Pauline Kra papers

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum 

Pauline Kra papers 

folders 6 

The Pauline Kra papers consist of biographical materials and photographs documenting the Bartkowski and Skornicki families from Łódź, their confinement in the Tomaszów Mazowiecki ghetto, Pauline’s hidden Jewish identity in a Warsaw convent, and the family’s relocation to Caracas after the war and eventual immigration to the United States. Biographical materials include a Tomaszów Mazowiecki identification card for Natalia Skornicka’s mother Tauba Bartkowska, an American Foreign Service application for non‐immigrant visa for Natalia and Paulina Skornicka, and Polish, Venezuelan, and American identification and immigration papers for Paulina Skornicka. Photographs depict Paulina Skornicka and members of her father’s and mother’s families, mostly in Łódź but also in Caracas and Brussels. One photograph documents Paulina’s first communion while she was hiding under a non‐Jewish identity in a convent in Warsaw. 

The Pauline Kra papers are arranged as two series: I. Biographical materials, 1942-1955, II. Photographs, approximately 1928-1949 

Pauline Kra was born Paulina Skornicka July 30, 1934 in Łódź, Poland to Eljasz (Edward, 1905‐1991) and Natalia (Natka, 1909‐2000) Skornicki. The family moved to Tomaszów Mazowiecki in 1941 to join her aunt Marysia, and the family was forced into the ghetto. Pauline’s father, who was working outside the ghetto, befriended Mr. Wojdan, the head of a socialist cell in Tomaszów Mazowiecki. Mr. Wojdan arranged for a woman named Mrs. Zajdel to hide Paulina in her home posing as her niece “Lusia” visiting from Warsaw. Her parents obtained false papers under the names Stefan and Janina Ziemnicki, moved to Warsaw, and Paulina joined them there. In 1943, she was placed in an orphanage where her Jewish identity was not known, and she visited her parents on weekends. Her family was evacuated during the Warsaw Uprising in August 1944 and stayed on Mrs. Rojkowna’s farm in Chudolipie until they were liberated by the Russians in January 1945. The family left Poland in 1946 and lived in Paris until 1947 when they traveled via the United States to Venezuela. They immigrated to the United States in the 1950s.