The Victims and the Survivors: The Lvov-Warsaw School and the Holocaust

Abstract

In this chapter, we will try to undertake the subject of death in general and in particular as it concerns the philosophers of the Lvov-Warsaw School during the Holocaust, committed by the Nazi Germans during World War II. From Daniela Tenner-Gromska (1946–1948) account of the Polish philosophers war causalities, whose deaths appeared to be the result of the World War II, among the 55 considered here, only a few died in Jean Amery’s terms: a kind of ‘soldiers’ heroic death’. Six (10%) were women, from this half were young important representatives of the Lvov-Warsaw School: Janina Hosiasson-Lindenbaum, Estera Markinowna, Eugenia Ginsberg-Blaustein, who met tragic deaths because of Jewish origin. About 20% of the group became victims who died in the Gestapo prisons, or were killed during investigations conducted by the SS: Antoni Panski and Janina Hosiasson-Lindenbaum in the Wilno prison. There were five (10%) ghetto causalities in Warsaw: Adolf Lindenbaum, Jakub Rajgrodzki and Estera Markinowna; Leopold Blaustein, and Eugenia Ginsberg-Blaustein lost their lives in the Lvov ghetto. Another of ten (20%) were victims of the death camps, half were the scholars of the Jagiellonian University in Cracow not connected with the Lvov-Warsaw School. Edmund Romahn and Marceli Handelsman, both associated with the School, lost life in the death camp Majdanek and concentration camp Nordhausen/Erlagen. Those who perished in the Auschwitz concentration camp were: Zygmunt Łempicki. Aleksander Kierski, Adam Stawarski, Jan Morsdorf. There were four individuals who committed suicide at the outbreak of the war—among them—Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz. Five members of the group (10%) perished in the Warsaw Uprising (in 1944)—among them—Jan Salamucha. Research and reports conducted after the war revealed cases of individuals being rescued from prisons and concentration camps, and also those who managed to survive the Shoah/Holocaust while in hiding. Irena Pannenkowa (Jawicowna) from the first generation of the women of the School and from the second generation: Dina Sztejnbarg (Janina Kaminska/Kotarbinska) and Seweryna Łuszczewska-Romahn. All of them survived concentration camps and resumed active lives after the war. They all shared an experience being a prisoner in the female concentration camp at Ravensbruck.