León Chaim Lazer Weinstein (May 13, 1910 – December 28, 2011) was the oldest surviving resistance fighter of the 1943

Warsaw Ghetto Uprising The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising was the 1943 act of Jewish resistance in the Warsaw Ghetto in German-occupied Poland during World War II to oppose Nazi Germany's final effort to transport the remaining ghetto population to the gas chambers of the ...

. A member of the

Jewish Combat Organization The Jewish Combat Organization (, ŻOB; ''Yidishe Kamf Organizatsie''; often translated to English as the Jewish Fighting Organization) was a World War II resistance movement in occupied Poland, which emerged from the merger of five Jewish ...

and later the

Home Army The Home Army (, ; abbreviated AK) was the dominant resistance movement in German-occupied Poland during World War II. The Home Army was formed in February 1942 from the earlier Związek Walki Zbrojnej (Armed Resistance) established in the ...

during the later parts of

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, Weinstein previously served in the

Polish Army The Land Forces () are the Army, land forces of the Polish Armed Forces. They currently contain some 110,000 active personnel and form many components of the European Union and NATO deployments around the world. Poland's recorded military histor ...

in the early 1930s and again during the

German invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign, Polish Campaign, and Polish Defensive War of 1939 (1 September – 6 October 1939), was a joint attack on the Second Polish Republic, Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany, the Slovak R ...

in 1939.

Early life

Leon Chaim Lazer Weinstein was born on May 13, 1910, part of a Jewish family in the small town of

Radzymin Radzymin is a town in Poland and is one of the distant suburbs of the city of Warsaw. It is located in the powiat of Wołomin of the Masovian Voivodeship. The town has 8,818 inhabitants (as of 2008, but the surrounding commune is heavily populate ...

, 20 miles outside of

Warsaw Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...

, Poland. At twelve years old, Weinstein became an apprentice to a local tailor. But he would soon run away from his family's village to Warsaw seeking better opportunities for employment. Continuing to work as a tailor, Weinstein saved a healthy sum to help his family and returned to Radzymin to rejoin his family by the age of 18. He began working as a foreman for a clothing manufacturer. Weinstein joined the

and served two years in the

cavalry Historically, cavalry (from the French word ''cavalerie'', itself derived from ''cheval'' meaning "horse") are groups of soldiers or warriors who Horses in warfare, fight mounted on horseback. Until the 20th century, cavalry were the most mob ...

World War II

As WWII broke out, Weinstein rejoined the Army in early September 1939 to fight with the Polish cavalry during

. Captured near the Polish-Russian border, he was sent to a prison camp in

Kovel Kovel (, ; ; ) is a city in Volyn Oblast, northwestern Ukraine. It serves as the administrative center of Kovel Raion within the oblast. Population: Kovel gives its name to one of the oldest runic inscriptions which were lost during World War I ...

, Ukraine. He escaped two months later and traveled the 600 miles to Radzymin by foot, arriving in September 1940. He took an active part in the

() under the leadership of

Mordechai Anielewicz Mordechai Anielewicz (; 1919 – 8 May 1943) was the Polish leader of the Jewish Combat Organization (, ŻOB) during the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising; the largest Jewish resistance movement during the Second World War. Anielewicz inspired further reb ...

and

Yitzhak Zuckerman Yitzhak Zuckerman (; ; 13 December 1915 – 17 June 1981), also known by his nom de guerre "Antek", was one of the leaders of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943 against Nazi Germany during World War II. Biography Zuckerman was born on December ...

. He obtained forged papers to regularly work outside his Jewish neighborhood. From there, he smuggled food, arms, and would recruit and train volunteers to fight. In October 1942, through a tip, he found out that Jews in Radzymin were going to be taken. He tried to convince his extended family to run away but to no avail. On October 4, Weinstein escaped with his wife Sima and his 15-month-old daughter Natalie. Thousands of Jews from Radzymin were rounded up and sent via rail transport to

Treblinka Treblinka () was the second-deadliest extermination camp to be built and operated by Nazi Germany in Occupation of Poland (1939–1945), occupied Poland during World War II. It was in a forest north-east of Warsaw, south of the Treblinka, ...

, a

Nazi concentration camp From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany operated more than a thousand concentration camps (), including subcamp (SS), subcamps on its own territory and in parts of German-occupied Europe. The first camps were established in March 1933 immediately af ...

in the northeast of Poland. This included the rest of his entire family including his grandparents, parents, sisters, and brothers, none of whom survived. The Weinsteins headed for Warsaw. Life was not safe for their daughter. So her parents bundled her up, hung a gold cross around her neck, hoping Polish authorities would believe she was a Christian. They left her on the doorstep of an attorney who immediately took her to the Warsaw Police Station. Sima went into hiding, and Leon went back to fight with ŻOB in the

Warsaw Ghetto The Warsaw Ghetto (, officially , ; ) was the largest of the Nazi ghettos during World War II and the Holocaust. It was established in November 1940 by the Nazi Germany, German authorities within the new General Government territory of Occupat ...

. Leon would never learn of what happened to Sima.

Warsaw Uprising

Weinstein was responsible for smuggling weapons into the ghetto. The

began on April 19, 1943 when German tanks began rolling into the Ghetto. The resistance lasted for 27 days. Weinstein survived and escaped through the Warsaw sewage system. He crawled through the sewers for three days and managed to escape the Ghetto with six others who scattered in the non-Jewish part of the city. Weinstein was able to stay at a friend's house for the remainder of the war and worked for the

Polish Underground Army The Home Army (, ; abbreviated AK) was the dominant Polish resistance movement in World War II, resistance movement in Occupation of Poland (1939–1945), German-occupied Poland during World War II. The Home Army was formed in February 1942 fr ...

. He would pose as a railroad worker to smuggle supplies and sabotage the rail system.

Later life, 1945-2011

Personal life

After the war, he learned all his relatives had died. At war's end, for six months, Leon traveled across Poland on his bicycle, searching one convent orphanage after another. After visiting many, he spotted Natalie and immediately recognized her. He was able to confirm the identification by her birthmark above her hip. Natalie was four years old. A few months later, Leon met Sophie, a survivor of

Auschwitz concentration camp Auschwitz, or Oświęcim, was a complex of over 40 Nazi concentration camps, concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany, occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) d ...

. They married and moved to France in 1947. They had a son named Michael. Eventually, the family emigrated to the United States in 1952. Weinstein died in

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

, California on December 28, 2011.

References

External links

Oral history interview with Leon Weinstein
at

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) is the United States' official memorial to the Holocaust, dedicated to the documentation, study, and interpretation of the Holocaust. Opened in 1993, the museum explores the Holocaust through p ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Weinstein, Leon 1910 births 2011 deaths Jewish Combat Organization members American men centenarians Polish men centenarians Jewish centenarians