What’s that for? “Travel Document” of a Polish woman of Jewish background

In the 1960s, some 30,000 Jews were living in the People’s Republic of Poland. While most of the Holocaust survivors had emigrated, those remaining in Poland were strongly attached to their homeland, urban and often well educated; many had made careers in the economy, administration, culture and academia. For the latter, the anti-Semitic campaign launched by the communist party in 1968 was all the more drastic. In our series “Why that?”, historian Dariusz Stola describes the exit document of Anna Trachtenherz, whose family decided to leave Poland in response to the campaign. The document can be seen in the exhibition “Citizenships. France, Poland, Germany since 1789”.