Marianna Jaroszewicz
Class 6
Wisznice, Włodawa district, Lublin voivodeship
21 June 1946
Memories of the German occupation
For a long time the enemy was vying for Polish soil. We fought and shed blood, because everyone knows [that] it would be very bad for us if the enemy took our country. The last time we reclaimed our country after the partitions, everyone knew how hard it was to live, so we started working so that we would never be in bondage again. The calm did not last for too long, because we were at war again soon, this time with our eastern neighbor. At that time, Poland was not defeated and the country was slowly turning into our Homeland once again.
Only 20 years passed until 1939, when the enemy from the West declared war upon us. Their forces were much greater and they invaded our country, making us their slaves. During the occupation, people suffered terrible fates. Thank God I didn’t have a lot of terrible experiences, but I remember one of them vividly.
I’ve long heard about how the Germans mistreated our people. Eventually, I saw it with my own eyes. In 1944, the Germans announced that people from our area had to come to our town of Wisznice on 5 March 1944 for a meeting that was going to take place there. People were afraid because they didn’t know what the Germans would do, but they had to go anyway as they were threatened with death if they stayed home. It was 5 March 1944. The Germans came in cars and brought some people with them. Fearful, the people came from the surrounding villages and the meeting started, and when it was over, 30 men were taken out of the cars and then they were shot to death in groups of 10. After all this, people went home trembling with fear, and the corpses of the dead were brought to the clay pit, where they were buried. Wives and children went to the graves to cry and pray for a long time.
I had no more such experiences, but since then I have been very much afraid of German soldiers. During that time, Germany conquered almost all of Europe and declared war on Russia, but Russia was stronger and chased them away from their land. Polish soldiers also helped in their fight against the Germans. And now we have a free country again.