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The Story Of A Secret State

A messenger ignored?

July 8, 2011 09:02
Jan Karski: bringer of news that may have been too hard to believe

By

Anonymous,

Anonymous

2 min read

By Jan Karski,
Penguin Classics, £20

This book was dictated by Jan Karski to a bilingual (Polish-English) secretary in a Manhattan hotel room during the summer of 1944. It was published that November in the US and was an immediate best-seller. It is now published in the UK for the first time, a very worthy Penguin Classic.

Karski came from the Polish Catholic middle classes, graduated with a law degree and was an army officer before briefly becoming a diplomat.

With the German blitzkreig on Poland in September 1939, Karski rejoined his regiment and took part in the retreat. A sixth sense prompted him not to be captured in an officer's uniform. He borrowed a private's one, a move that saved him from the Katyn massacre of 20,000 Polish officers.