Nadezhda Kubik
(A Russian-language version of the article can be found at the end of the text)
On September 28, 1939, the USSR and Germany signed Boundary and Friendship Treaty, according to which the territory of the Polish state was divided between Germany and the USSR. The Soviet regime declared the inhabitants of the regions annexed to the USSR, which were part of it as the western regions of the Belarusian, Ukrainian and partly Lithuanian SSRs, to be socially dangerous elements and evicted them to the interior of the country in several steps. It has turned out to be a perennial tragedy for the people. From early 1940 through July 1941, more than 300,000 people were deported to Siberia and Kazakhstan in four operations. The Pavlodar land became home to more than 11,000 Polish citizens for several years.
Unreliable nationality
Halina Gurski, taken from Szczuchin, Bialystok region, on April 13, 1940, recalled that the train arrived at Pavlodar station on April 29. Thousands of Poles were unloaded right on the banks of the Irtysh. They spent three days on the bare ground, under the penetrating wind, and only on May 3 were sent to the districts. Eight-year-old Galina with her parents and seven brothers and sisters were brought to the state farm “Akkulsky” of Kuibyshev district, where they lived in harsh conditions for six long years. During this time, the family was halved.
The parents of Panasenko (in maiden name Vysochinska) Galina Stanislavovna were sent to Kazakhstan from Khmelnitsky region (Ukraine) and sent to Andreevka settlement in Shortanda district of Akmola region. She recalled that the family was “settled in earth lodge dug out in the ground. The Kazakhs helped us not to die of hunger”.
As representatives of one of the “unreliable nationalities”, Poles in the settlements were registered with the NKVD commandant’s office and were obliged to observe the regime established for them, violation of which was immediately followed by a fine or arrest. For escape from the place of settlement (Maksimo-Gorkovsky district of Pavlodar region) Gavenda Karolina Franciskovna was captured in Ufa, she was escortedto the place of exile, and then sentenced to 3 years of correctional labor camps.
The Poles were not trying to escape from the good life. After prosperous Poland, life in Kazakhstan under wartime conditions was not an easy test, because most of them belonged to the intelligentsia, and there were many doctors, teachers, policemen, and government officials among the exiles. Finding themselves in a harsh climate, in difficult economic conditions, unaccustomed to hard physical labor, deprived of basic amenities, they remembered their homeland with longing.
In the new place, the Poles faced the problem of housing and employment. Kokotinskaya Y.K. and Matetskaya N.V. wrote in their statement to the NKVD : “When we were resettled, they said there was enough work for everyone in the USSR. If it was decided in advance that we would starve to death, why should we have been brought thousands of kilometers away when it could have been done locally. We are not asking for alms, we are asking to be given the opportunity to earn an honest livelihood to support our family. You can’t even buy bread here. Collective farmers say that due to the poor harvest this year they themselves will not have enough bread. When it comes to apartments the case is no better either. The collective farmers have large families, but the apartments are small, and there will be nowhere to live in the winter. We earnestly ask: give us a job.” Arjan Ida , the daughter of a special resettled woman, in a statement addressed to Comrade I.V. Stalin wrote: “We don’t have an apartment, we lived in a stable, but now we are being kicked out of it. Our mom is in poor health, and no one is helping us here.”
Take my children…
But the most terrible ordeal was famine, as the majority of the population were people with poor health, the elderly and children who did not receive food rations. Apart from the ration, which amounted to 500 gr. for workers, 400 gr. for employees, and 300 gr. of bread a day for non-workers and children, there was no food and it was impossible to get it. The lack of food made people swell with hunger, there were cases of deaths from exhaustion, for example, in Bayanaul district, where a significant part of Polish citizens were not employed and therefore did not receive bread, and they had to get water from melted snow and puddles. In Alekseevka, Bogdanivka, Emelyanivka settlements of Tsyurupinsk district and others there were recorded facts of pauperism and begging for pieces of bread. Paniuk Varvara, a Polish woman, who had been sent to the Irtysh district department of the NKVD with six small children, was driven to extreme despair and said: “Take my children, they are starving, I am unable to feed them. If you don’t take them, I’ll have to drown myself.” Leaving the children behind, she went off with the infant. Her children were sent to an orphanage.
But those who received rations were also in dire need of food, clothing, shoes, underwear, and towels. Eugenia Ivanovna Artsimovich wrote to the Assistance Commission: “I ask your permission to issue me assistance in food and clothing. I have two children, one goes to school in 1st grade, the other works at a grain elevator as a loader. The cold weather has already started and we are stripped and barefoot. My salary is small, I can’t buy something at the bazaar, a coat or shoes, because I don’t have enough money for food. My daughter has a great desire to learn, despite the cold, she runs to school in a dress. Please provide shoes and coats for my children, and give help with clothing for me as well.”
Malnutrition has caused varying degrees of severity of scurvy, chicken blindness, tuberculosis of the lungs, bones and joints (especially in children) and epidemic diseases. There were cases of tuberculosis, scabies, and typhus on farm No. 2 of the Ermakovsky state farm in Kaganovichi district. Stanislava Kazimirska, not receiving medical help, died on the eighth day of her illness.
10 years for words
The common misfortune united Poles, forced them to stick together. In personal conversations and correspondence they expressed their dissatisfaction with living and material conditions, the ban on free movement, disagreement with the administrative procedures of the Soviet state, and compared the living conditions in the USSR with those in Poland. One careless word became a reason for arrest, because criticism of the Soviet authorities by former foreign subjects was regarded as anti-Soviet, counter-revolutionary activity and pro-Fascist agitation.
Przyborowska P. С. wrote in her letters to her compatriots living in neighboring villages not to be discouraged and not to lose hope of returning to their homeland, Poland, as all Poles would soon be sent to Germany according to their place of birth. In return letters they thanked joyfully for such a message and at the same time expressed resentment at the difficult financial situation they were in, hoping to return to their homeland in the spring of 1941. These letters in the hands of the NKVD became a tool to accuse P.C. Przyborowska of slandering the Soviet authorities, anti-Soviet agitation, for which she was sentenced to 10 years of imprisonment.
Shmush Joseph Abramovich, Enatanson Naum Shayevich and Moses Mordkovitch Shchupak, who came from the family of the factory owner, received 8, 10 and 7 years’ imprisonment for “slandering the life of workers in the USSR” and contrasting it with life in the former Poland.
They did not want to become Soviets
After the signing of an agreement between the USSR and the emigration government of Poland on July 30, 1941, the former citizens of Poland were amnestied and released from prison by the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the USSR of August 12, 1941. As part of the Soviet-Polish Agreement of August 14, the Polish government of W. Sikorski was given the opportunity to establish Polish embassy representations in the republics and regions of the USSR where there was a significant concentration of Polish citizens. Delegations were formed, which received the right to organize the cultural life of their charges, to open Polish schools, orphanages, shelters for the disabled, to receive and distribute financial and material aid among compatriots received from the International Red Cross. The local trustees collected information on the local situation, drew up lists of those in need of assistance, took into account children left without care, disabled people, citizens unable to work, and so on. With the assistance of local authorities, the representative office organized playgrounds as feeding stations for the children of Polish citizens, orphanages, homes for the elderly, boarding schools, repair, tailoring and shoemaking workshops that employed Polish citizens as craftsmen, warehouses, etc.
By the end of 1942, due to political differences and the rupture of the agreement between the USSR and the government of W. Sikorski, the situation of Poles in the USSR again deteriorated sharply. Former Polish subjects were mandatorily required to accept Soviet citizenship. During the forced passportization, Poles who refused to obtain a Soviet passport and tried to keep their Polish documents were arrested, for in these passports they saw hopes of returning to Poland, liberated from the Nazis.
Kasperskaya Kazimira Yanovna in March 1943 at the interrogation in Pavlodar NKVD explained: “I motivate my refusal to get a passport by the fact, that during the war I do not wish to get a passport, when the war is over I will get a passport and go to my homeland in the Polish Republic.” It was only after her sentence (2 years in prison), which deprived her of any hope of returning to her homeland (convicts lost the right to repatriation), that she later agreed to obtain a Soviet passport and was released from detention.
At the end of 1942 and the beginning of 1943, members of the Polish Delegation and a number of trustees were arrested in the region on standard charges of espionage. Kuts B., Kashinsky F., Leszczyk F., Horowski L., Yanushkevich L., Kalina G., Shimanskaya M., Yatsino B., Girey A., Aulich E., Kolyasevich V., Shultz S., Chaplinskaya E. and many others were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment.
Under the care of the UPP
In the spring of 1943, when the course of the USSR leadership to establish a pro-Soviet regime in post-war Poland became clear, a group of Polish communists led by Wanda Wasilewska, under an agreement with the USSR Government, established the Union of Polish Patriots, which took over the guardianship of Polish citizens on the territory of the USSR.
Despite domestic disadvantage, regime pressure, and restrictions on rights, Poles preserved their culture and paid great attention to the education of children and young people. Polish schools and kindergartens were opened, groups were set up to teach Polish language, literature, history, geography, wall newspapers were published, and youth circles worked. In Bayan-Aul district 3 schools for Polish youth were organized, where reading, writing, arithmetic were taught in Polish. A school for Polish youth was opened in the settlement of Tavolzhan. The selfless work of teacher Vaikpkevich in the Polish school opened in Shcherbakty was noted; in the village of Griaznovka, Kaganovichi district, teacher Trokhletska devoted every free minute after her main work to the school.
In addition to schools, circles were organized for young people, for example, in Pavlodar a community center “Svetlitsa” was organized, where they read Polish newspapers, literature, sang songs and danced. In Kuybyshevsky district a similar circle was led by Baranska Janina, she also organized amateur evenings for Polish youth in the club in honor of their departure to the Polish army. In the village of Maysk a wall newspaper was published by the youth circle, which competed with the newspaper of the older circle, “as a result of which more and more good issues were published”.
A great moral support was given to their compatriots by the radio programs in Polish aired by the regional radio in 1945-1946, which broadcast international, allied and local news. They often featured classical music, especially F. Chopin. Polish citizens themselves also took part in them, for example, in the program of November 30, 1945, excerpts from S. Moniuszko’s opera “Pebbles” performed by pianist Blumenfeld and violinist Kopeczek were played.
Compatriots, to the West!
In August 1945, preparations for the repatriation of Polish citizens began. “Historical justice has won. The German invader, the mortal enemy of the Polish people and the entire Slavic world, has fallen, defeated by the united forces of the peoples. Lands plundered for centuries by Crusaders, Bismarck, Hitler, are finally returned to their native Mother Homeland. These desolate lands await their true owners. Compatriots, to the West!”, – so began the radio program that brought Pavlodar Poles the happy news of the liberation of Polish lands occupied by Germany.
For the organization of re-evacuation at Pavlodar Regional Executive Committee a special commission was created, which worked from December 4, 1945 to July 15, 1946. By this time 6311 Polish citizens lived on the territory of Pavlodar region. The Commission reviewed 3,769 applications. The right to leave the USSR had to be confirmed by documents, sincecitizens of Polish and Jewish nationality who were Polish citizens before September 17, 1939 could leave the USSR, it was necessary to submit evidence to the commission: a Soviet passport with a note of Polish citizenship; a Polish passport, a Polish military ID card, a birth certificate, a diploma, a trade union book, a hospital book, an amnesty certificate, etc. A total of 3,697 applications to travel to Poland were granted.
In anticipation of the return to the homeland Pavlodar regional board of the Union of Polish Patriots intensifies the work on the organization of Polish youth circles, classes in Polish language, as the main task of SPP became cultural and linguistic adaptation to the return to the homeland, mainly children who lived 6 years in the Soviet Union.
Food aid to the repatriates was provided by the Polish Government of National Unity. The campaign for the return of Polish citizens to their homeland was of great political importance for the Soviet government, it had to be carried out without fail, 436 families received 48,000 rubles from the funds of the regional executive committee as one-time aid, 1181 meters of cotton fabrics, 225 pairs of shoes were allocated, 2 sets of new clothes and shoes were given to children in orphanages.
The Poles themselves created a repatriation fund and organized the collection of money and food for it. Maximo-Gorkovsky districtwas the foremost , where 12580 rubles were collected from 550 people, in addition, 2125 kilograms of potatoes, 23 kilograms of wheat “and many other products”.
In spite of the difficulties encountered in preparing for the journey home (it was necessary to travel from the place of settlement to the station in snowstorms and frost by automobiles, carts, then ferries, the station lacked accommodation facilities and had to sleep outside in the open air, etc.), the hearts of the Poles were filled with jubilation. on February 19, 1946, the first echelon of 1670 people went to their homeland.
A farewell concert was organized for them by the regional board of the Union of Polish Patriots, in the solemn part of which the Commissioner for Repatriation Irena Shatunova addressed the audience: “We must remember that we waited out the storm in someone else’s house. The memory of our hospitable hosts will forever remain in our hearts!”, after which the Kazakh theater performed the play “Wedding Journey”. At the train station, the first repatriates were waiting for cars with inscriptions “Going to the West!”, “Long live Polish-Soviet friendship!”, decorated with red and white flags.
An urging desire of the return
To see off the first echelon came not only representatives of the Soviet authorities, the Board of the SPP and the citizens of Pavlodar, but also workmates with whom the Poles had worked side by side all these years. “In an atmosphere of sincere friendship the last hours passed. Suddenly the wagons shuddered. Last kisses, last words of farewell, and the train rushed faster and faster into the distance, taking with it 1673 repatriates of our neighborhood returning to their homeland.”
The dispatch of the next echelons had to be postponed until warmer times. In May 1946 three more echelons with repatriates went home, in June 97 children from orphanages left for home, in July the last 47 people, who could not leave earlier for good reasons, departed. The total number of Poles who returned home from the Pavlodar region amounted to just over six thousand.
During the Second World War, the Polish people suffered severe hardships: exile, restrictions on civil rights, hunger and deprivation. And only the burning desire to return to their native land again helped them to survive, to endure and not to break down during these sorrowful years.
All the subheadings come from the editorial office.
Scans of the documents and photographs belonging to Polish deportees are from the collection of the State Archive of Pavlodar Region in Pavlodar.
Nadezhda Kubik is a vice-director of the State Archive of Pavlodar Region in Pavlodar (Kazakhstan).
Translated from Russian by Wieńczysław Czułowski.
A Russian-language version of the article:
