ROMAN BRZEZIŃSKI

[1. Personal details:]

Senior uhlan Roman Brzeziński, born on 16 July 1916 in the village of Olszewka, [post office?], Gołotczyzna, Ciechanów district, Warsaw Voivodeship.

[2. Date and circumstances of arrest:]

I was interned in Lithuania from 23 September 1939 until 1940. Then we were interned in Russia [by?] the Soviet NKVD until 9 June (after a year of internment).

[4. Description of the camp, prison:]

During the internment, we were fed rancid meat and fish. Whoever wanted to work did so, and whoever did not [want] did not.

We lived in livestock buildings with bunks inside. We slept [illegible] and slept in the hay [?]. The camp was called Yukhnovo. Camaraderie was good.

[5. Composition of the prisoners, POWs, exiles:]

There were 2,000 of us in the camp. This group [was made up] entirely of Poles, who lived in the so-called commune and there they swore at our Poland. I know several names: Chylecki, Dobrowolski and others.

[7. The NKVD’s attitude towards the Poles:]

They showed us the power of cinema—all this was one massive propaganda. The political commissars also gave talks [illegible] in which they cursed England and America, calling them prostitutes and many other words. Favrenkev [?], an NKVD, was the most critical. He was a ranking major.

[8. Medical assistance, hospitals, mortality:]

Medical assistance was provided by our own as well as Soviet doctors.

[9. Was there any communication with homeland and family? If so, how was it?]

I got three letters from home, although I wrote a lot more.

[10. When were you released and how did you reach the army?]

I was released after working on the Kola peninsula. We were deported to work there after a year of internment. They tortured us there indescribably. After two weeks of work we left [and] we came to Arkhangelsk. We made this journey in a state of tremendous [exhaustion?]: we were not given anything to eat and drink for [a] few days. From Arkhangelsk we arrived at the camp [in] Talitsa, [where] there was a [military] commission. [However] during the journey I came down with acute joint swelling in the legs and was incapacitated.

After a few months, when our army departed, they took us sick and dispersed us throughout collective farms as far as Asia. After the illness, I sought out a Polish commission. I was in Karasu—I was told that soon we would leave and there was going to be a conscription, so I waited a few weeks and with the 5th Division I came to Bandar-e Pahlavi. I went there to the commission and was admitted to the 6th Division.