He had several apartments scattered around the world, luxury cars and lived like a king. The name he chose for his adult life was Roy, which means King in French. During his years in New Zealand, Jan Wojciechowski – John Roy was involved in rescuing failing companies, which earned him a fortune. But in reality, he probably never stopped being little Janek, who, together with his family, was torn from his safe home in the village of Ostrówki near Drohiczyn Poleski by the Soviets in February 1940 and deported to the village of Nuchw-Oziero in the Plesetsk district of the Arkhangelsk region.

His father Józef came from western Poland and, in the interwar period, received several hectares of land from Marshal Piłsudski as a reward for his participation in the Polish-Bolshevik War of 1920. Before the deportation took place, the Soviets arrested Józef and shot him. His mother, Helena, was left alone with six children. She died of illness and exhaustion in Uzbekistan, where she ended up after the Sikorski-Mayski Agreement was signed.

During his retirement Jan Wojciechowski gave back more than he had received from life before. In Howick, a suburb of New Zealand’s largest city, Auckland, he founded the Polish Heritage Museum. He also became Honorary Consul of the Republic of Poland and funded a plaque commemorating the arrival in New Zealand of the ship General Randall, carrying a group of 733 children – Polish orphans and half-orphans evacuated by Iran from Siberia in 1944. He himself had also arrived on that ship. The plaque was unveiled in 2004 at the Wellington harbour, where the ship carrying the young Poles forcibly deported by Soviets into deep Soviet Union, docked in 1944. For years, he provided financial support to the Polish community in New Zealand.

He passed away on Saturday, 23 August 2025, at the age of 92. ‘To whom much is given, much will be required’ – Jan Wojciechowski certainly fulfilled this Gospel warning with interest. May he rest in peace.