Given name: Paweł "Cwaniak" Family name: Chochman

  • YES
  • Male
  • Paweł "Cwaniak"
  • Chochman
  • Borkowski,Cwaniak
  • Yes
  • Jewish
  • A cigarette vendor from Trzech Krzyzy Square, after the Action in 1942 the brothers were left on their own and passed to the 'Aryan side' together with workers on detail. They wandered through the streets, earned their living with singing in yards, they slept in attics. Together with other Jewish boys they smuggled clothes, entering and exiting the ghetto together with workers on detail. They slept in allotments in Saska Kepa. In April 1943 Pawel kept watch on the allotments for 100 zl per month. He was allowed to sleep in a cabin on a plank bed, Zbyszek lived with him from time to time. In autumn the cabin was dismantled. The boys built themselves a shelter under the stairway in Skaryszewski Park. They sold cigarettes in Trzech Krzyzy Square. From October 1943 Pawel and his brother started to sell newspapers at the corner of Marszalkowska and Hoza Street. A Polish woman gave them shelter after they had shown her false documents. She did not suspect that they were Jewish, but when suspicions arose both boys escaped. They were given new documents. In the Warsaw uprising they worked as messengers under the name Borkowski. Pawel was given the nickname 'Cwaniak'. Both boys were very brave. after the capitulation they left Warsaw together with the insurgents and found themselves in a POW's camp in Lamsdorf, then Muhlberg and Brockwitz. Polish boys persecuted them there. He lives in Geneva.

  • Warsaw uprising, 1944
  • children
  • 10,50-60,71,73,80,94-98,100