ZYGMUNT POWICHROWSKI

Grójec, 5 June 1946. Judge W. Brzozowski heard as a witness the person specified below. Having been advised of the criminal liability for making false declarations and of the importance of the oath, the witness was sworn and testified as follows:


Name and surname Zygmunt Powichrowski
Age 41 years old
Parents’ names Jan and Teodora
Place of residence Grójec, Stalowa Street 22
Occupation merchant
Religious affiliation Roman Catholic
Criminal record none
Relationship to the parties none

I remember neither the exact date nor the month, but it was at the end of 1943 or at the beginning of 1944, on the corner of Bonifraterska Street and Franciszkańska Street. The execution itself took place at Bonifraterska Street opposite no. 4, by the wall of a house that had been demolished before the war. About noon, a few cars with prisoners came along, along with a few cars with the gendarmes. I had a shop on Bonifraterska Street, at no. 8. As the Germans ordered the shops to be closed, I watched the execution at first through the fanlight of the shop and later from the attic.

It appeared to me that there were about a hundred people, but the posters placed on the following day said that 107 people, including two women, had been executed there. Jews were made to carry the corpses to the cars. The cars with the corpses must have stayed in the Ghetto, as they did not go through the Ghetto gate.

I don’t remember any names of the executed. I learned after the Uprising that the execution had been watched by Mr Bronisław Jankowski, who lived and had a shop at Bonifraterska Street 4 or 6, and now lives in Warsaw at Chmielna Street 38, flat 2, and is a voivodeship chief of the Raw Hides Centre.

The gendarmes were shooting from posts by the paling of the Ghetto, where the cars were parked from which the prisoners were being led to the execution site. Some prisoners were only in their underwear and they had their hands tied. On the following day a list of the executed was published, and it turned out that all the prisoners had Polish names.

The report was read out before signing.