Objects

The badge belonged to Rywa (Róża) Bielicka. The badges, worn by the School of Nursing students, served an informative function. In 1928, at the invitation of her older sister Luba Blum-Bielicka, Rywa came to Warsaw and enrolled into the School of Nursing. Rywa worked at the hospital first as a junior nurse, then as a ward nurse and then as a superior nurse. In 1942, she also worked at the orphanage run by Janusz Korczak.

Rywa wore her badge pinned to her uniform, but after the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939 and the sequestering of the Jews in the ghetto in 1941, she hid it with other belongings outside the ghetto walls, in the flat at Okopowa Street, where she lived with her husband and son until the outbreak of war. The house was demolished at the end of the war. In the early 1950s, during the removal of rubble from the vicinity of Okopowa Street, one of the carters found some badges and brought them home. His wife worked at a hospital in Wola district and recognised the name Bielicka visible on the reverse of one of them. Luba, Rywa's sister, survived the war and was well known to the staff of this hospital as the headmistress of the School of Nursing located on its premises. After receiving the badge, Luba handed it over to its rightful owner, Rywa. Rywa considered this memento a precious treasure and guarded it for the rest of her life. After her death, the badge was cared for by her husband and then by Rywa's son.

On the back of the badge, in addition to the inscription 'R. Bielicka', there is a faintly legible name, probably H. Sarutiska. It is not clear who it belonged to or why it was placed on the object.

Gift of Alexander Kaganovich.