On April 11, 1943, the first news about the crime committed in the forest near Katyn was released to the world.
On 4 July 1943, at 23:07, moments after take-off from Gibraltar Airport, Liberator II aircraft AL523 with General Władysław Sikorski on board, crashed into the Mediterranean Sea.
Helena Grodecka-Możdżeniowa, was one of about 90,000 victims of the third great deportation, which began on 29 June 1940. Most of those deported were refugees from the German occupation, mostly Jews. Poles accounted for about 11 per cent.
On April 3,1940, the first “death transport” of Polish prisoners of war set off from the Kozelsk camp.
On 4 February 1940 (presumably!), Nikolai Yezhov, one of the cruellest perpetrators of Stalinist terror, was executed.
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was the first communist state in history. The decision to create it was taken on 30 December 1922.