Liberals, Jews, Poles in London Stirred by Soviet Execution of Alter and Erlich

The news of the execution by the Soviet authorities of Victor Alter and Henryk Erlich, the two internationally-known leaders of the Jewish Socialist Party of Poland, has created a painful impression here among British liberals and Jews, as well as in Polish Government circles.

Immediately upon being informed of the executions today by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Count Raczynski, Polish Foreign Minister, cabled to the Polish Embassy in Kuibyshev to ascertain the details of the trial reported to have been held by a Soviet court. He also declared that he will ask the British Foreign Office to have its diplomatic representatives in Russia investigate the case.

The official Soviet charges alleging that the two Jewish labor leaders spread propaganda among Soviet troops for the conclusion of a separate peace with Germany were termed “ridiculous” by all circles here where the two executed Polish Jewish Socialists have been known for many years as ardent fighters against Fascism The real reason for their tragic death is believed to be that fact that for many years they had opposed the Communist movement in Poland and were the leaders of a Jewish labor party which combated Communism.

It was recalled here today that Alter and Erlich, after being released by the Soviet authorities in September, 1941, under the Russo-Polish pact granting amnesty to all Polish citizens, issued an appeal to all Jewish citizens of Poland residing on Soviet territory to enlist in the Polish Army that was being organized in Russia, urging them to carry on a common fight with the Red Army against Nazi aggression. The Polish Government at the same time invited the two labor leaders to come to London and take part in the work of the Polish National Council as representatives of the Jewish citizens of Nazi-occupied Poland. They were re-arrested, however, in Kuibyshev on December 4, 1941. No reason for the arrest was given and no representative of the Polish embassy in Russia was permitted to communicate with them.

Victor Alter was born in 1890 in Mlawa, Poland and joined the then underground Jewish Socialist movement at the age of 15. Constantly harassed by the Czarist police, he left for Belgium where he studied engineering. Upon graduation he returned to Poland where he became a labor leader. He was soon compelled to leave Poland as a result of persecution by the Czarist regime. Together with Erlich he returned from exile at the end of 1918 when Poland was granted independence by the Versailles Treaty. Both were then elected to the City Council of Warsaw as representatives of organized Jewish labor.

Henryk Erlich was born in 1882 in Lublin, Poland, and was arrested many times by Czarist officials as leader of the underground Socialist movement. He forsook his personal career as a successful attorney for the precarious and dangerous existence of a revolutionist. After the Czar was overthrown, Erlich represented Russia as a member of a delegation that went to Europe to organize the International Socialist Peace Conference in Stockholm. From 1918 on he lived in Poland and was the recognized head of the Jewish Socialist movement there.