Stefan Petri (1899-1986) was born in Poland, which was part of the Russian Empire until the 1917 Russian Revolution. Stefan was an engineer and lived in Wawer, now a suburb of Warsaw, with his wife Janina nee Niewiarowska (1898 - ?), their son Marian (1929-?), and some of Janina’s family members. Stefan was Greek Catholic and his wife was Roman Catholic. On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, and much of the country was under aerial bombardment for weeks. On September 17, the Soviet Army invaded from the east, and the two occupiers partitioned the country as agreed upon in the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact signed a month earlier. By October, Warsaw was controlled by German forces. The occupation government sought to brutally subjugate the Polish people, and used propaganda to denounce Polish people as filthy, bestial, and subhuman. Stefan, uncertain of what might occur, built a hiding place in the cellar of his home. The access point was hidden in a cabinet in the laundry room. In the fall of 1942, Stefan decided to hide a Jewish family, the Szapiros, even though there were severe penalties, including death, for anyone caught hiding Jews. He had known Kazimierz Kaufman Szapiro (1888 – 1977) and his Swedish wife, Ela Mandelsztam Szapiro (1887 – 1957), both dentists, and their sons, Marek (1917 -2002) a neurosurgeon and Jerzy (1920 -2011), a medical student, before the war and felt he was obligated to provide assistance. They had fled the Warsaw Ghetto, where the Jewish population had been segregated in the fall of 1940. From July 22 - September 12, 1942, the Germans carried out mass deportations to Treblinka killing center, murdering around 300,000 Jews. The family escaped with the help of a Polish friend, Irena Wroblewska, and her brother. Irena took them to hide in a tollgate in Praga, a suburb of Warsaw, and from there Stefan came late one night and took them to his home. He hid them in the cellar space concealed by the cabinet. The Petri family’s neighbors became suspicious of the activity in their home, and someone told the Gestapo that they were hiding escaped Jews. Stefan was interrogated and beaten. The home was closely searched twice with dogs, but nothing was discovered because Stefan had spread nicotine powder on the cellar floor to confuse the dogs’ sense of smell. People outside Stefan’s family knew about the hiding place he had built during the invasion, which made its discovery likely. In early 1943, Stefan built a second hiding place by digging out a space below the first cellar hiding space. This space was accessed through a trap door underneath a large workbench where he stored a variety of tools, locksmith’s instruments, and electrical parts. The Szapiro's could stay in the apartment at night and had to hide in the cellar during the day. A few neighbors, such as a local shopkeeper, Jadwiga, helped provide food for the family. For two years, the Szapiros stayed hidden day and night in Stefan’s home. In early September 1944, the region was liberated by the Soviet Army, now part of the Allied Forces. Germany surrendered on May 7, 1945. Jerzy Szapiro became a professor of medicine in Warsaw. Jerzy remembered how Stefan took on this dangerous task as if it were a straightforward matter, and displayed in the face of threats and actual danger, steadfast courage and moral strength. Marek Szapiro immigrated to the United States. Stefan’s wife, Janina, died. Later, he married Jadwiga, the neighbor that had helped feed the Szapiros. In 1981, Stefan, his first wife Janina, and their son Marian were honored as Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem. Marek’s memoirs were published in 2007, including diaries from the war years and details of chess games played between himself and Jerzy.
The padlock was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 1992 by Jadwiga Petri, the wife of Stefan Petri.
Large padlock placed on a workbench that concealed one of the hiding places Stefan Petri built in his home in Wawer, Poland. Stefan, his wife, Janina, and their son, Marian, were Polish Catholics. On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland and began subjugating the Polish people. Uncertain of what might occur, Stefan built a basement hiding place concealed by a cabinet. In mid-1942, the Germans deported 300,000 Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto to Treblinka killing center. Stefan learned that his Jewish dentist and friend, Dr. Szapiro, his wife Ela, and their adult sons, Jerzy and Marek had escaped from the ghetto, where they had been since the fall of 1940. He felt obligated to save them and decided to hide them in his home, despite the great risk to his family. Neighbors grew suspicious and reported him to the Gestapo for hiding Jews. He was beaten and the home searched twice with dogs, but the hidden space was not discovered. Several people knew of its existence, so in early 1943, Stefan dug out a second space below it. It was accessed through a trap door under a workbench piled with machine parts and tools to make it inconspicuous. Jadwiga, a local shopkeeper, helped supply food for the hidden family. The Szapiros remained hidden for two years inside Stefan's home, until liberation by the Soviet Army on September 11, 1944.
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overall: Height: 4.375 inches (11.113 cm) | Width: 3.000 inches (7.62 cm) | Depth: 0.875 inches (2.223 cm)
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Padlock placed on a workbench used to conceal a Jewish family’s hiding place
Large, corroded, U shaped brown painted metal padlock with a flat front and back and thin top extensions that form rounded shoulders. On the top left shoulder is a rectangular hole. On the right, between the extensions, is the heel of a pivoting, arched shackle with a rectangular hole in the tapered toe at the other end. Centered on the lower front is a keyhole with a center post and a pivoting, flat 1.500 inch tab anchored above to cover the hole. To secure the lock, the toe slides into the case hole and is fixed in place when the key is turned to shift the inner mechanism.