Master Corporal Adam Rataj, the “Children of Lwów” 6th Tank Battalion.
I was captured in Łuck on 21 September 1939, and then I was transported to Novohrad- Volynskyi (in the Soviet territory).
I was working in the forced labor camps for prisoners of war in the town of Karakubstroy (the Donets Basin), and then in the 24th war camp of the 3rd columns (called 24 lagpunkt, 3 kolonna) in the town of Ukhta, the Komi Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic.
We spent the whole “journey” from the Donets Basin to the north of Russia, that is, from the train station Stalino to the train station Kotlas, in tightly sealed, barred train wagons. Seventy people were fit into a 15-ton cargo wagon. There was almost no air. Every day we received 700 grams of bread and just enough fish soup to fill two lids of a Polish mess tin. In addition to this, one liter of water.
We arrived to Kotlas and travelled through the Northern Dvina River, and then the Vychegda River to the town of Ukhta on an ordinary barge overloaded with people to the point where it was impossible to stretch your legs. The Bolsheviks were feeding us all with the same thing on those barges, that is, a piece of raw fish and some hardtack per day. When it came to water, it was skol’ko ugodno [however much we wanted], meaning the Soviet staff was drawing buckets of water from the place where we were satisfying our bodily needs.
The work in forced labor camps in the north. The workday started at 6 a.m. and during summer ended at 7.30 p.m. There was no lunch break, nor a day free from work. The only exception was heavy rain.
Living conditions and hygiene. Those of us who met over 100% of their quotas were given warmer clothes and better food. The rest of us had to suffer from hunger and work without any breaks while freezing and ruining their health. We were living in dark barracks and lice accompanied us almost everywhere.
Mortality. One of the main causes for death was lack of medications, the second one was the camp physician, Mr. Moszyński. He was often playing into the Bolsheviks’ hands, meaning, if someone was sick but he didn’t have temperature over 38 Celsius degrees, he couldn’t receive sick leave from work. Thanks to the above-named “physician” (who was actually only a Master Corporal in the Polish Army), I fell seriously ill with pneumonia, and not until I lost consciousness did they transport me to the hospital, where I stayed for the whole winter of 1941. During my stay in the hospital around 30% of the patients died. I don’t remember their names because I myself was almost on the other side. However, paramedics were carrying away the dead right before my eyes almost every day.
The work conditions on the day of the outbreak of war between the Soviets and the Germans. The quotas were increased, Bolshevik okhranniks [guards] were forcing us to work with beating and pushing, and I experienced this myself. At the same time, they reduced the daily food rations, first by 25% and then by 50%.
During my stay in Donbass, one Cavalry Sergeant and one Corporal of the military police were taken away in an unknown direction, and there was no trace left of them. I can’t remember their names.
On 12 July 1941 I was transported together with the others from the northern forced labor camps to the jurski camp, and there I was conscripted into the Polish Army in the USSR.
Quarters, 27 March 1943