During World War II, Walentyna Stocker (1913-2020) was the primary secretary and translator for the Prime Minister of the Polish Government-in-Exile. Walentyna (pronounced “Valentina” in English) translated reports from the Polish Underground State into English which first revealed Nazi atrocities–including the existence of concentration camps in German-occupied Poland–to the United Nations. Walentyna’s translations revealed the humanitarian crisis occurring in Europe to the Allies, putting her at the center of Polish intelligence during the War.

Walentyna also kept the Polish resistance alive from abroad, organizing and broadcasting Dawn, a secret radio station to Poland. Her service didn’t end after the War – she joined the Women’s Auxiliary Service in the rank of Second Lieutenant in the Polish Army. In this role, she worked with concentration camp survivors and prisoners-of-war, and was present at the Nuremberg Trials. She was recognized in 2011 with the Medal of Merit for Polish Culture by Poland’s Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and received the Jan Karski Eagle Award in 2016. Her life will be honored with a state funeral in Poland in 2021. A coalition of local activists seeks to honor her life by securing landmark status of her chosen and adopted home of Elmhurst, Queens.

Walentyna’s husband Aleksander was a Polish author and reporter. He was living in Paris when Germany invaded Poland, and promptly joined the Polish Army there. When the Nazis captured France, Aleksander concealed his Polish identity and played the role of a Frenchman, as it was known among soldiers that Nazi treatment of Polish partisans was especially brutal. He passed as a French prisoner-of-war and was kept as a slave by a German family until his escape to England in 1942.

While Walentyna and Aleksander were in France and later England during the same time, they didn’t meet until they each moved to Buffalo, New York after the War. They married only five months after meeting, and left Buffalo for New York City in 1955. They made their home in Elmhurst (88-28 43rd Avenue) by 1960, and their house was known as the nucleus of the Polish émigré elite in the United States. Walentyna remained here until her death at 107 years old in April 2020.

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