rescuers of jews
Matora Anna
Anna Matora
In the wartime Anna Matora lived with her two daughters in Kaunas. Her husband served in the Red Army and Anna had to gain for living alone. In November 1941, she rented one room of her two-room apartment to a young Pole, Yury (Ireneusz) Węgliszewski. The money that Yury earned working as electrician was not enough to pay the rent and Anna let him to live at her place without payment.
In the course of time, ties of friendship developed between Yury and Anna, and she learned that he was a Jew from Piotrków Tribunalski in Poland, who had escaped to Lithuania before the outbreak of the War. Later on he was imprisoned into the Kaunas Ghetto, but managed to escape one night jumping over the fence. Since his name was Polish and he spoke Polish fluently he passed for a Pole. However his wife Zlata Linkowska remained in the ghetto and he feared for her fate. At Yury's request, Anna used to transfer to Zlata letters, money and other dispatches from her husband. She did it on the way to the ghetto when Zlata with the brigades of Jewish workers returned from the work at the Kaunas airport.
Anna was very intelligent. She even let Yury to take her daughters with him when he needed to go out to Kaunas city. It was safer for him, but very dangerous for the girls and their mother.
After the war, Zlata was reunited with Yury-Ireneusz Węgliszewski (later Jerry Bengall) in Austria and together they immigrated to the United States.
In the wartime Anna Matora lived with her two daughters in Kaunas. Her husband served in the Red Army and Anna had to gain for living alone. In November 1941, she rented one room of her two-room apartment to a young Pole, Yury (Ireneusz) Węgliszewski. The money that Yury earned working as electrician was not enough to pay the rent and Anna let him to live at her place without payment.
In the course of time, ties of friendship developed between Yury and Anna, and she learned that he was a Jew from Piotrków Tribunalski in Poland, who had escaped to Lithuania before the outbreak of the War. Later on he was imprisoned into the Kaunas Ghetto, but managed to escape one night jumping over the fence. Since his name was Polish and he spoke Polish fluently he passed for a Pole. However his wife Zlata Linkowska remained in the ghetto and he feared for her fate. At Yury's request, Anna used to transfer to Zlata letters, money and other dispatches from her husband. She did it on the way to the ghetto when Zlata with the brigades of Jewish workers returned from the work at the Kaunas airport.
Anna was very intelligent. She even let Yury to take her daughters with him when he needed to go out to Kaunas city. It was safer for him, but very dangerous for the girls and their mother.
After the war, Zlata was reunited with Yury-Ireneusz Węgliszewski (later Jerry Bengall) in Austria and together they immigrated to the United States.