From the memoirs of Zofia Niewodniczańska, from the family Klemczyńska

I was 17 years old when World War II broke out. At that time we lived in Konin, where my father (Edward Klemczyński) was the headmaster of the school. In January 1940, a few months after the outbreak of the war, one day the Gestapo arrested hundreds of teachers, lawyers and other members of Polish society, known for their activities, in the Konin district and in the adjacent districts. They arrested my father at 8 a.m. He left calmly, and when saying goodbye to me, he said: "Zosia, you are the oldest in the family and from now on you are responsible for the fate of the entire family." These words might seem strange to many, because my mother was with us. She also came from these parts, but she was a person full of femininity, delicate, beautiful, very economical and thrifty - a true ideal of a "housewife", but completely unsuited to taking over the rule of the family. I had two more siblings: a sister, Irena, 3 years younger than me, and a brother, Janusz, 5 years younger. The arrested were first held that day in a high school in Konin, from where they were all taken away three days later in an unknown direction... It later turned out that they had been taken to the Strzelno estate near Mogilno, from where some were sent to the camp in Dachau, and most were murdered on the spot. After the war, I learned that the entire park in Strzelno and the surrounding forests were unexcavated mass graves... Over time, the local residents built a monument under the park in honor of the victims there, and a symbolic chapel was erected in the cemetery in Mogilno, dedicated to the memory of hundreds of people who were innocently murdered there. I never managed to obtain any information about the fate of my father, so I am certain that he died there on the spot. The Konin district was incorporated into the so-called Wartegau and the systematic displacement of its inhabitants began. Some of those who were able to work were taken to the Reich, and the rest were resettled to the General Government. When I took over the family as a seventeen-year-old brat, I decided to gradually transport our family members across the green border to the GG (General Government), where my mother's family was. One of my brothers was a priest in Piotrków Trybunalski, another lived in Warsaw (Konrad Ciesiołkiewicz), and the third lived near Piotrków. I started with my brother. Through the ice across the "green border" he reached the "transfer point" of the famous sportswoman Kwaśniewska, and from there he was sent to the priest's uncle. My sister Irena was to go next. For now, however, to protect her from being forcibly deported to the Reich for work, I placed her with our former maid in a house inhabited mostly by Germans. Besides, we were all resettled several times, and finally one night my mother and I were taken away and my poor sister was left alone in Konin. Later, however, she also managed to get through the "green border" to the General Government.

My mother and I were first herded into a barracks overflowing with a crowd of forcibly confined residents. As often happens, I "accidentally" took 10 pieces of toilet soap with me, which later came in very handy for bribing German women in the segregation area in Łódź, thanks to which we avoided being deported to forced labor in the Reich. After a day of waiting, we were loaded into tightly closed wagons and taken "to the unknown". There was no drink, no food. As a result, we were first brought to Łódź, where some of the "Nordic" children were taken from their parents and sent to the Reich, the rest of the people were segregated in factory halls. The stronger ones went to work in the Reich, and the rest were sent to Tarnów in the General Government. My mother and I (thanks to the soaps) ended up in Tarnów. In a crowd of Poles and Jews (there was no ghetto yet) we were placed on straw in some school. For several days they conducted a census. From there I managed to send a letter to my uncle in Warsaw, who also wanted to take us to his place immediately. However, I only agreed to let Mom go, because there were already a lot of family members at my uncle's. So I stayed alone in Tarnów. Here I must mention that I was very lucky with people; among other things, during the census of the people gathered there, a city clerk, a certain Stanisława Dylska, a charming blonde, took a liking to me and offered to “take me in” and find a job for me. I lied to her that I could type and the lady arranged for me to get a job at the starosty. She rented me a room at a friend’s for cheap and I survived the whole year… After a few days I managed to learn to type and even completed a course in German shorthand, thanks to the fact that I knew the language fluently from school. I soon became a “first-rate star” among the starosty secretaries and was made a secretary to a German – the head of the Education Department. At that time I was fluent in German. My stay in Tarnów – as I have already mentioned – lasted the whole year. I survived the entire year in one dress, although my aunts helped me with parcels from time to time, but generally it was very difficult for me... I even fainted from hunger once in church during the May service. Despite everything, I must point out that in Tarnów I experienced a lot of warmth from the local people, and the aforementioned Mrs. Dylska even violently tried to match me with her brother... In the summer of 1941, my uncle summoned me to Warsaw by telegram, because he had heard that a typhus epidemic had broken out among the Jews in Warsaw. So I went to Warsaw. In the meantime, the situation in Warsaw was getting worse day by day... The Germans evicted my uncle, who had taken us all in, from that large apartment and placed his whole family in a small cubicle in Wola at Sokołowska Street 16. It was a terrible apartment; damp, wet walls, a terrible toilet, rats running around everywhere, snow on the walls during the frost, and terrible dampness. In addition, everything was taken from my uncle... We vegetated there for quite a long time. I managed to get a job at the Philips factory thanks to the fact that my uncle's brother, a priest, was friends with one of the directors of the factory. So now we lived together. Apart from us, my mother's youngest sister, the later minister Wieczorkowa, was also there. The Philips factory was to some extent an "oasis" in Warsaw. The good Dutch did what they could to help the Poles. It was one big AK nest. The factory even organised something like a sanatorium for its employees. A certain doctor Jaźwiński worked there. He even sent me on a "holiday" to Busko, thanks to a spot in my lungs after my stay in Tarnów. When the Warsaw ghetto was partially reduced, with the factory's support, we managed to get a separate room with a kitchen on Leszno opposite the Church of the Virgin Mary. We brought this new apartment into relative order and our family moved there; we felt "like in paradise". Unfortunately, my brother was soon arrested on the street, because he was wearing a green scout jacket. He was placed in Pawiak, and yet he was only a fourteen-year-old boy! My uncle, a priest, came to our aid then. He was friends with a family of wealthy Warsaw merchants, the Pakulskis, and these honest people "bought" my little brother from the Gestapo for a lot of money. We lived there in Leszno until the outbreak of the Warsaw Uprising. During the Uprising in the Ghetto, I was on vacation with my uncle, a priest, but my mother saw the tragedy of the ghetto, because our apartment was nearby. My sister Irena, traveling by the Grójecka train to her uncle, caught typhus, which was very dangerous for many reasons. We brought her home and managed to save her from being taken to the hospital, and even managed to avoid cutting her beautiful blond braids... When the Warsaw Uprising broke out, my sister was already healthy and was not with us, as she was serving as a Home Army nurse in the hospital in Wola... During the first days of the Uprising, the Germans were enraged by the resistance of the Poles in Wola. They threw grenades into the basements to kill the inhabitants hidden there. We lived, like everyone else, in the basement. On September 6, the Germans reached us, but this time they did not throw grenades into the basement, but drove us all in a procession towards the Church of St. Wojciech in Wola... I managed to take a photo album, a pot of lard, my mother's fur jacket and my pelisse, made from a priest's fur, and 2 bottles of spirits.

My sister, as I have already mentioned, worked as a nurse in a hospital in Wola. The hospital was being evacuated, and she came running to see if we were alive. She had been through many sleepless nights and, seeing us alive, fainted from emotion and exhaustion. Thanks to that, she stayed with us. My mother's ten-year-old nephew, Sławek, was also with us, and came to visit us. My brother was a member of the Grey Ranks. After the first training camp, he was recalled, and he did not make it to the second one. In the vicinity of Płocka Street, all the young men (including my brother) were separated from our group, and we, ignoring my mother's screams and cries, were driven further with rifle butts... As we were leaving, we saw all the men standing by the wall with their hands raised... We were driven into the church of St. Wojciech and the doors were closed behind us. Then, after some time, we began to be taken in groups to the Western Railway Station, where trains were filled and sent "out into the world"... The first transports apparently went to Auschwitz, others to the Reich. My mother was in complete despair. Her mood forced me to try to bribe the guards. Thanks to bottles of spirit, I managed to get permission from two more guards to hide us behind some crates, and so we missed the first two transports. I had no more spirit, and the third guard ruthlessly drove us with his rifle butt onto a freight train. The train was so terribly crowded that people could only stand in a crowd, and so we set off into the unknown... People reacted differently: some prayed loudly, others cried, still others tried unsuccessfully to escape through the small windows, and others cursed loudly. We traveled in this terrible crowd for two days. Someone read the words “Breslau” through a crack in the door, which made us happy, because we understood that we were no longer on the route to Auschwitz. We were taken to the Brieg (Brzeg) station on the Oder. The train was divided into two parts and one was rolled onto the adjacent track. The guards opened the bolted doors and people almost fell out of those crowded carriages. Who jumped out of the carriage on the adjacent track? My brother!!! It turned out that while waiting to be shot under that wall, on the orders of some officer, they had to “first” dismantle some barricades. After this dismantling, another German came and simply directed everyone to the train transport that had not yet left... So thanks to my bottles of spirits we managed to travel in the same transport as my brother. When we were walking through the city of Brzeg, driven in a procession, I was surprised by the behavior of some German women; They gave us coffee and sometimes even slices of bread... I couldn't understand where these humanitarian reflexes came from? Where did these sudden signs of compassion come from? After a few days, things became clear. In some German newspaper I read a big article about all Poles voluntarily fleeing from the approaching Red Army! I didn't find a word in that newspaper about the Warsaw Uprising, or about deportations and executions... Thousands of people from our transport were placed in destroyed aircraft hangars outside the city. We were fed once a day with soup made of turnip leaves and beetroot. Terrible hunger began... A "delousing" operation was carried out there, which completely "loused" us... After delousing, we were led in groups to the square in front of the Arbeitsamt, where a real "slave market" was taking place... Local farmers would arrive and, feeling our muscles, make a selection of workers. We were not very attractive to them. My brother was with us, as well as my mother's sister Alina (later Wieczorkowa) and "little" Sławek. Aunt Alina and Sławek went to the factory in Oława (Ohlau), and only our family remained on the square, whom, despite our pleas, no one wanted to take. Finally, a farmer arrived late and, having no choice, was forced to take us, that is, my mother, sister, brother and me. This farmer had a large farm in Schaindlewitz (Szydłowice), he had 30 cows in the barn, draught oxen and horses. He had a son who was an SS doctor and another son, whom he had lost on the Eastern Front, but there was a daughter-in-law with a daughter. This man hated Poles, accusing them of all misfortunes: of the outbreak and unleashing of the war, of the loss of his son and other disasters... We had no idea about working on the land. I personally was in a real barn for the first time in my life, my brother was there for the horses, and my mother was Mädchen für Alles... We worked there from 4 in the morning until late at night... It was August, so there was a lot of work in agriculture. We lived in a small room in the attic, where in winter there was a real icehouse! We were fed in the kitchen, it was the so-called "servant's table", so almost starvation. The farmers themselves ate properly at home, of course.

Apart from us, there was a young Ukrainian farmhand. He had a lot of trouble with us, because we were not really familiar with this job. So at first he felt aversion, and when he saw that I knew German well, which he did not know at all, his aversion turned into hatred. This Ukrainian was the farmer's favourite, because he was a real professional farm worker. Not all Poles had such an unfortunate fate. On the first Sunday we went to a neighbouring village, where there was a Catholic church, and there we met other Poles from various villages. Those who had come there earlier sympathised with us deeply. It turned out that our farmer was famous in the whole area for his connections with the Nazi authorities. Here I must immediately make a small digression, and even fly into the future in my thoughts. After returning to Poland, my brother managed to persuade the authorities of the People's Republic of Poland to bring our farmer Bajog to court, who sentenced him to 4 years in prison for his inhumane attitude towards his employees, i.e. us... But let's go back to our slave labor at that time. For me personally, the worst period was when, as a result of work, cold and hunger, my legs and arms were covered with festering ulcers. I stood up for myself and energetically demanded a referral to a doctor. I took a bike from the Bajogs and rode to Brzeg. The doctor prescribed me an ointment, but when I asked him for vitamins, he looked at me with a look I will never forget and said: "vitamins can only be for our brave soldiers..." Fortunately, the ointment and youth did their job and my body fought everything off. When I took a better look at the situation, I decided to try to change our hard work. So one Sunday I went to my aunt Alina, who worked in a factory in Oława, and there I plucked up the courage and, using my good knowledge of German at that time, went straight to the boss of the factory – a German soldier – and as brazenly as I could, I started to explain to him that we could be much more useful working in the factory than on the land, because we had “no idea” about working in agriculture. Surprisingly! The fish “took”. The German arranged for me and my sister to be transferred to his factory at the Arbeitsamt for the time being. Unfortunately, Mom and my brother stayed with the farmer, and they experienced the worst period of work there, picking beets, and it was already the frost period... While working in the factory, I began to constantly tread the path to the Arbeitsamt, and after the picking I managed to get both Mom and my brother to Oława. We lived there in old barracks, where we even had our own room. Mom was assigned to the factory kitchen, which could have promised us a better life. In the meantime, Aunt Alina, who was a beautiful girl at the time, enjoyed special favours from the factory director, which was revealed by the fact that she was called to wash windows in the commander's villa (a great honour!). After working and living with farmer Bajog, we felt in Oława as if we were in seventh heaven. The food was lousy, but it was there. In addition, there were parcels that my aunt received after contacting Poznań. Parcels with crackers, peas and clothes, which were very useful later. I worked in a very difficult department of the factory, at the so-called "stoszmaszyny" - i.e. on the die-cutters - the extrusion plants. They made so-called "bechers" there, some cans like for electric batteries. It was an armaments industry, by the way. I was the only woman in this department, my sister worked as a packer. In my department the noise was so terrible that, without offending my own or other people's ears, because you couldn't even hear your own voice, I could sing loudly during the entire shift. The old German workers were even friendly. There was never a bad word there, and sometimes they even slipped me an apple... When my sister and I returned from night shifts, we would "step in" quietly to the gardens we passed and reach our camp with stolen vegetables: cabbage, carrots and beets. These were valuable additions to our zero menu. We thought that this would be how we would survive the war, especially since the front was slowly approaching and sometimes we could even hear the roar of cannons. As the front approached, the forced evacuation of all Germans began, which we watched with satisfaction and even joy, because we were certain that the Germans would leave us to the Russians "to be devoured". Unfortunately, our hopes turned out to be illusory. On January 22, 1945, a mass of guards came and seized the entire "lager". They drove us for a whole week along side roads and in freezing cold, without a drop of not only hot food, but even water! We were saved then by a bag of crackers from our aunt and the foresight of our mother, who carefully dried and hid every scrap of uneaten bread in the canteen.

Generally, there were great guys there! Their conversations, chats, jokes and pranks - simply incredible. We often had joint fights with lice. My mother tried to boil our underwear every day to destroy at least some of the insects. At first, these people laughed at us, but soon they followed in our footsteps. Hunger among everyone was getting worse: in the morning and evening we got a slice of sour bread with black, bitter coffee, and for lunch a little weed soup. My mother also worked in this factory, but she soon started to have a fever. I went with her to the local doctor, who diagnosed darkening in her lungs and firmly advised her to stop working. I arranged for her to be fired at the factory management, but a new dangerous danger arose... The "lame", disappointed with our indifference to his signs of adoration and unequivocal proposals, decided to take revenge on us and wrote a denunciation in which he claimed that our work absolutely did not cover our living costs... When she found out about it, she fell into despair and I immediately ran to the factory management, because I understood that the only way out would be to send us back to work digging trenches. My conversation at the management was listened to by a handsome German, probably forty years old, named Reich, as I later found out. When I was leaving the management office, the German followed me and in pure Polish began to calm me down and assure me that my case would be “successfully resolved”. When I asked him where this sudden decision came from, he calmly explained that he had worked in Tarnowskie Góry himself at one time and that he had never experienced any unpleasantness from the Poles there. Later I learned that Reich had covered this financial “deficit” with his own money, which I later acknowledged with a pot of flowers, because there was no possibility of getting cut flowers. The purchase of this pot was contributed by the residents of our entire unit... My mother, no longer working in the factory, spent her free time doing light work for local gardeners and farmers. For example, she would collect stones from the fields and arrange them into mounds, for which she would receive a basket of potatoes from them, which she would then cook and share with all the residents of the unit.

On Holy Saturday, part of our camp was obliged to go to dig trenches. We were even assigned a special section for digging. My sister, of course, did nothing there; at that time she was a beautiful blonde, whom the French and Italians digging trenches sighed over in droves. Ah! Que bella Blonda!... echoed all around. Near our section there was a small forest, to which people ran "for their needs"... At one point, one of the Frenchmen ran up to me and, in broken German, started shouting: "Komm, komm!" pointing to the forest. When I saw that other people were running there, I set off after the Frenchman. And what did it turn out to be? In a very dense grove there was a dead cow, and the enterprising Frenchmen, using razor blades and penknives, picked it to the bone! My Frenchman also cut me a piece of ham, which I carefully wrapped in a handkerchief taken off my head, and I even managed to stuff a piece of meat into my pocket. When we brought the meat to the room, my mother burst into tears, claiming that "we'll all be poisoned by that dead cow!" Crying, she nevertheless cooked the "dead" cow and we had a wonderful Easter breakfast. There was red borscht and boiled beef with potatoes! We covered the table with towels and had a real ceremonial Easter breakfast... I think my authority had reached its peak, never to be reached again in later life. At that time, a boy from the neighboring room was courting me, and he worked not in a factory but at some butcher's. He also sometimes brought me a piece of bacon for his boot, for which I had to entertain him for an hour of conversation "as a reward". The clothes, sent once from Poznań, were all exchanged by my mother for bread in German bakeries. Contrary to appearances, this action was quite risky both for the German women in the bakeries and for my mother. It cost a lot of effort and fear... In view of all these difficulties, my mother at that time dreamed of one of us marrying a butcher and the other a baker. As the failures on the front continued, the Germans' attitude towards us gradually changed. They started to offer us cigarettes, they treated us more leniently. The "lame" himself became humble at first, and just before the Russian troops entered, he disappeared without a trace... The Red Army entered the town without firing a single shot, because the town was hung with white flags by the German residents. One night, the residents of our unit noticed that Mr. Spirke was burying something in the garden at night in his villa. After the Russians entered, the residents of the room immediately ran to the garden and rushed to dig up this "treasure". And what did they find? They found two chests of cognacs and wines! Of course, we drank a hundred times that day... During this drinking spree, we experienced a great surprise. One of the residents of our room, the Russian I have already mentioned, nicknamed by everyone "stupid Ivan", because he gave the impression of an underdeveloped person, after a few cognacs he raised a toast: "To Stalin, to Rodin!" We were all dumbfounded, and he told us that it was all a disguise, that he was an officer of the Red Army, that he was an artilleryman, that his real name was such and such, and that he was happy that he had managed to survive this difficult period in this way. I personally fear that this "survival" may have bitterly punished us over time... Since the entry of the Russian troops fell on May 8, the day the war ended, the next day, without waiting, all Poles decided to return to Poland. At first we went in a compact group, but soon we broke up, we could not keep up with the stronger ones... We went along the route to Jawor - Strzegom (Strigau) and thus reached the motorway leading towards Wrocław. This entire route was practically completely deserted in the sense of the local German inhabitants, because they had all been forcibly removed by the retreating German army. So we spent the night in abandoned houses and the impression was sometimes downright terrifying, because there was never complete certainty that the farm was really empty. In one such farm we found a lame ox in the barn. He wasn't really fit to be taken, but we harnessed him to a small platform on rubber wheels left by the Germans, and my brother took two sapphire seats from a car lying in a roadside ditch (a DKA, I think) and attached them to the platform. So on these seats, on a platform harnessed to a limping ox, we set off. At the next overnight stay, little Sławek caught a half-horse, half-mouse-colored mule in a meadow, we also harnessed him to the platform, and so we rode, pulled by a rather comical pair...

Our food consisted mainly of young vegetables, pulled from the gardens we passed. Sometimes we managed to find a jar of compote in abandoned houses. It was a salvation for our starving stomachs, which were not harmed at all by this fasting food. On the way we started looking around for another place to spend the night. We drove up to the village of Järischau, where we saw a Russian patrol for the first time. It was probably some lost unit. A soldier with a rifle in his hand nodded to us with a decisive movement and stopped the vehicle, and after looking at the company – and our family had then grown by another young Pole, Bolesław Solarz – he nodded decisively to my mother, sister Irena and me and led the three of us to the nearest house, leaving the boys with the platform on the road. Having approached the house, the soldier opened the door, pushed us inside and locked the door... We found ourselves in a shabby room, and from the next room emerged the figure of a toothless old woman. It was a German woman left there on purpose or by accident. I immediately asked her what awaited us? And after a while she began to cry and mutter "arme Kinder, arme Kinder" and said that this is how women who wander through the village by chance are locked up almost every evening, and Russians come to them in the evening and rape them with weapons in their hands... Terrified, Mother fell to her knees and began to pray fervently, begging God for help. Perhaps as a result of her pleas, Providence sent us a completely unexpected rescue: a huge ladder wagon arrived, filled with Ukrainian girls from some, apparently nearby, estate where they worked. The soldier immediately opened our door, with a wave of his hand, ordered us to get out onto our platform; he had clearly assessed the Ukrainian women's higher "usefulness" in a flash, they went to the house... Having clung to the platform, we sat our mother on it, and we even pushed the vehicle ourselves, just to get away from the ill-fated village as quickly as possible. It was almost completely dark when we reached some secluded house, in front of which stood a beautiful carriage drawn by a pair of handsome horses. It turned out that they had been driven by two Poles in striped uniforms - so KL prisoners from the German camp. We stopped there with relief, under their care. Of course, our mother immediately conjured up some vegetable soup, which these poor people enjoyed incredibly, they told us women to go to sleep upstairs, while they stayed downstairs with our boys. The next day, having seen our magnificent carriage in the daylight, the KL prisoners decided that they had to collect a stronger draft animal from the Germans who were passing by and were already returning. Indeed, after a short time, our hobbling ox was replaced by a healthy ox, taken from the Germans. So we set off and, riding in this way, finally reached Wrocław itself. It was May 15. The streets of the ruined city were swarming with a wandering mixed crowd... At one point, our ox, apparently exhausted by hunger or thirst, stopped and simply lay down in the middle of the road...

To my surprise, I read the sign above the gate of the nearest house with the inscription "Municipal Board". Without thinking, just as I was standing, in my work overalls and with my head wrapped in a scarf, I ran inside. I saw two Polish "clerical ladies" sitting there and a handsome guy. I immediately started explaining to them that we were returning from forced labor in Germany, that we wanted to get to our area as soon as possible - to Konin, etc. I asked about possible means of transport. In response to my questions, the young man said that, firstly, there was no normal transport yet, and secondly, here, in Wrocław, I could immediately get both a job and an apartment. He also asked if I had any qualifications and, having learned that I could type, he sat me down and checked my skills, then told me that "I had to report to work at the Municipal Board the next day", to which I agreed. When I went out into the street, I announced to my family my decision to stay in Wrocław, at which my mother, sitting on the curb of the pavement, burst into tears. An ox was lying on the road next to me and only our horse, together with the boys, bravely stuck to the platform. Suddenly I noticed a soldier in a four-cornered cap! So he was a Pole! He approached us and in a melodious Eastern accent asked where these tears came from, what kind of trouble it was and if he couldn't help us with anything? I told him more or less everything. The soldier took me by the hand with a decisive movement, turned me on my heel and we entered the first staircase on the edge. Having entered the first floor, the soldier knocked on the front door with the butt of his rifle. An old German woman peeked out of the apartment. With a gesture of his hand, the soldier told her to go out, he knocked on the neighboring door, from where the German woman also peeked out. He directed the first one there, closed the door behind it and, to my astonishment, handed me the key to the first apartment. Having heard my mother address me by name on the street before, he reminded me with a bow that May 15th was my name day and announced that in the evening he and his lieutenant would come to the name day party... Before that, he helped my brother bring our horses, a horse and an ox, into the yard of the tenement house, clearing out some shed for them and placing both animals there. In the evening, our "name day guests" did indeed appear, namely lieutenant Kocyan - a very nice and cultured gentleman, by the way, and the sergeant, as it turned out. The boys brought a can of American "tuzonka", a packet of pasta and a bottle of champagne! They also gave me a "name day present" in the form of a home movie projector, looted from some apartment. My mother opened a jar of green beans found in the pantry and we feasted in harmony and joy, unfortunately with a sad result for our starving stomachs... The film camera came in very handy after a few years, because I sold it to buy a suit for our brother with the money I got. Both the ox and the horse were later our only, but significant financial injections, because our situation was rather difficult in terms of material things for the next few years. My father never came back, two of my mother's brothers died: my uncle, a priest, in the Warsaw Uprising, and my other uncle in the Guzen concentration camp; so I was the only one working, supporting my mother and two siblings who were studying. My sister graduated in pharmacy, and my brother in medicine, in which way I very honestly fulfilled my obligation to my father...

_____________________________

California, USA September 1, 2009

Dear Tomasz, Paweł, Marcin, Three sons, Zosia Niewodniczańska (Klemczyńska) and Olgierd Niewodniczański.

As Zosia's younger brother, I want to share with you memories from the first years of my family life with her. Our father was Edward Klemczyński and mother Bronisława, née Ciesiołkiewicz. Father Edward came from a wealthy Warsaw family, stable for many generations. Mother Bronia came from a family with a large landed estate and its own name - Dębocha, just outside the town of Władysławów (near Kalisz). They had their own steam mill. She was the oldest daughter, having six brothers and five sisters. Undoubtedly, in circumstances unknown to me, they fell in love, creating a new family. They welcomed their first daughter Zofia, in 1923. (In reality, Mom was born on December 6, 1922 in Konin. She died on December 31, 1987 in Wrocław in a hospital). (Paweł) Shortly after, our second daughter, Irena, was born (in 1925), and finally our youngest son, Janusz, in 1927. This is how our family's joyful and happy life began. Our early childhood was full of joy and a good life during the period of free Poland. Thanks to our Father's solid teaching work and our Mother's full care, we lacked nothing and our life was wonderful. My first memory of my sisters was probably when I was about five years old. In my imagination, Zochna was very grown up. After some time, I knew that she had started school early because she was very talented. She was soon accepted to a secondary school in Konin. After obtaining her high school certificate with very good grades (I think in 1937), our father found a school that suited Zosia's talents. Due to her very good results, she was accepted to the school of International Foreign Trade in Gdynia. She was always happily welcomed for summer holidays. She returned home safely in the summer of 1939.

Our father, just before the war, believed in the great culture of the German nation, in contrast to the barbaric Soviet Union. ON SEPTEMBER 1, 1939, the hordes of Hitler's army attacked our country. Our father, a teacher, went to the designated assembly point on the orders of our authorities. Terrified, we stayed at home with our mother. Within a few days, our Poznań province was occupied by the Germans. The brutal repressions by the occupiers began immediately. After some time, when Warsaw was defending itself against the invader, our father unexpectedly appeared in our house, swimming across the Warta River to avoid the German checkpoints. Unfortunately, after a short time, uniformed Germans burst into our house, shouting something in German and pointing at our father. Irka and I embraced our father. Then Zosia began to explain something in German. Suddenly, the Germans listened with astonishment to Zosia's explanation that he was our father and had been with us the whole time. The Germans were so taken with Zosia's perfect language that the NCO thanked her and left our house. Zosia looked like an adult, but she was only 16. Undoubtedly, Zosia had saved our father from death as a conspirator or spy. Unfortunately, our joy did not last long. After a few months, early, around five in the morning, we heard a loud banging on the front door of our house. Our father opened the door and a German uniformed officer and a civilian speaking in Polish to our father entered the bedroom, telling him to get dressed because he would go with them. Mother, terrified, asked what he should take with him. Nothing was needed, the civilian said, because it was only for 3 days. Our Dad, dressed, kissed Mommy and patted each of us on the head and left. This time Zosia was silent, because there was no point in saying anything. A large group of Poles was locked in the school building - doctors, lawyers, priests, teachers and landowners. All of our mother's attempts to free our father came to nothing. She begged the local Germans for help, but they refused. After three days, they were all taken away to an unknown destination. Throughout the war, whenever possible, we knelt by our beds in the evenings and prayed for our father's safe return. After the war, we already knew that our father, along with others, had been brutally murdered. From the moment we lost our father, Zosia and her mother took over the leading role in the family. The western territories of Poland were annexed to Germany and there was no longer any doubt that there would be a mass resettlement of us to central Poland, called the General Government. First, Irena and I were smuggled to the Government and our relatives. Soon, Mom and Zosia were expelled from their home with a small bundle of personal belongings. They went through hard times in the camp in Łódź, being searched by German women looking for valuables, even in human flesh. Finally, we gathered together in Warsaw, in an apartment on Sokołowska Street. We were happy together, but the cruel hunger tormented us greatly. We had ration cards and received bread with chaff, margarine and jam in insufficient quantities. I learned what it means to have an empty stomach. Zosia got a job in the Philips factory office. When the Germans discovered Zosia's linguistic talents, she was even used by the factory's Gestapo cell. Thanks to this, Zosia managed to obtain secret lists of Poles to be arrested. As I know, she passed them on to our underground. Our hunger was painful for Zosia, our breadwinner, and she made dangerous decisions. She stole four ration cards, which fortunately was not detected. The cards filled in were fictitious names of the Lewiński family (on the left).

Dear Zosia, we thank you very much for saving us.

Our further history during the war years in Warsaw was full of cruel and painful events. My goal, in this story, was to convey to you the image of heroism, great sacrifice for the family and patriotism of my sister Zofia, your mother, and for future generations. Now, in a nutshell, I will give you the further history of our family. After the liquidation of the so-called small ghetto, Zosia, through her work at Philips, got a bigger apartment at 29 Leszno Street. We witnessed mass street executions, street roundups and loading Warsaw residents onto trucks (kennels) like a herd of animals and taking them to slave labor in Germany. Irka and I studied in secret classes. The anger of the Poles grew and our underground Home Army grew in size. As I learned later, Irena was a trained medic in the Home Army. I also belonged to the Home Army Grey Ranks – BS (combat schools). In May/June 1944 I was arrested and handed over to the Gestapo on Szucha Street. I survived cruel and painful interrogations. I was taken to "Pawiak" and imprisoned underground - cell 243. Mass executions took place every night in the ruins of the ghetto. I was saved by my uncle - priest Roman Ciesiołkiewicz, through the wealthy Pakulski Brothers, owners of large grocery stores, who bribed a Gestapo officer. I returned happy to my family.

Unfortunately, soon, on August 1, 1944, the WARSAW UPRISING broke out. Irena and I took part in this terrifying fight in Wola. Groups of our armed units were retreating to the Old Town. All those without weapons were released from participation in the uprising. We were together again, not knowing what would happen to us from the approaching German units. Here I would like to describe another event concerning our family. Soon we were driven out of our homes by the SS, our houses were already set on fire, and we were driven to Kercelego Square. Women and children were separated from men. I heard my Mother's desperate scream. She tried to run to me, and Zosia and Irka held her with all their strength to prevent her inevitable death. The women were gathered and locked in the halls of the railway workshops in Pruszków. Then half of this large group was separated and led to a stationary train and freight cars. Mom begged Zochna to get through to the remaining group. She didn't want to leave now at all costs. Somehow they managed to do it, hiding behind the hall gates. After some time, the remaining group was taken to the next train. This time, Mommy, without any resistance, went to the train. Zosia couldn't understand how to understand Mom's decision. Meanwhile, I and the men were being driven to the barricades, which we had to dismantle. Finally, we were locked inside the church of St. Stanislaus in Wola, for a period of the night. My savior, Father Roman Ciesiołkiewicz, was brutally murdered under the walls of this church. This is described in the documents from the Nuremberg Trials. The next day, we were driven along Bema Street to the Western Railway Station, killing older people who couldn't keep up along the way. We were taken to Germany by cattle train. After a long journey, in the early morning, we stopped at the Brieg Station (Brzeg). Order to get off the train. When everyone was on the platform, one of the Poles shouted, look, there is a train with women on the farther platform. I ran closer with the others and suddenly a loud cry from one of the carriages – Janusz! It was my Mom with Zosia and Irena. It was a miracle, a real miracle. The first transport of women was directed to northern Germany, which our Mom did not want to travel on. Mother's instinct? We went through many difficult events in the slave labor camp. We were hungry again. Then a walking evacuation in the winter before the approaching Russian front, south to Nieder Salzbrun (Solice Dolne), where we worked in a factory. Here again Zosia's language skills and captivating intelligence caused the authorities to make an extraordinary decision that our Mom was fired from her job in the factory. 12 hours of work and 12 hours of rest. Finally, on May 8, 1945, the day before the end of the war, Russian soldiers entered. Joy. The end of the war! Walking back to Poland. We stopped in Wrocław. In Warsaw everything was burned down. Zosia was a pioneer of the city, organizing the City Office with the first settlers. Zosia continued to be the breadwinner of our family, until Irena and my university studies. After marrying Dr. Olgierd Niewodniczański, she established her own family nest.

DEAR ZOSIA, WHEREVER YOU LOOK AT US FROM HEAVEN, ACCEPT MY HEARTFUL THANKS AND HOMAGE FOR YOUR UNLIMITED SACRIFICE FOR US AND OUR LIVES.

Your 82-year-old brother Janusz Klemczyński.

Janusz died on January 3, 2011 in California