"Dear ma'am, please be mother to her and give her your heart."

In tender letters, Eda Kuenstler gave instructions to the Catholic woman who had agreed to care for her baby in February 1943.

As Jews in German-occupied Poland, Eda and her husband, Salek, knew their daughter was at risk and desperately wanted to find shelter for her. Just weeks before the SS and police murdered 2,000 Jews and deported others, the couple smuggled baby Anita out of the Krakow ghetto.

They placed her with the family of Sophia Zendler, who had three children of her own.

In her letters, Eda asked Sophia to dip a pacifier in sugar when Anita became fussy. She sent “kisses for the beloved baby” and wrote Sophia “begging you as a mother” to take care of little Anita.

Eda survived two labor camps and imprisonment in Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen. She eventually reunited with Anita. Salek was killed in the Mauthausen camp.

Click the link in our bio to see the letter.

Photo 1: Anita with rescuer Sophia Zendler

Photo 2: Anita’s mother, Eda Kuenstler

Photo 3: Portrait of Anita while in hiding wearing a cross

Courtesy of Anita Kuenstler Epstein

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