„6 tys. [Żydów] co dzień” – „oczywiście na stracenie”. Opowieść o pierwszej depeszy Polskiego Państwa Podziemnego na temat Wielkiej Akcji w getcie warszawskim

On 22nd July 1942, Germans initiated the Grossaktion, i.e. the destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto. The first known piece of information from the Polish Underground State addressed to the Polish Government-in-exile in London is the dispatch of 26th July 1942 by Stefan Korboński. However, its complete content has been unknown to date. All the evidence suggests that the key sentence about the daily “contingents” of Jews transported for extermination was wrongly understood in London. Moreover, unlike Korboński’s intention, the dispatch was publicised via the radio, which contradicts the thesis about the silence of the Polish Government-in-exile (at least in the initial period).