Pan Junshun (traditional Chinese: 潘均順; simplified Chinese: 潘均顺; pinyin: Pān Jūnshùn; 1889 – 1974), was the first Chinese national to be awarded the title Righteous Among the Nations for hiding and sheltering a Ukrainian Jewish girl during the occupation of part of the Soviet Union during World War II.
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Life
Pan Jun Shun moved to Russia in 1916 looking for work. He settled in Moscow where he found work as a laborer. As an enthusiastic communist, he decided to stay in the USSR. He married and had two sons while living in Moscow, after which he moved to Kharkiv, Ukraine in 1936. His wife died before the outbreak of World War II.
His two sons were drafted into the Red Army at the beginning of the war; they never returned home and were presumed to have been killed during the war.
He survived the war and continued to live there until his death in 1974.
Righteous among the Nations
Pan Jun Shun provided shelter and hiding for Ludmilla Genrichovna, a Ukrainian Jewish girl who had escaped from a detention area set up by the occupying German Army. She escaped through the efforts of her mother who realized that her children were likely to be killed as they were being transferred to another town.
References
- Gilbert, Martin. The Righteous: The Unsung Heroes of the Holocaust. ISBN 0-8050-6260-2, ISBN 978-0-8050-6260-1. New York: Henry Holt, 2003. P. 20.
- ^ "Jun Shun Pan". Yad Vashem. Retrieved 14 December 2024.
- "Teaching the Chinese About the Holocaust", Rafael Medoff, Jewish Ledger, 5 November 2010
- Ha, Tu Thanh. "Holocaust memorial honours individuals from all countries who risked their lives". The Globe and Mail. Archived from the original on 31 December 2016. Retrieved 29 September 2018.