HALINA WIŚNIEWSKA

Warsaw, 13 January 1948. Judge Halina Wereńko, a member of the District Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes, interviewed the person named below as a witness, without taking an oath. Having been advised of the criminal liability for making false declarations, the witness testified as follows:


Name and surname Halina Wiśniewska
Age 34 years
Place of residence Warsaw, Obozowa Street 100b
Religion Roman Catholic
Education Master of Arts in Philosophy
Profession secondary school teacher

By way of supplementing my testimony given on 23 April 1946, I hereby wish to make the following declaration:

During the Warsaw Uprising in 1944 I took part in operations as a nurse under the pseudonym of ‚Mila’. Initially, I was posted to the hospital at Zegarmistrzowska Street 4, under the command of captain ‚Nieborze’ from the ‚Miotła’ Battalion.

On 12 August (I’m not sure of the date), I was walking through the Ghetto to the Old Town, in the direction of the John of God Hospital. There the wounded were turned away, and a first-aid post was not permitted. Acting upon an order given by colonel ‚Wachnowski’, the commander of the ‚North’ group, we organised a hospital in the building of the school at Barokowa Street. Since we came under fire from the direction of Żoliborz, we moved the hospital to the house at Miodowa Street 23 – Długa Street 23. Towards the end of August, I don’t remember the exact date, it could have been after the twentieth, ‚Tarło’ promoted me to superior of the sanitary service in the Old Town. My tasks included supervising the provisioning of supplies and the work of nurses at all of the hospitals and first-aid posts in the Old Town, with the exception of unit hospitals. During this period I visited the following hospitals:

– At Freta Street 10, where Dr Szumigaj and Dr Lidia Wiśniewska worked.

– At Podwale Street 25, ‚Pod Krzywą Latarnią’, where Dr Janusz Anyżewski (currently an army physician in Modlin) worked during the final period – at that point the number of wounded might have been some 150. A certain number of wounded who were able to walk were led off during the night from 1 to 2 September to the hospital at Długa Street 23, and from there in part to the Śródmieście district (through the sewers) together with Dr Janusz Anyżewski. An unknown number of wounded were led away by the female nurses even after the area had been occupied by German units. In January 1945, a few days after Warsaw was occupied by the Polish army, I went to this location with father Michał Kordecki from order of the Pallottines in Częstochowa, Słowackiego Street 30, and saw the dead bodies of the wounded lying on the ground. I cannot determine their number.

– At Podwale Street 46, the ‚Czarny Łabędź’ (Black Swan) hospital (there were more than 30 wounded there); Dr Jastrzębiec worked there, and so did Maria Przyborowska, as a nurse.

– At Kilińskiego Street 1/3, in the left ground floor annexe, there was a first-aid station of the ‚Gustaw’ Battalion, in which there might have been some 30 wounded, and a first-aid station in the cellars of the right annexe, supervised by Dr ‚Tarło’, where there might have been some 30 wounded. I have no information regarding the fate of these stations after they were taken over by German units.

– At Długa Street 16 there was a hospital in one of the shops, with approximately 20 less severely wounded. Dr ‚Łoś’ worked there. The wounded treated at this location included the Sadowski brothers, Zdzisław and Ryszard (currently residing in Żyrardów, where they have their own house). As far as I know, the wounded from this hospital were taken away.

– At Długa Street, more or less opposite the hospital at Długa Street 7, there was a larger hospital, where nurse Janina Kwiatkowska – the sister of ‚Łukasz’ – worked. The wounded from this hospital were transferred at very the last moment, just before the arrival of the Germans, to Długa Street 7.

As regards the unit hospitals, I remember the hospital of the ‚Parasol’ Battalion in the Krasiński Palace at Długa Street, on the corner of Miodowa Street; it was located in the garrison church, or rather in the annexe of the church in the cellar. In January 1945 I saw a few bodies in this cellar. More pertinent information could be provided by the Pallottine Fathers from Ołtarzewo.

I would like to add to my previous testimony that when the sanitary group and approximately 50 wounded (these included the wounded from the hospital at Długa Street 7 and a small number transferred from other hospitals) were being led out from Długa Street 7 through Podwale Street, Zamkowy Square, and Mariensztat Street to the Church of the Carmelites, the SS men and ‘Ukrainians’ who were escorting us (the latter spoke in Ukrainian, a language I am fluent in) would shoot the patients who even momentarily separated themselves from our group. I had the impression that the escort was under orders to kill those wounded who didn’t walk properly. Marching at the end of the column, I noticed the bodies of some ten wounded, murdered during the evacuation march. I saw three of the wounded who could not keep up with the tempo being shot by the soldiers. When I was walking with a severely wounded man at the rear of column, one of the soldiers helped me, but he did so surreptitiously, making sure that the others did not notice.

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