Prior to 1939 respective 1000 Gypsies (Romów) lived in the territory of the Volyn Voivodeship. The exact data on the number of Gypsies in pre-war Poland are unknown. Although estimates were made for the authorities, due to the nomadic mode of many Gypsy strains, these data are not complete. Despite the applicable regulations, the gypsies did not always registry in the offices. Also, the gypsy population settled in mainly southeastern Poland II, was not listed in the general censuses as a separate group. In turn, the effort to estimation the number of Gypsies in the years of the war complicates the fact that at the time of its outbreak, the population moved by fleeing the occupiers, being subjected to forced deportations, repressions, collective murders, detentions and displacements.
My parent remembered the coming songs, the gypsy music and the burning fires in the clearing between the 2 chicks, where they frequently stopped. All of this impressed especially erstwhile the sun was going west.
My grandma mentioned all the time gypsy pans, forged, durable and perfectly warm. The taste of the dishes was unique. The most taste was scrambled eggs with 30 eggs, bacon and a small sweet cream.
In the 1930s, a gypsy female told Granny that the household would live in a lake home and that my grandpa Peter would drown in that lake. Who would believe that then? After leaving Volyn, my grandparents settled in the Kujawy Mountains in a lake house. 1 August 1958, my grandpa was very anxious. He rapidly ate scrambled eggs for breakfast, pulled out a boat and persuaded the neighbour Marciniak to fish. They sailed to the mediate of the lake and abruptly the boat fell over. Grandpa shouted to young Marciniak "Save yourself, or I will surely save myself." Grandpa was a large swimmer, but unfortunately he got cramped and went down. I remember my grandma and my parent screaming perfectly. I can inactive hear them today.
The gypsies alongside the Jews were peculiarly dulled by UPA cultural group. This is proved by the writings of the poet Papusza (Bronislavy Wajs). In these memoirs – poems and storytellers, the poet describes the horror of constant escapes through the real hunting of Gypsy rolling stock, which were held by Nazis and uppers. Papusz besides reminds of the “Captain soldiers” – russian partisans who, wandering among the forests and marshes of Volyn, defended the Gypsy groups against the deadly genocide raids of UPA. The poetic legacy of Papusza contains a certificate of martyrdom of Polish Gypsy. This is evidence of the Nazi-Bander extermination conviction on this community.
Papa sacrificed the demolition of the Gypsies in Volyn poem. Let me just quote a fewer verses:
Don't give anyone, God,
To live in war.
In the worst poverty, in bloody tears
How many hearts survived –
a judaic child,
Gypsy children with mediocre mother!...
***
They're following us, chasing us,
But they're afraid to go into the large forest.
Around the woods, out of the woods
The partisans are fighting the battle.
The Gypsies cry, God is asking,
At night they go to get something, they seldom bring anything.
Two, 3 days without food,
hunger happens all day,
And sleep on hunger.
Eyes don't close,
Only the stars look...
* * Oh, * *
Black berries I collected around,
We brewed and drank various herbs,
blueberry-we ate,
it's a small fish again,
the horses killed were cooked,
every 3 weeks they rot there frequently –
It was precious meat!
Sometimes the potatoes go to hell,
Those gypsy marzipans,
once a week – 10 or twenty
You hit the mediocre gypsies...
During the German occupation, the Gypsies and Sinti were subject to various types of repression and large-scale murders. They were sterilized, locked in ghettos and deported to extermination camps, murdered by Einsatzgruppen, Wehrmacht, SS, field gendarmerie and auxiliary police officers.
Ukrainian nationalists, and present their descendants deny that they murdered Gypsies surviving on the erstwhile Polish Borderlands.
Ukrainian historian Mikhail Tyaglyy analysed UPA's propaganda literature and concluded that the wandering Gypsies were among the enemies who, alongside Poles, Jews, “Moscals” and communists, had to be disposed of. They were besides frequently identified as supporters of russian guerrillas and spies.
In the days of the alleged anti-Polish OUN and UPA action Gypsies considered to be Polish (e.g. the Polish Roma strain utilizing Polish language and belonging to the Roman Catholic rite) were exterminated due to the torturers' inclusion in the Polish cultural area. It should be noted that there were 2 substantially different gypsy groups in Volyn, which differed clearly with the dialects of Gypsy. Band members distinguished them on the basis of their cognition of Ukrainian. It happened that a Polish group of gypsies took Ukrainian names to avoid persecution from Ukrainian bands.
A gypsy female named Gula reported:
“We got caught by the banders, they actually took us out of the forest we were standing in. They brought [...] to the village. They sent us all to school, along with the children and the elderly. They locked the doors and windows, placed all the exits. They waited for an hr or so. You don't number time out of fear. They came in a van, brought in a keg of gasoline, flunked the school around, and set fire. What happened inside, there are no words – 1 squeak inhuman and a cry. any started jumping through windows, but they were about to be hit by axes or pitchforks and sometimes bullets.” Guli managed to escape through the window. She had a burning back. Her full household and dozens of another Gypsies were murdered in the fire.
Władysław “Niunia” Krzyżanowski-Dębicki mentioned that the banders assaulted his household in forests in the area of Świnarzin and the last minute from the execution were rescued by Polish guerrillas. Ryszard Krzyżanowski provided information about the killing by Ukrainians of a group of gypsies surviving in barracks in the woods close Kowna. Tadeusz “Karol” Wajs told that after a successful escape of a group of Gypsies from a prison in Krzemieniec, the uppers murdered the wife and children of 1 of the rolling stock members with axes.
On the basis of the accounts of the fewer who survived POURAJMOS (this word in Roma means to consume, to eat, and to find the Holocaust of the Roma and Sinti during planet War II) 1 can effort to draw out strategies for the endurance of the Gypsy population. It included, first of all, hiding places in forest passages, in grain, frequent change of place of residence, dispersal of rolling stock into smaller groups, joining russian guerrillas, bribing police or guards, providing shelter by the local population, and sometimes, though rare, settled lifestyles in towns, or hiring Gypsies-experts by the occupying apparatus. Undoubtedly, the gypsy way of life, the deficiency of attachment to the earth and the habit of wandering besides increased the chances of survival. The gypsies had greater support from the local population due to their craft skills (cowels, boilerkeepers, musicians) and the general sympathy of the population for gypsy culture.
"Dando" by Joszkiewicz-Krzyżanowski, who thus remembered the Ukrainian manhunt in the area of the village of Kisielin:
"It was Saturday night for Sunday. And the bander roundup begins [...]. Let the Ukrainians drive us out of this forest! And Poles, old and tiny children, all who did not escape to Vladimir! The gypsies were separated by 3 steps from them. They have covered axes, forks, hoes, rifles [...] 1 of their elders, a Pole, arrives, baptised to the Ukrainian – Gołębicki and says: «We have about the Gypsies here! What are you Gypsies crying about?» – And we cry, «How can we not cry like death before our eyes?» [...] They've gone aside, the older Ukrainians alone, and they're saying, "What are these Gypsies expected to kill for?" They do not play any politics [...]. Gołębicki comes back and says to us: «What Gypsies? What nation? Polish or Ukrainian?» – And my brother [...] says a gypsy nation. And we Polish all, Roman Catholic. So he: «You will not beat». And they let us go, what a miracle... And look – these Poles were beheaded by blunt sabers.”
Volyn was a tragic place. Here were mass executions of Gypsies by Germans and Ukrainian nationalists. This out-of-camp extermination took on tremendous proportions. Jerzy Ficowski recorded memoirs from Papusza's rolling stock.
From the memories of Tadeusz Wajs:
"And here Ukrainians began killing Poles. 1 friend, Partian Józek, fled to Equal, and his brother was caught, tied hands and legs with wires, cut out the tongue and threw into the Horyn River. On the next day 1 Ukrainian gypsy reported that we are Poles. 1 of our boys, who grazed the Ukrainian cow, told another shepherd to slaughter us at night. The boy came crying: Let's get out of here, or they're gonna kill us tonight! And he fled, this son, to Rosochy, 3 kilometers from Bucharov, to his brother-in-law. The remainder went all the way to the cortical forests, due to the fact that we heard there was a Russian partisan. And those Rosoch guys were expected to leave the another day. There was an Ukrainian ambush in grain on the Germans, and close, in the barn, there were as many as 8 Gypsy families. The next day they were expected to come to us. Half of them left Rosoch – 4 families. They were caught by Ukrainians and only 2 children, which were in life due to the fact that they hid gold there, saw them fucking Gypsies and fled back to Rosoch. Mommy had to go get the remainder of the Gypsies, but erstwhile the news came that they were killing them there, she didn't go. Those of Rosoch were killed in Kobylanka. We went to Pikla in the powiat wiachelski. There was a sawmill – specified a ghetto on the Gypsies, but the russian guerrilla drove the Germans out of this sawmill, the sawmill burned and freed the Gypsies. We went to Kobylanka, we were about 24 families, and together with us – 2 russian guerrillas. We started asking questions, pulling tongues – who killed them, our Gypsies. We found out: the boy of the chief of Kobylanka was the chief there and another. And we caught a full group of them sleeping, and to Andrei's staff. There were 7 of them Ukrainians, and we armed ourselves in the plows. – In any time we hear that in Rosochach there were Gypsies – Mikołaj Markowski and others – and went to Szumsk, to Chodaki, not to Pikla. At 7:00 a.m., the Ukrainians caught them, tied them with barbed wire to Markowski's hands, Władysław Wajs and others who were with them – and in the evening, around 8:00 a.m., they killed them with axes and knives. We were afraid to leave Pike. There were groups of russian partisans, we were already sticking to these forests close the Pike. 2 kilometers from us, there was a forest house, and there lived Vladek Kowalski. It was his mother, Halinka, who was killed in the Cross. ‘.
It should be remembered that gypsies are characterized by a historical attitude towards the world.
The consequence is the silence of their demolition in the years of planet War II. Only young
The gypsies, those who heard about the war from the elders, but did not experience it, interrupted the silence.
The accounts written by Jerzy Ficowski are based mainly on a reliable reconstruction of what happened in Volyn. Of course, they do not concern the full period of war, but mainly 1943–1944. Most frequently there are motives for escape, uncovering a safe house, a place to stay.
Polish and russian guerrillas frequently appear in the memories as allies of the Gypsies, although there were besides good people among the tormentors (Germans, banderists). specified was, for example, the SS, the title character of the communicative by Edward Dębicki, who warned the Gypsies in Włodzimierz that they were threatened with being locked up in a deserted ghetto.
Papa's 1974 photo. It was the world's first gypsy poet to compose her poems. She paid a immense price for it, like anyone who overtakes their nation. Gypsies are not the nation of the book, they have no recorded history. The gift of writing was not an advantage to them, rather the opposite. It has always threatened that the educated Gypsy will become a justice and will justice his own brothers," said Krzysztof Krauze, manager of the movie about Papusz on Polish Radio.
Gypsy rolling stock
