us-005578-irn522948-irn61121
type: RecordSet
archival history: The drawing was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2005 by Stanislava Roztropowicz-Szkubel.
biographical history: Sabina (Inka) Kagan was born on August 1, 1941, in Radziwillow, Poland (Radyvyliv, Ukraine). Radziwillow was occupied by the Soviet Union in 1939 under the terms of the German-Soviet Pact. In June 1941, Germany declared war on the Soviet Union and occupied the territory. During these weeks, the local Ukrainian authorities and populace attacked and murdered many of the Jews in the community. The Germans established a ghetto for the Jews in April 1942, but Sabina’s young parents escaped and went into hiding. However, the Polish policeman and his family with whom they were hiding soon told them to leave. Sabina’s parents begged them to keep their infant daughter. The family agreed, though for a fee. Not long after this, Sabina’s parents were killed when the barn they were hiding in was set on fire. When the Polish family stopped receiving money for Sabina’s care, they abandoned her in a wooden crib in a dark cellar with no clothes or food. A sixteen-year-old girl discovered Sabina and gave her some food. The teenager told the Roztropowicz family that she had found a Jewish child living in horrible conditions. Jozéf and Natalia Taborowska Roztropowicz and their three children, Janina (Janka, 18 yr., Stanislawa (Stanka) 16 yr., and Andrzej, 13 yr., made the decision to take in Sabina and raise her as if she were their own daughter and sister. Sabina was very ill from malnutrition and exposure and not used to people. The family worked together to nurse her back to health, though she would continue to get sick easily. Sabina was given the name Irena (Inka) Roztropowicz. The family told people that she was the child of a cousin who had been murdered during the ethnic cleansing carried out by nationalist Ukrainian groups. That fall, their house was burned by bandits and they had to relocate. The family often had to board German soldiers in their small home. In the spring of 1944, the town was at the center of the warfront as the Soviets advanced from the East. After a bombin…
physical characteristics and technical requirements: Child's small, colored pencil sketch on light brown, rectangular paper. It depicts three 5-petaled light blue flowers with dark blue edges and circular yellow centers with a black center dot. There are 3 green stalks with black outlines arranged among the flowers. The word mama is pencilled in a child's handwriting to the right of the drawing and the year is in the bottom right corner. It is worn and discolored from age.
conditions of access: No restrictions on access
conditions of use: Restrictions on use
has beginning date: 1947-01-01
has end date: 1947-12-31
has or had holder: us-005578
has or had identifier: 1
has record set type: Item
identifier: irn61121
is or was included in: us-005578-irn522948
record resource extent: overall: Height: 5.375 inches (13.653 cm) | Width: 8.375 inches (21.273 cm)
results or resulted from: 1
scope and content: Bouquet of blue flowers drawn by 6 year old Irena Roztropowicz (Sabina Kagan) in 1947 for Natalia Roztropowicz, whose family who saved Sabina from starvation in Radziwillow, Poland (Radyvyliv, Ukraine) in 1942. Sabina's parents had paid a Polish family to hide her, but when her parents were murdered, the family abandoned Sabina. She was discovered in a basement by a teenage girl who told the Roztropowicz family. Jozef and Natalia, and their children, Janina, 18 years, Stanislava (Stanka) 16 years, and Andrzej, 13 years, raised Sabina as their own daughter and sister. They named her Irena and she was baptized as a Catholic in 1945. In the postwar period, the family experienced financial hardship and, in October 1948, decided the best thing for Sabina was to turn her over to the Coordinating Committee for Jewish Children in Łódź. In 1949, Sabina was adopted by a Jewish couple. They immigrated to Israel and never spoke to Sabina about her past. It was not until 1999 that Sabina discovered that she was adopted, that her biological parents had been killed, and that she had been rescued and, for six years, a member of the Roztropowicz family. She met them again in 2000 when she attended the ceremony in Warsaw where Jozef and Natalia were posthumously honored by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations.
title: Colored pencil drawing of flowers created by a hidden child for her rescuer