Thread by @marinamaral2

Irena Sendler, also referred to as Irena Sendlerowa in Poland, was a Polish social worker, humanitarian and nurse who served in the Polish Underground during World War II in German-occupied Warsaw.

Soon after the German invasion, on 1 November 1939, the German occupation authorities ordered Jews removed from the staff of the municipal Social Welfare Department where Sendler worked and barred the department from providing any assistance to Warsaw's Jewish citizens.

Sendler with her colleagues and activists from the department's PPS cell became involved in helping the wounded and sick Polish soldiers. On Sendler's initiative the cell began generating false medical documents, needed by the soldiers and poor families to obtain aid.

Her PPS comrades unaware, Sendler extended such assistance also to her Jewish charges, who were now officially served only by the Jewish community institutions.

With Jadwiga Piotrowska, Jadwiga Sałek-Deneko and Irena Schultz, she also created other false references and pursued ingenious schemes in order to help Jewish families and children excluded from their department's social welfare protection.

300,000 Jews were crowded into a small portion of the city designated as the Warsaw Ghetto and the Nazis sealed the area in November 1940. As employees of the Social Welfare Department, Sendler and Schultz gained access to special permits for entering the ghetto to check for

signs of typhus, a disease the Germans feared would spread beyond the ghetto.

Under the pretext of conducting sanitary inspections, they brought medications and cleanliness items and sneaked clothing, food, and other necessities into the ghetto.

Sendler and other social workers would eventually help the Jews who escaped or arrange for smuggling out babies and small children from the ghetto using various means available.

Transferring Jews out of the ghetto and facilitating their survival elsewhere became an urgent priority in the summer of 1942, at the time of the Great Action.

This work was done at huge risk, as—since October 1941—giving any kind of assistance to Jews in German-occupied Poland was punishable by death, not just for the person who was providing the help but also for their entire family or household.

During the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, a network of emergency shelters was created by Sendler's group: private residencies where Jews could be temporarily housed, while Żegota worked on producing documents and finding longer-term locations for them.

Jewish children were placed by Sendler's network with Polish families, in Warsaw orphanage of the Franciscan Sisters of the Family of Mary, Roman Catholic convents such as the Sister Servants of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Turkowice or in Boduen, and orphanages.

The children were often given Christian names and taught Christian prayers in case they were tested. Sendler wanted to preserve the children's Jewish identities, so she kept careful documentation listing their Christian names, given names, and current locations.

On 18 October 1943, Sendler was arrested by the Gestapo. As they ransacked her house, she tossed the lists of children to her friend Janina Grabowska, who hid the list in her loose clothing.

Should the Gestapo access this information, all children would be compromised, but Grabowska was never searched.

The Gestapo took Sendler to their headquarters and beat her brutally.

Despite this, she refused to betray any of her comrades or the children they rescued. She was placed in the Pawiak prison, where she was subjected to further interrogations and beatings, and from there on 13 November taken to another location, to be executed by firing squad.

Her life was saved, however, because the German guards escorting her were bribed, and she was released on the way to the execution.

During the Warsaw Uprising, she worked as a nurse in a field hospital. She was wounded by a German deserter she encountered while searching for food.

Irena continued to work as a nurse until the Germans left Warsaw, retreating before the advancing Soviet troops.

In 1965, she was recognized by the State of Israel as Righteous Among the Nations.

Among the many decorations she received were the Gold Cross of Merit granted her in 1946 for the saving of Jews and the Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest honor.

She lived in Warsaw for the remainder of her life, and died on 12 May 2008, aged 98.

Irena Sendler is credited with having saved the lives of 2,500 Jewish children in the Warsaw ghetto during the Second World War.