We knew the Russians had stopped their offensive on the Praga side of the Vistula. We spoke with a man walking through the village selling second-hand flatware, who had just returned from Pruszków on the outskirts of Warsaw, where our transit camp had been. He confirmed that Warsaw had been completely destroyed by the Germans. Once the entire population was expelled following the Uprising, the Germans systematically looted the remaining buildings. The plunder, taken from Warsaw by truck, was sorted and shipped by train to Germany. Next the buildings were set on fire with flamethrowers, and any remaining walls of historically significant buildings were dynamited.
We decided to go to Konstancin and see what we could find out, and try to contact my aunt Barbara, who lived there. At the beginning of December we walked to Miechów railway station and managed to squeeze ourselves onto a train travelling north to Pruszków. We arrived in the late afternoon and found a place to spend the night. The next day we went to the largest flea market that I had ever seen. All the ‘stuff’ from the looting of Warsaw that had managed to slip past the Germans was displayed on the ground for sale. Talking with people we learned that there was no way we could reach Konstancin, which was about 15 miles to the east and too close to the front line on the Vistula. We were also warned not to linger anywhere because the Germans were arresting people whose ID cards were issued in Warsaw, as mother’s was. We purchased some flatware and decided to return to Rzerzuśnia the next day. We were told that there was an express train to Kraków but it was very difficult to get on as there were not enough wagons for Poles.
The next day, an hour before our departure, we arrived at the station and purchased our tickets. When we reached the platform we found a multitude of people already waiting. After an hour, at the sound of a whistle, the train slowly pulled into the station. Through the windows of the first wagon we saw several German soldiers and officers. The following three coaches were empty. They were immediately surrounded by a mob of people pushing and shoving, manoeuvring to be closer to the doors. There was no way all those people could ever fit into the three wagons. The forward wagon was first class with the sign Nur für Deutsche. It was reserved for the Germans but also allowed the citizens of Axis countries: Hungary, Finland and Romania. After assessing the situation, mother said, ‘We are going to be Lithuanians,’ and we proceeded to enter the wagon. Walking through the corridor, we bypassed the first compartments of German soldiers and officers until we came to one with two civilians. They were sitting opposite each other at the window. There were two large suitcases on the luggage racks above them. We sat on the opposite side, next to the corridor. Everyone was silent, pretending not to see one another. Ten minutes later our train started to slowly move out, to the shouts of disappointed people who had not managed to squeeze in.
About thirty minutes into our journey, the morbid silence of our compartment was abruptly broken by our door being loudly pushed opened. There were two men: one in the dark navy blue of the German Railway Security Police, the other in the feldgrau of the German Army wearing a military police gorget. The two civilians sitting across from us were asked for their ID and they provided a pass and some other IDs. The railway policeman then turned to us. And mother gave him a pleasant smile and her Lithuanian ID, issued when Wilno was annexed in the autumn of 1939. The ID was in Lithuanian with a photograph and an appropriate amount of stamps and signatures. It was obvious that he had no idea what it was. He looked at her questioningly and she said in German, ‘Lithuanian’. She looked at me and I babbled something in Lithuanian. The railway policeman looked to the military policeman, who shrugged his shoulders. It was clear he had no interest in civilians. When the corridor door closed we all looked at each other. The two men opposite us started talking to each other in Russian. Mother, a fluent Russian speaker, joined in. It turned out that they were anti-communist Russians co-operating with Germans involved in the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia. Soon after, when they opened one of the large suitcases, it became obvious that they were smuggling spritus, 198 proof vodka. The suitcases were full of the stuff. They opened one bottle, took a swig each, and passed the bottle to my mother. She took a small sip and managed to swallow it. Years later, I learned how painfully that highest proof alcohol burns your mouth and throat. The Russians continued to drink and fall asleep.
It was evening when our train finally arrived in Kraków. There was a long wait for our local train to Miechów so we entered a large, crowed, dimly lit waiting room. We squeezed in and sat down at the end of a wooden bench, resigning ourselves to a long wait. It was quite cold, the room was barely heated – just sufficient to prevent the pipes from freezing. After an hour we heard a commotion at the front door: voices shouting in German and the metallic stomping of military boots. Two Gestapo officers entered followed by SS guards, who positioned themselves at the entrances. An announcement was made in German that everyone’s identity papers were to be checked. We were ordered to stay in place. Anyone who tried to escape would be shot. The waiting room was very large. In the middle of a short side there was a wide entrance guarded by SS. One of the long sides, along the platform, had windows; the other was blank with a few closed doors. The short back wall had no openings. The walking aisles were parallel to the long walls: there were three aisles between four rows of benches. They were full of people sitting facing the door. There were also people standing and sitting around the walls. As soon as the Germans appeared at the door the whole room quieted down. There was some occasional coughing and the sound of babies crying.
The two Gestapo men, each with a civilian interpreter and an SS guard, began checking papers. Each started at the beginning of one of the two outside aisles and proceeded methodically. It became clear that a few Poles were allowed to remain, most were released and permitted to leave the room, and the rest were escorted out by armed guards. It was murmured that all Warsovians were being arrested. Mother’s ID, a German kannekarte, was issued in Warsaw. We were sitting three-quarters of the way down the aisle and it took about an hour for the Gestapo to work their way to us. The one on our side checked two to three rows of benches on the opposite side of the aisle before turning around and doing the same on our side. Mother was sitting beside me on the end of the bench. She quietly said: ‘Get ready, when I get up, get up with me, take me under my arm and on my signal we will walk out.’ She moved her bag to the outside and held her kannekarte in her right hand. I slowly put on my backpack.
As the Gestapo officer finished checking the row before us he turned and moved to the other side of the aisle together with his interpreter and SS guard. When he began to question someone else, mother said ‘Now’, and we stood up and slowly started walking. She held her kannekarte in her hand while the second Gestapo officer, on the other side, looked at us questioningly. Mother smiled and waved her ID at him. He looked at the other officer who had his back turned, hesitated for a moment and then continued checking people on his side. We kept walking towards the door, where one of the SS guards opened it and we just walked out, leaving the station.
Nearby we saw the people who had been arrested held in two trucks guarded by the SS. It was late, well past curfew. Kraków was a large city and the seat of the occupational government. There were Germans everywhere; it was dangerous to be out during police curfew hours. The neighbourhood around the railway was mainly commercial. We hugged the walls of the buildings on the main street and turned into the next intersection. There was a small light visible in a service door. We knocked and were admitted into the small apartment of the building’s watchmen. We explained our predicament. He and his wife made a place for us to sleep on the floor. We covered ourselves in a blanket and immediately fell asleep.
We were glad to be back in Rzerzuśnia. There was no longer any German presence nearby except for in Miechów. There were Polish partisan units operating in the surrounding countryside. One night, shortly after our return, we heard a commotion at the end of the village. It was another raid by the partisan
s, which had destroyed a clandestine still that had been making bimber, moonshine vodka. The Polish underground government wanted to eradicate clandestine stills since they consumed scarce food grains and contributed to alcoholism.
For quite some time now everyone had expected the war to end soon. We were all waiting for the Russian offensive to begin. Christmas of 1944 and New Year’s Day 1945 arrived and were celebrated with the certainty that the war would soon be over.
One night in early January, I was awakened by the sounds of movement on the village road below us. I stepped outside and in the moonlight saw a long column of partisans, including mounted scouts and a wagon train, moving west. They were units of the NSZ, the military arm of an ultra-nationalist party that did not recognise the authority of the AK and fought against Germans, Russians and Polish communist partisans. They were withdrawing ahead of the Russian advance. Two days later a squad of front-line German soldiers arrived in our village. Four soldiers were billeted in Szczepka’s house. Prior to our arrival the Germans had built a line of fortifications across the valley on the east side of our village. By now, we were sure this was the beginning of the end. On the evening of the second day the corporal in charge, a Silesian, told us in Polish: ‘We will be gone early in the morning and the “Ruskis” will be here later in the day.’
I woke up at daybreak to the sounds of German soldiers getting up and putting on their gear. Once they left, an eerie silence descended on the village; there were none of the usual morning sounds, everyone stayed inside. I sat next to a window looking eastward. A solitary horseman appeared around noon. As he entered the village I recognised that he was a Russian soldier, with a PPSha (Russian machine pistol) hanging from his neck, mounted on a shaggy pony. Ten minutes later, more Russian troops walked through the village.
We were free of the Germans. It was 15 January 1945.
PART 5
RUSSIAN RETURN
22
Return to Warsaw, January 1945
The departure of the German troops and arrival of the Russians was very anticlimactic. There was celebration and joy knowing that the Germans were gone and the war would soon be over. For us, who had previously been under Russian occupation in Wilno, there was a feeling of unease. Nevertheless, we all were very happy that after five and a half years the worst was over, and the war would end.
We decided to go to Miechów and find a way to return to Warsaw. During our hour-and-a-half walk we did not see any signs of fighting until we came across a Russian plane that had been shot down. The two dead crewmen were still in their seats and as I walked on the wing I realised that one was definitely a woman while the other was burned beyond recognition (the plane was an IL-2 Sturmovik, the famous ‘flying tank’).
Miechów, a county town established in the twelfth century, was situated at the main highway and rail line between Warsaw and Kraków. It was full of Russian troops. I was impressed by the amount of equipment: tanks, the famous T-32, and American trucks and jeeps, which we saw there for the first time. The Russian soldiers all had good winter clothing: fur hats, padded jackets and trousers, overcoats or sheep skin coats and valenki, thick high felt boots with rubberised soles. To my surprise, the soldiers and officers all sported shoulder boards of the old Imperial Russian Army. There was a large volume of military traffic moving both ways through the town.
Mother started a conversation with some soldiers resting near a large Studebaker truck. She learned from them that the road to Warsaw was open. It was possible to get rides on army trucks especially if ‘something’ was offered. It became clear that a small bottle of vodka was the surest way to hitch a ride. The soldiers were eating dark Russian bread spread with copious amounts of tushonka (a canned stewed pork meat more than half fat). They offered us some. The can was painted in the same green as the American trucks and had English lettering. I asked one of the soldiers where it was made. ‘In Russia’, he replied proudly. ‘Why then is the can labelled in English?’ ‘Because we send them to America.’
Next day we purchased a dozen quarter litre bottles of moonshine. The village still that had earlier been destroyed by partisans was back in production. That evening we packed our luggage. Mother’s small bag held half of the vodka and my backpack the rest. At daybreak, after tearful goodbyes with the Szczepkas, we walked to Miechów. When we reached the road leading to Warsaw, mother held out one of the bottles and the first truck stopped for us immediately. The soldier sitting next to the driver moved over and we squeezed into the Studebaker. Soon we reached Jędrzejów, the next town. Now we were 30 miles closer to Warsaw. The driver had us get off at the outskirts and we walked into town. In the centre of Jędrzejów’s market square we noticed a group of people surrounding a body lying on the ground. The body was in a German soldier’s uniform and tied to a wooden board. Its legs were flat and the trousers were soaked in blood. The Russians had captured a RONA (Russian National Liberation Army) soldier, tied him to a board and slowly rolled a T-32 tank over his legs. We left, walked across town and were immediately picked up by another truck. The Russian drivers slammed on their brakes at the sight of vodka. Two days later we reached Raszyn on the outskirts of Warsaw. We found a place to sleep in exchange for one of our last bottles of vodka. Next day, probably 25 January, we walked for two hours and entered what had been Warsaw.
How do you describe a dead city? As we walked along the Kraków highway we had not seen all that much destruction in the Ochota suburbs. Once we passed through, the enormity of Warsaw’s destruction was before us. There were no buildings left standing. Every district was a sea of rubble punctuated by skeletons of black burned-out fragments of standing walls. There were hardly any people to be seen except for on Jerusalem Avenue, which we walked along. The avenue was cleared for traffic, but all the side streets were canyons filled with rubble from collapsed buildings. There were footprints visible in this moonscape. Here and there were signs: Uwaga Miny (caution mines). Closer to the city centre, there were more people; civilians like us wandering through, soldiers of the LWP Polish People’s Army and a sprinkling of Russian military. I spotted a couple of officers in NKVD uniforms. Mother and I looked at each other and she murmured, ‘Back to 1939’.
At the Marszałkowska Street intersection we found a makeshift wooden kiosk with a fire burning in a metal barrel and selling hot food. We bought some and while eating and warming ourselves up, we listened to the nearby conversations. We overheard one man recall a parade he had watched a week earlier on 19 January, two days after Polish soldiers entered Warsaw. He said there had been a ‘liberation’ parade right on this avenue. The reviewing stand was nearby and visible from where we were. The entire Provisional Polish Communist Government was present together with Polish Marshal Rola-Zymirski and Russian Marshall Zhukov. ‘Liberation’, the man repeated sarcastically: ‘What is liberation to one is just another occupation to the other.’ There was a murmur of approval.
It was time to see our apartment. We walked further down the avenue and passed Krucza Street. It had only been four months earlier that I stood wearing my uniform and had watched the brief ceasefire that took place just farther down the street. I thought of Cpt. Skóra and Lt. Zadra, who were killed nearby on the last day of the Uprising. When we reached Nowy Swiat Street we turned left and walked the block and a half to our apartment. Since the entire area was destroyed it was impossible to get there from the street. Walking around the block we reached the back garden. The rear section of our building, including our apartment, was in ruins. As we looked at each other, mother shrugged her shoulders and said, ‘Let’s go see if we can find aunt Barbara.’ Retracing our steps to Nowy Swiat, we began walking eastward.
Walking and catching a ride on a horse-drawn wagon, we finally reached Konstańcin and found aunt Barbara’s home. It was late and we had been on the road for five hours; we were hungry, tired and chilled to the bone. When we started our journey to aunt Barbara’s we had no idea what we would find. We knew there had been no fighting in the a
rea during the Uprising and the Russians’ offensive. My aunt’s family, on the other hand, had feared the worst for us in Warsaw.
After some hot tea and food I went to sleep in the kids’ room as my mother and aunt continued to talk in the kitchen. I woke up in the morning with 5-year-old Maciej climbing all over me and his younger sister, 3-year-old Małgorzata, looking at me with her large child’s eyes. We stayed with them for a few days. They had had no news of Barbara’s brother Jerzy Emir-Hassan, my godfather, since his disappearance during the 1939 campaign.
Three days later, we left early in the morning and headed west. At the intersection with the Warsaw–Kraków highway we found three parked trucks with Polish soldiers. There was an unusual number of women present. It was the LWP Theatre, travelling to Kraków to perform there. When they learned that we were in Warsaw during the Uprising, and were trying to get back to Miechów, we were immediately invited to join them. The people in the truck were mostly actors, men and women, wearing Polish Army uniforms, identical to the pre-war uniform with one exception: the eagle on their headgear insignia did not have a crown and was of a different design. No one liked it and derisively called it a wrona (crow). During the long ride we learned more of what had happened since the Uprising. A Provisional Polish Communist Government had been formed in July 1944 and controlled the civil administration. The army had a large number of Russian officers and political officers and the NKVD was everywhere. It was obvious that none of these people were communists or sympathisers. During one of the stops the director of the theatre group came out of the cab and joined us. He invited us to see their performance in Kraków, which was to be given few days later. We reached Miechów by early evening and on the way back to Rzerzuśnia we learned that train connections had been re-established with Kraków. An hour later we were warmly greeted by the Szczepkas, who wanted to know all about our trip.
My Boyhood War Page 21