Zofija Kaczan celebrated her 100th birthday on May 9, she was attacked and robbed in a brutal attack on May 28 that left her with a broken neck. Photo / Stacia Fitzsimmons
Zofija Kaczan celebrated her 100th birthday on May 9, she was attacked and robbed in a brutal attack on May 28 that left her with a broken neck. Photo / Stacia Fitzsimmons
A 100-year-old widow who survived Nazi prison camps, prayed for the man who brutally mugged her in a British street as she lay on her hospital death bed.
Zofija Kaczan was left with a broken neck following a brutal street robbery as she walked to church on May 28.
Her final act of forgiveness was, say friends and the priest who prayed with her at Royal Derby Hospital, a typical act of kindness from a woman who endured so much suffering in her own life.
"She prayed for forgiveness for her killer," says Anya Skrytek, 80, a close friend who found her lying in the street following the mugging near to her home in Normanton, Derby in the UK on May 28.
Zofija Kaczan's handbag which was ripped off her during the attack. Photo / Derbyshire Police
Police confirmed a 39-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of murder.
Flowers have been hung outside the St Maksymilian Kolbe Church she used to visit every day, with Father Sebastian Ludwin lighting candles in her memory inside the church.
He recalled the moment she was brought into church following the attack, where her bag was snatched.
Father Ludwin said: "She had black eyes, a lot of blood on her face and we bandaged her up and sat her in the last pew waiting for an ambulance. The community has been left shocked at what has happened. She was a remarkable woman."
Her death came almost a month after her 100th birthday, which she celebrated on May 9 friends. She even received a blessing from the Pope but despite living in England since 1948, she never applied for British citizenship so did not receive a blessing from the Queen.
The spirited centurion grew up in the town of Brody until the Nazi occupation. Her younger brother was killed by Hitler's forces while she was sent to work detail in Germany.
A friend of Kaczan said she was sent to work in two factories making nails and porcelain and was housed in a concentration camp.
St Maksymilian Kolbe Church where Zofija Kaczan attended mass every day. She was on her way to church when she was attacked. Photo / Google
At the end of the war, she fled to England with her partner Mikolaj first living in a resettlement camp in Weston on Trent before moving to Derby.
Angelika Cybulska, a close friend who cared for Kaczan following her husband's death in 2009 and spent the last few days with her in hospital, says such was the trauma of her war experiences that she rarely spoke about the past.
"She is happy now she is with all that she lost," she told the Daily Telegraph yesterday.
Zofija and her husband were said to be inseparable and she was left bereft following his death at the age of 92.
She attended mass every day at St Maksymilian and had been in good health, apparently even planning a holiday to the beachside town of Scarborough with Cybulska.
"She was an amazing person and became a part of our family," Cybulska said. "I'm just shocked. We had so many plans."
Another friend, Anna Zimand said: "She was a stalwart of the community. We are just in a state of disbelief that this could have happened and that after such a difficult life she met such a violent end."
Outside Kaczan's Victorian terraced home yesterday her neighbour Stacia Fitzsimmons had left a vase of roses bearing the message: "We love you and will miss you so very much".
In spite of Kaczan's show of forgiveness, her friends have admitted they are struggling with her death.
Anna Krepa, 83, said: "the penalties are too soft in England and this is why there are people committing so much crimes. It breaks my heart.
She added: "if this man has committed murder, he should be hanged."
