Joseph Bursztyn

Joseph Bursztyn was born on October 1, 1912, in Piaski, Poland. He joined the Communist Youth group in his hometown. Joseph Bursztyn graduated with honors from high school and then moved to France to study medicine in Reims. He became one of the leaders of the student organization Combat.

During the Spanish Civil War, as a member of the Volunteer Reception Committee, he reviewed applications for enlistment in the International Brigades.

After three years of study in Reims, he moved to Paris with his wife, Marie, to complete his studies. Once he became a doctor, he continued to be an active member of several progressive organizations.

When war broke out in 1939, he enlisted in the French army to fight against Nazism and was sent to a military hospital.

After his demobilization, he joined forces with the poet and journalist Mounie Nadler to help establish, in 1941, a committee of intellectuals linked to the underground organization “Solidarité,” an offshoot of the Jewish section of the M.O.I. Together with Wowek Cyrzyk, he wrote *Notre Voix et Notre Parole* as well as numerous appeals and leaflets aimed at intellectuals. As early as July 12, 1941, he was wanted by investigators from the 3rd Section of General Intelligence, following the arrest of Abraham Erlich, a communist doctor with whom he was in contact.

Inspectors from the Special Brigade of the Paris Police Prefecture arrested him on April 26, 1942, as he arrived at the home of the Communist activist Masja Lew, who was in charge of the TA (German Labor).

His interrogation enabled the police to establish his ties to Dr. Aimé Albert, a member of the Organisation Spéciale (OS), a clandestine armed group affiliated with the Communist Party. Joseph Bursztyn was accused of having ties to members of the second detachment of the FTP-M.O.I., Hersch Zimmermann and Salek Bot, both of whom had died the day before his arrest in an explosion caused by a bomb they were developing in their laboratory.

He was imprisoned on the orders of the German authorities. He and six of his comrades, who had been arrested in connection with the same case and added on August 7, 1942, to a list of hostages drawn up by the occupying forces, were taken into custody by the German police and then handed over to the French police.

Joseph Bursztyn was one of the 88 communists executed by the Germans on August 11, 1942, at Mont-Valérien.

In a black-bordered box in issue No. 10 of *Notre Voix* (an underground publication of the Jewish section of the M.O.I. dated October 1942), the execution “by Nazi bandits” of Mounie Nadler and Joseph Bursztyn is reported (a medical doctor and leader of the Jewish Students and Intellectuals).