Jozefa Kwolek-Obierska

Jozefa Kwolek-Obierska was born to Jozef and Karolina (nee Biedka) Kwolek on 20 October 1925 in the village of Warszawka, Brody district, Tarnopol province, eastern Poland. Her siblings were: Eugenia and Edward.

Jozefa and her family were deported from Warszawka on the night of 10 February 1940 by the Soviets. She was then 14 years old. The family was given about twenty minutes to gather their things and leave the house. The Soviets said that they would not be gone for long. No one knew where they were going, so no one was sure what things should be taken. Jozefa was away at school on the day it happened – in her first year of high school in Brody, a nearby town. When she came home after school, a young man who had not been arrested came and told her that her parents were at the train station and that they asked him to tell me to go to them. Other members of her family (cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents) were also deported that day.

They were packed into rail cars, about 30 or 40 people in each. They were locked into these cars for the duration of the trip. The rail cars had some boards that formed beds or benches at each end. There was a small stove and some coal for heat. There was a hole in the floor that was used as a toilet. The only food they had was what they managed to bring with them from home.

It took two weeks to get to the labour camp called Sincibino, in the oblast of Arkhangelsk in Siberia. They were lucky as this settlement had barracks that had been built by two previous groups that had been deported from the Ukraine approximately 5 and 10 years before. Some of these people were still there. The barrack that they were allocated had two rooms and a kitchen with a large stove. A family was allotted to each room, including the kitchen. They were not allowed to communicate with the people that were already living in the settlement. The Soviets had spies that would stand at the window or come and sit inside, sometimes all day, to observe them.

The day after they got there, the commandant of the camp called a general meeting. He told them that they are to forget about Poland. That they will likely die here. He also told them that they must work to eat. Everyone who was 16 years of age and older was put in a work brigade.

Every week, the work brigades walked 12 km to the location where they had to cut down trees. There, they stayed in a large barrack, men, women, and teens, all together. The brigades worked from sunrise until sunset. At the end of the week, they walked 12 km back to the settlement. There was a quota for wood that was to be cut each day. Soviet supervisors counted the logs, placing a mark on the end of each log. During the winter, the logs were piled by the river’s edge. It was hard work and many times, to make the quota, after the supervisor had marked the log, the end was cut off and burned along with all the branches. The log was then presented again as part of the quota. When the number of logs by the river did not add up to the number that was noted as being cut, questions were asked, but of course, no one knew anything about it.

Being under 16 years of age, Jozefa, her brother, and sister, stayed in the settlement. The family was allotted 600 grams of bread each day and nothing else. Sometimes they had to wait in the bread line for a long time and many times they got nothing. After a year, they were allowed to join their parents at the camp 12 km away. The large barrack had been partitioned into small units so families could be together.

In June 1942, they found out that Hitler had invaded the Soviet Union. This gave them a measure of hope regarding their own fate. Then they got word that they were free and that the Polish Army was being formed in the southern Soviet Union. They didn’t know what to do. It was going on winter, and they thought that maybe they should stay until spring. Then on 31 December, the decision was made for them. The commandant of the camp told them that they were all leaving the next day. A train would be at the Konoshy station and that would be their only chance to get out.

On 1 January 1942, the family began the long journey south. They were lucky. The entire immediate family survived – her parents, sister, brother and Jozefa. Her grandparents died there.

They were told by the commandant that they could not go back to Poland, and they could not travel in the general direction of Poland. They were to head south to where the Polish army was being formed.

The journey south took about two months. They travelled by rail car, only this time the cars were not locked, although the conditions were not much better. When they left the settlement and got to the first large train station in Vologda, which took about a week, they were ordered to evacuate the rail cars. They had nowhere to go except out into the open area around the station. It was January and it was very cold. The station was filled with Poles trying to get to the Polish army. The Poles were sitting and lying, tightly together, half-alive. The men had to report to the office and they had to try and find shelter and a place to sleep, hopefully under a roof, but there was no guarantee that they would find anything.

They found an empty cattle car on a sidetrack that had been used to transport animals. It was dirty but at least offered a roof over their heads and would get them out of the snow and cold. Again, they had to report to the office to get permission to occupy the car. Once permission was granted, whoever had a bit of strength helped to clean out the car.

Typically, at every station in Russia, boiling water (kipiatok) was available. They did not require anyone’s permission to get this water. While some of them cleaned the car, others would get the water, still others tried to find some stoves, coal, and boards for beds. The boards came from other rail cars.

In the evening, they moved into the relatively clean and warm rail car. Every family occupied a spot where they could get warm from the stove. Near midnight, the rail car was jolted, once, twice and then a third time. Then a miracle, a train was travelling south from Siberia carrying other Poles and our wagon was attached. In this way they continued our journey south. At one point, the train had to stop because the tracks were filled with snow, and it stood in the open field for about a week.

During the journey, they got to have a bath at one station. The women and children went to one side and the men to the other side. While they bathed, their clothes were taken away and were disinfected. When they finished bathing, they found that all the clothes had been thrown into a large pile and everyone, naked, had to look for their own clothes.

They then arrived in Ashabad in Turkmenistan near the Persian (now Iranian) border. This was one of the locations where you could sign up for the Polish Army. It was a very happy time for them. Jozefa’s father was accepted into the Polish Army; her brother Edward was accepted as a Cadet. Jozefa, her sister, and their mother registered to be evacuated from the Soviet Union.

From Ashabad they travelled by passenger train to Krasnowodsk, a port town on the Caspian Sea. When the train began to leave the station, everyone began to cry and sing “Pod Twą Obrone” (Under God’s Protection) and it felt as if the rhythm of the train kept time to the hymn as they sang. There was joy, because they were leaving the boundaries of the Soviet Union. This was and is an unforgettable time in Jozefa’s life. One thing she remembers is that at Krasnowodsk, they were served rice soup made from fish heads, with some of the heads still in the soup.

From Krasnowodsk, a ship took them across the Caspian Sea to Pahlavi in what was then Persia and is now Iran. The trip took about a day and a half. They were packed like sardines. The waters were very rough, and many people got seasick. In Pahlavi, they were given thorough baths and were disinfected. This was a transit camp where they lived in tents and tried to regain their health. From Pahlavi, they were taken by truck through the Alborz Mountains to Camp No. 2, near Tehran. Again, they stayed in tents and had an outdoor kitchen.

After five months, they went by train to another transit camp just outside of Karachi, Pakistan. During that time the teenagers got together and put on a show. Jozefa remembers that they danced the Polonaise and some gypsy dances. The show was for some American troops stationed in Karachi. After a month, they left by ship over the Indian Ocean to Eastern Africa to Tanganyika (now Tanzania) to a Polish refugee camp called Tengeru. This was around the end of 1942.

A time of intensive work began. Schools were organized but there were no books. The teaching staff dedicated a lot of time to prepare lessons. Children and teenagers, recognizing the hard work of the teachers, applied themselves to their lessons, and tried to make up for the lost time spent in the work camps. A scouting movement was started. There were scouting events, jamborees, and many organized activities and field trips. They lived in round huts with banana leaf roofs. Because faith was very important to them, everyone volunteered to build a church. The church still stands today and is used by the local people. Many of the friends that were made during this time are still friends today. They keep in contact although they are now scattered all over the world.

When the war ended, the Polish Army was moved from Italy to England. The re-unification of families began. In 1948, Jozefa, her mother, and sister left Tanganyika for England to reunite with her father and brother.

Her mother’s brother had been in Canada since 1913, so her mother asked him to sponsor them to Canada. After several months, they received papers allowing them to emigrate to Canada. After all the formalities were complete, they boarded a ship for Canada. It was January 1949.

Her parents, Jozef and Karolina died in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. Her sister Eugenia, now a widow, still lives in Sault Ste. Marie. Her brother Edward and his wife also live in Sault Ste. Marie.

Jozefa married Jozef Obierski, and they raised their two children: Zdzislaw and Teresa, in London, Ontario.

Jozefa was a long-time member of the Ladies Auxiliary of the Polish Combatants Association, Branch #2, in London. She volunteered in the kitchen and worked on Cavalcade and with the Cracovia Dance Group.

Jozefa passed away in London on 1 November 2019, at the age of 94 years. She was buried in the Holy Family Mausoleum.