Season 12 · Episode 3

Timewatch: The Stolen Child

During the Second World War the Nazis snatched 200,000 Aryan-looking Polish children from their mothers to replenish the "master race" back in Germany. This film tells the extraordinary story of two cousins who were stolen on the same day, 4-year-old Alojzy and 10-year-old Leon. Alojzy was adopted by a "good" Nazi family and soon forgot his Polish past, becoming a model German. When Alojzy was told at age 12 of his Polish parentage, he was horrified, believing the Poles to be Untermensch ("less than human"). It was years before he could accept his real mother and years before the Polish people forgave him his German identity.