23
Miechów and the End of the Second World War, February–9 May 1945
The following Sunday we were on our way to Kraków and the theatre. In the evening we picked up our tickets and were directed to the second floor. We followed the usher down the right-hand corridor to the last door. When he opened the door we found ourselves in the presidential box. It was the first time since the war started that I had been to the theatre (during the war all theatres were closed). I remembered the last time we had sat in the same box, when as children we had watched a performance of Puss in Boots in Wilno. A few more people arrived before the performance started. It seemed obvious they were local dignitaries from the new communist administration and they looked surprised to see us there. A play by Wyspiański had premiered in 1901 in this same theatre. Written during the time of lost independence, it had a lot of national symbolism. The play was enthusiastically received by the audience as it was the first play performed in Polish to a Polish audience since the beginning of the German occupation.
On our arrival from Kraków we heard that the secondary school in Miechów, which had been closed during the occupation, had just reopened. It had been closed throughout the occupation. We went to register and after answering a few questions and completing a short exam, I was admitted to the second year of gimnazium. I joined my classmates and mother returned to Rzerzuśnia. When school ended around 4 p.m., I walked home. The next morning I got up at 6 a.m. to be in school before 8 a.m. For the following two months, I repeated my routine six days each week. When the weather was good I was able to get to school in just over an hour by taking short cuts through the fields. When the weather was poor, as when snow and rain turned the roadway to mud, it would take two hours.
In order for us to cover the required curriculum in the short time left, our school year was extended through July; two extra classes were added to the school day and Saturday was increased to a full day. During the occupation our school building had been used by the German Army. Once the Russians captured Miechów it became their field hospital. On my first day, one of the boys took me behind a building and showed me an open pit full of amputated legs and arms. The building still stank of formaldehyde.
I joined the school’s Boy Scout troop and was named second in command. The local Underground Boy Scouts had been dissolved a few weeks earlier. Their members, including the troop commander, formed the nucleus of our new troop.
Towards the end of March I returned home to find father sitting and talking with mother. He had aged in the two years since I had seen him last, his face was gaunt and there was more grey hair at his temples. He had a short beard and a moustache that was also grey. He looked at me for a long time then hugged me. Mother was silently standing by. Father had travelled from Warsaw, where he found out our whereabouts and learned of Andrzej’s death. He stayed with us two days. We learned that he had left Wilno weeks ago in one of the first repatriation trains of Poles. Being an expert in rail transportation, he had been assigned to a group that would eventually take over the German railways in Pomerania. The group was waiting for the OK from the Russian military as there was still heavy fighting in that area. After he left, mother told me that he wanted to get back together but she had said no.
A week later, when I returned home, I found a man in quiet conversation with mother. As I came closer the intense scrutiny of the man turned into a broad smile. Mother said, ‘This is uncle Jurek.’ It was my godfather, a captain in the Polish Army who had last been seen when the war broke out in 1939. In the evening, once the Szczepkas had left the kitchen, he began to talk quietly. He had been the CO of an infantry company during the September 1939 campaign and was wounded later that month. He avoided being taken prisoner. He had been arrested by Russians in November 1939, trying to cross into Hungary. After a stint in an NKVD prison he was sent to a Siberian gulag. Following Germany’s invasion of Russia, Stalin released many of the Poles so they could join the Polish Army and uncle Jurek became commander of an officer’s school. He had recently parachuted into Poland following some special training. While visiting his sister Barbara, she had given him our address. We talked until late and made arrangements to get together for Easter at aunt Barbara’s. Next morning, Jurek gave mother $300, a very significant amount of money at that time. I walked with him to Miechów, where he took a train for Kraków. We parted saying, ‘See you at Easter.’ Shortly after, during the Easter holiday, when we arrived at aunt Barbara’s uncle Jurek was not there. When we left a few days later we still had no news from him. We were afraid that he had been arrested again by the NKVD.
During our stay with aunt Barbara we made our way into Warsaw. Some life was coming back into the city. All the major streets had been cleared of rubble and were again passable. Army engineers had replaced the bridges with two temporary wooden structures and a pontoon bridge. There was traffic on the streets, military trucks and horse-drawn wagons. Shops had re-opened in some of the ruined buildings. There were people living in heavily damaged buildings. We again visited our apartment building. Nothing had changed – it was still a ruin with part of the front wall standing and gaping holes where the windows had been.
Soon after returning home we received a letter from father, which included a document identifying me as the son of an employee of the Polish State Railways. On that basis, I was eligible for room and board at the local bursa, a government boarding house for students in an old police station located close to the school. There were about thirty boys living there, eight or ten to a room, sleeping on two-level bunks with wooden slats and straw mattresses. The food was bad; the school schedule, because of the shortened school year, was very demanding. Nevertheless, we were in good spirits and played all kinds of juvenile pranks on each other. The two most popular were partially cutting bunk boards so that beds collapsed, and placing a washbasin full of water in the straw of a mattress so when the target snuck in and carefully sat down he was in for a surprise. After a while a truce was declared.
Once the Russians had occupied Poland a new Polish communist administration was established. Nevertheless, Russian troops, now supplemented by special NKVD units, had been stationed in the area. The attitude of the Polish population towards the Russian soldiers, which had been friendly or lukewarm, was now hostile. The Russians were confiscating food and livestock, and committing rapes and robberies. There were armed encounters between Russian soldiers and Polish partisans, who were still active in the area. NKVD troops were brought in for the specific purpose of destroying what remained of the Polish Underground. According to findings made following the fall of Communism, in the time period starting with the Russian Army crossing Poland’s pre-war frontier, the NKVD arrested more than 60,000 Polish Underground soldiers and sent 50,000 to Siberia. Occasionally during the night gunfire could be heard between the Milicja, Polish State Police and rampaging Russian soldiers. One night we heard an explosion from the direction of the jail. The next morning we learned that Polish partisans had attacked the prison during the night and liberated their comrades.
Towards the end of April we all knew that the war would be over in a matter of days. On 2 May, the Russians were shooting into the air. Berlin had fallen to the Russian Army. On 9 May, all hell broke loose. Russians were firing every weapon they had, from pistols to AA guns – Germany had capitulated. Actually, Germany capitulated to the Western Allies on 7 May; Stalin insisted that the capitulation be repeated, in Berlin in the headquarters of the Marshall Zhukov; it was signed shortly before midnight of the 8th Berlin time, when it was already the 9th in Moscow. To this day, the end of the Second World War is celebrated as VE Day on the 8th in the West and as the end of the Great Patriotic War on the 9th in Russia.
24
Second Visit to Warsaw, 9 May–August 1945
At the end of the Second World War, the Polish-German border had been moved west to the Oder–Neisse line. We decided to take a look at Silesia with the idea of settling there. There is no way that we could have
returned to Warsaw. Not only was there nothing for us to return to, but at that time a special permit was required to live there and was very difficult to obtain.
We travelled by trains, as overcrowded now as they had been during the occupation. After changing in Kraków we arrived in Katowice. It was less than 20 miles to Gleiwitz, previously a German town and now renamed Gliwice. Once we were over the old Polish-German border the aftermath of Russian ‘liberation’ was plainly visible: mostly empty buildings, broken windows and dwellings completely ransacked. Apartments with broken furniture and floors covered in white down from emptied pillows, duvets and featherbeds. Russian soldiers greatly prized tightly woven pillowcases and sent them home to their families. A number of large pillows on a peasant’s bed was a sign of prosperity in Russia.
After spending a couple of days in Gliwice and nearby areas we decided against staying. This industrial area of steel works and coalmines was depressing. We returned to Rzezuśnia. In the meantime, father reached Pomerania. His group was assigned to take over administration of the provincial railway. In his letters, he had strongly suggested that we consider moving to Szczecin. We decided that when the school year ended in July, we would first go to Warsaw and then Szczecin.
The accelerated school year ended in the last week of July. For the first time I had respectable results: rather than all Cs, I got mostly Bs. We said our goodbyes to the Szczepkas and their family, who had so very warmly welcomed us before.
We arrived in Warsaw and stayed with aunt Barbara. We learned that uncle Jurek and his wife had been arrested in March by the NKVD with several other high-ranking AK officers, and turned over to the Department of Security (Urząd Bezpieczeństwa, UB). A few weeks later he was sentenced to ten years and sent to Wronki, where political prisoners were incarcerated.
Two days later we ventured into the city. There were marked differences from six months before. In summer it looked less grim and desolate than in the dark days of winter. Most of the major streets were clear and traffic was flowing. There were no trams or buses, but rudimentary public transit was provided by trucks with wooden plank benches. Shops and restaurants were open. There were signs of people living in partially destroyed buildings, where some parts had been made habitable. Demolition and clearing was going on. The partially standing walls of burned-out buildings had been pulled down. Ropes had been attached to the top of the freestanding walls and teams of men were rhythmically pulling on them. The high walls oscillated as much as 6–8ft before collapsing in a cloud of red and grey dust.
Again we walked on our street. This time Nowy Swiat was completely clear. There was a lot of traffic because this street connected to the temporary bridges built over the Vistula. We passed the ruins of our old apartment building and continued towards the old town. A year ago, I had walked from the old town in the sewers below. When we passed the university, on our right was Karowa Street leading down to the new high wooden bridge built by Russian military engineers in 1945. We entered the old town. The air was heavy with the stench of decomposing bodies. The exhumation of temporary graves had started a few months before, when the thawed-out ground made digging possible.
For a long time, holding handkerchiefs to our noses, we watched bodies being dug out of graves, placed on stretchers and carried away for identification. After identification, if identification was possible, they were reburied in temporary communal graves in Krasiński Gardens. In the office of the Polish Red Cross we listed Andrzej’s name. Unknown to us, his body had already been found, exhumed and reburied about three months before. Due to the sheer number of names, the paperwork was behind.
Over the next few days I spent most of my time in Warsaw. I went back to the old town and walked all over the places where we had fought a year before. In the garden of Radziwiłł Palace I found Abczyc’s grave. The cross was leaning all the way down to the ground. I straightened it and carved out his code name, rank and date with a penknife. I saluted and left the old town.
In the centre of the city I came across some of the returning POWs. They were easy to spot by their English or American uniforms with Polish insignias. I was told of a new organisation that had formed for combatants. It was approved by the communist government after AK veterans’ request for a separate organisation was denied. Its Polish acronym, ‘ZUWZoWiN’, stood for the pompous name of ‘Association of Participants in the Armed Fight for Independence and Democracy’. In the Association’s offices I found out that Nałęcz, Pobóg and Holski were already in Warsaw.
The first one I got in touch with was Holski. When he got the word he came immediately. He was wearing the uniform of a lieutenant colonel of the Polish People’s Army. After capitulation he had escaped from the rail transport and rejoined the Underground. When the Russians came he joined the LWP. He knew that Nałęcz and Pobóg had returned. The next day we all had a reunion. Nałęcz and Pobóg had returned from an oflag that was liberated by the British in May, a few days before the war had ended. A couple of days after the war ended they found an abandoned Germany military car and started driving to Warsaw. Once they crossed into the Russian Zone they ran into trouble. They were arrested and held in detention. Several Polish ex-POW officers were detained there by the NKVD. They managed to bribe some Russian soldiers with American cigarettes and were smuggled out. Once they reached the part of Germany under Polish administration they made their way to Warsaw.
One day, Holski told me that he wanted to introduce me to somebody. When I met him next he was in the company of an American colonel to whom I was introduced. He was the military attaché in the just reopened American embassy (I believe his name was Clark). After some general conversation, translated by his Polish-speaking sergeant driver, we got into his car, a military green Hudson with American flag pennants on the fenders. I sat next to the driver and we drove all over Warsaw. The other two in the back seat were engaged in a quiet, long conversation in German.
I also met with the Mirowski brothers; they had made their way from the same POW camp. Towards the end of August, before I left for Szczecin, Nałęcz told me that I should join the Association. By that time the communist government had announced an amnesty and all members of the AK were asked to reveal themselves. Nałęcz verified my participation in the Uprising and I was issued a membership ID with my rank of corporal and the award of the Cross of Valour. I said goodbye to Nałęcz. He was leaving for the harbour town of Gdynia. He was promoted to major and appointed inspector general of the newly formed Harbour Guards, formed to protect the transports of UNRRA arriving by ship in Poland.
25
Szczecin, August 1945–July 1946
After two weeks in Warsaw it was time to continue on to Szczecin. The school year would be starting soon. While at the Warsaw train station we requested that father be notified of our departure from Warsaw and our scheduled arrival time at Szczecin. After an overnight journey in a crowded compartment, our train stopped in front of the bridge over the River Oder, a short distance before the city. The conductor announced that the bridge was not safe and that we needed to cross over on foot. All the bridges in this area had been destroyed by the retreating Germans. This bridge was a high wooden structure rebuilt by Russian Army engineers on top of the destroyed metal bridge. It was wide enough for two lanes of traffic. A single rail track ran through the middle. The bridge swayed noticeably as vehicular traffic passed by. Once everyone was across, the bridge was closed to vehicular traffic. Our train started to cross at a snail’s speed while the bridge moved visibly. Once it had crossed we re-embarked and continued on to the recently reopened Szczecin station. Father was waiting with an official car and driver.
We drove to the apartment, which he had prepared for us. There was some food and we all had a meal together. After that we all talked. Father had heard from the Polish Red Cross that Andrzej’s body had been buried temporarily in Krasiński Gardens. Towards evening, as our conversation wound down, he again repeated his desire to return to the family. Mother again declined.
Szczecin at the mouth of the River Oder had 270,000 inhabitants before the war. It was a harbour town with shipbuilding and other industries. It was carpet-bombed by Allied bombers in 1943 and August of 1944. The last raid created a ‘firestorm’ similar to those in Hamburg and Dresden. Thousands of people had died and 60 per cent of the city was destroyed. The old town next to the river ceased to exist. Eighty per cent of all harbour installations and 90 per cent of industrial buildings were destroyed. The retreating German Army destroyed over fifty bridges. As the Russian Army entered Szczecin on 24 April, only 6,000 Germans remained, most of the German population had already fled. Two weeks later, when the war ended, they started to return. The vanguard of the Polish administration arrived two days later, but, under pressure from both the American and British governments, who did not yet recognise Poland’s new western borders, was withdrawn in mid-May. The Polish administration returned in early June. The Polish State Railway for Pomerania headquarters, and father with it, moved in July and began to transition from the German railway workers. There were only 1,000 Poles living there at that time. In July, the Polish People’s Army took control over most of the city. The Russians, however, retained large parts of the city, including the harbour, shipyards and industrial areas.
My Boyhood War Page 22