1942, Warsaw has been suffering the brutal Nazi occupation of the city for three years now, swastikas wave on government buildings and German soldiers roam the streets, but something is stirring beneath the surface of oppression. A young Polish woman draws on a piece of paper a symbol destined to become the most powerful symbol of Polish anti-fascist resistance. The symbol looks like a stylised anchor attached to the P for Poland but its meaning is deeper, the letters are a P and a W or Polska Walczaca - Fighting Poland.

The girl's name is Anna Smolenska and she is a student of art history at the University of Warsaw, as well as an activist in the Polish resistance that was already operating clandestinely in many parts of Poland in 1942. Anna was 22 years old when the Polish government-in-exile held a secret competition to choose the emblem of the resistance movement; Anna's design proposal won the competition. Within a few months the Kotwica began to appear everywhere, on walls, in metro tunnels and in schools, a silent symbol that Poland had not surrendered to the occupiers. During the 1944 Uprising, the Kutowica was omnipresent, it was sewn together with the Polish flag on the uniforms of the Krajowa Army insurgents, it was printed on posters, carried on the arms of young boys and became the visual and ideological focus of an entire generation ready to die to resist the advance of Fascism.

Unfortunately, Anna's fate was tragic, the girl was identified and arrested by the Gestapo together with her entire family. After being tortured, she was deported to Auschwitz concentration camp where she tragically died in March 1943. She never saw her symbol rise proudly in the days of the 1944 Uprising, her legacy far exceeding her death. Even today in Poland, Kotwica is considered a fundamental symbol of the country's historical memory, its incredible resilience and national unity, a legacy that honours the memory of Anna and her sacrifice.

After the war, the new communist regime tried to erase the historical memory of the uprising (led mainly by nationalists), but the Kotwica endured until it was completely restored and affixed to numerous buildings in the centre of Warsaw after the fall of the communist regime in 1991. The Kotwica testifies to the power that symbols can play in historical memory, symbols that often prove stronger and more resistant than any words.