Zavel Mordkowski (Sol Marko)

Sol and Sonia Marko
Sol and Sonia Marko

Rhonda Marko honors her father Sol Marko, who was from Zhetl, Poland. Although he believed that he was going to die, he survived an attack from Hitler’s SS when they stormed into the family home. Everyone in the house was shot by the SS except for him. Sol hid under a twin bed and could even see the boots of the SS men while he was hiding. After the attack, he took his rifle, pictures, and a change of clothes, and he fled his home. He joined the partisans, and became a scout for them, working underground to sabotage German supply trains and conduct raids and forays distributing both food and justice. His picture, holding a semi-automatic machine gun, can be seen on the third floor of the Museum Of The Partisans in Israel. After the war, because of his paramilitary background, the invading Russian army appointed him Sheriff of his town. Sol, who had previously been married, soon thereafter met his second wife, Sonia, who was 16 years old at the time. The couple eventually moved to the United States and started a family.

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