Souvenirs of Siberian exiles

Our museum’s collection includes objects that once belonged to people exiled to the USSR during the Second World War. About 70 per cent of them were Poles, the remaining 30 per cent Belarusians and Ukrainians. The deportations began on 10 February 1940.

Information tablet belonging to Stanisław Krasucki brought from Vorkuta, where he was exiled after being arrested near Równe in February 1943. The tablet contains information about Krasucki and the number of places in his room. Krasucki spent 10 years and 9 months in Soviet prisons and forced-labour camps. The tablet was made after he was officially released and awarded the status of a settler. He was not allowed to return to Poland until the middle of December 1955.
Inside the trunk is Miss Szpilewska’s pencil signature in Russian.
Cross from the Polish exiles’ cemetery in the special settlement in Ezhma, Arkhangelsk oblast, where thousands of Polish citizens from the pre-war Polish territories occupied by the USSR beginning on 17 September 1939 were deported in the early 1940s. Photo: J. Balk
Wooden spindles belonging to Mrs Irena Stankiewicz surviving from her exile to Kazakhstan. Wool was spun very crudely, without a spinning wheel.
A trunk donated by Halina Młyńczak, whose mother, née Szpilewska, brought it along with her when she was resettled in Kazakhstan. She used the trunk to store her clothes and personal possessions. Photo: J. Balk
Book-notebook from exile in Kazakhstan. This copy of "Cape of Good Hope" by Zygmunt Nowakowski somehow found its way to Kazakhstan, where it fell into the hands of a Russian teacher who, for lack of clean paper, used it as a notebook. Irena Stankiewicz was exiled there in 1940-46 and met the teacher, who traded the book for a packet of cigarettes. Stankiewicz brought it back with her when she returned to Poland in 1946.
A trunk donated by Halina Młyńczak, whose mother, née Szpilewska, brought it along with her when she was resettled in Kazakhstan. She used the trunk to store her clothes and personal possessions. Photo: J. Balk
Krzyż z cmentarza zesłańców polskich byłego "spiecposiołka" Jożma w obwodzie archangielskim, który na początku lat czterdziestych ubiegłego wieku stał się miejscem zsyłek tysięcy obywateli polskich z terenów II RP okupowanych przez ZSRR po 17 września 1939 roku. Fot. J. Balk
A drinking cup belonging to an exile in Siberia. The writing carved on its bottom is unfortunately no longer legible.