Agent Zo with Clare Mulley

(HYBRID - IN-PERSON AND VIRTUAL)

After World War II, she was discharged as one of the most highly decorated women in Polish history…and then Elżbieta Zawacka was erased from history.

Tonight, join award-winning author and historian Clare Mulley for an introduction to this forgotten hero. During the Second World War, Zawacka—the WWII female resistance fighter known as Agent Zo—was the only woman to reach London as an emissary of the Polish Home Army command. In Britain, she became the only woman to join the Polish elite Special Forces, known as the "Silent Unseen.” After secret training in the British countryside, she became the only woman to parachute back behind enemy lines to Nazi-German occupied Poland. There, while being hunted by the Gestapo, she played a key role in the Warsaw Uprising, the largest organized act of defiance against German occupation. 

Yet after the war, the Soviet-backed Communist regime imprisoned Zo, and ensured her story was never told.  Mulley’s new book Agent Zo: The Untold Story of a Fearless World War II Resistance Fighter restores Zawacka to her rightful place in history. Mulley will discuss the interviews and archival research she conducted to recreate the world of this heroic resistance fighter.

Agent Zo will be available for sale and signing after the event. The in-person event will have open seating available on a first-come, first-served basis.

This program is in collaboration with the Embassy of the Republic of Poland and The Kosciuszko Foundation, Washington, DC

Assistive listening devices will be available for the in-person program. Auto-generated closed captioning will be available for this program when viewed online.