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Freedom at the age of 10

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My desire to fight
Jacek Kuroń Social activist
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No więc wojna, dla mnie przede wszystkim sprawa żydowska i potem to pragnienie walki, niesłychane pragnienie walki. Ja nieustannie zakładałem podziemne organizacje. Podziemne organizacje zakładałem, wynosiłem z domu gazetki, kiedyś jednej swojej podziemnej organizacji obiecałem, że pokażę rewolwer, bo wszystkim oczywiście mówiłem, że ojciec mój działa w podziemnej organizacji, bo to był mój sposób na organizowanie. No i do pokazania tego rewolweru nie doszło, ponieważ matka mojego kolegi – też, znaczy... też jak Kowalikowa wspomniana wdowa, ojciec jego był oficerem w oflagu – zaprosiła mojego ojca i powiedziała mu o wszystkich moich właśnie wyczynach. Co więcej, powiedziała mu: oddaję się w pańskie ręce, potrzebuję broni. Potem okazało się, że ona też jest konfidentką gestapo i też ją rozwalono, ale o to już mnie ojciec nie obwiniał. No więc właśnie różne podziemne organizacje i kiedy we Lwowie, gdzieś zaraz na samym początku to już wiem z historii, "Szare Szeregi" właściwie powstały dopiero za okupacji niemieckiej, była olbrzymia wsypa, tak że malowanie ulic było raz i to na gościnnych paru występach warszawski Wawer to robił, ale o tym malowaniu ulic ja właśnie z moją podziemną organizacją przystąpiłem do malowania murów i jakiś czas żeśmy to nawet malowali. Dość szybko trzeba się było ze Lwowa wynosić i dość szybko, znaczy nie tak – przepraszam – nie tak dość szybko, bo w czterdziestym czwartym roku. W czterdziestym czwartym roku ojciec wywiózł mnie, Felka, matkę i Wacka, takiego mojego ciotecznego brata, który się u nas wychowywał, bo mamę jego wywieziono, wywieźli Rosjanie, znaczy na Sybir. I przyjechaliśmy wtedy do... i mieszkałem później u ciotki w Zarytym, gdzie w dalszym ciągu próbowałem walczyć, wysadzać pociągi, na szczęście mi się to nie udało, zapewne bym rozwalił, znaczy żeśmy próbowali tory rozkręcać, ukraść ładunek wybuchowy z kamieniołomów, przy której to okazji spadłem z kamieniołomu. No i tak. Aha, jeszcze to powstanie miało być. Powstanie pamiętam, po prostu dowiedziałem się zaraz na początku sierpnia, że wybuchło powstanie i byłem strasznie, zupełnie porażony tym, że ja tam nie jestem i że powinienem tam być. Ale na ucieczkę z domu się jednak mimo wszystko nie zdecydowałem.

So, then, for me, the war was mainly about the Jewish issue followed by the desire to fight, a huge desire to fight. I was forever setting up clandestine organisations. I was setting up clandestine organisations, I was taking pamphlets from the house, I once promised one of my clandestine organisations that I'd show them a hand gun because of course I was telling everyone that my father was an activist in an underground organisation as that was my way of organising things. I never did show the hand gun because my friend's mother who, like Kowalikowa, the widow I mentioned earlier, his father was an officer in the POW camp, and she invited my father and told him all about what I was getting up to. What's more she told my father that she was putting herself in his hands because she needed to get hold of some weapons. Later, it turned out that she, too, was a Gestapo informer and was executed as well although that time, my father didn't blame me for her death.

So then, there were these various clandestine organisations, and when in Lwów sometime at the very start, I know this from history, the Grey Ranks were only really set up during the German occupation, there was a huge operation and lots of people got caught, so there was the painting of slogans on walls which was done by the Warsaw-based Wawer, but as far as painting slogans went, I and my clandestine organisation did that for a while. We had to leave Lwów pretty quickly and... no, it wasn't like that, sorry, we had to leave pretty quickly because in '44, in '44 my father took me, Felek, my mother and Wacek, one of my first cousins who'd been raised with us because his mother had been deported, the Russians had deported her to Siberia, and we came, and I later lived with my aunt in Zaryto where I carried on trying to fight, blowing up trains. Luckily, I never managed to do that, I'd have probably destroyed - I mean, we tried to disconnect the tracks, to steal explosives from the quarry where I managed to fall down the quarry. Oh yes, there was going to be that uprising. With the uprising I remember I found out at the beginning of August that it had started and I was terribly, completely shocked by it that I wasn't there and that I should have been there. Mind you, I drew the line at running away from home.

The late Polish activist, Jacek Kuroń (1934-2004), had an influential but turbulent political career, helping transform the political landscape of Poland. He was expelled from the communist party, arrested and incarcerated. He was also instrumental in setting up the Workers' Defence Committee (KOR) and later became a Minister of Labour and Social Policy.

Listeners: Marcel Łoziński Jacek Petrycki

Film director Marcel Łoziński was born in Paris in 1940. He graduated from the Film Directing Department of the National School of Film, Television and Theatre in Łódź in 1971. In 1994, he was nominated for an American Academy Award and a European Film Academy Award for the documentary, 89 mm from Europe. Since 1995, he has been a member of the American Academy of Motion Picture Art and Science awarding Oscars. He lectured at the FEMIS film school and the School of Polish Culture of Warsaw University. He ran documentary film workshops in Marseilles. Marcel Łoziński currently lectures at Andrzej Wajda’s Master School for Film Directors. He also runs the Dragon Forum, a European documentary film workshop.

Cinematographer Jacek Petrycki was born in Poznań, Poland in 1948. He has worked extensively in Poland and throughout the world. His credits include, for Agniezka Holland, Provincial Actors (1979), Europe, Europe (1990), Shot in the Heart (2001) and Julie Walking Home (2002), for Krysztof Kieslowski numerous short films including Camera Buff (1980) and No End (1985). Other credits include Journey to the Sun (1998), directed by Jesim Ustaoglu, which won the Golden Camera 300 award at the International Film Camera Festival, Shooters (2000) and The Valley (1999), both directed by Dan Reed, Unforgiving (1993) and Betrayed (1995) by Clive Gordon both of which won the BAFTA for best factual photography. Jacek Petrycki is also a teacher and a filmmaker.

Tags: Lwów, Grey Ranks, Wawer

Duration: 3 minutes, 14 seconds

Date story recorded: 1987

Date story went live: 12 June 2008