September 22, 2023 • ANGELUS • 23