page_title: Tosia Altman
section_title: Smuggling arms
hierarchical_section_title: Tosia Altman / World War II / Smuggling arms
caption_attribution_description: Original or archival image caption, which may be erroneous, biased, obsolete or politically extreme. German&#58; Mit Waffen gefangene Weiber der HaluzzenbewegungHehalutz women captured with weapons Deutsch: Niederschlagung des Aufstandes im Warschauer Ghetto. Foto von Jürgen Stroop in einem Bericht an Heinrich Himmler vom Mai 1943. English: Stroop Report: a report written by Jürgen Stroop for Heinrich Himmler about liquidation of Warsaw Ghetto in May 1943. Polski: Raport Stroopa: raport z maja 1943, napisany przez Jürgena Stroopa do Heinricha Himmlera na temat likwidacji getta warszawskiego. עברית: דו"ח סטרופ, נכתב על ידי יורגן סטרופ להיינריך הימלר על דיכוי המרד בגטו ורשה במאי 1943
context_page_description: Tosia Altman was a courier and smuggler for Hashomer Hatzair and the Jewish Combat Organization during the German occupation of Poland and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
  Born into a well-off family of Zionist leanings, she joined Hashomer Hatzair and became part of the central leadership before the war. After the invasion of Poland, she fled with the leadership of the youth movements to Vilnius. Volunteering as a courier, she passed herself off as a Polish gentile and risked her life to visit ghettos, first to organize underground education and later to warn them of the impending mass extermination of Jews.
  After the formation of the ŻOB in the Warsaw Ghetto, Altman was appointed a liaison to the Home Army. She smuggled weapons and explosives into the ghetto and established a chapter of the ŻOB in the Kraków Ghetto. During the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, she acted as a courier between bunkers. Seeking shelter at the command bunker at 18 Miła Street, she was one of six to escape when the Germans discovered it. Despite suffering wounds to the leg and head, Altman escaped from the ghetto via the sewers. She was captured two weeks later when the factory she was sheltering in caught fire.
context_section_description: Upon her return to Warsaw, Altman found that the Jews were unwilling to accept that they were about to be exterminated, even after reports arrived of a death camp at Chełmno. In early 1942, she collaborated with other leftist groups to establish a self-defense organization, but their efforts came to nothing because they were unable to secure any arms. In July, during the Grossaktion Warsaw and after the establishment of the Jewish Combat Organization (ŻOB), Altman, due to her Aryan appearance and Polish language skills, was appointed a liaison with the Home Army and Armia Ludowa. Although these Polish resistance organizations refused to offer any substantial help, Altman helped smuggle some grenades and explosives. Living on the Aryan side of the city, she also helped Jews escape from the ghetto and find places to hide. In a letter to Adam Rand, then in Vienna, in April 1942, she wrote, "Jews are dying before my eyes and I am powerless to help. Did you ever try to shatter a wall with your head?"
  In September, the Grossaktion finally ceased, leaving less than 70,000 Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto, one-fifth the original population. The leadership of Hashomer Hatzair was damaged by Gestapo arrests and an explosives cache of another smuggler was detected. Altman was joined by Arie Wilner, another Hashomer Hatzair activist, in an attempt to convince the Polish resistance groups to arm them. She also continued her visits to other ghettos, this time organizing armed resistance. She was instrumental in setting up a chapter of the ŻOB in the Kraków Ghetto. In October, the Home Army recognized the ŻOB and began to provide weapons, starting in December.
caption: Captured Hehalutz fighters during the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
exif: {"Image SubfileType": "Full-resolution Image", "Image DocumentName": "28-1411M.TIF", "Image ImageDescription": "Portrait", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "GIMP 2.10.14", "Image DateTime": "2020:07:11 23:38:20", "Image Artist": "NARA", "Image ExifOffset": "214", "Thumbnail ImageWidth": "183", "Thumbnail ImageLength": "256", "Thumbnail BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail PhotometricInterpretation": "6", "Thumbnail SamplesPerPixel": "3", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "368", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "8481", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB"}