On 14 February 1946 in Warsaw Associate Judge Antoni Krzętowski, delegated to the Warszawa-Miasto Branch of the Main Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes, interviewed the person named below as a witness, without taking an oath. The witness was advised of the obligation to speak the truth and of the criminal liability for making false declarations, and testified as follows:
| Name and surname | Aniela Tomaszewska |
| Parents’ names | Franciszek and Wiktoria, née Piątkowska |
| Date of birth | 25 July 1894 in Warsaw |
| Place of residence | Warsaw, Stanisławowska Street 75, flat 56 |
| Occupation | engaged in trade |
| Education | four classes of secondary school |
| Religion | Roman Catholic |
| Criminal record | none |
My husband, Bronisław, was the chairman of the Association of Small Traders in Warsaw, which was named "Strength through Unity". This was also the place of employment of my son, Zbigniew Hubert Tomaszewski.
On 3 February 1943, following the denunciation by one of my son’s colleagues from a clandestine Polish organisation, whose surname I am unable to provide at this moment, but undertake to report presently, all of the officials of “Strength and Unity” were arrested by the Gestapo. My husband was arrested in our apartment at Grzybowska Street 69, flat 3, and my son in our daughter’s apartment at Prosta Street 50. Our daughter, Zofia Smardzewska, was arrested together with our son.
My son was subsequently shot by the Germans – 12 February 1943 in the Chojnowski Forest near Piaseczno, in the township of Stefanów, where he was taken from Pawiak. 74 people were executed together with him. The victims of this execution were buried by the Germans in a mass grave, from which on 9 May 1945 – acting on my own initiative and with the consent of the Polish authorities – I exhumed my son’s body and buried it at Powązkowski Cemetery.
The former President of Warsaw, Słomiński, and a certain Tadeusz Sobieszczański, were also exhumed in addition to my son. Their exhumations were also organised by their families, but only, as far as I recollect, in July 1945. The other bodies are still lying in the grave. In the majority of cases the bodies were intertwined, or even joined with each other, as if embracing, and I therefore think that the victims were buried while still alive.
Apart from those mentioned above, I now know the surnames of some of the other persons who were executed along with my son: Stefan Mulewicz, son of Franciszek and Władysława, arrested by the Germans on 6 February 1943, and Bolesław Łyczewski, a tailor. I learned these details from the papers that I found upon the abovementioned men while searching for my son’s body. I have determined the date of Mulewicz’s arrest on the basis of a Pawiak deposit receipt that he had with him, for detainees would have their belongings taken from them and a receipt issued on the day of their arrest. I found an identical receipt, dated 3 February 1943, on the body of my son.
In April 1943 I was summoned to the German police precinct located on Jasna Street, where a German policeman informed me of my son’s death. He told me that the information had been passed on from Pawiak, but that they did not state a cause of death. Only the date of death, 12 February 1943, was given.
I knew that my son was dead beforehand, for I was informed of the event by Stanisław Dangel, who in 1943 – as far as I recollect – was imprisoned in Pawiak (turned in by the same Gestapo informer, my son’s colleague from the organisation). Dangel informed me of my son’s death while he was still at liberty. He must have had some contacts with persons imprisoned in Pawiak.
I know from my husband, who on 10 June 1945 returned from Mauthausen (he had previously been through Oświęcim and Oranienburg), that amongst the personnel of Pawiak were persons who facilitated contacts between detainees and the outside. My husband mentioned the surname of one Doctor "Wacek" – an ophthalmologist who during the occupation worked as the Polish physician at Ujazdowski Hospital, and also took turns of duty as an ophthalmologist at Pawiak.
I don’t know his present whereabouts or status.
My husband and daughter (she was also imprisoned at Pawiak, and subsequently transported
to Oświęcim, where she perished) also mentioned the surname of a certain Łapińska, a female Pawiak warden whom the prisoners called “Dear Mother”. I received smuggled messages from my daughter through Łapińska›s agency.
I don’t know her present address. I know that she was sent to Oświęcim in 1944, but is still alive. Maria Poterańska saw her in Kraków in the spring of 1945. Poterańska is not in touch with her now.
If I have an opportunity to establish the surname of “Doctor Wacek”, and maybe also his address, then I will submit this data to the citizen judge.
The wife of Stanisław Dangel, Helena Dangel, worked for some time as an internist at Pawiak. She currently resides at the following address: Warsaw, Czerwonego Krzyża Street 13.
I would like to correct my deposition: Only my husband, son, daughter, and the chairman of the "Strength through unity" association, Stefan Szczepański (currently residing in Radość near Otwock, where he owns a house), were arrested on 3 February 1943, while the remaining officials of the association were detained only two weeks later. The following were arrested and put in Pawiak prison along with them: one Wirt (residing in Radość), Rymsza (residing in Warsaw, in the Praga district) and Jankowski (residing in Pruszków), who told me that all these arrests were due to the fact that the Germans suspected that the association’s premises were being used as the headquarters of the main Polish clandestine organisation.
In connection with the above, the following were also arrested and detained at Pawiak: Tadeusz and Henryk Dzięgielewski. Currently they are both employed at the Polish YMCA in Warsaw.