Anastazy Matywiecki (17.09.1914–26.08.1944)

He was born on September 17, 1914 in Kobryn, as a son of Zelik and Malka née Goldin. In 1931, he began law studies at the University of Warsaw. During his studies, he became involved with leftist circles sympathizing with communism. He was also briefly arrested for distributing communist leaflets. After graduation, he was a trainee at the law firm of Leon Berenson, whose leftist views to a large extent he shared. He was a member of revolutionary organizations such as “Pochodnia”, “OMS Życie” and the Communist Union of Polish Youth. He wrote poetry, but none of his works survived the war.

During the German occupation, he was displaced to the Warsaw ghetto, where he was an activist of the underground and the Jewish National Committee – he organized help and shelter for Jews in Warsaw. The circumstances of his escape to the so-called Aryan side are unknown. During the Warsaw Uprising, he served as a lieutenant officer in the AL [People’s Army] Staff of the Warsaw District. He died on August 26, 1944, along with four other commanders of the People’s Army as a result of the bombing of a tenement house at ul. Freta 16. He was exhumed in March 1945 and buried in the grave of the AL Staff at Hoover Square in Warsaw. On August 26, 2009, the remains of all those buried there were moved to a mass grave in the AL headquarters at the Powązki Military Cemetery in Warsaw.