I, volunteer Emilia Bartoszewicz, sister of Czesław Bartoszewicz, who was arrested on 13 April 1940, was deported together with my mother and sister on 13 May 1940 from the village of Ceperka in the district of Nieśwież, Nowogródek voivodeship. I was born on 9 November 1915.
I was sent to the Severo-Kazahstanskaya Oblast, to the Bajan kolkhoz. This was a Cossack [Kazakh?] kolkhoz, where we Poles would spend the entire year without any work; we would only be driven out from time to time to take part in subotniki [(a day of) unpaid labor]. There would usually be a few subotniki a week, and they paid us nothing, for they said that these were community actions. They later gave all of us passports, which were specially marked and valid for five years, at the same time forbidding all Polish women to go to town. We were under the supervision of the NKVD. We lived in a single hut with two other families: that of Ms Jadwiga Mielżyńska, who was accompanied by three children and her mother (the oldest child, a girl, was 4, her son was 2, and her infant daughter was 9 months old), and that of Żenia Adamczuk, whose daughter was born during our incarceration and christened in secret: my mother acted as the priest, my sister was the godmother, while a policeman’s son was the godfather – such were the christenings organized by us, poor Poles. The third family was ours – I, my mother and my sister. The hut was small, wet and cold. We heated it with branches and twigs that we carried in from the forest. We lived without work, but we had to pay rent – 15 rubles per month for each adult and 8 rubles per child. Bread was expensive, costing as much as 60 rubles for a pood. Nothing could be bought for money, the only option was barter – and for one pood of grain they wanted to take as much as they could. We were saved by food parcels from back home. If any one of us received a package, then he or she would have to share it with the others, for many of ours started dying; we had to bury them without coffins. The son of Ms Jadwiga, who lived with us, died that winter, on 24 February 1941. Two weeks later, her mother fell ill, and died on 25 March. She was buried 25 kilometers behind the Cossack [Kazakh?] kolkhoz, in Kirówka, a kolkhoz that was used for interring Russians and Poles. I accompanied this lady, and together we buried Ms Maria Jeleńska, may the Lord grant her eternal peace; we were accompanied by one other lady, Halina Czarnocka. We all came from the same district and the same township. Following Ms Jeleńska’s demise, our mother started suffering from rheumatism. There was no medical care, for there were no drugs, and so we had to fend for ourselves. The conditions were terrible.
Gradually, our Poles started running away from this kolkhoz, where there was no work, to ones where they could find employment. My sister also left, going with another Polish woman to the Przesnowski kolkhoz, which was closer to the city, and indeed there were more Polish families at that place. They quickly registered all the Polish families from our settlement there, so that we would be together. My sister, I, and a few other women left the Bajan kolkhoz to work at the new kolkhoz, for they promised that they would provide us with bulls to bring our families over. After we had toiled for ten days, they gave us the bulls to transport our families and belongings to the Przesnowski kolkhoz, to farm no. 3. To be precise, they provided us with a pair of bulls, upon which we placed three children and my mother, for she could no longer walk, and whatever belongings we had – all this, the people and the movables, had to be transported in one cart. The distance was some 50 kilometers, and we had to travel at night.
When we finally arrived, they gave us work. My sister was assigned to the labor brigade, while I remained at the farm, for I had to tend to my sick mother, who no longer rose from her bed. I worked in the gardens, watering and planting vegetables. In the summer I earned 140 rubles per month. The work was hard, for the water had to be drawn in barrels from the river and then carried by bulls. The watering, done at night, could take up to 12 hours. The foreman would not let us go until we finished our work. Four of us performed this job, all Poles. On 1 August my mother died. She was buried in the same township, in the Russian cemetery. And although her coffin was made from rotten planks, it was still expensive. Only Polish families attended the burial; none of our “minders” showed any interest. A large birch cross was put up on the grave, while some time later we noticed that the Russians themselves had started erecting crosses instead of placing stars.
In the winter I worked at winnowing grain. I earned between 60 and 70 rubles per month. The place where we worked was eight kilometers behind the farm – that was where the crops grew. The temperature would normally fall to minus 45 degrees centigrade, and since I didn’t have felt boots, my legs got frostbitten and I was unable to go to work. They then put me before a court. The trial was held on 8 January 1942. Since my witness was the nurse whom I had visited with my swollen legs, the case was dismissed.
After the amnesty, a great many prisoners passed by our abode, and so our families, too, waited, but no one came to our hut – neither my brother nor Jadwiga’s husband returned, and neither did Żeńka’s. Such was our bad luck.
Some time later Mrs Mielżyńska received a letter from her husband, in which he informed her that he had enlisted in the Polish Army, and that many people from our settlement had gone to Buzuluk to join the service. At the time I was unable to go, for I was tending to my sick sister. Then Mrs Mielżyńska received a telegram telling her to go to Guzar. On 19 March 1942 an orderly arrived, accompanied by a girl who had returned to the settlement to get her parents; she was already serving in the Women’s Auxiliary Service. I left with them. I arrived in Guzar on 10 May and enlisted in the Women’s Auxiliary Service on 15 May 1942. My sister remained in Russia, for she was still not completely well. As regards my brother, I know only that he was released from the camps and was said to have enlisted in Buzuluk. I don’t know his current whereabouts.