大象传媒

This story has been submitted to the website by Janet Kowalska on behalf of her late husband, Kazimierz Mieczyslaw Kowalski and is based on a tape recording made in 1999. She fully understands the terms and conditions of the website.

It was early in September 1939. I was almost 14 years old and staying at my family's villa at Wesola, just outside Warsaw. My parents were separated and I lived with my grandmother and my father who was a major in the Polish Cavalry. At the villa at that time were my grandmother, my aunt and a couple of friends. We knew the Germans were on their way and, one night, I heard German bombers overhead. My father was away on duty so I ran to get one of his service revolvers, climbed up on the roof, and fired in the direction of the bombers.

A few nights later I woke to the sound of distant machine gun fire. Once again, I grabbed my father's revolver and ran through the forest towards the sound. It was very foggy and I ended up on the hill at Stara Milosna, the village next to Wesola. I heard German voices shouting 'Fan out!'and I could also hear the sound of tanks behind them. I emptied the contents of the revolver in the direction of the voices and then ran like hell back home. I don't know whether I hit anyone! When I got back, I woke everyone up and told them the Germans had arrived. We grabbed what we would quickly lay our hands on and made off on foot back to Warsaw. About halfway there, we came across a small detachment of Polish troops led by a cadet officer. He asked where we were going and I told him that the Germans were coming. He said, rather patronisingly, that I must have imagined it. I told him that I had heard German being spoken and he then said that they must have been paratroops. I told him that they couldn't have been because paratroops are generally dropped behind the lines and I had heard tanks following them up from the rear. He still wouldn't believe me so we continued on our way to Warsaw which was about 14 km from Wesola. My grandmother was about 60 at the time so she did well to cover such a distance in a relatively short time. We were in a hurry, as you can imagine!

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