Bronisław Orzechowski, rifleman, 25 years old, tiler, unmarried.
The first time I was arrested was by Ukrainians from the USSR, on the Hungarian border. When my friend Jan Szeremieta and I left Nadwórna and headed to Rafajłowa, we received instructions from the secret organization on how we were supposed to explain ourselves in case Ukrainians arrested us, and then we set off. We were walking for 24 hours. All of the sudden we were fired upon by a patrol of the Ukrainian militia [?]. As soon as we heard the fire, we hid behind the trees. A moment later, the Ukrainians came and asked us what we were doing there. My friend told them, in the Ukrainian language, that we were from Hungary and we were going to fight for the Ukrainians. When they heard that, they were very glad, and joined us on the road to Rafajłowa. It was my friend who was talking to them on the road, because I didn’t speak Ukrainian well. One of them, out of the blue, told us who we were supposed to vote for and assured us that that very day he’d accompany us to the border so that the Soviets wouldn’t capture us. They were just about to let us go when one of them asked me something, and I answered him using a kind of mix of Polish and Ukrainian words, because I didn’t know Ukrainian. That’s how they found out that we were Poles and that we were going to Hungary. They ordered us to show them our documents. I said that we didn’t have any. Then they started to carry out [illegible] inspection, and they found our military documents and the other one pulled out [illegible]. That was you Poles who were [illegible] our men and burning them alive in Carpathian Ruthenia. After a while, they collected [illegible], and tied us up to a tree [illegible], took five steps from us, pulled out their rifles and prepared to take a shot at us, so I said, “Wait! One day [illegible] will come for you too”. And I said two words [...] “Friends, this is our grave”. Then, suddenly, a Soviet patrol appeared from over the mountains. [Illegible] they saw the patrol put their rifles down, and told them that we were going to [illegible], saw the militia patrol and attacked [illegible]. After a while, the Soviets untied us and escorted us to the Soviet outpost in Rafajłowa. There, a commander interrogated us and ordered for us to be taken to the prison in Nadwórna.
In the prison in Nadwórna we were thrown into a basement, because all of the cells were already full. After 48 hours, which we spent there without any food, they called us for an interrogation. They beat us badly, because we didn’t want to confess. We said nothing and went back to our cell. While I was there, I was plotting an escape. Then, the door opened, one of the Soviets entered and said, “we need eight volunteers!”. I stood up [illegible] and maybe seven other men and [illegible] we left the prison and went through a big yard. A Soviet was right behind us.
I’m going first, watching the Soviet and looking around. When we reached the second building, I stood before the entrance and played the fool, like I didn’t know where to go. The Soviet, annoyed, approached me and said, “What’s the matter with you? Don’t you know how to get in?” – he hit me on the back with his rifle and yelled: –“Follow me!” I was waiting for this. Right after the Soviet and the other seven men went inside, I started to run from the yard to the garden, heading for the railway track. I was sure the Soviet hadn’t noticed because he went first, and when I was running away, no one was trying to shoot me, which meant no one saw me running.
When I reached the railway track, which was leading to Lwów, the freight train arrived. I jumped on it and left for Lwów. I went to the leaders of the secret organizations who I used to meet in cafes, restaurants, cinemas and so on and I told them that we had been arrested and I had managed to run away.
The next day lieutenant Czesław Mocuski, my cousin, visited me. I told him about my escape from prison and about the secret organization that I knew of. He told me that he also knew [illegible], and we went to the meeting place together. When we met the leader, I told him I was not going to Hungary, because I didn’t know the border well. Instead, I wanted to go to the German border. Suddenly, he agreed and gave me some papers and letters that I was to deliver in Warsaw and Kraków. I went to the border with 35 letters. Luckily, I managed to cross the border and deliver them. I went back to Lwów with replies to every letter. The next day I met my cousin, lieutenant Mocuski, and together we went to the headquarters of the secret organization and reported my arrival [illegible] colonel, who was in charge of the organization, I don’t remember his name. He gave me a task – I was to get some major and his daughter across the border, to Warsaw. I didn’t know either of them.
I accomplished my task, I got them across the border, and a few days later I went back to Lwów. I was crossing the border over and over again until April 1940. One day, two commanders from the NKVD and one Polish militia officer came to my house and asked about several things. When they were leaving, they told us, my father and me, to check in to the NKVD headquarter the next day. I went to my cousin, lieutenant Mocuski, and told him that NKVD was at my place and they had ordered us to show up at the NKVD, so we decided to go to Warsaw. We took many letters to Warsaw with us.
On the road to the border, three Soviets showed up and demanded to see our documents. We gave them false ones and told them that we were visiting our relatives for Easter. They didn’t believe us, and when the train stopped, they took us to the NKVD. After the interrogation there, they locked us up in prison in Łomża, in different cells. Four Soviets brought me to my cell. 12 people were there, and the cell was big, 2,5 by 3,5 meters. The next day they brought a hot, salty, soup-like water and 400 grams of bread, and that was all for the entire day. We slept one on top of another, sitting. We weren’t allowed to speak out loud, and windows were closed. After exhausting myself through the night, I started plotting my escape. Escaping that prison was really hard, but I didn’t give up. I was in constant contact with my cousin because he was ten cells away. One morning they rushed us to the bathhouse, so I left my cousin a message that I was planning to escape. After we came back from the bathhouse, they called me to the interrogation, because they thought I was a spy. At first, they started to beat me and told me to confess about what task the Germans had given me. They put a gun to my head and ordered me to speak the truth. When they brought me back to my cell, I was all bruised. They tortured me for three months, so I decided to escape.
One evening I decided to run away. I jumped up to the window, broke it with my hand, and tried to cut myself in order to get into the hospital and run away from there. When the Soviets heard the sound of the breaking window, eight of them came to see what was going on, right as I was cutting my veins. They were too afraid to come in, so they called on others. They caught me and started to kick and beat me, and in that way they brought me to the infirmary, where they continued kicking and beating me. After a while, three doctors came – one man and two women – and started the surgery right away. After the surgery [illegible] came and led me [illegible] floors down and started to beat me badly again.
They kept me in the dungeon for ten days. The walls were always wet, there was no window, and I was sleeping in water. They gave me 300 grams of bread and a cup of cold water a day. They were beating me for ten days, day by day. My escape plan didn’t work out. When I left the dungeon, they led me to another cell. There were 60 people there, five meters by eight meters.
After six months in prison, they led me to the courthouse. They wanted me to sign the sentence - five years in a labor camp. I signed it, smiling, ‘cause I knew I wasn’t gonna to be there that long. The next day they took us outside the prison and led us to the train. When we arrived at the train station, we saw many freight wagons with bars in the windows. They loaded us into a small wagon, 50 people in each, so there was only room enough to stand. I wasn’t going to lose heart, and I was plotting my escape.
After several days on the road, we arrived in Orsha. We stayed there for ten days and then we moved on. The Soviets knocked the wagon walls with hammers a few times a day in order to check if there weren’t any loose bolts, but I decided to escape anyway. When the train was at its full speed, me and some stranger, we twisted off the screw in the window bars, jumped off the train and started to run into the woods. Suddenly, I heard shots, and the train stopped. The stranger was killed, I reached the woods. I was exhausted, so I hid in the bushes. And then the dogs came running, barking. The Soviets also came and started to beat me badly. They dragged me to the train and loaded me into a separate wagon.
In that wagon, I arrived in Kotlas. From there we drifted by river to Ukhta. In Ukhta they assigned me to the labor camp and the next day they rushed me to work in the woods. It was winter, with temperatures down to 50 degrees below zero. The quotas were so high that I wasn’t able to meet them. Lice were biting us like hell and rats were crawling all over us. As for food, in the morning they gave us 500 grams of bread, and the same for dinner – that was all that one could get for the quotas. But I was lucky enough to be taken far, far away.
I used to write letters to home, but I never received an answer.
From Ukhta they took us to the labor camp near Pechora. We had to walk 300 kilometers there, and they gave us 300 grams of bread and a bit of [illegible] a day. After 20 days on the road, we finally arrived there. It was somewhere between nowhere and goodbye. One had to work like a horse to receive 500 grams of bread, and it was common to sit in solitary with only 200 grams of bread. After three weeks we went back to Ukhta, but we found out that it would all end soon because the Polish government had made a deal with the USSR. So we arrived in Ukhta. When we got there, we knew for sure that they were going to release us, and one day they did and gave us documents [illegible] to stay in the North and work.
I didn’t think about it a lot. I took a train and, as a stowaway, I headed to Tock [Totskoye]. I wanted to join the Polish Army that was gathering there. On my way there I had to sell my bushlat [jacket], cause I had no money at all. After a couple of days, I arrived in Tock [Totskoye], where I joined the Polish Army.
12 February 1943