Playing Banjolele for Poland - Spitfire pilot Katy Carr to sing for Auschwitz escapee Kazik Piechowski and Warsaw diplomats
Published: 25 March 2011
by PAVAN AMARA
AN aviator who befriended an Auschwitz escapee and wrote a song about his story will play her banjolele for Warsaw diplomats outside the Polish Embassy next week.
Songwriter Katy Carr – a qualified pilot who has flown Spitfires – tracked down 91-year-old Kazik Piechowski after seeing a documentary about his amazing story.
In 1942 Kazik escaped from the notorious concentration camp, where he had been forced to work as a slave labourer because of his involvement in the Polish Scout movement – a group deemed subversive by the Nazis.
Kazik and three other political prisoners dressed up in stolen SS uniforms and made off in the commandant Rudolf Höss’s car, resolving to shoot themselves if captured.
Kazik will join Katy (pictured), who is half Polish, for the performance in Portland Place on Tuesday and at a second event on March 31 at Baden-Powell House in South Kensington.
Katy, who lives off Marylebone High Street, said that while many people knew about the terrible crimes which took place on Polish soil during the war, few recognised that Polish Resistance fighters were key to Britain’s war effort.
“What people don’t understand is the important role Polish pilots played in the RAF during the war,” she said. “Twelve per cent of all Luftwaffe planes in the Battle of Britain were shot down by Polish fighter pilots. If it hadn’t been for them, Britain might not have won.”
• The Polish Embassy gig is an invite-only occasion. The event on March 31 is free and open to the public. Donations can be made to the Auschwitz Museum. The gig will take place from 7pm on March 31 at Baden- Powell House, 65-67 Queen’s Gate, SW1.