Władysława Kostańska lived in Warsaw with her three children Jadwiga, Danuta, and Jan. They were friends with their Jewish neighbors the Wierzbicki family. In the fall of 1940, the building where both families lived was divided. The part in which Aizyk Wierzbicki and his children Nathan and Nacha lived became part of the ghetto. Like many other ghetto inhabitants, the Wierzbickis often went hungry, so Władysława Kostańska and her son Jan provided the family with food.
When the deportations to extermination camps began in 1942, the Wierzbickis escaped from the ghetto with Władysława and Jan Kostański’s help. Władysława Kostańska sheltered them for a short time in her home and her brother’s vacant apartment. In 1943 the Kostańskis hid the Jewish family in their new apartment, which was destroyed in August 1944. While Władysława Kostańska left the city with her daughters, Jan Kostański hid in a basement with the Wierzbickis until their liberation.
Władysława Kostańska and Aizyk Wierzbicki married in 1946. Władysława Wierzbicka was honored as Righteous Among the Nations by the Israeli Holocaust memorial center Yad Vashem in 1983.