Personal belongings of Warsaw insurgents returned

Ceremony at the Warsaw Palace of Culture

It was a deeply moving moment: staff from the Arolsen Archives returned the personal belongings of victims of Nazi persecution to their relatives – more than 80 years after the items were taken from their owners. The ceremony, which took place on September 10, 2024, in Warsaw’s prestigious Palace of Culture and Science, was the largest #StolenMemory event to date. Relatives of 11 victims of Nazi persecution were in attendance, with most families bringing members of several different generations.

“It means a lot to the relatives to be able to come together, share their experiences, and remember their loved ones in this formal setting,” said Anna Meier-Osiński, the initiator of the campaign. Floriane Azoulay, the Director of the Arolsen Archives, opened the ceremony in Warsaw with a few warm words of welcome to the families. Archive staff then outlined what is now known about the deportees’ paths of persecution; relatives also had the opportunity to tell their loved ones’ stories.
The ceremony received extensive media coverage in Poland and abroad, raising public awareness of the personal fates of the victims of Nazi persecution from Warsaw.

Items belonging to the following people were returned at the ceremony: Stanisława Wasilewska, Janina Mróz, Lucjan Chrzanowski, Danuta Krajewska née Szcześniak, Janina Januszewska, Jan Jędrzejczak, Ryszard Gogut, Józef Markiewicz, Rudolf Załucki, Wanda Ulatowska, and the two sisters Józefa Skórko and Zofia Strusińska.

Ceremony at the Warsaw Insurgents’ Cemetery

Nearly two months later, on November 26, 2024, another ceremony took place – this time in the Hall of Remembrance at the Warsaw Insurgents’ Cemetery. Survivors of the Warsaw Uprising who lived through the uprising as children were also in attendance. They reflected on their traumatic experiences under German occupation and spoke about the fates of their deported relatives.
Some families brought photos, letters from concentration camps, and other historical documents, which they made available to the Arolsen Archives for digitization and archiving.

Items belonging to the following people were returned on this occasion: Bolesław Ungier, Aniela Szczęścik, Wacław Lendzion, Ewelina Jaworowicz, Wacław Głodny, Bolesław Ślusarczyk, and Aurelia Jasińska.

Bolesław Ślusarczyk’s wedding ring is returned to his family

One of the stories that can now be told thanks to the campaign is that of Bolesław Ślusarczyk, who was born in Warsaw on April 16, 1910. Like many thousands of other residents of Warsaw, he was deported from the Polish capital during the uprising. He was 34 at the time. Escorted by Wehrmacht soldiers, he walked to the transit camp in Pruszków, known as Dulag 121. Located on the grounds of former railroad workshops, the camp operated from August 6, 1944, until January 16, 1945. Between 340,000 and 650,000 people passed through the camp during this period, and around 70,000 were sent to concentration camps.
Bolesław Ślusarczyk was sent to Stutthof concentration camp in late August 1944. A few days later, the Nazis deported him to Neuengamme concentration camp near Hamburg. In January 1945, he was assigned to the Meppen-Versen external labor detail. The Arolsen Archives do not have any documents with information about what happened to him after that.

Bolesław survived his incarceration. His son Jerzy, born in 1937, had to walk from the Wola district of Warsaw to Pruszków with his mother and shared the following recollection: “We only had sandals on our feet, later we wore wooden clogs.” More than 80 years after the Warsaw Uprising, Jerzy and Bolesław’s daughter Grażyna, who was born after the war, was presented with her father’s wedding ring. The details of his persecution have only now come to light: “I knew that he had been in a concentration camp, but my father never wanted to talk about the war,” explained Grażyna.

The campaign continues

It is mainly thanks to Małgorzata Przybyła and #StolenMemory volunteer Manuela Golc that so many families of Warsaw insurgents have now been found. In November, the Arolsen Archives were awarded the prestigious Polish BohaterON Prize for the campaign. And the search is far from over – the archive still holds personal items confiscated from victims of Nazi persecution from Warsaw that are waiting to be handed over to the families of their owners.