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The first workers to be saved - letter to Berlinguer

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The trial of the Ursus workers
Jacek Kuroń Social activist
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That was why when this sense of a storm brewing I began to think about the possibility of some mass campaign. I mean that's the direction my thoughts were taking. We supported each other enormously, then suddenly we learned that the trial was taking place in Leszno, on Świerczewskiego Street, of the workers from Ursus who'd walked out onto the tracks. Because they... the strike at Ursus saw people stopping work and going out onto the tracks to stop the trains just where two big transit routes passed through so that even Brezhnev wasn't able to get to a conference of worker's parties being held in Berlin. He had to fly by plane which was something he hated doing. This was the imperative of the situation of workers who had no organisation and no information. They had no organisation and as a result, no information. When we undertook an operation it was for communication, for information, to establish a dialogue with others without whom it would have been impossible, we would have had to have taken to the streets to do something spectacular. And here, they chose a train, I think, intuitively. To this day I don't know the people who thought this up although I had a lot of contacts among them all. But it was a first-rate idea. First-rate! But the first seven accused were tried for sabotage, and they were in danger of receiving the death penalty behind closed doors, people weren't even being allowed in the corridors. Their defence was made up of duty lawyers who didn't even state why the accused had gone on to the tracks. The trial was conducted by accusing some people who'd gone and removed a locomotive from the tracks. There was a locomotive there for shunting, the protesters were going to be dispersed by running the shunting locomotive at them but after a few attempts at this, they approached the driver and ordered him to get out of the locomotive and they removed it from the tracks. This was completely out of the blue, with no social, political context of a worker's demonstration or strike. And there we were in the corridor, there was a habit of 'corridor sitting' whenever there was a trial because it was obvious that they wouldn't let us into the trial itself, so we'd make for the corridor. We called it 'corridor sitting'. A big group of us arrived and we started straight away to establish contact with the parents, and one of the boys showed us his back which was black and blue all over, and they told us about the 'road to health'. We began collecting money on the spot to help these families. A hugely important role in contacting these people was played by Heniek Wujec and my Gajka. They struck up friendships with these people very easily. We found new solicitors for them for the appeal trials. And Antek Macierewicz said, because the women were complaining that now they had no one to shovel the coal, or the pick the fruit from the fruit trees or dig the garden because their men were locked up in prison while the women were left alone with the children so they couldn't go anywhere or fix anything because they had to mind the children. Antek said, Czarna Jedynka - the older scout group called Czarna Jedynka would do this. And this was that first-rate idea which later grew into KOR, KOR which went out to collect money and to find lawyers, these were operations conducted by KOR. It was being run at the tempo we had adopted at that point. But this idea that you go there and meet them was fantastically fruitful, because people went not just from Czarna Jedynka, Heniek Wujec went there and was very active, from Czarna Jedynka there was Piotrek Naimski and Wojtek Onyszkiewicz as well as Andrzej Celiński and others. They began to be given addresses of others and from them addresses of still others which they collected, but just then, I was conscripted into the army for three months.

Dlatego w tym momencie, gdy się zrobił taki nastrój burzy, ja myślałem o jakiejś masowej kampanii może. Znaczy w tym kierunku myślałem, myśmy spierali się bardzo i nagle dowiedzieliśmy się, że odbywa się w sądach na Lesznie, to jest na Świerczewskiego, proces pierwszej grupy robotników z Ursusa, którzy wyszli na tory. Bo oni... strajk w Ursusie wyglądał w ten sposób, że przerwano pracę i ludzie wyszli na tory i zatrzymywali ruch pociągów – akurat tam dwa wielkie, duże tranzytowe trasy przebiegają – że nawet Breżniew nie mógł do Berlina na konferencję partii robotniczych dojechać. Musiał lecieć samolotem, czego on bardzo nie lubił. Nas... to było... to była ta konieczność sytuacji robotników bez organizacji i informacji. Bez organizacji, a w związku z tym bez informacji. Jak się robiło akcję to dla... komunikacji... dla informacji, dla porozumienia się z innymi, bez których się nie da rady, trzeba było wyjść na ulicę i zrobić coś spektakularnego. I to oni tu wybrali pociąg, jak myślę, intuicyjnie, jakby do dziś dnia nie znalazłem tych, którzy to wymyślili, choć miałem przecież wśród nich już wtedy bardzo duże kontakty. Ale to był genialny pomysł. Genialny! Ale pierwsza siódemka była sądzona o sabotaż i groziła im kara śmierci przy drzwiach zamkniętych, nawet na korytarz nie wpuszczano. Bronili ich dobrani adwokaci z urzędu, którzy nawet w ogóle nie mówili z jakiej okazji oni weszli na te tory. Ten proces odbywał się w ten sposób, że sądzono jakiś ludzi, którzy wzięli i zrzucili z torów lokomotywę, bo tam manewrowa, lokomotywę – miano ich rozbić manewrową lokomotywą, która na nich wjechała, żeby oni odstąpili, po kilku takich takich próbach oni podeszli kazali wyjść maszyniście i zdjęli lokomotywę z kołami jednymi z toru. Otóż tak jakby no nie wiadomo, ni z gruszki ni z pietruszki, bez społecznego politycznego tła i kontekstu tego, demonstracji robotniczej, strajku to było robione. I tam myśmy na korytarzu – taki obyczaj był korytarzowania, że jak jest proces, to wiadomo, że na proces cię nie wpuszczą – idziemy na korytarz. "Korytarzuje" to się nazywało, siedzi się na korytarzu. I nas tam duża ekipa przyszła i zaczęliśmy zbierać i od razu kontakt z rodzicami i taki chłopak nam pokazał plecy zupełnie sine, no i opowiedzieli nam o "ścieżkach zdrowia". I myśmy na miejscu zaczęli zaraz zbierać pieniądze na pomoc dla rodzin. Tam niesłychaną rolę w kontaktowaniu z nimi odegrał Heniek Wujec, Gajka – moja. Oni mieli taki łatwy kontakt i momentalnie jakoś tak się z nimi zbratali. Postaraliśmy się dla nich o adwokatów na rewizyjny proces. A Antek Macierewicz powiedział, ponieważ te kobity się żaliły, tam nie ma im kto węgla zrzucić, nie ma kto tam czereśni zebrać, ogródka skopać, no, chłop siedzi, tu sama z dzieckiem nie mogę wyjechać, tu dzieci, to dzieci trzeba przypilnować, naprawić coś. Antek powiedział "Czarna jedynka" - starszoharcerska grupa "Czarnej jedynki" – to będzie robić. I to był ten genialny pomysł, od którego dalej zaczął się KOR, KOR wychodzący, bo to już zbieranie pieniędzy i staranie się o adwokata to już była akcja KOR-u. Ona była w naszym dotychczasowym trybie. Ale ten pomysł, że się tam idzie i trafia na nich, zaowocował genialnie, bo ludzie poszli nie tylko z resztą "Czarnej jedynki", chodził tam właśnie bardzo energicznie. Działał tan u Heniek Wujec, to z "Czarnej jedynki" Piotrek Naimski i Wojtek Onyszkiewicz, ale także Andrzej Celiński i inni. I zaczęli dostawać od tych adresy następnych, od tych adresy następnych, zbierać, no ale mnie w tym momencie wysłano na trzy miesiące do wojska.

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: Leszno, Świeczewskiego Street, Ursus, Czarna Jedynka, KOR, Henryk Wujec, Gajka Kuroń, Antoni Macierewicz, Piotr Naimski, Wojciech Onyszkiewicz, Andrzej Celiński

Duration: 3 minutes, 39 seconds

Date story recorded: 1987

Date story went live: 12 June 2008