Helena BOZEDAJ-DEMBINSKA
Helena Bozedaj was born to Wladyslaw and Stanislawa on 26 February 1916 1916 in Warsaw, Poland.
She fondly reminisced about growing up amid family in a pre-war ‘free and prosperous’ Poland. The next few years would bring much hardship and change to her life.
In war-torn Warsaw on 3 February 1940 at the age of 23 she married the love of her life, Zygmunt Dembinski (spending the next 56 years together until his death on 6 January 1996). Their first son, Krzysztof was born later that year. Their involvement in the Polish Home Army (AK) was soon curtailed by the Germans. Helena was deported to Germany to work as a house maid for a miller's family, while Zygmunt was sent to Auschwitz and later to Buchenwald concentration camps. He remained there until liberation came in 1945. On release, Zygmunt joined the 1st Polish Armoured Division as a Sapper.
Reunited, Helena travelled with Zygmunt to start a new chapter of their lives in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1950. Their second son, Tomasz was born in 1954. For many years Helena worked as a full-time night shift nurse on a cancer ward of a local Edinburgh hospital.
They both retired in 1978 and moved to the quiet rural setting of Peterchurch, Herefordshire, England. Then in 1987 they moved to Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Hekena passed away in Winnipeg om 13 March 2016, at the age of 100 years. She is buried at the Holy Ghost Cemetery in Winnipeg.
Copyright: Dembinski family