ALEKSY WAKAR

Warsaw, 12 April 1948. Judge Halina Wereńko, a member of the District Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes in Poland, interviewed the person named below as an unsworn witness. Having been advised of the criminal liability for making false declarations, the witness testified as follows:


Name and surname Aleksy Wakar
Names of parents Anatol and Anna née Muszkin
Date of birth 17 January 1898, Samara
Religious affiliation Orthodox
Education Warsaw School of Economics [Szkoła Główna Handlowa]
Occupation Professor at the Warsaw School of Economics
Place of residence Warsaw, Rakowiecka Street 6

The Uprising found me on the premises of the Warsaw School of Economics. At 5 p.m. on 1 August 1944, I was in the shelter under the library building, from where I could not see the insurgents’ attack on the barracks (Stauferkaserne) adjacent to our grounds. An SS unit was stationed in the barracks and in the professor’s hotel, where machine guns were installed on the roof, within range of our area. There were no insurgents on the grounds of the School of Economics.

On 2 August at 1 p.m., an SS officer with a small unit burst into the premises of the School and ordered everybody to go to the barracks. This I did in a group of around 30 people, including the late Professor Królikowski, assistant and school administrator Franciszek Branny, Mrs. Limanowska and Mrs. Zawadzka, both professors’ wives, and the staff and their families living on the premises of the School. Senior Lecturer Andrzej Grodek, the current rector of the School, remained standing guard. Our group and other groups of civilians were taken to the courtyard of the barracks and then driven to the basement. Around 3 p.m., the women were segregated and then released. The men were taken out into the courtyard, where those who had documents proving they were employed by state institutions were sorted out. I ended up in a group of more familiar people, in a room to the right of the entrance. Other groups had remained in the courtyard for quite a while and were being gradually taken away to the opposite wing of the barracks complex, to the first and second floors. On the same day, before sunset, I saw through a window how SS-men took out a group of a dozen or so people from the second wing of the building, where the men had been accommodated. I saw them being led through the courtyard to the gate. People later said that this group had been executed on the grounds of Mokotów Prison.

I do not know the names of either the commandant of the German unit stationed in the barracks or of other Germans on site. More detailed information in this regard can be furnished by Professor Grodek, Franciszek Branny and Kleszczyńska, a caretaker (a rehabilitated Volksdeutsch, I think). I can only remember a German who wore a part- civilian and part- military outfit; he was fat and had fishy eyes. He held some unspecified positions and everybody suspected that he was with the Gestapo. This German was interested in everything and held no specific position.

During the first days, the Volksdeutsche were sent in vans to Kutno (to the Reich). However, the Volksdeutsche were in no hurry to leave. Consequently, on 4 August, people in our room were offered a couple of seats in the vans. That way, my and I wife got out of Warsaw. The vehicle was driven by SS-men of French descent and at our request they dropped us off in Łowicz.

At that the report was concluded and read out.