Aleksander Förster

Aleksander Förster was an informer in the service of the Germans in the Krakow ghetto. PankiewiczTadeusz Pankiewicz (1908 - 1993) - Polish pharmacist, graduate of the Jagiellonian University, owner of the "Pod Orłem" (polish: "Under the Eagle") pharmacy in Krakow, the only pharmacy operating in the Krakow ghetto. He came from a family with patriotic traditions. For his activity in aiding and rescuing Jews, he was awarded the medal "Righteous Among the Nations". He described his wartime memories in a book entitled "Apteka w getcie krakowskim" ("The Cracow Ghetto Pharmacy")., who met him before the war, described him as follows:

Supposedly son of a manufacturer from Leipzig. A German Jew who speaks Polish poorly, around 40, medium height, bald, dark-haired, elegantly dressed. He spoke many languages, traveled almost all over the world, and was an impresario for dancers before the war. In 1939, in August, he was in Krakow with the dancer Angelika, who performed in Feniks, and that same year I met him. Immediately after the establishment of the ghetto, it was widely said that Förster played a significant role in espionage for Germany. Therefore, he enjoyed outstanding privileges; he walked around the ghetto area and outside it without an armband, he lived in one three-room apartment right next to the ghetto entrance gate only by himself, he ran a restaurant in the same tenement house, which he later leased. He exercised the right to enter and leave the ghetto at any time of the day or night, regardless of the curfew. He had a second apartment in Krakow at the Royal-City Hotel. He had the right to greet the Gestapo men by raising his hand, and the Gestapo men greeted him by shaking hands, he had an informal relation with many [he could address them per "you", not per "sir"], he organized parties for smaller and larger dignitaries of the Gestapo and the army. Such entertainments lasted until late at night, and even until morning, and the guests returning from him, with revolver shots, reminded the inhabitants of their existence [...]. Many people tried to get closer to Forster, believing in the effectiveness of his intervention. And it turned out then that Forster's possibilities are great. [...].

His restaurant was located at the entrance gate to the ghetto. It was a former tavern owned by a jew named Landwirt, leased by Förster. The Germans, Spira and others have been meeting here. Förster was well informed about what was going on in the ghetto and in the city.

He lived at 15 Rynek Podgórski, right next to the entrance to the ghetto. It is known that Förster provided reports on the situation in the ghetto and that he organized and commanded a six-person network of Gestapo agents. He denounced Jews on the "Aryan" side and Poles engaged in underground activities.

During the deportation he became known from the better side. He helped many people in return for bribes, but he also disinterestedly released them from deportation. He was very active at that time on Plac ZgodyZgoda Square was the central square of the Krakow ghetto in Podgórze district. It was the equivalent of the Warsaw Umschlagplatz. This square was used to gather Jews during periodic deportations to the death camps in Bełżec and to Płaszów. During the resettlements, Jewish policemen could move freely and lead out of the square those who had sufficient funds for a bribe, and sometimes they did it selflessly. and in OptimaThe "Optima" factory was located in the Krakow ghetto in Podgórze district. After the deportation to the death camp in Bełżec on June 4, 1942, documents were checked and a blue-colored ghetto residence permit was issued, the so-called Blauscheins. Only those who had these permits were to remain in the ghetto. The rest were concentrated in the courtyard of the "Optima" factory awaiting deportation. They were deported to be exterminate on June 8, 1942., and his efforts to free others from deportation were successful.

After the liquidation of the ghetto, he moved to Krakow. Suspected of collaborating with English intelligence, he was imprisoned in Montelupich prisonMontelupich Prison - a former prison in Krakow. During World War II, there was a Nazi police prison under the Gestapo. In 1940–1944, about 50,000 people were imprisoned here. Mass executions of prisoners took place on the premises of the prison. Most of those arrested, after heavy interrogations, were transported to the concentration camps in Auschwitz-Birkenau and Płaszów. After 1945, the building housed a heavy central penal and investigative prison of the Security Office and the NKVD, through which several thousand Polish soldiers passed through, some of whom were deported deep into the USSR.; The Germans killed him in the Płaszów camp in 1943.

SOURCES
Witold Mędykowski "Przeciw swoim. Wzorce kolaboracji żydowskiej w Krakowie i okolicy"