JAN WOŁK

Warsaw, 26 March 1949. A member of the Main Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes in Poland, Norbert Szuman (MA), 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 Jan Wołk
Date and place of birth 15 September 1909 in Lachowicze, near Baranowice
Parents’ names Jan and Anna Szaulińska
Father’s occupation bricklayer
Citizenship and nationality Polish
Religion Roman Catholic
Education elementary school
Occupation master construction worker
Place of residence Warsaw, Szustra Street 3, flat 21
Criminal record none

When the Warsaw Uprising broke out, I was in my flat at Szustra Street 3. During the first two days of the Uprising I did not notice any insurgents in the vicinity of my home. Nor did any Germans (whose nearest positions were in Dworkowa and Puławska streets, on the corner of Madalińskiego Street) show up near our house, as they were only firing heavily upon Puławska Street.

On 3 August at around noon, a German tank drove into Szustra Street from the direction of Puławska Street. This tank fired at the windows of the house at no. 3, and probably also at no. 1, for people started running away from that property. Next, the tank set fire to the paper shop at number one and also to our house, whereupon it withdrew into Puławska Street. The residents of the house at no. 3 Szustra Street then started to remove furniture from their flats and occupied themselves with extinguishing the fire. After some time, maybe one or two hours, a few Germans in uniform (I got the impression that they were gendarmes) entered the square separating the house at Szustra Street 3 from the next building, no. 7. With their weapons at the ready, they ordered the tenants of our house who were in the courtyard, or within their field of sight, to approach them. They started questioning the caretaker as to why the gate onto Szustra Street was closed, looked through our documents, and conducted a perfunctory search, after which they ordered us to come out into Szustra Street with our arms raised and to proceed along the sidewalk on the odd-numbered side of Puławska Street. There were around seventeen to eighteen people in our group, both men and women. Some of the residents – a minority – managed to hide in the house, while the others had already removed themselves to another property.

The Germans passed to the even-numbered side of Szustra Street. I walked at the front of our group. When I reached the fenced square behind the house at no. 1, I heard the Germans issue a command, which was addressed to us: halt! – stop!

At this very moment I jumped to the side and ran over to the unfinished shop in the house at Szustra Street 1 (from the side of Puławska Street), hiding in its basement. At the same time, I heard a loud salvo being fired on Szustra Street. After just under two days of hiding, I managed to get through to the house at Szustra Street 15. I learned from my sister-in- law, whom I found there, that she had seen a dozen or so bodies at the very spot where the Germans had ordered us to stop on 3 August.

Around 25 August 1944 I managed to get near the place of the execution, from where civilians had carried a few of the bodies of the murdered victims to the premises behind the house at Szustra Street 1. Amongst these bodies I recognized – and subsequently buried – that of my brother, who had been evicted by the Germans together with me from the house at Szustra Street 3 on 3 August.

I spent the rest of the Uprising in the house at Szustra Street 15. A few days before the fall of Mokotów I was wounded and taken to the insurgent first-aid post which had been set up in our house a few days previously. I had to leave the first-aid post already on the same day – there were a dozen or so wounded people there at the time – for a fresh group of wounded insurgents was to be brought in, and space was sparse. On the day of the capitulation of Mokotów, 27 September 1944 (if I remember correctly), we were forced to leave our house and walk under German escort to Służewiec, from where we were transported to Pruszków.

As far as I know, the wounded and the female nurses remained at the first-aid post at Szustra Street 15.

I don’t know the surname of the physician who worked there.

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