Stefan Pijarski. Photo made in Iran, 1942. Sybir Memorial Collection

Stefan Pijarski, aged 13, was deported to Siberia on February the 10th, 1940. He was exiled along with his parents Piotr and Anna, and his siblings: Helena and Roman. Before the war, the family had lived in Ostrówek in the Kosów Poleski district, where Piotr had received land for his wartime contribution. The Pijarskis were sent to the Vodopad special settlement in the Arkhangelsk region (or: Arkhangelsk Oblast). Within a year, the children were orphaned. The father was killed in the taiga, where he worked as a logger. The mother was taken by illness, which she contracted by selling her last possessions to raise money to feed their children. Following the amnesty, the children were taken under the care of the newly formed army. After evacuation to the Middle East, the siblings were separated. They were reunited in England after the war, in 1948. Stefan Pijarski settled there permanently. Upon hearing about the establishment of the Sybir Memorial Museum, he contacted his cousins in Poland and asked them to donate personal memorabilia to the institution. On the back of the photograph exists an annotation: 194[…] LT. FROM MARCH RUSSIA. According to Stefan Pijarski, the photograph was taken in Tehran, in April 1942.