Czesław, born in 1928

I’m Jewish

Before the war, my name was Maksymilian Ścisłocki. I was born in 1928. I lived in Warsaw, in the Jewish district at 9 Miła Street. My father was the representative of the Singer company in Warsaw. My mother, however, didn’t work. I had a brother ten years younger than me. His name was Marek Ścisłocki. Before the war, I attended school at 29 Nowolipki Street. I was in the third grade.

KATARZYNA MELOCH: What was your family home like?

CZESŁAW: We came from an intelligentsia family. We were assimilated. My relatives were Dr. Zygmunt Ścisłocki; The Five O’Clock Newspaper—Ścisłocki;  the  pharmacy  in  Śródborów  at  24  Żeromskiego  Street. I had grandparents in Otwock, they lived at 8 Przeworska Street. My grandparents were religious Jews. Grandpa had a beard, Grandma wore a wig. In the summertime I used to visit my grandmother. And there was also my aunt, who was called Dora Segał, she had a girl, whose name was… I don’t remember… I don’t know… My photo hangs in the Museum in Otwock, a photo from before the war, from ‘38.

It was ‘39, beautiful summer weather. Everyone was anxious because political affairs between Germany and Poland were on a knife- edge. And it so happened that there was mobilization, I walked my father—an officer—to the army, because my father was a university graduate. I remember Mommy cooking twenty-one portions of food for the soldiers. Well… The bombing came and we didn’t know which way to go. Chaos. The raids. Fire. We thought it was a drill but it turned out to be a real war.

How did you survive the ‘39 bombings?

We didn’t hide in the basement, we were in our building at 9 Miła Street. There were two yards. At 11 Miła, there was a pharmacy warehouse. Later, at 15 Miła, there was said to be Anielewicz’s bunker. Later on, our building was part of the ghetto. After they put up the wall, I slipped through the sewer to the Aryan side.

How do you mean?

There were walls and a sewer underneath them; a (child’s) head could fit through that little hidey-hole. I was slim and I could fit through it. I left the ghetto every day, I mostly loitered on the Aryan side. I’d go to Lisowska Street, Szreger in Bielany… During the occupation, I no longer went to school.

hidey-hole—In fact, it was a clearance under the wall over the sewer.

Did you bring something to eat from the Aryan side?

I brought carrots, potatoes…

How did you get them?

I asked around—simply. Because I didn’t look Jewish, I didn’t sound Jewish, I got this and that. And it went on for several months. I didn’t make rounds every day, every other day. I spent the night in Bielany, in well rings. Everyone knew me there, they gave me clothes and other things. I brought them home. At that time, my father was ill and died of pneumonia and meningitis. Whatever we had, we sold, and we weren’t rich to start with.

And your mother?

My mother was alive, she had a sewing machine and started sewing. She’d make something to get some soup. I remember, when I brought potatoes, she cooked everything, even the peels. I can’t speak… (Cries).

Did you go out on the eve of the Ghetto Uprising?

I was very lucky because if I hadn’t left, I would have been done. I had nowhere to go. I spent the night at the Eastern Railway Station. The gendarme ID-ed everyone, but not me. Perhaps I didn’t look like a typical Jew. But I felt like a Jew of flesh and blood. I went to my grandparents in Otwock at 8 Przeworska Street. Before the war, my aunt had gold teeth, now she didn’t have them, she must have sold them… Because there was a period when they couldn’t make a living. All his life, my uncle had cut the crusts off the bread, so he had a few bags of them and they lived on that. I said goodbye to them and went to my father’s cousin, he had a pharmacy in Śródborów at 24 Żeromski Street. But I don’t remember exactly. And my aunt gave me 200 zloty. I remember she didn’t have hair, it had burnt when she got a perm. She gave me 200 zloty and I went to Kołbiel, by train or by bus… I don’t re-member anymore. I asked around if there was any job for me. I didn’t look like a Jew and I didn’t speak with a Yiddish accent. I met people who told me to go to a nearby village. There was the noble Wielgołaski family. Wielgołaski hired me. I had a school ID with someone’s last name, I stole it before Wielgołaski hired me. All summer I grazed cows for a quarter of rye, a quarter of potatoes and two linen shirts. Sometimes the Germans came, and I prayed… I didn’t know the Polish prayer, but I prayed and it somehow kept my spirits up. I got used to that living and sometimes I went to wedding parties. I knew the peasant mentality. I plowed, I went to town. I had no fear. Maybe I didn’t happen to meet the people who were against Jews.

You worked for a farmer, you could be an exemplary farmhand, but you probably wanted some stability, so that you wouldn’t feel constantly threatened…

I went to church, learned to pray, I had to learn. There was even an enemy  of  Jews  in  the  area,  perhaps  he  was  denouncing  Jews,  but for me—he bought a suit. To me, he was kind, a complete stranger. A weird coincidence  happened:  the  farm  owners  went  to  church, and  I  decided  to  climb  the  ladder  above  the  barn.  Among  the  hay, I found hundreds of birth certificates, piled up, and chose the one with the name that I have now.

The age matched?

The age matched, only the father’s name and other things didn’t. It was January 26, a change of farmhands, boys for pigs, for cows, and I moved to another village, Władzin. One more thing, after I found this record, this was my new name in the other village, and it is today.

And you reported for a Kennkarte?

I reported for a Kennkarte, I wasn’t scared, I don’t know why. I didn’t feel any danger because I had no enemies, I was easy-going. I just worked for pennies and for food. In Władzin, I was hired by a widow who had a daughter and a granddaughter. They had one cow and one calf.

How old were you then?

I can’t say exactly… I lived in the country, slept in the barn, but it was quite impossible. In the barn, there was a dog and sheep, and the landlady had a heifer. She fed me well, in the wintertime I stayed in her kitchen. I wasn’t looking for trouble, I did what I needed to do. The tree was cut, so I chopped the wood, once I cut off part of my finger… Well…

There’s a lot to tell. But I don’t remember. Because I worked in the manor as a pig boy and I fed pigs. The landlady in the manor also fed me well. Her son’s name was Wojciechowski. He rode a horse and apparently denounced Jews, but I don’t know exactly. A strange coincidence; I slept over the winery… And before that…

At Christmas, there were five Germans; five Germans who guarded the manor (I don’t know if they were SS-men or Wehrmacht). The landlady, the mother of young Wojciechowski, liked me a lot. On New Year’s Eve, I drank the “Arkadia” liqueur with the Germans. Still, I spent the night over the pigsty. And one evening there was a commotion, noise, the pigs were being pulled out. Apparently those were partisans, I don’t know what kind. Anyway, I jumped out of the mezzanine window and hid among the lupins. And they yelled: “Where is he?” I don’t know if it was about me or someone else. Then, I went back to the previous landlady. But I don’t remember exactly. I worked for Nowakowa and went to the neighbors, their name was Bac. Those may have been bandits before the war, they surrounded the house and took us away.

I remember: they led us to the Mińsk police station at gunpoint. Among us was a boy my age, his name was Krupa, the landlord’s son. We stayed there for two days, the landlord apparently bought his son out and they let me go, too. I was lucky. I went back to work in the countryside, probably at Nowakowa’s. And the Soviet troops were already approaching. There were lights over the whole of Warsaw. And I was already happy, I was so happy that I would be liberated, that I would be a real human being, that I wouldn’t be abused, that I wouldn’t have to fear death.

Liberation was coming. I went to Kołbiel, where I met Jews who also had escaped. One of them was called Cebula. Throughout the occupation, he made sheepskin coats for a Polish furrier. He worked in the basement at night. He said, “Come on, we’ll live together,” and he lived in the basement on the front side, opposite the church, in Kołbiel.

He lived with his pregnant wife and grandmother. They saved themselves somehow. One morning or afternoon, I went out with Cebula to run an errand, and when I came back, I heard that some partisans had stopped by, who was it: the National Armed Forces or the AK? I can’t say, I don’t know.

In Kołbiel, I also met a young boy, he said, “Let’s go to Łódź.” I had nothing to lose. I went to Łódź, I started to look around. I went to the Jewish municipality and registered. I had a witness who had worked for my uncle before the war. I remember that.

You found yourself in Łódź, the post-war “capital” of Jewish survivors…

I met a military man, I think also a Jew. He was demobilized and had a room in a wooden hut. He left it to me and I went to live there. Initially, I went to the Jewish municipality for lunches and I got something from the municipality. I met my future wife, who lived next door. So, we kept each other company for several years.

Did she know you were Jewish?

Yes, I started crying and told her. She loved me out of pity. She was my mother, my wife, everything.

She was older than you…

Two years older. She worked at Scheibler’s winding threads. I attended primary school and music school, and later, I worked as a messenger at the Main Liquidation Office. I didn’t make much but I bought my wife her first dress. She was very pleased. She loved me and I loved her. I liked it when my wife served potatoes with okrasa [bacon or lard] once or twice. I told her she had done a good job.

Where was I? A guy comes along in ‘49 and says that he needs a drummer for the Officers’ School in Jelenia Góra, a drummer who can read scores. I did well in music school. And I went to replace the boy who’d quit. Captain Dańczak and others welcomed me. And my wife found her parents at Wiejska Street in Cieplice. And it just so happened that we’d already tracked down her family. And Captain Dańczak says: “Go home now, come back tomorrow, we’ll put you in uniform and you’ll be in the orchestra.” And I was in the orchestra for a year. And there’s a long story how I got fired because of plums! After the army, in 1951, I moved to Jelenia Góra, at 4 Wiejska. Mazurkiewicz had a band “from Europe”. He hired me, I started earning money. I was capable, easy-going, I did my job. My wife also had some kind of job, in any case, we were doing pretty well. Later, I got a contract from Jelenia Góra to Międzyzdroje in ‘52. But first, in ‘51, I performed in “Patria”  in Karpacz. Later in various sanatoria.

Patria—a villa guesthouse.

Life went on. I worked at home, then abroad, in many countries. For example, I worked several times in Finland. In Austria, with a show on ice, with circuses, in East Germany, West Germany, Yugoslavia, and Greece. I was easy-going and I guess I knew a thing or two. But no one knew I was Jewish. If they’d known, I’m not sure if they’d have hired me… I felt that I was a Jew, so I was looking for a fellow man, but I had Aryan papers. I didn’t want to get together with Jews… because I was afraid. I was afraid to “go back to my own name” because I went to school on Aryan papers and was in the army on Aryan papers and they didn’t even know I was a Jew. Nor did they realize in the creative sector.

Was there a breakthrough moment when you were more closely associated with Jews?

Not until ‘68… when I went to Bulgaria. I stayed at the Golden Sands for five months. When I returned and applied for a global passport, a policeman came and said, “Something is wrong with your passport.” I started crying and told the truth. We went to the prosecutor. The prosecutor wrote that everything was in order. And I applied for the document. Oh, and with my old document, which was based on the Kennkarte, I had gone to Finland. They asked me at the security office, “Are you coming back?” I answered, “Why not!” Later I got a new document, in the same name.

Golden Sands —a Bulgarian resort town on the Black Sea.

You once spoke of the death of your wife, and earlier, that you had a son…

My son was born in 1952, I was working then in Karpacz in “Patria”. My son is a type of artist… Yes, he’s a stage artist, I don’t want to give any more details. Everyone knows him. My wife died in ‘99. We’d been together for fifty years, that’s a long time, mostly all good. I had a lot of freedom, I could go anywhere, she didn’t forbid me, we didn’t argue, never, everything was fine, she raised our son in the Catholic faith, and I so wanted him to know about my origins. He learned this from his mother…

I feel that I’m a Jew of flesh and blood. I live in Łódź. I often visit the Jewish community. I haven’t found anyone from my pre-war family.

But you once talked about some relatives who lived in Egypt.

In 1926, my uncle Josek Anuszyński and my other uncle Maks Anuszyński left for Egypt. They were the sons of my grandfather from Przeworska Street in Otwock. Since they were photographers, they were hired as King Farouk’s photographers and traveled with him everywhere and in all these deserts, and we had photos. When we took pictures, we sent those, and they sent us enlarged ones. Well… Then Nasser came… And later, when Farouk was dethroned, they set up a photo studio in Alexandria. I remembered that. I remembered all throughout the occupation. And when liberation came, I immediately wrote them a letter. They sent us a few packages, but that wasn’t important, only that I had contact with them. For several years before the war, they sent my grandparents five or ten pounds. Nasser forced them out to Israel, they had 48 hours to leave. They settled in Haifa. When I started going abroad, I didn’t want to admit that I had family in Israel. Maybe I would have had problems getting a passport, which, incidentally, I always got easily. I lost touch with my uncles because I stopped writing them.

Were you afraid?

Naturally. Now I’m looking for them through Sohnut and can’t find them. They must have changed their name. I’d like to get pre-war photos of Otwock from them. One of these photos of Otwock—my photo with my cousin—is in the museum in Otwock (in the section from the Otwock ghetto).

Sohnut—the Jewish Agency for Israel whose programs include connecting Jews to Israel and to each other.

I think of this Jewish boy from Miła Street, who learned to be a village farmhand…

…I went in and out of the Warsaw ghetto. I saw corpses covered with newspapers. I saw it with my own eyes, but I didn’t realize… Because I was a little kid. My father died in the ghetto. I took my father in a box with wheels (it was a cart of some sort). I took him to the cemetery at Okopowa in Warsaw. There are one hundred and fifty people in one grave. My father is there. But I don’t know if his name is up there. I’d like to live in Warsaw, it’s not possible, although— could. My son won’t go to Warsaw, he prefers to stay in Łódź. I bought my son an apartment in Łódź. I was offered to have my biography written earlier, right after the war, but I said no. I didn’t want anything to do with the Jews. I was afraid. I didn’t want my origin to come out.

Interview with Katarzyna Meloch, Śródborów, 2006