Rumors that Senator Moses Schorr of Poland, Chief Rabbi of Warsaw, had been executed by the Nazis, were reported today to have been confirmed by a brother-in-law of the eminent Polish Jewish leader.
The relative, a refugee from Poland, was quoted in a Havas News Agency dispatch from Bordeaux as declaring that Rabbi Schorr was shot without trial by a German firing squad immediately after the Nazi occupation of Warsaw. He added that the fate of Rabbi Schorr’s wife was not known.
According to the brother-in-law, whose name was not given, Rabbi Schorr, as an ardent Polish patriot and a confirmed friend of France, had earned the undying hatred of the Nazis. The 65-year-old leader of Polish Jewry refused, nevertheless, to leave his post when the Germans advanced on the city, the refugee declared.
(The first report of Rabbi Schorr’s execution was published in New York on Oct. 1, after Warsaw’s surrender but before the official German occupation. Two daughters in Paris said they were without information as to his fate. Relatives in London later said they were confident he was still alive and expected to hear from him shortly. Polish Foreign Minister August Zaleski, in Paris, also expressed doubt as to his execution, revealing that Rabbi Schorr had heroically refused to leave Poland with other Government officials when given an opportunity but that he had left Warsaw before the occupation.)
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
