大象传媒

My father grew up in Wilno (then Poland, now Lithuania) and at the outbreak of WWII he was in training at a military academy. Germany invaded Poland from the west on 1 September 1939 and the Soviet Union attacked from the east on 17 September. Jerzy was taken prisoner by the Russians and sent to various POW camps in Siberia, working first in a mine and then building the railway. Twelve-hour working days, starvation, illnesses, the freezing temperatures and exhaustion caused 40% of the prisoners to die within the first year.

Then Germany invaded its ally Russia and after the amnesty in July 1941 Jerzy was released and joined Anders army in September, becoming a sapper in the 5 KDP (5th Kresowa Infantry Division) as Sergeant-Cadet Officer. They exchanged their Russian uniforms and weapons for British. The newly formed Polish army trained in Persia/Iran, although it took a while for the emaciated soldiers to recuperate. Most of the soldiers were part of the estimated 1,7 million people that had been deported from the eastern borderlands of Poland (Kresy) into the USSR and were in very bad shape after a year and a half of forced labour in forests and saw mills (like my mother), mines and building roads and railways, etc. Many thousands died of malnutrition, exhaustion, and diseases (typhoid was rampant), often on the doorstep to freedom, waiting to be transported to Persia. Only about 116,000 (soldiers and civilians) were evacuated in 1942 across the Caspian Sea with Anders Army.

The Polish army, now part of the British Eighth Army travelled to Teheran, Irak, Egypt, Lebanon for intensive training. Jerzy became a Second Lieutenant in July 1943, while in Irak (protecting the Middle East and its rich oil fields).

In March 1944 the whole Company left Egypt by ship to Taranto, to the Italian front. During the Italian Campaign he was Commander of the 3rd platoon of sappers and reconnaissance and Commander of the assault platoon, 5th Company, 5KDP, Polish 2nd Corps. The allies were fighting their way up from southern Italy towards Rome. The 1,400 year-old Benedictine monastery of Monte Cassino stood at the strongest point of a powerful German defensive line, the Gustav Line, which was drawn along rivers backed by steep mountains and ravines - icy in winter and baking in summer.

The allied forces were very mixed: as well as Americans and British, there were French from North Africa, Indians and Gurkhas, Australians, New Zealanders, South Africans, Canadians and Poles. There were four main battles at Monte Cassino: in January, February, March and May 1944. The Polish 2nd Corps under the command of General Wladyslaw Anders, carried out the fourth and last attack from the north on German positions at Monte Cassino. The Polish army suffered huge losses but the attack was successful and the fortress was taken on 18 May, opening the road to Rome for the Allied forces.

The Sappers (engineers) lived dangerously: they blew up bridges or they built pontoon bridges (as the troops needed them), disarmed mines and blew up German bunkers, etc. My father died in 1989 so we can鈥檛 ask him questions about his war experiences but the following eye-witness description was written by another Polish soldier:

鈥淚 take my hat off to sappers. Their job was very often very dangerous, one could say suicidal. At Monte Cassino they played a vital role by cleaning the road for the tanks. They did it at night, under fire, crawling under tanks that were slowly advancing. They worked with complete disregard to their safety. That was an act of heroism of the highest degree. Many, many of them were killed. But they did their job; our tanks got through and once they got on Mass Albanetta they started to destroy German bunkers one by one. Later on, when we were on the Adriatic Coast, Germans mined every place that would be suitable to cross a river (every bridge was either mined or destroyed). Again, sappers had the job of clearing the mines. And it was not easy. Germans tried every trick in the book; they put one mine on top of another, so that when a sapper pulled one the other detonated, they used wooden and plastic boxes so that a mine detector could not find it and so on. Again, they were many times under fire. It takes nerves of steel to carefully disarm a mine under such conditions. I take my hat off to sappers - they did their job!鈥�
Romuald Lipinski, The 12 Podolski Lancers.

Jerzy was wounded at Monte Cassino (Phantom Ridge) but was back in service after spending three months in hospital. He re-joined his unit in Istra and took part in operations along the Adriatic coast and the Emilian Apennines, through to Bologna, which was captured by Polish forces in April 1945. The 2nd Corps was then withdrawn for recuperation, thus ending its campaign in Italy.

For his actions at Monte Cassino, Jerzy was awarded the Military Cross and the Virtuti Militari, as well as the other standard medals. The tragedy of Polish soldiers is perhaps best summarized in the inscription that can be seen at the cemetery on the slopes of Monte Cassino:

"We Polish soldiers
For our freedom and yours
Have given our souls to God
Our bodies to the soil of Italy
And our hearts to Poland."

In August 1945 he married my mother Danuta Maczka, they spent their honeymoon in Venice and Lake Como. In June 1946 the troops left from Verona to England. My parents eventually settled in London, where Jerzy worked as an electrician and brought up six children.

The Poles fought bravely 鈥渇or our freedom and yours鈥� in the Second World War but unfortunately Poland had to wait many years ... until 1989... for its freedom!

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