BRONISŁAWA MASIUK

Warsaw, 28 February 1946. Acting Investigating Judge Alicja Germasz, delegated to the Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes, heard the person named below as a witness. Having been advised of the criminal liability for making false declarations, the witness testified as follows:


Name and surname Bronisława Masiuk, née Karska
Age 65 years old
Parents’ names Wincenty and Józefa
Occupation -
Education -
Place of residence Warsaw, Grochów district, Omulewska Street 6
Religious affiliation Roman Catholic
Criminal record none

I lived in my own house at Omulewska Street 6 in Grochów. My son Józef Masiuk (39 years old) and his wife Maria (38 years old) lived on the ground floor of the same house, and my son had a mechanic’s workshop in the courtyard of the same house.

On 14 October 1943, at 7.00 a.m., my neighbor shouted through the wall that the German gendarmes were coming for my son. At the same time I heard a series of shots from the direction of the courtyard. I rushed downstairs, but a gendarme was stationed on the ground floor of the staircase and he forbade me to go any further. Then I looked through the window in the staircase, which itself looked out onto the courtyard, and saw my son, lying in a pool of blood in front of his workshop. Two gendarmes were standing next to him. At that moment one of them took out a gun from his pocket and shot my son in the head. Then, without paying heed to anything, I burst into the courtyard and called to that gendarme who had fired the shot, “How dare you kill my son!” He replied, “Duty is duty,” and that was all. The gendarmes left.

Then I rushed to the workshop. My dead daughter-in-law was lying on the floor, covered in blood and with her stomach torn open, and some other dead man was lying in the corner. I learned later from the neighbors that he was a client of my son’s and was by complete chance in the workshop at that time. The neighbors also told me that the gendarmes had come in a small car, and that the car had been standing in front of the house the entire time.

I don’t know whether my son was a member of any underground organizations.

More details pertaining to the murder of the above-mentioned people may be provided by eye-witnesses: Janina Kocielska, Terlikowski (whose name I don’t know) – both residing at Omulewska Street 6, and other residents of that house.

The report was read out.