Introduction
I first spoke with Chani Schreibhand on the phone this past January. Her number reached me through a rather winding route. It began with Professor Daniel Reiser, an Israeli scholar of Jewish thought, who had received her son’s contact details from the Aish Kodesh community in New York.
My reason for reaching out was professional. I’m a historian working on a Holocaust archaeology project based at the University of Huddersfield, focused on the history of the Trawniki camp. Trawniki served various purposes: it was, among other things, an SS training site, a Jewish forced labour camp, and most tragically, the place of the mass murder of Jews during the so-called Erntefest (Harvest Festival) on November 3, 1943. Among those likely murdered that day was Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapiro, also known as the Piaseczner Rebbe or Aish Kodesh (“Holy Fire”).
Rabbi Shapiro was assigned to forced labour in the Schultz leather workshop in the Warsaw Ghetto and, in the spring of 1943, was deported along with other workers to the Trawniki camp. Despite rescue efforts by Jewish organizations, he chose to remain with his fellow prisoners.
Emanuel Ringelblum, who had also been imprisoned in Trawniki and was the leader of Oneg Shabbat (a group of historians, writers, rabbis, and social workers who recordedand secretly archived daily life in the Warsaw Ghetto) later wrote from hiding, calling for Rabbi Shapiro the Piasecezner Rebbe, to be remembered among the murdered Jewish intellectuals.
In March, some of our team members, archaeologist and project leader Professor Caroline Sturdy Colls, Israeli historian Dr. Tamir Hod, and I travelled to Prestwich to meet Chani, her father, Rabbi Y. Reuven Rubin, and her husband, Itzik. We were warmly welcomed. It felt like the beginning of something very meaningful.
To deepen our understanding of Rabbi Shapiro’s life, we reached out to Dr. Marta Dudzik-Rudkowska, a Polish scholar of Hebrew and Jewish thought, who wrote her PhD dissertation on the Rabbi’s teachings. She generously offered us an enlightening presentation that helped us appreciate the enduring legacy of a man who, even in the shadow of the Holocaust, remained devoted to the spiritual nourishment of his community.
What follows is a short Q&A with Professor Caroline Sturdy Colls and Dr. Marta Dudzik-Rudkowska. They reflect on how they came to their respective research topics and disciplines, what draws them to the figure of Rabbi Shapiro, and what it means to engage in this kind of work as women. You’ll also find additional details about the history of the Trawniki camp below.
Interview with Caroline Sturdy Colls
Caroline Sturdy Colls is Professor of Holocaust Archaeology and Genocide Investigation and Director of the Centre of Archaeology at the University of Huddersfield. A pioneer in non-invasive forensic methods, she has led over 60 archaeological surveys at Holocaust and genocide sites across Europe and Africa. She leads the project Trawniki: Nexus of the Final Solution, funded by the Claims Conference.
How did you become interested in this topic?
I wanted to be an archaeologist since I was a child, and my interest in the Holocaust emerged in secondary school after meeting survivors and reading a lot of Holocaust testimonies. Whilst at university, I learnt that forensic archaeology could be used to bring perpetrators to justice and help resolve the fate of missing persons. I began to research whether archaeologists had investigated the Holocaust, and I discovered the few that had done so had always relied on excavation methods which were at odds with Halacha. I then developed a methodology that would allow sites to be investigated, but in a way that respected the religious and ethical issues that surrounded them. My Master and doctoral theses both focused on these topics, and I undertook the first forensic archaeological investigations at Treblinka extermination and labour camps, and at the sites connected to forced and slave labour in Alderney as part of my university studies. Since 2022, I have been researching and undertaking non-invasive fieldwork in Trawniki, and therefore, I came across Rabbi Shapiro’s incredible life during this project. As an educator and someone who is interested in resistance during the Holocaust, I was drawn to his story.
What have been some of the challenges in your research?
Firstly, I had to find a way to investigate mass graves of the Holocaust without disturbing human remains. I draw upon methods like Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR), which enables me to scan beneath the ground in search of buried evidence, and techniques like LiDAR, which offers the opportunity to look for depressions on the surface that might indicate the presence of remains underground. I also look for visual clues in the landscape, like evidence on the surface and subtle changes to vegetation caused by ground disturbance. This work can be difficult, so many years after the crimes took place. The atrocities perpetrated during the Holocaust also often elicit several different responses. Obviously, this subject can be extremely painful and difficult for many people, especially the families and communities whose loved ones were murdered. So, I am always mindful of that, and I am humbled to work closely with many descendants and Jewish leaders around the world. Also, some people do not want us to look for the evidence of the crimes because they don’t want the area where they live to be tarnished by this history, because they feel they should shape the narrative around the site or because they deny that the crimes took place at all. In fact, Holocaust deniers often target us for speaking about what happened. The work itself can be physically and mentally challenging as well for us as researchers, and it can sometimes be difficult to find the evidence that the Nazis tried to hide.
How has your perspective as a woman shaped your work?
I feel that the empathy that I have for others has shaped my research. When I was training to be an archaeologist and historian, most of the professors were men and, although they inspired and supported me in my work, I really felt that as a woman I could bring another perspective to forensic archaeology, and that is why I developed a methodology that has empathy, respect and dignity for victims at its heart. Additionally, now as a mother, wife, and daughter, I can only imagine what it must have been like to lose and to try to protect loved ones during the Holocaust and in its aftermath. I have met with many families who have experienced this and who have no body of their loved one(s) to bury. And it is a desire to help people in this situation which drives my work. I do have to admit that since I have had my children, my work has become more difficult. However, I think it is more important than ever now in a world where hatred is being normalised in many societies.
Given the current rise in antisemitism and your role in this project, how has your perception of the importance of your work changed, if at all?
I feel that my work is increasingly important in an age when antisemitism is on the rise because it provides important physical evidence that shows where this kind of hatred can lead. I hope that using our findings to teach about this and the crimes perpetrated during the Holocaust will encourage more people to take notice of historic crimes and commit to preventing them from happening again by standing up to antisemitism. I think the Trawniki project is particularly important in this regard because we are not only encouraging people to connect with – and therefore hopefully empathise with Jewish people who were sent to the camp – but we are also highlighting what might happen if people follow the orders of people in power who encourage hatred and division
Interview with Marta Dudzik-Rudkowska
Marta Dudzik-Rudkowska is a graduate in English and Hebrew Studies from the University of Warsaw and holds a PhD from the University of Haifa. Her current research focuses on the history of Polish Hasidism, particularly Hasidic pedagogical thought and Jewish youth organisations in interwar Poland. She teaches modern Hebrew, translation, and Israeli cinema, and has translated numerous literary, historical, and academic texts.
How did you become interested in this topic?
My first contact with the Rabbi’s writings was as a translator – I was asked to translate the pre-war educational kuntrasim preserved in the Ringelblum Archive into Polish. It is my experience that reading for translation is one of the deepest readings possible – it is necessary not only to understand the content, but also the structure, the target audience, as well as, or perhaps primarily, the author’s intention. Working on those texts gave me insight into the Rabbi’s techniques and strategies, which turned out to be absolutely fascinating. This led me to start research on his life, family, educational and political activity, as well as the sources of inspiration.
What have been some of the challenges in your research?
As a non-native of Hebrew, I obviously faced language challenges, especially as regards quotes from Aramaic. As a gentile, I also had to work intensively on my knowledge regarding Hasidic tradition, as well as do loads of additional reading in mystical writings. These, however, were all very educational and gave me lots of satisfaction. One of the most exasperating tasks was locating the sources of quotes from various Hasidic masters and mystical writings, which probably doubled the time I had to devote to translating those texts. The result is nevertheless very satisfying – the first (and, so far, only) critical edition of Kalonimus Shapiro’s educational writings.
How has your perspective, as a woman, shaped your work?
I was once told by a professor of Judaism that my approach is characterised by high sensitivity, which enables me to see things that most researchers do not notice. I am not sure to what extent this is actually true, but I believe that my experience as a woman and as a mother provides me with a better understanding of some of Shapiro’s strategies and educational decisions. His deep involvement in family matters and educational issues was one of the major elements that inspired my interest in his work.
*The spelling Shapiro is used consistently in this piece and Q&A, reflecting evidence from Dr. Dudzik-Rudkowska’s archival research. In Polish records, Aish Kodesh signed as Szapiro using the Latin alphabet, while German-language documents held in Polish archives list him as Schapiro. Although Shapira is more widely used in international contexts, Shapiro more accurately represents the historical documentation.
TRAWNIKI CAMP
The Trawniki camp, located 36 km east of Lublin, Poland, was set up on the grounds of a former sugar factory. Its early history is unclear, though some sources suggest that Polish Jews and prisoners were detained there as early as autumn 1939. Following the German invasion of the Soviet Union, Soviet prisoners of war and civilians were sent to Trawniki, along with ethnic Germans who were trained there for service with the SS. By 1944, the camp had produced over 5,000 auxiliaries, deployed to assist in the execution of the Final Solution across ghettos, labour camps, and death camps.
A Jewish transit camp was added in April 1942 and converted into a forced labour camp by June. In early 1943, Jewish workers from the Warsaw Ghetto’s Schultz company were sent to Trawniki. By September, the camp was designated a sub-camp of Majdanek. Executions took place regularly and culminated in the mass murder of 6,000 Jews on November 3, 1943, during Aktion Erntefest. The labour camp was shut down soon afterwards, though the SS training operations continued until May 1944.
After the war, the area—including former housing and SS buildings—was repurposed for residential and business use. The wooden barracks used by Jewish prisoners were destroyed. Since 1995, part of the site has been used by the Nicols chemical factory, with restricted access due to health and safety concerns. Warehouses have been built over sections of the camp, including execution and body disposal areas.
Today, two memorials exist: one on the north wall, featuring reproductions of drawings by Józef Richter alongside a map and explanatory text; the other is a granite obelisk in the camp’s south-east corner, commemorating the victims of Aktion Erntefest. Nearby forests in Borek and Dąbrowa also contain marked mass graves.
Since 2022, the project Trawniki: Nexus of the Final Solution—led by the Centre of Archaeology at the University of Huddersfield and supported by the Claims Conference—has been working to produce a new historical, archaeological, and spatial history of the site, support heritage protection, and develop educational materials.
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