On 9 June 1948 in Grójec, judge Leon Antoszewski, with a court reporter, Wanda Adamczyk, present, interviewed the person named below as an unsworn witness. Having been advised of the criminal liability for giving false testimony, the witness testified as follows:
| Name and surname | Father Stanisław Lewarski |
| Age | 42 |
| Names of parents | Konstanty and Marianna |
| Place of residence | Złotokłos, municipality of Komorniki |
| Occupation | parish priest |
| Religious affiliation | Roman Catholic |
| Criminal record | none |
| Relationship to the parties | none |
The uprising caught me in Warsaw, where I was a vicar at St. Anthony’s Church on Senatorska Street.
On 7 August, German troops entered St. Anthony’s Church, or rather the church grounds. From the shelter below the vicarage they took civilians and a couple of priests who had been hiding there. The priests were released after a few hours. The civilians were taken to the Saxon Garden [Ogród Saski], where men were separated from women. The Germans marched the women out of town and released them. The men were used for various labors in town and to protect the movement of German tanks and troops. The next day, German troops again entered the grounds of St. Anthony’s Church and took the remaining civilians and all the priests. They made them dismantle the barricade on Senatorska Street near Teatralny Square. But when the insurgents laid fire to the barricade from the house at Senatorska Street 22, the Germans retreated, taking us to the Luxemburg Mall [Galeria Luksemburga]. On my way there, I noticed three curled up female corpses in front of the church. As we moved towards the mall, the Germans would shoot anybody they didn’t like. This is how Prelate Trzeciak died and many were wounded. From the Luxemburg Mall the Germans took us to Alberta Street, threatening the priests on the way that they would soon be executed, calling us bandits of the worst kind and saying that the biggest bandit, Prelate Trzeciak, had already been killed. On Alberta Street, the priests were separated from the group and lined up against the wall of a house, told to get ready to die and completely despoiled.
I cannot tell what unit the German troops that had barged into St. Anthony’s Church belonged to. It was a German unit, but officers were nowhere to be seen, except one, who was a doctor and whose behavior clearly indicated that he was helpless. The soldiers wore German uniforms but when despoiling us, they demanded czasy [Russian for “wristwatch”] and looked like Ukrainians. At Alberta Street, the Germans sorted out the Reichsdeutsch and the Volksdeutch, who, supervised by soldiers, were escorted to Saski Square. From among the people gathered on Alberta Street the Germans selected a number of men. Priests were stood up front, with young and well-dressed men behind; we were then ordered to head, in rows of five, towards the barricades on Bielańska Street. When the insurgents spotted us, they ceased firing on the area, but the Germans started to fire at our group from a tank on Teatralny Square and from machine guns on Alberta Street. Fired at, our column fell to the ground, and when the Germans ceased fire, the whole column, except the dead of course, sprang up and ran towards Bielańska Street, where, having passed the second barricade, we joined the insurgents. During this flight, we were not being fired at from machine guns and only single shots could be heard.
I was told that a first-aid station had been set up in the gardener’s house by St. Anthony’s Church, but only after I left the church grounds. When I returned to Warsaw, I saw burnt bones in this house, while in the Heart of Jesus chapel there were numerous traces of fat melted out from burnt human bodies.
When we joined the insurgents on Bielańska Street, i.e. at the Old Town redoubt, our column dispersed, each on their own. I went to the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary parish in the Old Town, where I remained until 15 August in the vicarage. After it was destroyed, I went to St. Stanislaus care facility at Przyrynek Street 4, staying there until the evacuation, i.e. until 29 August.
I was not an eyewitness to the atrocities perpetrated by the Germans at the St. Stanislaus care facility. The Germans had rushed whoever was able to walk to Broni Square. The vestry nun had stayed in the motherhouse a bit longer and arrived at Broni Square around an hour after us. She said that the Germans had thrown grenades into the basements where the elderly and the cripples were staying, and then set the whole house on fire. When I returned to Warsaw, I went to those basements and saw numerous bones [and remains of] burnt human bodies. In a similar manner the Germans murdered the elderly women staying in the church who had arrived from the facility run by the municipal board. The Germans ordered them to get out of the church, and when they failed to because they were too feeble, they threw grenades at them.
I do not know what unit of the German army perpetrated these crimes. Among the soldiers, there were quite a lot of Kalmyk types, who were even more ready to despoil us than the German soldiers I had encountered on Senatorska Street. On our way from the Old Town to Broni Square, I was frisked at least a dozen times and every single item I was carrying in my pockets was taken away from me. From Broni Square we were taken for an overnight stay to a school building situated by the railway tracks. The next day, after a night spent in appalling conditions – the place was so crammed that there was absolutely nowhere to lie down – the Germans sorted out the old, the frail and the wounded, who were offered transport by car, and rushed us to the Pfeiffer factory on Okopowa Street. Before that, I was summoned by a German officer, who questioned me via an interpreter about the details of Father Trzeciak’s death. He would not believe that Father Trzeciak had been killed by theGermans and insisted they must have been Ukrainians.
We remained on the grounds of the Pfeiffer factory for a couple of hours. The Germans only let us drink water, and the nuns, staff and boarders from St. Stanislaus care facility were denied even that. The elderly, weak and wounded from Broni Square, who were supposed to be driven to the factory in cars, never arrived. They were said to have been murdered in the ghetto. When we were in the Pfeiffer factory, the Germans separated nuns from the others from the St. Stanislaus care facility group and took them away in cars. To date, neither I nor the Daughters of Charity authorities have learnt what has become of those seven nuns or of the facility staff and boarders whom the Germans had left at the factory, having taken away [the rest of] the people herded there. From the Pfeiffer factory we were marched to St. Adalbert’s Church in Wola, where we stayed the night, and the next day, after a group of men was segregated to do some work in Warsaw, we were rushed to the Western Train Station [Dworzec Zachodni], loaded on a train and transported to the Pruszków camp.
As regards witnesses of German crimes, some details concerning the Senatorska Street area can be provided by Helena Kasprzak (resident at Senatorska Street 31, near St. Anthony’s Church) as well as by the co-owner of the funeral house on Emilii Plater Street, Mr. Szwejk, and by a former organist, Władysław Stefański, currently at the Starachowice factory, where he is in charge of choirs. As regards German atrocities in the Old Town, they can be recounted in detail by Reverend Wacław Ośko (resident in Pilczyca, Słupia post office, near Końskie) and the youngest son of mgr. Gobiec – I do not know his first name, nor the address; they own a house and a pharmacy, I think, on Piusa Street or Poznańska Street. He is the son of that herbalist who keeps advertising his business.
That is all.
The report was read out.