Cracow, 19 October 1946. The investigating judge Jan Sehn, a member of the Main Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes in Poland, heard as a witness the person specified below. The witness testified as follows:
My name is Roman Niewiarowicz, born on 15 January 1902 in Lwów, son of Tadeusz and Helena née Miłowska, theatre director, Roman Catholic, of Polish nationality, domiciled in Cracow, Przemyska Street 8.
I had known Igo Sym before the war. I often came into contact with him due to my artistic work, but we were not friends. He was just an acquaintance of mine. I had already known before the war that Sym’s mother was German, spoke German only and knew few Polish words.
I don’t know where she came from, I don’t know where she was born. Sym’s father was Polish, and he held some senior post in the Forest Board of Komora Cieszyńska [latifundium of the Dukes of Teschen]. Before the war, Igo Sym frequently went to Berlin, very often suddenly, unexpectedly, and without warning. He often went by plane. According to Sym, he was travelling to Berlin on business only, apropos films that were being made by Ufa, Tobis, or other production companies.
During the war of 1939, I did not come into any contact with Sym, as I was at the battlefront and I marched with my unit to Hungary.
I received the first news concerning Sym in the Polish consulate in Budapest. The consulate officers informed me that Sym was in Warsaw, that he was on good terms with the German authorities, that he worked for the Germans and that he had been a German spy before the outbreak of the war.
In December 1939 I decided to come back to Poland, and after a few days I reached my destination through the “green” border. Before I left I had been instructed by the consulate officers to watch Sym, observe his movements and notify Polish authorities of what I had learned.
Shortly after my return to Warsaw I met Sym on the premises of a Polish theatre, Komedia [Comedy], which he was organising then in an edifice at Kredytowa 14. Already then, he occupied the posts of: chief director of the Theater der Stadt Warschau (formerly the Polish Theatre), chief owner of the Palladio cinema at Złota Street, and chief concessionaire of the Komedia theatre. As I wanted to be close to Sym so I could observe his movements, I took a job in Komedia. I was acting on specific orders in this case.
As at that time all artistic activities were being closely supervised by the Germans, each artistic undertaking entailed the necessity of filing petitions, holding conferences, and making the rounds of all sorts of German authorities. Sym was taking care of those things, and I was accompanying him as a director. While visiting various offices, I had a chance to see that Igo Sym had many connections and was an influential figure with regard to both police authorities, that is, at aleja Szucha, and administrative authorities, that is, in the Brühl Palace. At aleja Szucha there was the Warsaw Gestapo headquarters, and the Brühl Palace was the headquarters of the Governor of the Warsaw district, Fischer.
Sym boasted that he was on very good terms with Fischer himself and with his wife, and that he often visited them in their private house. Upon entering guarded offices he would show the sentries some card, and they would salute him and receive him with honours. Sym was a Volksdeutsch, he championed the German cause and many times, in conversations with Polish people, emphasised that he could not understand what the Poles wanted and why they did not want to settle with the Germans. Nevertheless, he didn’t reveal to the Poles any of his movements that would point to his direct collaboration with the Gestapo, other German police authorities, or the German intelligence service. He pretended to be an organiser of the Polish arts under the auspices of the Germans.
My own observations and bits of information that I was receiving from my informants clearly indicated that Igo Sym was collaborating with aleja Szucha, thus with the Warsaw Gestapo. He was informing these institutions on the general mood of Polish society, and at the same time he was a useful tool in the hands of the Gestapo for shaping Polish public opinion in accordance with German wishes. As such activity was detrimental to Polish society, the underground movement authorities decided to liquidate Igo Sym.
I received an order to carry out this action with my group. After two unsuccessful attempts the action was carried out on 7 March 1941 at 7.00 a.m. in Sym’s flat at Mazowiecka Street 10. Sym was shot in the doorway of his flat by a man chosen for this action and called “Zawada” (it was his codename; I don’t know his real name) accompanied by “Mały” who provided cover (also a codename, I don’t know his real name). I would like to emphasise that this was the execution of a sentence by which Sym was condemned to death. Before 8.00 a.m., a liaison walking down the street gave me the prearranged sign that the execution was done.
The previous day, that is, on 6 March 1941, I had arranged with Sym to meet him on 7 March at 11.00 a.m. in his administrative office in the Polish Theatre at Oboźna Street to discuss with him some matters connected with his assuming a position of film production manager in Austria. While I was waiting for Sym, his neighbours, the Jaworscy, came and brought the news that Sym had been shot. I have never again come into any contact with the executioners of the death sentence, “Zawada” and “Mały”; they were not arrested in connection with this case, and I was not even taken for interrogation.
Dobiesław Damięcki was not working in Sym’s theatre. He would, however, often come there, quite tipsy, call Sym names for collaborating with the Germans and threaten him. In effect, after Sym’s execution the Gestapo focused their investigation on Damięcki, so he fled from Warsaw with his wife and they remained in hiding. The Gestapo circulated wanted posters with his photo. Yet they did not manage to seize him. Damięcki had nothing to do with the execution of Sym on 7 March 1941. Focusing the investigation and their entire attention on Damięcki saved the real executioners from suspicion and arrest. The details of the action of 7 March 1941, during which, at 7.00 a.m., the renegade Igo Sym was shot in his flat at Mazowiecka Street 10, are to be found in my article The Truth About Igo Sym printed on page no. 4 of “Tygodnik Powszechny”, issue 14, 7 April 1946. The details presented in this article are true and supplementary to my testimony today. Only two facts need to be corrected: Stanisław Łaniewski (codename “Roman”) died in Buchenwald as Stanisław Dziewicki, not Roman Dziewicki; and Claudius, a high German clerk, was liquidated before, and not after Sym’s execution, as it has been erroneously stated in the article. Additional explanations about the entire case are to be found in my article Behind the Scenes of Komedia, printed on page 5 of “Tygodnik Powszechny,” issue 42, 20 October 1946.
The report was read out. At this the hearing and the report were closed.