On 7 February 1947 in Głuchołazy, the Municipal Court in Głuchołazy, with Judge Stanisław Gozdawa Leonowicz presiding and with the participation of a reporter, L. Marynowicz, interviewed the person named below as a sworn witness. Having been advised of the criminal liability for making false declarations, of the provisions of Article 107 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, and of the significance of the oath, the witness was sworn and testified as follows:
| Name and surname | Irena Bartonezz, née Zawadzka |
| Date of birth | 3 October 1895 |
| Parents’ names | Antoni and Weronika |
| Place of residence | Jarantowice 6, Nysa district |
| Religious affiliation | Roman Catholic |
| Criminal record | none |
| Occupation | housewife, lives with her husband |
I hereby confirm in its entirety my testimony of 18 December 1946, and testify as follows:
In the years 1939–1941, I worked together with my husband in the District Command of the Union for Armed Struggle, and later in the Zagłębie-Śląsk District as head of the industrial information department. My daughter Krystyna (married name Froncisz) worked as a field liaison, and my then thirteen-year old son Jan Antoni as a liaison of the unit’s staff.
Following the exposure and escape of my husband, who had been condemned to death, on 20 November 1941 at 8.00 a.m., I was arrested by the Gestapo and transported on that day together with other arrestees to the prison in Lubliniec. During the search of my flat – which was conducted by the Gestapo and the police, headed by the Gestapo men from Zawiercie, one Schulz and one Hurke, who was a Wachtmeister of the German Schutzpolizei in Myszków – my flat was turned upside down and completely looted, while our valuable library (of some 2,000 volumes) was loaded into a car and transported to the paper mill and destroyed under supervision of the local police and Volksdeutchers.
When I arrived in Lubliniec, I was chained, and then several times interrogated in the Gestapo headquarters, where I was beaten and harassed, and stripped of my dignity as a Pole and a woman. On 6 December 1941, I was transported under heavy escort to the prison in Opole, where I was interrogated anew and suffered further harassment which defies description.
In March 1942, I was deported to a concentration camp for women in Ravensbrück, where I arrived on 7 March 1942. After the introductory formalities had been completed, I was assigned to a block and forced to perform various tasks, including such work which was most arduous and beyond my strength. I was given number 9769. In August 1943, I was deported to Neue Brandenburg, to an aircraft components factory, where I fell gravely ill and was consequently taken back to the camp in Ravensbrück in September of that year. I stayed in that camp until its evacuation at the end of April 1945.
During my stay in the camp, I was continually beaten and harassed. It was very often the case that I didn’t receive packages from my family although I had to confirm their receipt. Twice I was placed in a so-called Jugendlager [youth camp] in order to be finished off with gases, but I managed to get out of that place thanks to the help of my companions in misery.
The executions were usually carried out during the morning and evening roll calls. I managed to escape the fate of “guinea pigs”, but as an ill person, I was treated in a most brutal manner by the female wardens and the camp doctors.
I remember the surnames of some executed women from the period of my stay in Ravensbrück: Jadwiga Litwinowicz from Warsaw, Dębowska from the vicinity of Grójec with her daughter Krystyna. Unfortunately I don’t remember any more names, although there were many of them. I well recall the following surnames of some of the female camp wardens who were notorious for their cruelty: Kowa, Mandel, Erich, and the doctors: Schiedlausky, Rosenthal and Dr. Winklemann, and a dentist Hellinger. There was also one female doctor, but her surname escaped me.
The food and sanitary conditions in the camp were below par and generally demeaning. During the evacuation we didn’t get anything to eat and had to survive on raw potatoes, and as a result, our route was marked with corpses of women who had died of hunger and exhaustion or had been shot by the SS men.
I remain at the disposal of the authorities and hereby repeat my testimony under oath.
The report was read out – I have nothing more to add.
I would like to explain that when the surnames of the soldiers of the Polish underground from the Home Army in Katowice were made publicly known, I was promoted to the rank of second lieutenant during the war, and my husband’s surname, Bartonezz, was supplemented with his underground pseudonym, Korsak.
The report was read out and signed.