KAROLICKA-KARPINSKA, Janina (1912 – 2011)
In April 1943, after the outbreak of the Warsaw ghetto Uprising, Hilary Kochanski and Marian Stolinski escaped to the Aryan side of the city, where Malka, Kochanski’s wife, was hiding. After numerous reversals of fortune, the Kochanskis and Stolinski moved in with Jania Karpinska, a young widow with a four-year old boy who was already sheltering Wincenty Karolicki, a fugitive from the ghetto. Some days later, Karpinska also took in Shlomo Ginsburg. In risking her life to save the refugees, Karpinska was guided by humanitarian principles, which overrode considerations of personal safety or economic hardship. Due to the cramped conditions in her apartment and fear of discovery by neighbors, Karpinska decided to rent a summerhouse for the refugees in the nearby resort town of Izabelin, where they stayed for some months under Karpinska’s care. In due course, the refugees, with Karpinska’s help found hiding places in and around Warsaw.
In 1944, after the suppression of the Warsaw Uprising, Karolicki returned to Karpinska’s apartment in Izabelin, where he stayed until the area was liberated by the Red Army in January 1945. After the war Karolicki and Karpinska married and immigrated to Israel. Many of the other survivors also immigrated to Israel. Marian Stolinski’s grandson, Rabbi Maciej Pawlak, became the first Polish born Rabbi to serve in Poland since the Holocaust. On March 13, 1997, Yad Vashem recognized Janina Karolicka (Karpinska by her first marriage) as Righteous Among the Nations. (Excerpt from”The Encyclopedia of the Righteous Among the Nations”, Poland, Yad Vashem Publications, p. 337)
