WŁADYSŁAW FILIPEK

Warsaw, 2 July 1949. Norbert Szuman (MA), member of the Main 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 Władysław Filipek
Date and place of birth 26 April 1893, Zakrzów, Puławy county
Parents’ names Franciszek and Katarzyna, née Guzal
Father’s occupation carpenter
Citizenship and nationality Polish
Religious affiliation Roman Catholic
Education elementary school
Occupation laboratory technician at the State Institute of Hygiene
Place of residence Warsaw, Chocimska Street 24, flat 404
Criminal record none

When the Warsaw Uprising broke out, I was in my flat at Chocimska Street 24.

Throughout 1 August a considerable group of insurgents gathered on the premises of the State Institute of Hygiene; according to my calculations, there were more than two hundred of them. However, these insurgents did not engage in any military activity; literally, not a shot was fired from the Institute. During the night of 3 or 4 August, I do not remember the exact date, the insurgents left our area.

The outbreak of the Uprising forced 54 members of Institute’s personnel, residents, and a dozen or so people who had found themselves there completely by chance to remain at the Institute. When the Uprising broke out, there were no Germans at the Institute.

The day after the insurgents left, SS-men surrounded the premises of the Institute, and led the men from the Institute to the barracks at Puławska Street, where there were already a great many civilians from the neighborhood. While going to the barracks I noticed that the houses in Puławska Street were ablaze, but I did not observe any executions. We, that is to say, the employees of the Institute, did not stay in the barracks for long. Already on the same day we were returned to the Institute.

A few days after our return, the Germans started the planned removal of equipment belonging to the Institute; the operation was administered by the Institute’s administrative director, Ingard, who walked around in a dark blue uniform with a Swastika armband (it was said that he was a Gestapo man). Allegedly, Ingard lived in Skolimowska Street. The Institute’s equipment, which we had to pack in accordance with his orders, was transported by motor vehicles to Tworki, and from there – as I heard – to Wrocław.

I would like to add at this point that the director of the State Institute of Hygiene during the War was one Professor Kudiche, who was then subordinate to Dr. Bormann, chief medical officer of the 6th Army, who visited the Institute on a few occasions during the Uprising. Professor Kudiche was not present in Warsaw during the Uprising.

Towards the end of the first half of August 1944, the German soldiers ordered a group of ten or twelve men from our Institute to remove the human bodies lying around at Puławska Street 11 and Skolimowska Street 3 and 5.

There were a few (I do not remember the exact number) bodies in the courtyard of Puławska Street 11, mainly female. These bodies were in an advanced state of decay, and therefore I was unable to determine the cause of death. We buried them in the garden on the premises of Puławska Street 11. The house itself was burnt down, and I did not venture inside.

At Skolimowska Street 5, blackened and decomposing human remains were strewn around everywhere – near the outdoor toilet, in the motor-car workshop, and in the courtyard proper. It is impossible to provide accurate numerical data concerning the number of victims on the basis of these scattered remains. We piled them all up in the middle of the courtyard and incinerated them. The house had already been burned down. There were corpses – of two children and two elderly people, if I remember correctly – in the courtyard of Skolimowska Street 3 which had not been burned down. We buried them in the courtyard.

Apart from the above-mentioned instance, no one else was taken from the premises of the State Institute of Hygiene to perform work outside the facility.

More or less in the middle of August, “Ukrainians” arrived at the Institute and, having first checked our documents, took with them a group of a dozen or so people who did not work or reside at the Institute. These people were never seen again.

No other interesting developments that might have taken place on or near the premises of the Institute during the period of the Uprising are known to me.

On 1 September, when the removal of equipment had been completed, we were all transported to Pruszków.

At this point the report was brought to a close and read out.