WLADYSLAW MARIAN DĄBROWSKI, son of Antoni and Zofia Osiałkowska was born 31.01.1902 in Warsaw. In 1916. Władysław Marian (hereinafter Władysław M.) completed six classes of common school and then continued his studies in the Society of Vocational Courses for Employees Metal Industry in Warsaw, where he completed a 3-year cycle science. In December 1918, as soon as Poland regained its independence after 123 years of partitions and non-existence, at the age of less than 17 he ascended to volunteer to the Polish Army, taking the military oath in the Tabor Squadrons. When it turned out that Władysław M. had previously belonged to sports organizations, he was assigned to the cavalry. It was a time of tension and a war between the newly reborn Republic and Bolshevik forces. The 1920 War, in which Józef Piłsudski was the commander of the Polish Army and the Head of State with Symon Petlura, Chairman of the Directorate of the Ukrainian Republic People's, after their conclusion of the political and military alliance They went to Kiev, which was in the hands of the Red Army. 18-year-old Władysław Marian went with them to his first war. According to the premises of the alliance, Poland relinquished territories of the Pre-Partition Republic to the east of the established line of the border with Ukraine and pledged to fight together with the Bolsheviks, while the Ukrainian People's Republic relinquished rights to the lands of Eastern Galicia, which she had previously occupied as the West Ukrainian People's Republic. Kiev was conquered in May 1920; however, the quickly reorganized and reinforced Red Army forced the Polish forces to retreat in the direction of Warsaw.

 

During the final battles, Władysław M. was twice severely injured in both legs. He was driving a cart with heavy ammunition. During the shelling, the horse pulling the cart was killed, and he himself was driven over by the wheels of the cart. Treatment of these serious injuries lasted a very long time, the wounded Władysław M. could no longer participate in the further phase of the Polish-Bolshevik war in 1920. He regained his health and fitness in walking after the end of the war. Then he could start to arrange his civil life. He found employment in a private company in Warsaw related to the aerospace industry and the production of avionettes. In 1922, a strike broke out in these factories and Władysław M., as one of the leaders of this action, was kicked out by factory owner and was left out of work. In Warsaw, there was unemployment at the time. Having graduated early from school with a mechanical profile, Władysław M. had a technical secondary education. With this qualification, he was registered in the unemployment register office and, through these public registers and the qualification recorded there, he was found by the army, in which he already had previously served. He was approached with a job offer and told: “You will be admitted to the Police in Nowogorodek, at The position of the gunsmith!". Wladyslaw M. had the task of dealing with weapons, taking care of rifles taken from invaders, i.e. German, Austrian, Soviet, various types and different brands that had to be repaired. His duties also included inspections for which he went to the field, and checking the condition of guns in police stations. In time, the army sent him as a specialist gunsmith for an entire month to weapons factories in Radom, where he checked for quality and efficiency of manufactured weapons there. During service with the police, Władysław M. further trained and specialized in the profession of gunsmith.

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In 1922 in Warsaw, he met his future wife, Urszula Rozperska, an employee in a haberdashery shop. On 9 July 1922, the young couple married. Two years later, Urszula gave birth to their first son in Jerzy Warsaw on 6 October 1924, on 22 Wilcza Street. In 1928, a younger son, Zbigniew, was also born in Warsaw. The mother took care of her family and raising her children. When Wladzio was 6 years old at the time, he was sent to 1st grade to a high-level private school, led by the Nazareth sisters, all having a pedagogical education. He attended this school for the first three years. In the meantime, a modern state school was built, to which he attended for the next three years. After Graduating from the 6th grade he went to middle school, completed three classes and passed to the 4th, but the German assault on Poland prevented further learning. This was followed by the treacherous occupation of the eastern territories of Poland by the Soviets, who crossed the Polish border on September 17, 1939.

Decision made in such circumstances by the Polish military authorities, all police officers, military, KOP officers, members of the organization paramilitary, senior government officials were ordered to withdraw from this region of the country to the territory of Kaunas Lithuania, where they were interned in accordance with the 5th Hague Convention, in force from 1927. On 18 September 1939 the first Polish soldiers crossed the Lithuanian-Polish border. In the following days, more soldiers appeared both individually and in groups or entire branches of service. The decision to withdraw to Lithuania or Latvia resulted from the assumption of opportunities for easier evacuation from these countries to the West, e.g. to France, where the entire Polish government was going. According to the order of on 19 September 1939, issued by the Provincial Headquarters State Police in Wilno, senior constable Władysław M. Dąbrowski went to Lithuania together with the police and the army, while his family remained in Nowogorod. The internment camp for Polish military, to which Władysław M. was sent, was in the seaside resort of Palanga. The Lithuanian authorities had chosen camps for internees that were primarily summer towns or spas, in which in the autumn there were many free rooms, but which were unlikely to be adapted to the conditions winter. The Lithuanian side tried, in general, to arrange the accommodation as best as possible. Living conditions of Polish soldiers in internment camps were generally satisfactory, although they were quite diverse in different camps.

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From the first days, internments in almost all camps were organized in a wide collective scale and single escapes. Prisoners with their own cash had the opportunity to get through regular airliners from Kaunas to Stockholm thanks to special travel visas. Others resorted to local services of fishermen taking them for an appropriate fee to Sweden. Some prisoners took the opportunity to leave the camp and get to neutral Sweden, but most interned remained in the camp, in the hope that allied England and France will come to Poland and that Poland will quickly recover its freedom and they will return to the country. But that did not happen. Since the autumn of 1939, Lithuania and Latvia transferred interned soldiers who voluntarily volunteered to depart to Germany and the USSR. From November 1939 to February 1940 to the Union Soviet 1,706 soldiers left Lithuania, and from 111 soldiers left Latvia. Of those sent to the USSR, non-commissioned officers and privates were allowed to return to their homes, while the officers were sent to the NKVD camps in Kozielsk and Starobielsk.

Wladyslaw M. found himself in the Kozielsk camp. Voluntary departures of internees from Lithuania to the USSR coincided with the ongoing Winter War, i.e. the Soviet-Finnish armed conflict lasting 105 days, from 30 November 1939 to 13 March 1940. This war showed all the weaknesses of the Red Army, which suffered huge losses. The resistance of the Finns was so great that the Soviets lacked sufficient weapons - their supplies did not reach the battlefield because Soviet aircraft were unable to land in the area of permafrost, through which the front ran, crashed against the ground while landing and the Soviet technology was not advanced enough to prevent this. The Soviets also did not have a qualified workforce and were forced to look for professionals among the Polish prisoners held in camps, which reversed the fate of some prisoners of Kozielsk and saved them from the Katyn massacre, which happened a few months later.

 

Władysław M.’s specialization was a chance for life for him. All the specialists, among the military and police officers held in this camp, were sent to work to modernize Soviet aviation. Prisoners transported behind the polar circle – to the forced “Ponoj” labour camp in the Murmansk region on the Kol Peninsula (for a long time the bastion of Russian and then Soviet armed forces), to build a military airport (construction of NKVD No. 106). The Soviet Union planned construction of a series of airports along the western border with Finland. Władysław M. belonged to a group of prisoners employed in the installation of aircraft-enabled devices safe to land in glaciated terrain. During the construction of this airport and the modernization of the Soviet air fleet, transports of war equipment was sent by sea to the non-freezing port of Murmansk. From there, the unloaded equipment was transported by horses or reindeer to the camp where Polish prisoners worked on the assembly and improving this equipment. Living conditions in this camp for the group of prisoners responsible for this specialist work, were much better than in the camp in Kozkielsk. The prisoners had more freedom, and they got new clothing. The colleagues of Władysław M. survived this period of forced work, with only two of this group of prisoners dying in captivity. Władysław M. stayed and worked in this camp until the outbreak of the German-Soviet war and the so-called “amnesty”, to which took place in the summer of 1941, and which allowed the release of Poles transported deep into Soviet Russia and held in camps and prisons.

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After the deal was made between the USSR and the United Kingdom, the NKVD set up the so-called four “Poamnesty” camps where the Polish prisoners from the labour camps were forced to go. One of them was the camp in Suzdal in the region Włodzimierz, where some of the prisoners were transferred from the Kol Peninsula (1,967 people). After the conclusion of the Polish-Soviet Sikorski-Majski agreement of 30 July 1941, the prisoners were released in August and could be recruited into the army Polish army on the territory of the USSR. Władysław M. joined the Polish Army on 25 August 1941 at the camp in Suzdal, where Col. Nikodem Sulik announced the agreement concluded with the USSR. On 15 September 1941, Władysław M. was incorporated into the 14th Infantry Regiment and assigned to the staff platoon.

 

The former police officer's gunsmith skills were immediately appreciated, which decided his role in the newly forming Polish army. After the evacuation of the army to Iran in the spring 1942, Władysław M. was transferred to the Command Company of the 11th Riffle’s Battalion. The gunsmithing was supposed to be his main role in the military and to train to the standards of new guns. On 1 February 1943, he was sent on a gunsmith course in the British Workshops in Abasia, Cairo, Egypt (the 533 Base Workshops). Service and training in Egypt were also an opportunity to explore local monuments, get to know the local attractions, and get acquainted with the local population.

 

Władysław M. was moved to the 14th Wilanski “Żbików” Rifle Battalion (formed on 25 October 1942 in Khánaqín. After completion of the gunsmith course on 20 April 1943, Władysław M. was assigned to the command company of the 14th Battalion.

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After Władysław M. crossed to Lithuania in September 1939, his family remained in Nowogorodek. The fate of Polish families of prisoners of war, imprisoned in Soviet camps, were already known in society. This was also the case on 13 April 1940, when at midnight The NKVD broke down to the door of the Dąbrowski apartment. They were given little time to pack and then they were brought to the railway station. The journey into the unknown took place in closed cattle wagons with a hole in the middle, to deal with physiological needs. During the journey, the exiles were released from the wagons into fresh air only three times, not given any meals, only hot water, the so-called "kipiotok", with which they brewed their own tea. They rode like this for two weeks, passing the Volga River and the Ural Mountains and then the train went on a further journey south. They reached Aktyubinsk, a peripheral city in northern Kazakhstan from where, under escort of three Soviet military, they were brought to their destinations by trucks. These were open trucks and it was raining, so the exiles were imprisoned wet, and drove soaked for a very long time. In the evening, they reached Kirov's kolkhoz. The Poles were deployed around the local families, to brick houses. The Dąbrowski family was placed in one room with a Russian family. The hostess invited them to lunch, and for the first time, they ate Ukrainian borscht. It turned out that they were Ukrainian settlers who had been sent there in Tsarist times.

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The exiles were not allowed rest after their long journey in inhumane conditions. Already on the second day, the less than 16-year-old Wladek and other exiles were sent to the tractor brigade to plow the fields for the cultivation of grain. During work, the Poles ate meals together with Russians. This rhythm of the functioning local economy, based on the forced work of Polish exiles, was interrupted by the outbreak of war German-Soviet in June 1941. Wladek, after completing the tractor course, was assigned a new tractor, which he ploughed until 13 March 1942 (i.e. until his appointment to the Polish army).

 

The first men released from the camps were admitted to the Polish army. The Wladyslaw family knew his whereabouts when he was in prison camps in Lithuania and then in Kozielsk. After transferring the captives to the Kola peninsula, the news about him broke off. The family finally learned from Mr. Zawadzki, a soldier from Nowogródek, whose family were in exile with the Dąbrowskis. He informed them of the fate of Władysław M., about the fact that he got out of the camp and was already accepted into the Polish army. Thanks to his skills from serving in the police, he was ranked as a gunsmith in the army. He could weld and that was a valuable specialty. The Senior Constable became a Sergeant in the military.

 

The Military Commission was in a brick building, and there were Russian officers, but also Polish military dressed in British uniforms. Determining the suitability for military service of recruits was carried out by two doctors, one Russian and one Polish. Before the medical board the boys had to undress, and the doctors examined their general state of health. Władek was given category A, which meant ability for military service. After the medical examinations, they were given a meal and went to sleep. On the second day, together with three young Polish officers from England, they were taken to the Aktyubinsk region, and from there further by train to the south, but in to an unknown destination. They reached Guzar where there was a huge camp and spent a week waiting there.

 

After a week, they were told that at noon all boys born in 1923 and 1924 were to appear for a meeting in the square. There were about 150 of them, they passed medical examinations again, which lasted until the evening. From all those examined, 14 boys were selected, they were put in trucks along with three officers and then the transport set off in direction of Tashkent in Uzbekistan. The officers did not tell the recruits the destination and what their military purpose was. In Tashkent, everyone went to the railway station and set off on further travel. They reached Jangi-Jul station where the Headquarters of General Anders and the Command and Staff of the Polish Army in the USSR was located. The visitors walked to the “Training Battalion” camp. Two infantry companies were already formed, and a third company was to be formed.  The boys were accommodated in a tent for the night. The next morning, after bathing, they got uniforms with Polish eagles. Within days, they adapted to the new conditions and circumstances. Waddek’s colleagues from Nowogrodek were already there.

 

The new recruits soon started exercises, equipped with automatic rifles with scopes and the best combat equipment. A special team was created to protect the staff. It was supposed to be an infantry assault unit, also trained on parachutes. General Anders did not trust the Soviets, so he decided to create s completely dispositional army commander's unit capable of immediate use, including to act in the event of a threat from the Soviets. A unit he could completely trust, created of people ready to defend the staff to the last. General Anders issued secret order, on 17 April 1942, in which he ordered the formation of the Special Battalion called the “S” Battalion, created from the sons of soldiers and policemen. Wladek was a son of a police officer, that's why he found himself in this battalion. The command of this formation was entrusted to Captain Zbigniew A Kedacz, who in 1939 during the September campaign three times saved General Anders from being killed.

 

After the German assault on the USSR, the conclusion of the Sikorski-Majski Agreement in July 1941, and the creation by General Władysław Anders of the Polish army in the USSR, the captain immediately volunteered for service by the General's side. The battalion became the basis of the restoration the 15th Poznań Lancers Regiment in the Polish 2nd Corps, as an armored formation. Later, after evacuation of the Polish army to Persia in 1942, the “S” battalion transformed into a reconnaissance regiment; the 15th Armoured Cavalry Regiment, returned to the old name – 15th Poznań Lancers Regiment. General Anders was the commander of the original Poznań Lancers Regiment in the years 1919-1921.

 

The soldiers of this unit went through serious exercises, trained to fight even under the supervision of instructors trained in the art of judo martial arts. Trainers practiced judo with long knives on straw puppets. They had to learn to hit the neck with a knife so as to be able to kill the enemy. Projected jumps in exercise parachutes did not come to fruition because they were not delivered any aircraft. Captain Kiedacz commanded the "S" Battalion with a hard hand. He was strict and demanding both towards his own subordinates, as well as towards himself. He paid a lot of attention to the regulations. He immediately picked up even the smallest shortcomings. Nevertheless, his lancers were extremely attached to him.

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After completing the training, when it came time to join the fighting, the battalion went from Jangi-jul by rail to Krasnowodsk, the port on the Caspian Sea, where they got on dirty passenger and freight ships and departed towards the port of Pahlevi on Persian shore. Upon arrival, the battalion was stationed in this city for a month. It was a time of rest and of strengthening the organism. There were no military exercises, and the soldiers often underwent medical examinations and received injections to protect them against diseases such as malaria or typhus. After a month, buses driven by Persians came the camp to take the soldiers to Iraq. They drove on winding roads through the high mountains, over chasms, which made for strong emotions. They were passing near Baghdad, heading to the Khanaqin, located on the Diyala River, by the tributary the Tigris River. The water in the river was clean, but it could not be drunk, but you could take a bath. In Khanaqin they were accommodated in a preparatory camp. On the second day the camp grew to great size after the Carpathian Lancers Regiment was brought there with the task of training the recruits. The Carpathians were well armed, and their presence on the Middle East was necessary to protect the oil fields from Kurds. After training the recruits, the Carpathians left.

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The battalion was equipped with 3-person light armored Morris vehicles. Not long after the battalion received Loyd Carrier vehicles, and armored Artillery tractors. Each squadron received several of these vehicles and six anti-tank guns, used by the British for the first time in 1942 at the Battle of El Alamain against the Axis troops. Weapons had to be well guarded because the Kurds, clearly Pro-Germans, tried to steal Polish weapons.

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Christmas 1942 found Wladek and his comrades in Iraq. During this Christmas he met his father Władysław M. for the first time since their separation in September 1939. They celebrated Christmas by a palm tree decorated like a Christmas tree. Wladyslaw M. (the father) was in the ranks of the 11th Sagittarius Battalion (company of command) of the 5th Kresowa Infantry Division. In May 1943, the Polish units were moved West of Kirkuk. Near the camp of Wladek’s Transport Company, there was a little bear. They had taken this animal from the ladies taking care of Polish orphans evacuated from the USSR with the Polish army. To bring the orphan children a little fun, they bought a small, also orphaned, live bear. But then it came time for the children to travel to India, where they were to be taken care of by the Maharaja Jam Saeb Digvijay Sinhji. The Maharaja had decided to grant shelter to Polish orphans near his summer residence in Balachadi. He built the Polish Children’s Camp there. Unfortunately, the growing bear could not go with the children and had to be placed in the care of someone else. It was adopted by the Transport Company intended for Transportation of heavy military equipment. The little bear became with the famous bear Wojtek, who went with the Polish army on their entire battle route.

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The Armored Regiment to which Wladek belonged, was destined for later struggles in Italy. Therefore, after completing training in Iraq at end of 1943, it was transferred, through Jordan, to Palestine (in the territory from the Egyptian border to the Gaza region). Soldiers mostly coming from the plains of the Polish Eastern Borderlands had to learn to fight in the mountains. The exercises were in the mountainous areas of Lebanon and Palestine. Earlier, yet while in Iraq, along with his regiment, Wladek had been sent to Egypt for a three-week training course on armored weapons. He had the opportunity to meet with his father for the second time. After the course, Wladek returned to his unit in Iraq. During Christmas in 1943. the regiment was transferred from Gaza to Egypt to pursue exercises near Alexandria. In Heliopolis, near Cairo, they carried out by more specialized training. The regiment was then sent to Port Said and embarked on a sea journey to Taranto in Italy. The convoy of ships consisted of 50 units, the whole 15th Poznań Lancers Regiment was deployed on several ships. This was the first stage of the transfer of troops of the 5th Borderland Infantry Division under the command of General Nikodem Sulik in the territory of Italy where they landed on 24 February 1944.

The regiment was immediately deployed to the mountainous areas. At the end of February, the Poznań Lancers reached Civitanova del Sannio, located j 656 mt above sea level, where they were accommodated in local homes. The front line had already moved away from there. When Wladek and the Regiment arrived to towns, the inhabitants initially treated them with distrust and fear. On the first Sunday after the accommodation, the soldiers wqent to Holy Mass at the local church, that had been partially damaged by the retreating Germans. When they marched down the streets of the town, they were amazed at the absence of people. Only older married couples went to church, and were followed by the women themselves, while their husbands went to the local bar. As a result, the priest celebrated Mass mainly for the Polish soldiers. When he gathered donations to the tray, the soldiers had British pounds from the pay they received from the British command. Each of them threw banknotes in the tray, and filled the basket quickly. The priest stopped collecting donations and instructed the church to bring from the sacristy a bigger basket. They brought out a laundry basket and continued collecting, the whole basket was filled with British pounds. The priest, caught with such generosity and piety of these "guests," he later rebuked the inhabitants of Civitanova, putting them as an example of the piety and honesty of those Polish soldiers.

Fame about the generous and pious Polish soldiers quickly spread throughout the Apennine peninsula. Everywhere where the Polish army and soldiers later appeared they went to Mass and the priest already knew that the tray would be filled and warmly greeted the Polish faithful. Sunday Mass in Civitanova became an event that changed the relations between the inhabitants and the Poles. They explained the reasons for their dislike of foreigners: shortly before the arrival of the Poles, Civitanova and the surrounding area had been occupied and controlled by the Germans, who kidnapped three women, drove them out of town and raped them. They called the residents and admitted to committing rape but did not kill. They emphasized that, as opposed to them who only raped, Poles already moving along The Apennine Peninsula, are barbarians who rped and killed women. The residents of Civitanova who had never had contact or heard of Poles, believed these false announcements and applied simple defensive tactics, hiding young people and children in basements to protect them from alleged Polish rapists and murderers. However, soon all their fears disappeared, the coexistence of the inhabitants of Civitanova and the Polish soldiers did not cause any difficulties. On the contrary, friendly relations were established. Wladek mentioned that the local girls offered them the best wine and homemade cakes, bringing them to the armored vehicles. Everywhere where Polish soldiers were stationed, they left a positive impression, maintaining the good name of the Polish Army.

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During the period of being in Civitanova, Wladek did not have the opportunity to meet his father, but he knew where he was, and he had contact with him. At the end of March 1944, the 6th Lwow Infantry Brigade was transferred to the Sangro River, where her 17th Rifle Battalion, to whom Władysław M. belonged from 21.03.1944. He was assigned to the economic platoon of the command company, and identidied the designated section of the front, after its earlier stabilization during winter battles in 1943/1944. The “Lwowians” were tasked with keeping defensive positions in the Mainarde Mountains and protect them from expected German attacks. The zone of these mountains was of strategic importance for the entire grouping of allied forces.

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After spending time in Civitanova, the Poznański Lancers entered the his first battle section on the Italian front on 6 April 1944. in Capracotta, a mountain village located 1.421 mt above sea level, with task of taking over from the 2nd Carpathian Rifle Battalion. There were only about a hundred residents left in the town as, in the perspective of future actions in this area almost everyone else was displaced by the Allies to Puglia. There were only a few left in place - families needed to provide the most important functions, so there was a doctor, pharmacist, parish priest, municipal officials, midwife, and other necessary persons.

A squadron was assigned in Capracotta – the 1st,  2nd. and 4th of the 15th Poznań Lancers Regiment. Wladek belonged to the 4th squadron. From the journal of the 15th  Poznań Lancers Regiment, it is known that the Regiment had the task of gripping the 1613 hill, from where to ambush a convoy of the civilian population carrying food and escorted by Germans. This convoy, according to the testimony of a local civilian, was to pass every morning by road to Gambareale – Palena next to hill 1613. The patrol was commanded by Edward Wojciechowicz of the 1st squadron, set off from Capracotta on 13 April 1944 at 8 pm, with the task of catching captives and determining to which German formation belonged the enemy in the foreground.

 

In the face of preparations for the planned 4th battle on the Gustav Line, Polish troops were deployed in the towns of Viticuso and Acquafondata in the Monte Cassino area. The15th  Poznański Lancers Regiment, to which Wladek transferred to Viticuso on 29 April 1944. In this way the fighting paths of the father and son came together and were able to see each other again personally. On 2-3 May, the military had already taken up combat positions on the Monte Castellone hill. On the night of 2 May, father and son said goodbye before the battle. Wladek fought as Private lancer, later promoted to senior lancer. His father was in the position of gunsmith and had his hands full because he had to keep fixing guns. When necessary, he was sent to the first line to repair weapons, mainly CKMs (heavy rifles machine).

The Battle of Monte Cassino, fought by the Polish 2nd Corps on 11 May and on 18 May, did not mean the end of the fighting and the defeat of the Germans. After breaking the “Gustava line” in the Monte Cassino area on 18 May 1944, Polish troops joined the attack on German positions in the Piedimonte San Germano region. Wladek, participant in this battle, remembers how hard the fight was.

 

After a week of rest in Santa Croce del Sannio (2 – 9 June 1944) the Polish 2nd Corps had to march towards Ancona. Wladek and his father, as an senior Sergeant in 17th Rifle Battalion had seen a lot of each other since then. The route of the Poznań Lancers Regiment from Loreto through San Biagio to Agugliano. From 4 to 16 July 1944 they fought in the Casenuove area and conquering the Palazzo del Cannone lying within the city of Osimo.

Conquering Ancona did not mean the end of the struggle against the enemy, who retreated further north, fortified his own positions on the next defensive lines. After conquering Ancona, the Polish 2nd Corps began to march north of the Apennine peninsula towards the Goth Line.

Battles in the Emilian Apennine in October 1944 were the end of the combat route for the Poznań Lancers Regiment. In November, the regiment was moved to the far south of Italy to the village of Maglie near Lecce.

 

On 6 January 1945, the 15th Poznań Lancers Regiment left Maglie towards Tarent, where they embarked on a passenger ship and sailed in direction of Egypt. The Lancers were sent without combat equipment, they each had only a handgun. Upon arrival in Port Said, trucks were waiting for them in the harbor. In addition to the 15th Poznań Lancers Regiment, the 10th Hussars Regiment, composed of 21 officers and 549 privates, and 3rd Śląskie Lancers Regiment, which soon had 36 officers and 612 men.

 

After training in Egypt all the regiments that arrived there created an additional Armoured division. Such a plan was made possible by the fact that at the end of the war great numbers of Volunteers were Polish prisoners and deserters from the German army, increasing the number of Polish troops. They were trained in military camps near Cairo and Alexandria. Wladek and his regiment was to perform exercises in the military camp in El Amirija in near Alexandria. Before they started exercising with a gun armored and tanks, they were entrusted with another urgent task to perform. They were directed to the vicinity of Tobruk, where in three POW camps for the Germans, created by the British after the victorious campaign of Allied troops in North Africa, there were rebellions and intervention was necessary.

 

After the surrender of the Axis troops in May 1943, nearly 275,000 soldiers were taken into British captivity, deployed in numerous prisoner-of-war camps. German prisoners held in three camps near Tobruk, got out of control, created their own organization of camp management and tried to force British acceptance of their self-government. Wladek’s Regiment was sent to restore order of the British authorities.

Upon completion of the mission and course in Egypt, 15 mechanics from the 15th Poznań Lancers Regiment, including Wladek, returned to Italy, again to Maglie. Their task was the seizure of new tanks. During these activities, they were protected by two Hindu companies with whom they established friendly relations, the soldiers spent their free time together and They went to the bar for coffee. The war ended and the regiment did not return to the front. The Rest Of The 15th Regiment Poznań Ulanów returned from Egypt to Italian soil in October 1945 and stayed deployed in Giulianova on the Adriatic coast in the central Italy. In June 1946, the regiment was transported to England where a year later it was disbanded.

Meanwhile, his father Wladyslaw remained on the Italian front line with the Polish 2nd Corps. During the winter break in hostilities on the turn of 1944 and 1945, Władysław M.’s regiment was involved in defense on the river Senio, where there had been fierce fighting between the Germans and allied troops. Together with the Polish 2nd Corps, Władysław Marian Dąbrowski entered into the history of Bologna, fighting to the very end on the Goth Line.

 

He was awarded three Polish and four British decorations:

• Monte Cassino Cross

• Bronze Cross of Merit with Swords

• Military Medal

• Star for War 1939–1945

• Italy Star

• Africa Star

• The War Medal 1939/45

 

Despite the end of the war the Polish army remained still in the territory of Italy, the road to free Poland broke off after the Yalta Conference, on which the fate of Poland was entrusted with the treacherous Stalin. Thousands of soldiers found themselves without the possibility of returning to their homeland, whose eastern territories were incorporated into the USSR. Many of them were taken to Siberia when they were still of school age. Before they finished fighting on the Italian front, which took place on 29 IV 1945, in units of the Polish 2nd Corps functioned already the first soldier's schools with educational and vocational courses. This was made possible by the order of the General Anders, ordering the systematic training of soldiers during breaks in combat operations. The Corps sought to give the soldiers and Polish civilians the opportunity to supplement their education. When the war ended definitively in May 1945, many schools were organized with different directions. Wladek decided to take advantage of this opportunity and applied for baccalaureate courses. Schools were in Alessano, Apulia, near Maglie. in the very south of Italy in the so-called heel peninsula. Wladek attended he school in Alessano.

 

At the end of July 1945, Wladek and his comrades were ordered to Naples and sailed to the United Kingdom. After landing in Glasgow, they arrived by train to Barnsley and from there to nearby Cawthorne, where they were accommodated at the Cannon Hall Military Camp, a former American camp, in which American troops were stationed while waiting for the Normandy landing in June 1944. Polish soldiers lived for a long time in numerous camps organized for them in the United Kingdom, waiting for a return to the country, or to emigrate to various countries, or to remain in the UK. The structures in which they lived were straight barracks covered with wavy sheet metal, built-up boards and looked like longitudinal fish barrels overturned to the side and laid on the ground one next to the other. The Poles called them barrels of laughter, referring to their simple standard, although there was not much reason to laugh.

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With the evacuation of the troops of the Polish 2nd Corps from Italy to the United Kingdom, they also evacuated the Polish schools established in Italy. The Polish Resettlement Corps was a volunteer formation formed in May 1946 by the British authorities for demobilized Polish soldiers in the West, but subordinate to the Polish-government-in-exile, to adapt them to civilian life. Both Władysław M. and Władysław A. enlisted in this corps just after its creation. Wladek continued his studies and graduated in 1947. He and three of his colleagues received an offer to settle in Canada from the Canadian Polonia. Wladek’s father, based on his police and military experience, quickly found himself on the labor market in the new post-war reality in Great Britain.

 

Wladyslaw M. already was almost engaged in a gun factory in England when he received an unexpected message from the Polish Red Cross which completely changed his plans. The organization informed Władysław M. Dąbrowski that his wife and younger son were found, with whom he had lost contact after the evacuation of the Polish army from the USSR to Middle East. The first letter after this separation Wladek received from his mother in Palestine in 1943. She was left with her younger son Jerzy in Siberia wrote that they belonged to Union of Polish Patriots, formed in June 1943, and that heard that the Polish population would be repatriated to Poland. Indeed, they were loaded into train carriages along with other Poles displaced in 1940 and carried away to the western Soviet army. But the promise to return to Poland turned out to be a cruel lie, all exiles carried seemingly to Poland were sent to Ukraine, where they were urgently needed as slave labor. Mother and brother had to work in a kolkhoz and again live the hope that one day they will return to Poland and will find the husband and son with whom contact has broken off again, It was not until 1945 that Urszula Dąbrowska and her younger son Jerzy reached Warsaw through Lublin.

 

As soon as Wladyslaw M. received the news that the wife and younger son are alive he immediately decided to return to Poland. He came to Gdańsk at the invitation of his wife's nephew, Rozpierski, who had already occupied an apartment there and proposed that Władysław M. join him. The family later settled in another apartment on the same street. After returning to Poland Władysław M. found a job first in a manufacturing workshop, then he worked in a tin packaging factory where he held the position of tool manager. Back in Poland where the Stalinist regime was already in place, he knew his past would expose him to persecution from the Polish communist services. Happily, that did not happen.

His resume was probably known to the intelligence services and news of the police gunsmith quickly dispersed in the post-war police-military community. In the Polish People's Army there were a lot of weapons, which needed repair and maintenance and lacked specialists, who would be able to remedy these problems. They turned to Władysław for help and henceforth used his skills to maintain and repair weapons. In exchange for the useful and necessary help to the military the Security Office allowed him to live in peace.

 

Wladek, on the news finding his mother and brother, decided not to take advantage of the opportunity to emigrate to Canada and immediately returned to Poland. He waited in the camp for his turn at repatriation. He returned by sea to Gdynia in mid-1948 and joined the family in Gdańsk. His professional life started in post-war Poland in a textile distribution headquarters. He worked in this company until his retirement, promoted to Increasingly higher positions. In the workplace, he met his wife Eleonora (nee Laszczyk). Her father, the legionnaire, former commander of the gendarmerie in Wilno, died in 1939 from the German bombing. Eleanor died at a fairly young age of cancer, leaving in mourning her husband, two daughters and two sons.

Wladislaw Marian died in Gdańsk on 6 April 1976. His grave is entered in the register graves of veterans of the struggle for freedom and independence of Poland, run by the Institute of National Remembrance. Władysław Antoni, despite his 100 years completed on 6 October 2024, is an active veteran caring for the memory of the tragic years of the war wandering from the inhuman Soviet land to beautiful but suffering Italy, from which many of them were not allowed to return to the free Poland they dreamed of and fought for, making the highest sacrifice. Thousands of his colleagues died far from their homeland. Władysław Dąbrowski participates in all celebrations commemorating the bravery of Polish soldiers during the Second World War. He honors fallen colleagues in anniversaries of battles and liberations of Monte Cassino, in Loreto and Ancona, in Bologna, and elsewhere in Europe, where Polish blood overflowed for “your and our freedom.”

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Władysław Antoni Dąbrowski’s military past and participation in the struggles for the freedom of the homeland is evidenced by the following orders and medals:

• Star for War 1939–1945

• Italy Star

• Africa Star

• Defence Medal

• Cross of the Polish Armed Forces in the West

• Monte Cassino Cross

• Cross of Valour  

• Medal of the Polish Army

• Gold Medal “For merits for the defense of the country”

• “Pro Patria” Medal

• Medal of the Recovered Century Independence

• Medal "For cultivating the memory of soldiers of the 2nd Polish Corps"

• Medal “Pro Bono Poloniae”

• Medal "Defenders Homeland 1939-1945"

• Cross of Siberian Exiles

• Cross of the Field Bishop Deo et Patriae​​​​​​​

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