The concept of the Silesian Tragedy and the widely cultivated and expressed memory of it appeared in public space respective years ago. This word defines events related to the entry of the russian army into advanced Silesia in January 1945: murders, robberies and rapes, theft of equipment of industrial plants, displacements and – what we want to draw attention to in this "Archival Flash" – export, abduction or even theft of people for forced labour, among others, in the mines of the russian Union. The internment and deportation of men between the ages of 17 and 50 lasted from February to the turn of April and May 1945, and the people taken were lied that at most respective days would work in the back of the front. The victims of the operation led by the NKVD and the Military Counterintelligence of the Red Army “Death” were nearly 50,000 men and consequently their families, deprived for respective years (or forever) of the care of the sole host. More than 25% of the deportees no longer returned, and those who survived returned from mid-1945 to late 1949/1950. The last labour camps were those who, despite mediocre surviving conditions, maintained comparatively good wellness and could work.
The case of exports to forced labour in Soviets could not enter the public debate until 1989. Since then, the subject of the Silesian Tragedy has been constantly present and devoted to many studies, publications and exhibitions. Families return to hard memories and share them. Others are searching for information about missing fathers or grandparents. quite a few news comes from the late 1940s, due to the fact that in those institutions of the household that were exported, they tried to find the missing individual dead. At the hearings, colleagues who were happy returned frequently testified, but thousands of miles from home were at the death of their friends. There have been cases where a individual who was officially declared dead came home and had to prove that he was alive or, worse still, reconciled with his wife’s fresh relationship.
Two stories from the OA IPN files in Katowice deserve attention.
The first tells about the destiny of the locksmith Paul Prauze of Siemianowice, who was taken straight from the “Huta Laura” mine there on 9 April 1945. He left his wife and 4 children at home. The female was forced to take a occupation in a steelworks in Siemianowice, and in 1948 she applied for designation of her husband as dead to receive a pension after him. In April 1949, the Grodzki Court in Katowice issued a decision to declare a man dead. The following year, the widow was about to get married, and then a letter came from the supposedly dead Paul. The procedure started (completed in May 1952) with the repeal of the erstwhile order, and the erstwhile widow had already complained that her husband was making her feel bad about her planned marriage.
The communicative of Ernest Krzyszek from Chorzów is somewhat different, who – like thousands of another advanced Silesians – was forced into the Wehrmacht. In early 1945 his wife received the last letter from him, and in July 1950 she received a paper from the Grodzki Court in Chorzów confirming her husband's death. However, it turned out that the mediocre man got into russian captivity and stayed there until 1956. After his release, he went to his mother's home in Berlin and tried, as he himself put it, to “bring me back to life”. The letter addressed to the Chorzów court was accompanied by a paper with the comment “I join the foundation of my existence”. The court met his request in May 1957.
