Legacy of Courage

by Suzanne Schuurman

The story of a remarkable life that began in the Austro-Hungarian Empire of Franz Joseph, spanned two World Wars, and played out on three continents.

‘I was extremely happy in Kasai. I felt free, gloriously free as never before in my life . . . I was dependent only on the Bahá’í institutions which I loved and respected.’

Here is the story of a remarkable life that began in the Austro-Hungarian Empire of Franz Joseph, spanned two World Wars, and played out on three continents.

Born into the Polish aristocracy, Ola Pawlowska was told she would never have to earn her living. War and early widowhood changed all that. Fleeing Nazi-occupied France to Canada with her young daughter, Ola worked at various jobs, mainly as a secretary at the Polish Legation – but in Canada she also encountered the Bahá’í Faith, and in 1953 she became a Knight of Bahá’u’lláh to the St Pierre and Miquelon Islands off the Canadian coast.