Krys family papers

The collection primarily contains prewar photographs and wartime postcards of the Krys family of Skierniewice, Poland. Included are prewar photographs of Martin and Anna Krys prior to immigrating to the United States, Martin’s sisters and brothers, and other relatives including the Munkabotzki family. There is one postwar photograph of Miriam Ordenas’s (Krys) son Yitzchak (Jack) and his wife in a DP camp. Correspondence consists of two prewar postcards and six wartime postcards addressed to Martin Krys in the United States from his sisters Miriam in Skierniewice and Roiza in Warsaw, both of whom perished during the Holocaust. Martin Krys was born on 6 December 1905 in Skierniewice, Poland to Yehoshua (Shaya) Krys and Sheva Gruna. He married Anna (Necha) Jakobowitz, to whom he was related to by marriage, in 1930 in Skierniewice. She was also born in Skierniewice and immigrated to the United States in 1920. He immigrated to the United States in 1932 and worked as a carpenter. Their son, Sheldon, was born in 1934 and would later become a United States Foreign Service officer and the United States Ambassador to Trinidad and Tobago. Martin had five younger siblings, and nearly his entire family perished during the Holocaust. His sister Chava Koss (1893-1942) died in the Warsaw ghetto in 1942. His sister Marjem (Miriam) Krys Ordenas (1901-1942) was murdered in Treblinka in 1942 along with her son Moshe. Her other son, Yitzchak (later Jack Ordenas), survived after jumping from the deportation train. His brother Hershel (1917-1940) was in the Polish Army and was killed in action in Warsaw in 1940. His brother David (1919-1941) died in Warsaw in 1941. The fate of his sister Roiza and her family is unknown.