The Forger

His story reads like something out of a spy novel: Risking death at the hands of a brutal dictator, a member of an underground resistance group expertly forges documents that help thousands of people escape to freedom.

Except these events actually happened, and the forger wasn’t a seasoned resistance fighter but a shy Jewish teenager who had worked as an apprentice in a clothes-dyeing/dry-cleaning shop. During World War II, Adolfo Kaminsky resourcefully adapted the skills he’d learned on the job to make fake IDs and other documents that helped thousands of fellow Jews in France escape deportation to German concentration camps.

At one point, he had three days to produce 900 birth and baptismal certificates and food ration cards for 300 Jewish children who were about to be rounded up by Nazi authorities. The goal was to deceive the Germans until the children were sent off to safety with families in the countryside or convents, or smuggled to Switzerland or Spain. He forced himself to stay awake for two straight days, telling himself, “In one hour I can make 30 blank documents. If I sleep for an hour, 30 people will die.”

Kaminsky is now 91 years old and living in Paris, and his daughter, Sarah Kaminsky, has told his gripping story in a book recently translated into English, Adolfo Kaminsky: A Forger’s Life. 

His story reads like something out of a spy novel: Risking death at the hands of a brutal dictator, a member of an underground resistance group expertly forges documents that help thousands of people escape to freedom.

Except these events actually happened. The forger wasn’t a seasoned resistance fighter. He was a shy Jewish teenager. He had worked as an apprentice in a clothes-dyeing/dry-cleaning shop. During World War II, that teenager, Adolfo Kaminsky, adapted the skills he’d learned on the job to make fake IDs and other documents. That helped thousands of fellow Jews in France escape deportation to German concentration camps.

At one point, he had three days to produce 900 birth and baptismal certificates and food ration cards for 300 Jewish children who were about to be rounded up by Nazi authorities. The goal was to deceive the Germans until the children were sent off to safety with families in the countryside or to convents. Some were smuggled to Switzerland or Spain. Adolfo forced himself to stay awake for two straight days. He told himself, “In one hour I can make 30 blank documents. If I sleep for an hour, 30 people will die.”

Kaminsky is now 91 years old and living in Paris. His daughter, Sarah Kaminsky, has told his gripping story in a book recently translated into English, Adolfo Kaminsky: A Forger’s Life. 

To understand Kaminsky’s heroism requires dipping into a grim chapter of history. On Sept. 1, 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland, sparking World War II (1939-45). German dictator Adolf Hitler had a grandiose plan to conquer all of Europe and murder all of its Jews in what’s now known as the Holocaust (see Timeline, below). The German army soon overran Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and northern France. Southern France officially remained independent, with a government based in the town of Vichy (see map), but that regime collaborated with the Nazis, imposed anti-Semitic policies, and helped arrange deportations of Jews to places like Auschwitz in Poland, the most infamous of the Nazi death camps. There, Jews were sorted into two groups: those who could work and those who couldn’t. The latter were put to death in gas chambers disguised as showers. 

Thousands of Jews were saved, however, by various underground resistance groups. If discovered, members of these groups faced certain death, yet they risked hiding Jews, smuggling food or weapons to them, or transporting them to safety. 

Many of the people who engaged in such resistance activities were young, says Michael Berenbaum, an American scholar of the Holocaust. For example, 19-year-old Tina Strobos in Amsterdam helped hide Jews in her family’s attic (see “Young & Courageous,” below).

“They were more daring because they were at a stage in life where they were responsible just for themselves,” Berenbaum says. “They were neither responsible for young children nor old parents.”

To understand Kaminsky’s heroism requires dipping into a grim chapter of history. On Sept. 1, 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland, sparking World War II (1939-45). German dictator Adolf Hitler had a grandiose plan: He wanted to conquer all of Europe. He also wanted to murder all of Europe’s Jews—now known as the Holocaust (see Timeline, below). The German army soon overran Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and northern France. Southern France officially remained independent. It had its own government based in the town of Vichy (see map). But that regime collaborated with the Nazis. It imposed anti-Semitic policies. It also helped arrange deportations of Jews to places like Auschwitz in Poland. That was the most infamous of the Nazi death camps. There, Jews were sorted into two groups: those who could work and those who couldn’t. The latter were put to death in gas chambers disguised as showers. 

Thousands of Jews, however, were saved thanks to various underground resistance groups. If discovered, resisters faced certain death. Yet they risked hiding Jews. They smuggled food or weapons to them. Or they transported them to safety. 

Many of the people who engaged in such resistance activities were young, says Michael Berenbaum, an American scholar of the Holocaust. For example, 19-year-old Tina Strobos helped hide Jews in her family’s attic in Amsterdam (see “Young & Courageous,” p. 18).

“They were more daring because they were at a stage in life where they were responsible just for themselves,” says Berenbaum. “They were neither responsible for young children nor old parents.”

Adolfo Kaminsky was one of those young resisters. In 1940, when he was 15, his mother was killed after traveling back from Paris, where she had gone to warn her brother of his impending arrest. Adolfo never learned exactly how she died, but the few clues his family could find convinced him that Nazis had pushed her from a train. Furious at her murder and at the execution of one of his friends by the Germans, Adolfo began engaging in acts of sabotage, using chemicals to rust railway equipment and corrode transmission lines, and making detonators for explosives. 

“For the first time I didn’t feel entirely impotent following the death of my mother and my friend,” he wrote. “At least I had the feeling I was avenging them.”  

In 1943, when he was 18, Adolfo’s family was arrested in their town of Vire in northern France and sent to Drancy, an internment camp near Paris that was a way station to the death camps. But they were released from Drancy after three months because his Russian-born parents had once lived in Argentina, which protested their detention.

Soon after, his family began to fear that their Argentine passports would no longer protect them, so they sent Adolfo to secure false documents from the anti-Nazi French underground. The underground agents soon learned that Adolfo had a special talent: He knew how to remove Waterman ink from clothing. Waterman ink was an indelible blue ink used in official documents like ID cards and food ration cards, and no one in the resistance could figure out how to erase it. If Jews had any chance of escaping deportation, typically Jewish names, like Israel and Abraham, had to be removed from official documents and replaced with French-sounding names. 

Adolfo Kaminsky was one of those young resisters. In 1940, when he was 15, his mother was killed after traveling back from Paris. She had gone there to warn her brother of his impending arrest. Adolfo never learned exactly how she died. But the few clues that his family could find convinced him that Nazis had pushed her from the train. Adolfo was furious at her murder and also at the execution of one of his friends by the Germans. So he began engaging in acts of sabotage, using chemicals to rust railway equipment and corrode transmission lines. He also made detonators for explosives. 

“For the first time I didn’t feel entirely impotent following the death of my mother and my friend,” he wrote. “At least I had the feeling I was avenging them.”  

In 1943, when he was 18, Adolfo’s family was arrested in their town of Vire, in northern France. They were sent to Drancy, an internment camp near Paris. Drancy was a way station to the death camps. But they were released from Drancy after three months. That was because his Russian-born parents had once lived in Argentina. That country protested their detention.

Soon after, his family began to fear that their Argentine passports would no longer protect them. So they sent Adolfo to secure false documents from the anti-Nazi French underground. The underground agents soon learned that Adolfo had a special talent: He knew how to remove Waterman ink from clothing. Waterman ink was an indelible blue ink used in official documents like ID cards and food ration cards. No one in the resistance could figure out how to erase it. If Jews had any chance of escaping deportation, typically Jewish names, like Israel and Abraham, had to be removed from official documents. They needed to be replaced with French-sounding names. 

Abraham, had to be removed from official documents and replaced with French-sounding names. 

Adolfo had learned how to remove stains after dropping out of school at 13 to help support his family. He took a job at a clothes-dyeing/dry-cleaning shop in Vire and experimented with chemicals that removed the most stubborn stains. He had also spent hours talking to a chemist at a local dairy about how lactic acid (which forms naturally in milk) could bleach even supposedly permanent blue ink.

Those skills made Adolfo a key member of a Paris underground “laboratory” whose members—all working for no pay—had code names like Water Lily, Penguin, and Otter. They altered documents or created new ones from scratch. Adolfo also produced various typefaces, which he’d learned to do while editing his school newspaper, to match those used by the authorities. He pressed paper so that it too matched, and created his own “official” rubber stamps, letterheads, and watermarks. Word of the lab spread through the European underground, and soon he and his colleagues were getting orders from London and across Europe and producing 500 documents a week.

Historians estimate that France’s resistance networks saved 7,000 to 10,000 children, but more than 11,000 were deported and killed during the Holocaust.

Adolfo had learned how to remove stains when he was 13. That’s when he had dropped out of school to help support his family. He took a job at a clothes-dyeing/dry-cleaning shop in Vire. There he experimented with chemicals that removed the most stubborn stains. He had also spent hours talking to a chemist at a local dairy about how lactic acid (which forms naturally in milk) could bleach even supposedly permanent blue ink.

Those skills made Adolfo a key member of a Paris underground “laboratory.” Its members—all working for no pay—had code names like Water Lily, Penguin, and Otter. They altered documents or created new ones from scratch. Adolfo also produced various typefaces to match those used by the authorities. He’d learned about typefaces while editing his school newspaper. He pressed paper so that it too matched. And he also created his own “official” rubber stamps, letterheads, and watermarks. Word of the lab spread through the European underground. Soon he and his colleagues were getting orders from London and across Europe. They were producing 500 documents a week. Historians estimate that France’s resistance networks saved 7,000 to 10,000 children. But more than 11,000 were deported and killed during the Holocaust.

The work Adolfo did was extremely dangerous. The memoir, written by Sarah but told in Adolfo’s first-person voice, opens with Adolfo sitting on a Paris subway clutching a leather satchel containing blank identity documents and tools to forge them. When a police officer walks through the train checking documents and asks Adolfo what he has in the bag, Adolfo tells him just some sandwiches. “Would you like to have one?” he casually asks. Fortunately, the officer didn’t check further.

Several of Adolfo’s underground colleagues were arrested and killed after falling into a trap set by a German counterspy. Meanwhile, the strain of doing such painstaking work for hours cost Adolfo his sight in one eye, he wrote. 

After Paris was liberated by the U.S. and other Allied armies in August 1944, Adolfo went to work for the French government. He fabricated German documents that allowed intelligence agents to go into German-held territory and gather evidence about the concentration camps. 

The work Adolfo did was extremely dangerous. The memoir, written by Sarah but told in Adolfo’s first-person voice, opens with Adolfo sitting on a Paris subway clutching a leather satchel containing blank identity documents and tools to forge them. When a police officer walks through the train checking documents and asks Adolfo what he has in the bag, Adolfo tells him just some sandwiches. “Would you like to have one?” he casually asks. Fortunately, the officer didn’t check further.

Several of Adolfo’s underground colleagues were arrested and killed after falling into a trap set by a German counterspy. Meanwhile, the strain of doing such painstaking work for hours cost Adolfo his sight in one eye, he wrote. 

After Paris was liberated by the U.S. and other Allied armies in August 1944, Adolfo went to work for the French government. He fabricated German documents that allowed intelligence agents to go into German-held territory and gather evidence about the concentration camps. 

His work didn’t end with the Nazis’ defeat and Hitler’s death in 1945. For almost three decades after the war, he forged documents for resistance fighters in such conflict-torn places as Spain, Algeria, and South Africa. He stopped in the early 1970s and continued to make his living in Paris as a photographer and photography instructor. He still lives in Paris and can be seen walking through his neighborhood with his cane, recognizable by his long white beard and tweed jacket.

Kaminsky recently spoke to Upfront* about why he risked his life to save strangers.

“I can’t accept that some people think they’re superior to others, think other people are inferior,” he said. “All human beings are equal, no matter what their skin color, their nationality, their religion.” He added that being freed from the detention camps at Drancy compelled him to help others, which gave him a sense of purpose. “I was lucky to have saved a lot of people, or else I wouldn’t have had the will to live.”

In 2010, Sarah Kaminsky gave a talk in Paris in which she spoke about her first glimpse of her father’s heroic deeds. As a child, she’d received a bad grade in school and forged her mother’s signature to avoid showing her parents her grade. Her mother discovered the forgery and yelled at her, but her father broke out in laughter: “But really, Sarah, you could have worked harder,” he said about the fake signature. “Can’t you see, it’s really too small.”

In her speech’s most poignant moment, Sarah explained why her father chose such a treacherous life.

“He would be unable to witness or submit to injustice without doing anything,” she said. “He was persuaded that another world is possible, a world where no one would ever need a forger.”

*Upfront editor Veronica Majerol interviewed Adolfo Kaminsky in French over Skype and translated the interview into English

His work didn’t end with the Nazis’ defeat and Hitler’s death in 1945. For almost three decades after the war, he forged documents for resistance fighters in such conflict-torn places as Spain, Algeria, and South Africa. He stopped in the early 1970s and continued to make his living in Paris as a photographer and photography instructor. He still lives in Paris and can be seen walking through his neighborhood with his cane, recognizable by his long white beard and tweed jacket.

Kaminsky recently spoke to Upfront* about why he risked his life to save strangers.

“I can’t accept that some people think they’re superior to others, think other people are inferior,” he said. “All human beings are equal, no matter what their skin color, their nationality, their religion.” He added that being freed from the detention camps at Drancy compelled him to help others, which gave him a sense of purpose. “I was lucky to have saved a lot of people, or else I wouldn’t have had the will to live.”

In 2010, Sarah Kaminsky gave a talk in Paris in which she spoke about her first glimpse of her father’s heroic deeds. As a child, she’d received a bad grade in school and forged her mother’s signature to avoid showing her parents her grade. Her mother discovered the forgery and yelled at her, but her father broke out in laughter: “But really, Sarah, you could have worked harder,” he said about the fake signature. “Can’t you see, it’s really too small.”

In her speech’s most poignant moment, Sarah explained why her father chose such a treacherous life.

“He would be unable to witness or submit to injustice without doing anything,” she said. “He was persuaded that another world is possible, a world where no one would ever need a forger.

*Upfront editor Veronica Majerol interviewed Adolfo Kaminsky in French over Skype and translated the interview into English