19 January 1950, Warsaw. Trainee Judge Irena Skonieczna, acting as a member of the Main Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes in Poland, interviewed the person named below, who testified as follows:
| Name and surname | Aleksander Kowrecki |
| Date and place of birth | 24 March 1897, Mińsk Litewski |
| Parents’ names | Szymon and Marianna, née Niewierek |
| Father’s occupation | Blacksmith |
| State affiliation and nationality | Polish |
| Religious affiliation | Catholic |
| Education | 4 grades of secondary school |
| Profession | Carpenter |
| Place of residence | Warsaw, Żelazna Street 41, flat 36 |
| Criminal record | None |
When the Warsaw Uprising started, I was in the house at Żelazna Street 41. That evening at 6.00 p.m. German tanks drove into Żelazna Street from the side of Grzybowska Street, trying to force their way through to Aleje Jerozolimskie. However, they only reached the barricade at the corner of Twarda Street and had to turn back. The insurgents hadn’t yet appeared in this area. Until 6 August 1944, they occupied the terrain from Aleje Jerozolimskie (Railway Hostel) through Grzybowska to Chłodna streets. In the first days of the Uprising, on Chłodna Street, the insurgents took over the gendarmerie headquarters. However, shortly afterwards, I can’t determine exactly when, the Germans began to move in the direction of Grzybowska Street, firing into Żelazna Street as they advanced. I heard from the people who had fled from the Germans that the residents were murdered and their houses set on fire. During the first days of the Uprising, the Germans were particularly ruthless in Wolska and Chłodna streets.
Some people from our area, which was occupied by the insurgents and enclosed by Grzybowska and Towarowa Streets, Aleje Jerozolimskie, Marszałkowska Street and even Nowy Świat Street, decided to come out, responding to the demands printed on leaflets which were distributed by the Germans. We knew that the Germans segregated those who had come out into separate groups of men and women, and led them either in the direction of the Wola district or towards “Zieleniak” market on Grójecka Street.
I do not know what happened to these people. It is said that they were taken to the transit camp in Pruszków from where they were deported to Germany.
1 and 2 October 1944 saw the surrender of the whole Śródmieście (City Center) district. Having surrendered their weapons, the insurgents left Warsaw. Acting on orders from the Germans, a small insurgent unit remained in our area to oversee people dismantling the barricades at the street junctions. On 6 October 1944, an order was issued that all the people who were still in Warsaw were supposed to leave their flats by 11.00 a.m. of the following day. We were sent to the Western Railway Station, from where we were transported to the transit camp in Pruszków and to Ursus. I and my family were taken to Ursus, where on the following day, the segregation was carried out. The older women, mothers, their children and older men were separated from the younger men and women. The latter were deported to Germany as forced laborers and we, the older, were put on stock cars and transported to Mszana Dolna near Kraków.
On 6 October 1944, when the Germans ordered the people to leave the city, they also sent the elderly and the disabled to the Polish Red Cross point, somewhere on Towarowa Street. The Red Cross was expected to arrange for these people to be taken out of Warsaw. Henryka Juszczak, a resident of our house at Żelazna Street 41, handed her seventy year-old mother over to the Red Cross. No trace of her was ever found. Rumors circulated that the Germans murdered the elderly and disabled, and these were confirmed in the sense that none of the persons who had been sent there have been found so far.
At this point, the report was brought to a close and read out.