Prison in the Staufer Barracks

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The SS-Stauferkaserne, a view from Kazimierzowska Street

The prison in the Stauferkaserne was a provisional prison and a gathering point for expellees from Warsaw , which was built by the Germans in the first days of the Warsaw uprising on the grounds of the SS-Stauferkaserne at Rakowiecka-Strasse 4. In August and September 1944, thousands of residents of the Mokotów district of Warsaw walked through the SS- Hohenstaufen barracks. They lived in inhumane conditions and were treated extremely brutally. During the uprising, numerous executions took place here, the number of which is estimated at at least 100 victims.

Establishment of the prison

During the German occupation , the building complex of the Main Staff of the Polish Armed Forces ( Sztab Główny Wojska Polskiego ) at 4 Rakowiecka Street in the Mokotów District in Warsaw was converted into a barracks - the SS Stauferkaserne. At the time of the outbreak of the uprising, the SS Panzer Grenadier Replacement Battalion 3 was stationed there, which included around 600 soldiers supported by a tank company . On August 1, 1944, the barracks were attacked by the soldiers of the Home Army ( Armia Krajowa , AK for short ) of the storm battalion "Odwet II" and the artillery force "Granat", but the attack was repulsed by the garrison.

On the morning of August 2, SS men from the Staufer barracks began to clear Mokotów in the vicinity of the barracks. The residents in the streets: Rakowiecka, Puławska, Kazimierzowska, Rejtana, Wiśniowa, Aleja Niepodległości, Asfaltowa, Opoczyńska and Fałata were evicted from their houses and driven towards the Staufer barracks using physical force. Several hundred civilians had to wait in the rain in the courtyard of the barracks until 8 p.m. The SS men fired a series of machine gun shots over the heads of the prisoners to further intimidate them. The commandant in the barracks was SS-Obersturmführer Martin Patz. Patz informed the gathering that they were being held hostage . If the uprising does not stop within three days, they will all be shot. He also announced that for every German killed by insurgents, Poles would be executed. Later men were separated from women and children and the two groups were housed in different parts of the barracks. Most of the women and children were released the next day in the evening.

Over the next few days, other residents of Mokotów - mostly men - were arrested in the barracks. The barracks have been converted into a makeshift prison and assembly point for displaced residents of that borough. It held this function until mid-September 1944, although many Poles were detained in the barracks until the beginning of October. After a longer or shorter stay, the prisoners were usually taken to the transit camp in Pruszków or to other assembly points set up by the Germans for the displaced population of Warsaw.

Living conditions of prisoners

The first group of men was not provided with food and drink until the next day, some after three days in detention. From around August 5, the Germans allowed Polish women to bring food to their relatives imprisoned in the barracks. SS men opened fire several times for no reason on the Polish women who were carrying white flags. Some women were killed or injured in the process.

The former prisoner, Zbigniew Bujnowicz, remembered that the Poles lived in the Staufer barracks under conditions similar to those in a concentration camp . There was a wake-up call at 5:30 am, followed by a roll call. Afterwards the prisoners received breakfast, which usually consisted of 1–2 rusks and a black coffee . The inmates worked until the 1:00 p.m. lunch break. For lunch they usually received a portion of cooked porridge . Then they continued to work until 7:00 p.m. Then there was a break during which dinner was taken. After that, the inmates worked until 2:00 a.m.

The imprisoned men had to work hard, including a. Clean latrines with your bare hands, tear down the insurgents ' barricades , clean tanks, bury corpses , carry out earthworks in the Staufer barracks (e.g. dig connecting trenches), clean streets and load goods stolen by the Germans onto wagons. Much of this work was done only to exhaust and humiliate the inmates. The SS men tortured the prisoners at every opportunity. Violence was on the agenda.

Strict living and working conditions soon led to complete exhaustion of the prisoners and the outbreak of a dysentery epidemic [12]. After a while, a group led by the inspector of the Polish Red Cross, Jan Wierzbicki, persuaded the Germans to set up a medical department from Polish prisoners. At the beginning it consisted of 16 members, later the number reached 60 people, including two doctors and two nurses. The medical department had its own truck. In addition to looking after the prisoners in the Staufer barracks, the paramedics provided medical assistance to the Poles in the German-occupied parts of Mokotów (especially in the area between Rakowiecka Street and Madalińskiego Street). They also had to bury the bodies of killed civilians and insurgents. The paramedics were strictly forbidden to help injured Poles suspected of participating in the uprising.

Executions in the Staufer barracks

At least 100 residents of Mokotów were murdered in the Staufer barracks during the Warsaw Uprising. On August 3rd (other statements by the witnesses show the date of August 4th) the Germans selected around 45 men from the prisoners, who were then brought out in groups of 15 and shot outside the barracks. Among the dead was an Orthodox priest whom SS men forced to sing before his execution. The bodies were buried in the Mokotów prison opposite the barracks. The other prisoners were told that this execution was in retaliation for the alleged execution of the 30 ethnic Germans by the insurgents.

On August 4, a group of about 40 men from the house on the corner of Narbutta Street and Aleja Niepodległości were taken to the barracks. All were shot by machine guns in the barracks yard. The injured were with shots from pistols murdered.

Individual executions often took place in the barracks, mostly carried out by SS-Obersturmführer Patz. Among other things, Patz once ordered the shooting of a man whose facial expression (for health reasons) he viewed as a mockery of himself. When the prisoners began to resist the exhausting work, the SS men hung up one of them in front of the other comrades as a punishment. The execution was directed by one of the cruellest SS men, SS Rottenführer Franckowiak.

In addition, some of the detained men were picked up by the State Secret Police ; they disappeared without a trace. Among other things, around 20–40 prisoners were taken away in this way on August 9th. Between late August and early September, almost 70 men disappeared in one day. The people picked up by the Gestapo were probably murdered in the ruins of the General Inspectorate of the Armed Forces (pol. Generalny Inspektorat Sił Zbrojnych ) or in the vicinity of the commander of the security police in Aleja Szucha. The women imprisoned in the barracks were used as "living shields" against German tanks.

On August 8th, Patz sent a delegation of 100 women to the commander of the Home Army in Mokotów, Colonel “Daniel”, with a categorical demand for surrender and threatened that if he refused, all Poles captured in the Staufer barracks would be shot. The blackmail failed, however, because "Daniel" threatened to deal with the German prisoners in the same way .

After the war

The buildings of the former Staufer barracks remained the seat of the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces ( Sztab Generalny Wojska Polskiego ) even after the war . The seat is there to this day.

No memorial was built on the site of the deaths of many Mokotów residents.

In 1978 a trial against SS-Obersturmführer Martin Patz began in court in Cologne . Above all, he was convicted of the murder of 600 prisoners in the prison at 37 Rakowiecka Street (the murder was carried out by two SS men under Patz on August 2, 1944). In February 1980, Patz was found guilty and sentenced to 9 years in prison. In the same trial, Karl Misling was sentenced to 4 years in prison.

Remarks

  1. ↑ They belonged to the 4th District of the Home Army (5th District “Mokotów”) - (Pol. IV Rejon AK Obwód V “Mokotów” ).
  2. ^ Before the war, Martin Patz was a German teacher at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań . During the Warsaw Uprising, his battalion committed a series of crimes against the people of Mokotów. In addition to the murders in the Staufer barracks, Patz was guilty of the massacre in Mokotów prison and the murder in the Jesuit monastery on Rakowiecka Street . That is why he is sometimes called "Mokotów Butcher".
  3. ↑ The seriously ill were taken to the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception Provisional Hospital on Kazimierzowska Street or to the Hospital on Chocimska Street.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Maja Motyl, Stanisław Rutkowski: Powstanie Warszawskie - rejestr miejsc i faktów zbrodni . Warszawa: GKBZpNP-IPN, 1994. p. 133
  2. ↑ Lesław M. Bartelski: Mokotów 1944 . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1986. ISBN 83-11-07078-4 . Pp. 182-183
  3. ↑ a b Szymon Datner, Kazimierz Leszczyński (red.): Zbrodnie okupanta w czasie powstania warszawskiego w 1944 roku (w dokumentach) . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1962. p. 109
  4. ↑ a b c Ludność cywilna w powstaniu warszawskim . TI Cz. 2: Pamiętniki, relacje, zeznania . Warszawa: Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, 1974. pp. 103-104
  5. ↑ Lesław M. Bartelski: Mokotów 1944 . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1986. ISBN 83-11-07078-4 . Pp. 275-276
  6. ↑ Ludność cywilna w powstaniu warszawskim . TI Cz. 2: Pamiętniki, relacje, zeznania . Warszawa: Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, 1974. p. 110
  7. ↑ Szymon Datner, Kazimierz Leszczyński (red.): Zbrodnie okupanta w czasie powstania warszawskiego w 1944 roku (w dokumentach) . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1962. pp. 116-117
  8. ↑ a b Szymon Datner, Kazimierz Leszczyński (red.): Zbrodnie okupanta w czasie powstania warszawskiego w 1944 roku (w dokumentach) . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1962. pp. 112-119
  9. ↑ Szymon Datner, Kazimierz Leszczyński (red.): Zbrodnie okupanta w czasie powstania warszawskiego w 1944 roku (w dokumentach) . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1962. pp. 118-119
  10. ↑ Ludność cywilna w powstaniu warszawskim . TI Cz. 2: Pamiętniki, relacje, zeznania . Warszawa: Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, 1974. p. 120
  11. ↑ a b Szymon Datner, Kazimierz Leszczyński (red.): Zbrodnie okupanta w czasie powstania warszawskiego w 1944 roku (w dokumentach) . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1962. p. 110
  12. ↑ a b Szymon Datner, Kazimierz Leszczyński (red.): Zbrodnie okupanta w czasie powstania warszawskiego w 1944 roku (w dokumentach) . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1962. p. 111
  13. ↑ Lesław M. Bartelski: Mokotów 1944 . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1986. ISBN 83-11-07078-4 . Pp. 334-335
  14. ↑ a b Szymon Datner, Kazimierz Leszczyński (red.): Zbrodnie okupanta w czasie powstania warszawskiego w 1944 roku (w dokumentach) . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1962. p. 116
  15. ↑ a b c Szymon Datner, Kazimierz Leszczyński (red.): Zbrodnie okupanta w czasie powstania warszawskiego w 1944 roku (w dokumentach) . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1962. p. 121
  16. ↑ a b Ludność cywilna w powstaniu warszawskim . TI Cz. 2: Pamiętniki, relacje, zeznania . Warszawa: Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, 1974. p. 104
  17. ↑ a b c Lesław M. Bartelski: Mokotów 1944 . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1986. ISBN 83-11-07078-4 . P. 277
  18. ↑ Szymon Datner, Kazimierz Leszczyński (red.): Zbrodnie okupanta w czasie powstania warszawskiego w 1944 roku (w dokumentach) . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1962. p. 123
  19. ↑ a b Szymon Datner, Kazimierz Leszczyński (red.): Zbrodnie okupanta w czasie powstania warszawskiego w 1944 roku (w dokumentach) . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1962. p. 117
  20. ↑ Lesław M. Bartelski: Mokotów 1944 . Warszawa: wydawnictwo MON, 1986. ISBN 83-11-07078-4 . P. 327
  21. ^ Friedo Sachser. Central Europe. Federal Republic of Germany. Nazi Trials . In: American Jewish Year Book. 82, 1982 p. P. 213