On August 13, at 2 am, Capt. “Proboszcz” Jan Jaroszek, chief of staff of the “Chrobry II” Grouping, gives an order to the WIG-District Office-Tax Chamber units to withdraw to the other side of the Avenue, to the Railway House at Żelazna St. From Witold Pilecki’s report: “The last point of the task entrusted to Captain “Witold” and the late Lieutenant Janek was executed. WIG-Tax Chamber units dominated Starynkiewicza Sq., preventing the movement of enemy motor weapons for 10 days”.
At 4 am the insurgents of Cavalry Captain Pilecki’s evacuated to the other side of the [Jerusalem] Avenue. The last to leave the ruined redoubt was its commander. He fitted the account of a 13-day period of actions – written in August 1945 in London – into 5 sheets. Without them, the history of the fights for WIG, District Office, Tax Chamber and Tourist House would remain poor and incomplete.
The idea of two Macieks
One day in 2002, Maciej Łukasiewicz, editor-in-chief of the daily “Rzeczpospolita” and creator-founder of its Saturday-Sunday supplement “Plus-Minus”, invited me for an interview. I had been a partner in the supplement since the days of Dariusz Fikus, the first editor-in-chief of “Rzeczpospolita” after its 1989 renewal. After returning from London, I printed fragments of the history of the Warsaw Uprising, described by Witold Pilecki. I had previously published it in the London-based “Tygodnik Polski” in the issue of January 15, 1994.
In the editor-in-chief's office, I found Maciej Rosalak, a columnist at “Rzeczpospolita”, and a friend of Maciej Łukasiewicz from their joint work at “Kurier Polski” in the 1970s until the outbreak of martial law. My fellow editors suggested immortalising my discovery in the London archive with a commemorative plaque. I accepted this idea with enthusiasm. There was a ceremonial unveiling of the plaque, followed by a banquet with the participation of the Captain’s daughter and many invited guests.
Both Macieks have gone, I’ve been to their funerals. What remains is the neglected, dirty plaque and a burning candle beneath. And there remains TVP Weekly with its editor-in-chief, Dominik Zdort, who ran “Plus-Minus” after the death of Maciek Łuaksiewicz. I hope that this article will manage to reach Readers in Poland and in several dozen countries around the world. If the Weekly disappears, history will certainly neither forget nor forgive its liquidators.
– Maciej Kledzik
TVP WEEKLY. Editorial team and jornalists
– Translated by Dominik Szczęsny-Kostanecki