Based on years of archival research, 'The Doctors of the Warsaw Ghetto' is the most detailed study ever undertaken into the fate of more than 800 Jewish doctors who devoted themselves, in many cases until the day they died, to the care of the sick and the dying in the Ghetto. The functioning of the Ghetto hospitals, clinics and laboratories is explained in fascinating detail. Readers will learn about the ground-breaking research undertaken in the Ghetto as well as about the underground medical university that prepared hundreds of students for a career in medicine; a career that, in most cases, was to be cut brutally short within weeks of them completing their first year of studies.

About the Author

Dr. Maria Ciesielska is a specialist in Family Medicine and a university lecturer with a doctorate in medical history. A keen personal interest in learning more about the fate of her Jewish peers in Warsaw during the Holocaust motivated Maria to publish an award-winning book on this topic in 2017 after years of research.

For thirty years, Professor Emerita, Agata Krzychylkiewicz, lectured in Russian and European literature at the University of South Africa. A native of Poland, in 1970 she obtained an MA in Russian Philology at Wroclaw University, before emigrating to South Africa with her husband and sons in 1981. In 1999, she was awarded the degree DLitt et Phil for her thesis entitled "The Grotesque in the Works of Bruno Jasienski" (revised and published under the same title by Peter Lang [Bern], in 2006). During her academic career, Agata mainly focused on contemporary literature. She also was interested in translation theory, attempting to translate mainly short stories, several of which being published in Jewish Affairs and elsewhere. She also served as editor of the bilingual scholarly journal, Slavic Almanac.
Luc Albinski is based in Johannesburg and is the co-founder of Vantage Capital's mezzanine finance business which offers long-term, growth capital to mid-size businesses across Africa. He has recently launched an education investment platform which, in the first instance, is targeting the countries of Central & Eastern Europe. Luc has a long-standing interest in development finance. After completing his MBA at INSEAD in France, he spent time working on projects in countries such as Brazil, Gabon, Romania and Bosnia with the World Bank (IFC). Luc is passionate about entrepreneurship. Before Vantage, he established an employee-benefits business in Poland which was ultimately successfully listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. Luc learnt about his Jewish origins in his early twenties. His interest in holocaust and genocide work springs from his personal history as well as from his on-the-ground involvement with a non-profit during the Bosnian conflict.

Jeanette Friedman, a member of The Society of Professional Journalists, established her own company, The Wordsmithy, Llc. in 1979. That same year, she also founded Second Generation North Jersey for sons and daughters of Holocaust survivors. At The Wordsmithy, Ms. Friedman ghostwrites, edits and publishes books, most of them Holocaust memoirs, nursing books from handwritten manuscripts to the printed page. Her own book, Why Should I Care? Lessons from the Holocaust, written with David Gold, received critical acclaim from Holocaust educators. She also trains students to interview survivors for Names Not Numbers, a middle school Holocaust Education program. Friedman served on the NJ Governor's Task Force for Holocaust Education under Gov. Tom Kean and is one of the founders of the International Network of Children of Jewish Holocaust Survivors. She was a Second Generation advisor to the United States Holocaust Memorial Council and founder of an online group that exchanges information about current events, the Holocaust, character development in children and multicultural and ethnic understanding. From 1990-2004, she served as executive editor of the magazine Lifestyles. In addition to maintaining The Wordsmithy, Friedman continues her volunteer work in human rights/Holocaust education and is developing a Human Rights/Holocaust resource center for the Pocono Mountain region of Northeast Pennsylvania.
Tali Nates is the founder and director of the Johannesburg Holocaust & Genocide Centre and chair of the South African Holocaust & Genocide Foundation. She is a historian who lectures internationally on Holocaust education, genocide prevention, reconciliation and human rights. Nates has published many articles and contributed chapters to several books, among them God, Faith & Identity from the Ashes: Reflections of Children and Grandchildren of Holocaust Survivors (2015), Remembering The Holocaust in Educational Settings (2018) and Conceptualizing Mass Violence, Representations, Recollections, and Reinterpretations (2021). She won many awards including the Kia Community Service Award (South Africa, 2015), the Gratias Agit Award (2020, Czech Republic) and the Austrian Holocaust Memorial Award (2021). She was one of the founders of the Holocaust and Tutsi Genocide Survivors groups in Johannesburg. Born to a family of Holocaust survivors, her father and uncle were saved by Oskar Schindler. The rest of the family was murdered.

Reviews

"[The Doctors of the Warsaw Ghetto] sheds light on the influence of doctors, nurses and other health workers on daily coping while attempting to survive and save lives. The book broadens the perspective regarding participants in the Uprising. Ciesielska describes dozens of doctors and nurses who, rather than fleeing for their lives following Aktions in the ghetto, stayed behind to treat their patients in the bunkers, where nearly all of them died; a type of 'white-coat rebellion' alongside the armed struggle. These medical services also reflect the doctors' and nurses' ethical decisions made under extreme tragic circumstances during the ghetto's final stages. ... This book is a must read for researchers of the Holocaust, the history of medicine, in general, and particularly Jewish medicine. Its appendixes pose an interesting research challenge for further study."

- Miriam Offer, Social History of Medicine

"It goes without saying that the Nazis had no interest whatsoever in the well-being and health of the captive Jewish inhabitants of the Warsaw ghetto. But because they feared that diseases and epidemics might spread beyond it and endanger German personnel and afflict the general Polish population, they provided a bare modicum of assistance to Jewish hospitals, health services, doctors, nurses and pharmacists.

Innumerable books have been written about the Holocaust in Poland, but precious few have dealt with this important but overlooked issue. Maria Ciesielska's The Doctors of the Warsaw Ghetto... examines it in voluminous detail from the moment the ghetto was established in November 1940 until it was destroyed during the uprising in April 1943."

- Sheldon Kirshner, The Times of Israel (blog)

"Dr. Maria Ciesielska's account of the Jewish doctors in the Warsaw Ghetto adds an important dimension to the existing material, but this is not just another historical account. Dr Ciesielska's meticulous, detailed, and comprehensive use of many personal memoirs and testimonies to document their lives, and their deaths, provides a special lens through we which we can learn and understand more about the personal stories of those doctors, nurses, and pharmacists who worked and lived under those dire and extreme circumstances in the Ghetto. Through her unique way of storytelling, Dr. Ciesielska provides us with a humanistic glimpse into the complexities of the daily lives of these Jewish victims, and the ethical and moral complexities that they faced as healthcare professionals. This is a work of devotion to the memory of these individuals."- Dr. Tessa Chelouche, M.D.
"This remarkable book depicts the heroic efforts which the Warsaw Ghetto doctors deployed to protect the inhabitants from epidemics and treat them if they were sick. Weakened by starvation, overcrowding, catastrophic hygienic conditions and diseases, most Ghetto residents did not survive. Many also perished in death camps. The Ghetto medical community was also almost completely wiped out. The author studied accounts by surviving physicians and provides a chronological history of the Ghetto medical organization, interspersed with portraits of Ghetto doctors. The book offers many examples of doctors' altruism and self-sacrifice. Their exact number is unknown, but Dr. Ciesielska lists the names of over 700 of them. Their tragic and often heroic stories will now be available to English readers, both in the medical community and in the general population interested in the history of the Warsaw Ghetto."- Claude Romney, Professor Emerita, University of Calgary
"The Warsaw Ghetto is one of the greatest tragedies of the twentieth century, ending with the Great Deportation to Treblinka's gas chambers; at the same time, the Ghetto offers an empowering story of a new and resourceful system of medical care which was a form of sustained resistance to the Nazi occupation. Maria Ciesielska tells this story vividly: she offers many new insights into the Jewish physicians and nurses confined to the Ghetto. It is a narrative of hope in efforts to create a new system of healthcare, and of dark violence from the Nazi authorities in their determination to destroy the Ghetto. The culmination is the heroic resistance of the Ghetto Uprising. We are offered a vivid and authoritative narrative with many new and often touching insights in the efforts to overcome epidemics and starvation. Dr. Ciesielska has created a lucidly written and inspiring book."- Paul Weindling, Research Professor in the History of Medicine, Oxford Brookes University

"Ciesielska, however, a specialist in family medicine and an expert in the history of medicine, has delved into the various archives in Poland, producing highly impressive findings. She presents a new, preliminary database, which will serve as a foundation for additional studies and is a significant contribution to commemorating Jewish doctors, both men and women. ...Ciesielska's findings are impressive and an invaluable achievement. Her methodically written book follows a chronological development placed in broad historical contexts and enriched by diverse sources. ...Maria Ciesielska's book sheds light on the 'other side of the coin' in its description of Jewish doctors. They left behind a written legacy that is also still relevant today. Their stories provide food for thought on the potential of maintaining ethical and professional strength, even in the most difficult circumstances, and of the ability to resist the forces of evil while continuing to provide patients with devoted medical care in impossible and unexpected conditions. The book also draws attention to the dozens of non-Jewish doctors, who assisted their Jewish colleagues while risking their own lives. Although their numbers were few, their inspirational actions were extraordinary."

- Miriam Offer, Western Galilee College, Israel, Holocaust and Genocide Studies

"This meticulous account of the Warsaw Ghetto's medical community, doctors, nurses, and pharmacists, is a long overdue tribute to an era's unsung heroes. Drawing extensively on archives, with appendices and a photo gallery listing over seven hundred individuals, backgrounds, specialties, hospital affiliations, the author sheds light on a subculture that emerged in 1940, following the ghetto's establishment, and their dedication under the most hellish of environments to saving or helping Jewish lives. ...This poignant but well-researched book is essential for Holocaust collections."

- Hallie Cantor, Yeshiva University, AJL News & Reviews


Awards
Winner of Maria and Lukasz Hirszowicz Award 2018 (Poland).



Book Information
ISBN 9781644697269
Author Maria Ciesielska
Format Paperback
Page Count 428
Imprint Academic Studies Press
Publisher Academic Studies Press
Weight(grams) 39g