Remembering Occupied Warsaw

Polish Narratives of World War II

Erica L. Tucker

• Publisher: Northern Illinois University Press
• Year: 2011
• ISBN:
  9781609090296
• Topic: Historia
• Subtopic: Historia báltica

Offering a rare glimpse into the lives of those who lived through the German occupation of Poland's capital, this important ethnography explores how elderly residents of Warsaw recollect, narrate, and commemorate their experiences, thus showing how the cultural legacies of the occupation reveal themselves in contemporary Polish society. The individuals who are the focus of this study, all long-time residents of the Warsaw neighborhood Zoliborz, responded to the daily deprivations and brutality of the German occupation by joining branches of the Polish underground, ultimately participating in the Warsaw Uprising of 1944—during which their neighborhood was burned, but not destroyed—as soldiers, couriers, and medics. Using life histories and ethnographic fieldwork, Tucker examines the ways that her informants recovered from the rupture of war, arguing that this process was connected to efforts to rebuild the city itself. Remembering Occupied Warsaw makes an important contribution to studies of collective memory. A moving work of oral history, this book will appeal to scholars and students of anthropology, sociology, and East European studies, as well as general readers interested in Polish history.

Index

Act of Capitulation, 164, 232–33

AK (Armia Krajowa): and the aftermath, 237–38, 242, 245, 248, 250; background of, 48, 112–13, 164–66; capitulation of in October, 1944, 202–4, 220; and the conspiracy, 96, 111, 114–16, 133; and Jewish relations, 146, 152–54, 161, 259n5; narratives of capture, 202, 237, 240–42; relationship with the Red Army, 259n1; retreat, 180; and scouting, 127–28; and the Warsaw Uprising, 231–34

AL (Armia Ludowa), 153, 179, 231, 232, 241

Aleksandra Piłsudska Middle and Secondary School, 10, 111

Anabaptists, 30

Andrzejewski, Jerzy (Ashes and Diamonds), 234

antisemitism, 29–31, 37, 40–41, 80–81, 105, 162, 256n10

archival collections, plundering of, 91

Archives of Earlier Records, 91

Archives of Recent Records, 91

Archives of the Age of Enlightenment, 91

Arians, 30

Armia Krajowa. See AK

Armia Ludowa. See AL

arrests, 92–93, 243

art collections, plundering of, 91

Aryans, 72–73

Ashes and Diamonds: movie (Wajda), 234; novel (Andrzejewski), 234

assimilation, 30, 37–40, 141

Assimilationist movement, 256n11

AuBerordentliche Befriedungsaktion (Operation A-B), 75

Auschwitz, 16, 20, 21, 99, 105, 164, 199, 227

Baczyński, Krzysztof Kamil, 252

Baltendeutsche (Baltic Germans), 38

Baczyński Street, 121

Barszewska, 123

Bartoszewski, Władyslaw (Foreign Minister), 115, 122, 247

Basia (sister of Sławka and wife of Marek), 14, 15, 27, 28; and the aftermath, 221; and the Fall of Warsaw, 204; memories of civilian behavior, 182–83; memories of Old Town, 184–86; memories of the exodus, 205–6; narratives of death, 194; narratives of deprivation, 188–90; on remembering loss, 221; on the Siege of Warsaw, 54–56

Baszta, 154, 170

Battalion of the Defenders of Warsaw, 48

Battle of Kock, 55, 60, 64

Belarus, 5

Belvedere Palace, 78

Berling, General Zygmunt, 259n1

Białoszewski, Miron (Memoir of the Warsaw Uprising), 173, 180, 183, 186–87, 192, 252

Białowieża, 38

Białystok, 38, 259n1

Bielany neighborhood, 7, 121

Bierut, Bolesław, 241–42

Big Ghetto. See Warsaw ghetto

Biuletyn Informacyjny, 258n3

Black Madonna of Częstohowa, 27

blackmail, 19, 77, 144–45, 155, 157, 161–62

Bogumiła, 45, 46, 49, 69, 146

Bolsheviks, 61, 62, 102

Bór-Komorowski, General Tadeusz, 153, 164, 203, 231, 233–34

Borman, Mr., 81, 82, 150

Boy Scouts. See scouting organizations

Brandys, Kazimierz: Letters to Mrs. Z, 9, 10; Man Does Not Die, 233

Bratkowski, Stefan, 105

Brothers of the Maltese order, 116

Bug River, 68

Bund deutscher Madel, 52

Bureau of Public Transportation, 215

Burza (“tempest”), 164

Buszowna, Hala, 99

Callois, Roger, 43

Calvinists, 29

Capital’s Committee for Social Assistance (Stołeczny Komitet Pomocy Społeczny), 48

Carmelite nuns, Oświęcim, 21

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