Corporal Władysław Rokicki, 50 years old, farmer, married.
On 10 February 1940, at 3 a.m., in the settlement of Jałówka, Prożoroki commune, Dzisna district, NKVD officers showed up. After searching the place, they ordered us to put on our clothes and go outside. When we went out, we were going with them from house to house as they were collecting settlers from each of them. In every house they left two of their people as guards, so they wouldn’t let anyone in or out. In this way we reached the last settler’s house. They let us take 500 kilograms of baggage, then all families were loaded onto sledges and transported to the station. At the station they loaded us into railway wagons and closed them up. There were 40–50 people in each wagon. We were standing in the station for two days. After that the train set off and we were traveling for 12 hours until we reached Kotlas. During this time we got food twice and they gave us 5 rubles per person.
In Kotlas we were unloaded, and after one day’s stop they loaded us onto sledges and transported us to the rural settlement of Krosty, Tojemsky region. There were barracks full of snow, and we were to live in them.
After three days, my family stayed there and I was sent to some other rural settlement 40 kilometers away to work in the forest. I was working there cutting trees and living in the general barrack. On average I was earning 2 or 2.5 rubles a day, and the payment was every 10 days. I was eating at the canteen where I could buy oat soup, groats and sometimes even meat, however, my income didn’t cover the food. Once a month, on Saturday after work, we could get a pass to see our families living in the neighboring rural settlement. Nevertheless, on Monday you had to be at work at 5 a.m. We were working from dawn till dusk.
In the rural settlement there was a first aid station where a nurse was on a duty. We were bathing once a week. On 20 May they drove me out to a rural settlement 80 kilometers away from the place where my family was staying. I was felling and rafting wood there. I was working there for nine months. There was a canteen and the food was similar. We were living in a barrack. My income amounted to 30–40 rubles every 10 days. 10% of my income was deducted for the NKVD. My family was living by systematically selling the things we had brought with us. In August I was released and I came back to my family. I was working there at barrack construction. I was earning up to 5 rubles a day. There was a shop in this rural settlement where we could buy bread (1 kilogram for a working person and 400 grams for a non-working person). To buy shoes you had to have a coupon from the NKVD post. On 3 November 1941, we were transported to Kotlas on ships. We rented a common rail wagon there and left for Kogon. From Kogon I was going from town to town looking for our military organization. After two months of wandering around Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, we settled in a kolkhoz, Kejnas No. 2 in Jambyl Oblast in Kazakhstan. We settled ourselves in a dug-out and we were working at ditch digging. For our work we received 800 grams of wheat a day for six persons. In February 1942, I left for Chokpak, where the Polish military forces were being organized, and there I joined the Polish Army in Kermine.