Volunteer M. Strzemecka, born 9 January 1908 in Habiczany in Wołyń.
Since 1934, I worked as a nurse at the garrison hospital in Równo. With the outbreak of the war, I was mobilized and I remained at my post until the entry of Soviet troops into Polish territories. On 20 December 1939, they arrested my brother, officer of the State Police from the Investigation Department. On 13 April 1940, I was deported together with my entire family, consisting of nine members including my sister, my sister-in-law and her [illegible] and children aged from 4 to 15 years, deep into Russia, Kazakhstan, Petropavlovsk Oblast. The transfer lasted for 14 days in sealed unheated freight cars under escort in terrible unhygienic conditions, with little food and a lack of water. Upon arrival at our destination, they put us on a kolkhoz [collective-owned farm] and left us to the mercy of fate. We lived in small mud houses – several families together, for a high fee. In addition, we were bitten by bugs and other insects. There was a strict ban on leaving this area and we had to report to the kolkhoz representative every five days. We were made to do only physical work like sawing trees in the forest in clouds of mosquitoes, mixing clay, making kiziak [fuel], etc.
From the very beginning, we worked hard in threes to feed such a large family. Prices rose every day; imported items were depleting and we rarely saw bread in our house. There were times that we swelled up because of starvation. Very often, tears were our only food. Naked, hungry, and treated by the Soviet authorities in a brutal way, we waited for mercy. In a very short time after arriving in Siberia, they issued us passports valid for five years.
The day came, shortly after [the Polish-Soviet] agreement, when we got udostovereniye [certificates] on the basis of which we could change location. Thereafter, we were treated a little better. Having heard about the setting up of the Polish Army, I tried to get into it, thinking that my professional education will be useful in a military hospital. I encountered great difficulties and only through a doctor, Major Gajek, was I able to join the military hospital in Guzar on 14 February 1942, where I worked as a nurse helping with an epidemic of typhus. Despite the difficult conditions, I did not get sick. At the end of March 1942, I left for Persia with the hospital crew to organize the evacuation of a hospital in Pahlavi. I was there up to the end of the evacuation, after which I went to Tehran. In Tehran, I completed a six-week course organized by the Polish Red Cross that verified my competences. In July of 1942, I worked again in the evacuation hospital in Pahlavi. After the evacuation I was appointed to Military Hospital No. 3, where I currently work as a ward sister [RN in charge of a ward].
I know nothing about the fate of my family.
Place of stay, 8 March 1943.