大象传媒

Krystyna's Escape Part b2

1946
Then we were to go on a journey though no one was to be told of it. I don鈥檛 know what my granny or my aunts thought of our disappearance - maybe they knew we weretrying to get to the West? We travelled to the south of Poland (probably to Jelenia Gora). We had very little luggage so it did not look as if we were travelling far orfor long. My mother went off to meet some people to discuss possibility of us joining the regular parties crossing of the Sudety mountains to Czechoslovakia (which was still open to the West at that time) - she must have heard of this when in Warsaw. Unfortunately this method of escaping from Poland had been discovered recently, and people had been shot by border guards, so the "guides" had stopped operating. She heard that he successful escapes now seemed to be in ships to Scandinavia from the Baltic coast to the north of Poland.

So we went up to Szczeczin (the pre-war German city of Stettin, now just inside the new Polish border). Presumably this was the place advised to my Mum. There my mothet got a job in charge of a Health Centre (the equivalent of a hospital out-patients department in Britain) and we moved into a first floor flat overlooking the street. I do not think this was winter. I did not go to school or have any friends because we did not want to be "missed" when we managed to get away. My mother went to work regularly and tried to find an alternative way of escaping. Then there was bad news. People hiding in the holds of the ships had been discovered so this method could not be used again.

I was only informed of some things - I was only 11 or so, but at short intervals I used to be dragged by Mum to some British army office, where very polite army personnel listened to my very basic English words regarding my father being part of the Polish Parachute Brigade in Britain. What good this was supposed to do I could not understand and I was embarassed at being forced to do it. However those were my first meetings with the calm and trustworthy British. (by contrast to all other foreigners I had met before then!).

I now realise that during our stay in Szczeczin my mother must have somehow
contacted my father (via the Red Cross or direct?) and let him know where we were. Also that my father had contacted the Pole who was in charge of regular trains which took the Germans who had been displaced by Stalin鈥檚 reorganisation of the Polish borders back to what remained of German territory 鈥� in fact back to that part occupied by the Western Allies.

In the meantime my mother found there was a possibility of escaping from Poland by illegally travelling in Russian army lorries which were going to Russian occupied Berlin. Years later, seeing the Berlin wall, and reading about the many, usually fatal, attempted escapes from east to west, I relise that this could have been my life - or death - also.

My mother arranged with the Russian driver that she and I will travel with him using false papers, as an officer鈥檚 wife and child. Luckily she spoke reasonable Russian (she had lived with a family near Odessa during the last
partition of Poland).Unfortuately I knew only a few words of Russian -
those I had picked up since the Russian invasion of Poland. It was to be a night trip On the evening of departure we discovered that the driver in his greed to earn more money, took a few more people in the back of the lorry. They had no papers and were just covered by a large tarpaulin!

We passed several checkpoints successfully, but at one (perhaps the Polish/German border the guards decided they did not like the look of things and stopped us for a more detailed inspection. The lorry driver (who was a soldier) put his foot down and raced through the checkpoint barrier into the night - after all he would have been punished if caught. Soon we were being followed by one of the checkpont vehicles and a movie style shooting match developed between our driver and the vehicle behind. When we approached a empty ruined village, the driver took a sharp turn to one side and the other vehicle passed by at high speed. Now the driver told my mother that we would have to get out of the lorry and take a short cut across the large bend in the road to meet again some miles beyond. He knew that without a woman and child in the front his lorry would not be recognised at future checkpoints (which would have been informed by phone). The soldier had been paid and we knew that he may not wait around for us, however there was no choice. We were no longer in Poland, we had to carry on.

We were in deep countryside and the night was extremely dark so we had great difficulty in seeing the lay of the land, and it was a complete surprise when we realised that we had to cross a small river in order to keep going in the required direction. My mother rather gingerly tried to test the depth of the river whilst holding on to overhanging branches. It was
only up to her waist so we both waded across. Luckily it was not winter. Once on the other side we were making our way in the prescribed direction when we walked into an object that turned out to be a huge German village policeman! This was the end of our liberty. The policeman escorted us to the local police station where he took us down to the cells in the basement. It
was very frightening. There were only tiny barred windows near the ceiling of the cell. The furnishings consisted of a wide built-in continuous shelf along two walls acting as a bed, and a large tin with sand in it as a toilet.

We were to be interrogated by the Russian officer in charge and as we realised this would be done separately we had to agree on a 鈥渟tory鈥� very quickly. When my turn came the officer made a show of his big revolver and his large dog, however wild tigers would not have made me tell anything but
the vague story about looking for our long lost relatives. The Russian gave up after realising I was not going to be a pushover. I believe that my mother gave a similar story to him but the fact that she could speak Russian made things easier. Basically the chap did not want to have two muddled females littering his prison, and was glad to be persuaded to let us go.

Mum had offered him her rings and some dollars (these we had rolled up to look
like slim silk or cotton reels often seen at the time, and were in the small
hold-all together with some other small items and a couple of hard boiled eggs). The officer said he would let us go but it was up to us to get back to Poland or anywhere else. Early in the morning we started walking in the direction of Poland, as we knew we were much nearer to the Polish border than to Berlin. The countryside looked deserted. Walking along the road we saw skeletons of females in the roadside ditches. From their positions we could gather that the barbarous Russians had raped before killing. The occasional passing person was very much feared. After all we did not speak German and we could be handed over to the nearest police. We might not be let out again - or they could attack us, a helpless woman and a girl.....

Whenever we saw a check-point ahead we would make large detours through woods and shrubland in order not to be seen. The woods had reminders of the war, broken helmets etc. When night came we decided to seek shelter in a group of houses in a wood. We delicately knocked on the door and a lady inside let us in. She had some distant Polish family and so was sympathetic and agreed to let us stay the night in secret. We did not expect the Germans to be friendly. We were starving as we only had a hard boiled egg from Mum's holdall all day. The lady did not have much to but she made us some potato soup from boiled, grated raw poatoes. It was the most wonderful meal I have ever had. I am sure my mother had something to give the lady as a thank-you and early next day we set off again.

Late in the afternoon we came across the Poland/German border. We recognised it because great barbed wire fences stretched from the checkpoint gates to as far as the eye could see. There was no shelter of
any kind to hide behind and we decided that the only way to get through to Poland was to give ourselves up voluntarily.

The Russsian border guards were very surprised to find two lonely Polish females with a large handbag walk to the checkpoint and ask to be let back into Poland. Our story was that an old relative in Germany was very sick and dying and we went to visit her, and now we want to get back home. Not knowing what to do with us they put us in a lorry load of other prisoners -
suspicious looking characters - and drove us back to the main Russian headquarters in Szczeczin.There we were waiting to be questioned and dealt with, when a passing high ranking Russian officer recognised my mother and arranged for us to be freed immediately. Apparently he was very pleased how discretely, quickly and efficiently he was dealt with when he had visited the
venereal clinic in Mum's health centre. Anyway that night we were back in our Szczeczin aparttment as though nothing had happened! But as far as escape was concerned we were back to square one.
____________________________________________

Background information
REPATRIATION TRAINS
The trains by which Krystyna and her mother were attempting to escape to the West formed part of the huge resettlement of populations which took place in 1945/47 . The victorious Allied powers, the USA, Britain and Russia, agreed to split the areas recaptured from the Fascists into 鈥渟pheres of influence鈥�; the western part to be under the control of Britain, France and the USA, and the eastern part to be controlled by Russia, which intended to impose communist governments on them.
Stalin insisted that Russia 鈥渞egained鈥� the the eastern area of pre-war Poland, and that, in turn, Poland would expand to the west, taking over areas from Germany 鈥� in effect Poland was moved 150 miles to the west after 1945. Some 3.5 million ethnic Germans had to be transferred from within the new Poland to Germany, many into what became West Germany. These were the people carried on the trains from Szczeczin and elsewhere (at the same time 3.5 million Poles were 鈥渞epatriated鈥� from the east to their new lands to the west and north).
____________________________________________

Obviously the organiser of the German repatriation trains whom my father paid to bring us out of Poland, had got in touch with my mother though I do remember him coming round and speaking with her. Anyway our next try was going to be with his help on one of his trains. These ran every 2 or 3 weeks. We started visiting the end of the line where the Germans were boarding the trains. We observed minutely how people were dressed, what kind of luggage they carried etc. so that we could camouflage ourselves to look like them. When the appointed day came we again did not mention anything to anyone in case we did not get away - as before.

Dressed in a very plain manner, with sleeveless all-covering apron/dresses, with hair covered in head scarves tied on top of the head in the familiar wartime style, with just one holdall, we joined the assembled Germans to board the train. We were to travel in the Red Cross carriage next to the conductor鈥檚 tiny office. The advantage this carriage was that "the sick" did not need to come out of the train at the checkpoint when the train crossed the "iron curtain", where everyone's papers were to be checked in detail. We were also in danger from the other occupants of the carriage. Had they realised that we were masquerading as Germans they might have enjoyed denouncing us to the Russians. Thus we had to remain silent, pretending that we were dim or very ill, and desperately hoping that no one would speak to us and discover our very scarce knowledge of the German language.

After a long embarkation period the train started slowly and proceeded into the night in fits and starts. The journey was a terrifying experience, fearing discovery by the other occupants. We were very crowded sitting in the Red Cross carriage. Finally the rain stopped and there was a lot of shouting in German and Russian whilst people were told what to do and where to queue.This lasted a couple of hours with us dying a continuous death during that time.

Then something happened. A Russian soldier entered the train conductor鈥檚 office and there followed a bargaining session, which my mother as a Russian speaker understood. The soldier said he suspected that the conductor was hiding someone in the Red Cross carriage so he will check everone鈥檚 papers.The conductor presented the Russian with a large bottle of vodka and suggested that he need not bother to do this. The Russian persisted and was offered another bottle and then another. Our lives were at stake during these negotiations and my mother's whispered translations meant that we were both relieved when the Russian left with numerous bottles of vodka. Until the train moved off again we could not be sure that the Russian would not change his mind and re-enter the carriage despite his bribe.

During this time I realised that my seat felt damp and on checking found that the wetness was blood. It took a while to understand that I was not wounded but that this was my introduction to a natural biological event. We sat silent and worried as the train proceeded slowly on its journey. A short time after dawn broke we had a sign from the conductor that this was the time to jump out while the train was at its slowest! Luckily we did not break any bones, and still clutching our holdall we
surveyed the scene where we had landed. We were in the countryside next to several railway lines, and there were silent queues of people waiting for early morning trains to take them to work, presumably in the town which we could see in the distance. Here we found we were not dressed like other people and we had to surreptitiously remove our headscarves and aprons.

My mother with her usual bravery or audacity decided we would have to use
public transport as it was too far to walk to the city. She knew the town was Lubeck, and that the local British occupying forces had a Polish unit who were expecting us. So near and yet so far! We had no local money to pay for the transport and we did not know where the Polish unit was housed. I felt like the daughter in the film where the mother is less practical and sensible or simply, as in our case, more brave than her daughter.

While standing in the queue for the tram to Lubeck and whispering to each other, the lady in front of us turned around and quietly told us in Polish, that she was of Polish origin and that she was willing to help us. This was wonderful news, however she said she first had to go to her home which was in a town half way to central Lubeck. Thus she paid for our tickets but we all had to get off in her home town.

She told us to sit in the main square and wait until she returned. My mother promised her some tins of meat, which we had in our holdall, as a reward when we reached our destination. We died a death every time a German policemen or official appeared in the square because we realised the lady could easily change her mind and denounce us to the authorities as illegal immigrants. She seemed to be away for a very long time but did eventually return alone.

The journey into the centre of Lubeck was uneventful with our fares paid for us, but there remained the search for the British/Polish office. It was a worrying time, but with the lady鈥檚 help it was accomplished without major hassles. The lady got her tins of meat and our sincere thanks, and we spoke to the Polish soldiers who knew about the possibility of our arrival and immediately phoned through to my father. He was in charge of a unit of the Polish Parachute Brigade, which formed part of the British Army of occpation in the district of Osnabruck (near a town called Bramche).

The rest is like a fairy tale. My father drove down immediately to fetch us. Feeling safe and feeling like a child again - taken care of - rather than a co-participant in hellishly dangerousjourney. Arriving to stay with my father in his headquarters was like paradise. Being with the father whom I had not seen since I was 5 years old - but always hearing and thinking about him. It was summer and I was the child of a very well loved commanding officer, life was
wonderful.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.