BOLESŁAW MURJES


1. Personal details (name, surname, rank, field post office number, age, occupation, marital status):


Gunner Bolesław Murjes, 24 years old, farmer, unmarried, FPO number 161.

2. Date and circumstances of arrest:

On 9 May, I was arrested and taken to a prison in Moscow.

4. Description of the camp, prison etc. (area, buildings, housing conditions, hygiene):

The prison in Moscow was very large. I can’t describe it in detail, because I was blindfolded. Moreover, they kept us in a cell beneath the prison. I was sleeping on a concrete floor, without any bedclothes, in my clothes only. They were tormenting me terribly, interrogating by day and by night.

5. The composition of POWs, prisoners, exiles (nationality, categories of crimes, intellectual and moral standing, mutual relations etc.):

There were very many prisoners, I don’t know how many exactly

6. Life in the camp, prison etc. (daily routine, working conditions, work quotas, remuneration, food, clothes, social and cultural life etc.):

The food was awful. We got 200 grams of bread, a bit of salt and a little pot of water for a day. I was eating like this for three months. I was so famished that I couldn’t stand on my legs.

7. The NKVD’s attitude towards Poles (interrogation methods, torture and other forms of punishment, Communist propaganda, information about Poland, etc.):

The NKVD authorities were very brutal – they used words like [illegible]. During interrogations, they forced us to admit crimes we hadn’t committed. Communist propaganda was on a massive scale – they used to project movies, read newspapers and books to us, [give] various lectures. The worst thing they used to say to us was that we’d never see Poland again. That hurt very much.

8. Medical assistance, hospitals, mortality rate (provide the names of the deceased):

They could have provided medical assistance, but they didn’t want to. They used to say: let him podokhnie. Many Poles were in the hospital. They were taking those who were gravely ill God knows where. And they used to tell us that they were taking them to another ward, but once taken away, they never came back. I saw how they shot prisoner Śliwiński, from Wilno. I know many cases of deaths, but I can’t remember the names.

9. Was there any possibility of getting in contact with one’s country and family?

I had no contact with my family. The only information about Poland we had was what the Soviets told us, that it was very good there, enough of everything, unlike when we were independent of the Soviet Union.

10. When were you released and how did you manage to join the army?

I escaped from the prison (in Kazań[?]) in December 1940. I reached the Polish Army in Tock [Totskoye] on 9 January 1942. I travelled on my own.

Staging point, 17 March 1943