FRYDERYK KORSAK-BARTONEZZ

Głuchołazy, 7 February 1947. Judge Stanisław Gozdawa Leonowicz heard as a witness the person specified below. Having been advised of the criminal liability for making false declarations and of the significance of the oath, the witness was sworn and testified as follows:


Name and surname Fryderyk Jan Korsak-Bartonezz
Date of birth 14 October 1891
Names of parents Jan and Maria
Place of residence Jarantowice [village] 6, Nysa county
Religious affiliation Roman Catholic
Criminal record none
Occupation farmer

I confirm in every detail the deposition which I made in Jarantowice on 18 December 1946, and I hereby testify:

From 1939 to 1941 I held the post of commanding officer of the ZWZ [Union for Armed Struggle] District comprising Zawiercie county, Lubliniec county, Blachownia county and the city of Częstochowa, and subsequently I was appointed chief of the information services of the Zagłębie and Śląsk region.

My entire family was engaged in the underground activities, that is my wife Irena, my married daughter Krystyna Froncisz, and my son Jan Antoni, then a minor.

As the result of a denunciation the organizational cells were partially exposed, but since we were in possession of some vital information, we managed to forestall, at least to some extent, the repressive action of the occupational authorities (with Gestapo in the lead) and many people were thus saved. Only the organizational headquarters fell prey to the Germans and the following people were arrested: my deputy, Zygmunt Sokół (finished off in March 1942 in Auschwitz); the chaplain, father Jaworski, first interned in Auschwitz and later in other camps from which he has come back, physically devastated, only a few weeks ago; my wife Irena, interned in the concentration camp in Ravensbrück, from which she came back ill in May 1945; my married daughter Krystyna Froncisz, interned in the forced labor camp in Bergstadt in Śląsk, and my son Jan Antoni, deported as a minor to the forced labor camp in Gruttenberg (Oleśnica county). Our property was confiscated and I was sentenced to death. After successfully escaping in November 1941, I hid in Warsaw, where I worked, until the outbreak of the Warsaw Uprising, as a special information officer in the Home Army Headquarters.

On 11 August 1944 I received an order to leave Warsaw and establish communication with the “Kampinos” operations group. At the same time I was tasked with leading out a group of people who were working for the signal office of the Home Army Headquarters and the so-called Government Delegation. Pretending to be foreigners, we left Śródmieście on 12 August and we were directed to an assembly point on Grójecka Street, at the so-called Zieleniak [market square]. As we were waiting for further transport, we witnessed many outright grisly scenes taking place at the assembly point. Zieleniak was controlled by a unit of dead-drunk “Ukrainians” from the SS-Galizien division and “Mongols” from Kamiński’s group under the command of some Ukrainian in an SS uniform with an Untersturmführer ’s insignia. At the time of our arrival, the square had already been packed with people of all ages and social groups. Petty bourgeoisie and laborers predominated. Before our very eyes, both underage girls and older women were being raped and executed with a shot from behind.

The climax came with a mass execution of some 150 men who had been brought in the afternoon from the following streets: 6 Sierpnia Street, Hoża Street, Krucza Street, Wspólna Street, and Emilii Plater Street. It was carried out in the following manner: the convicts, randomly selected (some were in the uniforms of the guards) were placed by a concrete wall near the building at the entrance to the square, and there was a gate (without a door) in that wall and a large pit just behind it, apparently dug especially for the occasion. The convicts, in groups of 30–40 people, were coming one by one to the gate, and when they were crossing through it they were being shot from the back of the head, and as a result they were falling into the pit. Two “Ukrainians” in German uniforms were taking turns shooting and the execution itself lasted for about an hour. The rest of the people gathered in the square had to watch the massacre passively, and were later marched, while being beaten and called names, to the Western Railway Station, from which transports were being sent to the Pruszków camp.

As for our group, we were under special guard as foreigners, and all of us survived. Nevertheless, we were utterly robbed. In the evening we were taken in a car to the Pruszków camp, where our papers were minutely examined in the so-called green train car, in which Major Sendel had his headquarters.

On 13 August (Sunday) in the evening we were all released and told to leave for the Reich without delay. I managed to avoid transportation with one of the female liaisons and, having escaped the camp, we completed our task and returned to Warsaw.

What happened to the rest of people, I do not know, since I have not had any contact with them since. I suppose, however, that the majority of them, if they were not killed at a later time, must have survived.

Having read the report, I have nothing to add in the case.

I would like to explain that Korsak-Bartonezz is my proper and legal name, under which I was, during World War One, called up for military service in the Russian army as a reserve warrant officer; later, in the Polish Legions I had the rank of Lieutenant, in the Polish Army the rank of Captain, and I earned the rank of Major in the Home Army during my underground service. To the occupational authorities I was known exclusively as Korsak, and I used the nom de guerre “Jan Szary” in my underground work; I had the proper papers of a foreign citizen.

At this the report was closed and signed.