EDMUNT GONTARCZYK

12 December 1945, Warsaw. Investigative Judge Alicja Giermasz interviewed the person named below as a witness. After being advised of the criminal liability for making false statements and of the significance of the oath, the witness was sworn and testified as follows:


Name and surname Edmunt Gontarczyk
Age 55 years old
Parents’ names Wacław and Wincentyna
Place of residence Warsaw, Puławska Street 41, flat 22
Occupation Head of the Exhumation Section of the City Funeral Home
Religious affiliation Catholic
Criminal record None

During the Uprising, on 2 August 1944, I was taken, with all the men from the house at Aleja Niepodległości 132 where I lived, to the Stauferkaserne at Rakowiecka Street. All the healthy men who had been gathered there (about 1,000 in number) went out into the city to work and returned in the evening. I didn’t have to work because I was wounded. From those who returned from work I learned that they were being employed to bury dead bodies in Mokotów. They also told me that about 30 people, whom the Germans had taken from the Stauferkaserne, were shot in the prison grounds at Rakowiecka Street. My prison companions buried them on the spot. Mass executions took place there. I know that our men were ordered to set fire to the prison hospital where a lot of dead bodies from around the prison area were dumped. I am unable to determine the names of those who gave me this information. They were chance prison companions.

Read out.