press release
THE BOOK Translated as faithfully as possible to the original writers’ intentions, these stories tell how- Throughout the bitterly cold early hours of Saturday 10 February 1940, thousands of Polish country folk were roused from their sleep by the peremptory knocking of Soviet soldiers. Under gunpoint entire families were huried to waiting trains, crammed into cattle trucks and deported as disposable labour into the secret depths of Stalin’s Russia. Many were to perish, defeated by malnutrition, disease, the extremes of climate, and the rigorous demands of the communist military regime. A few- weak, drained and sick- miraculously emerged from years of this inhuman suffering and struggled to reshape their mangled lives but generally far distant from the land of their birth. This book appears in English as a more generally available witness to their suffering and courage. THE TRANSLATORS Eric J Whittle has been a friend of Bronia and the Preston Polish community for over 25 years. A graduate of the University of London and Justice of the Peace on the South Ribble Bench of Magistrates , Lancashire, he retired from the Headmastership of Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School , Blackburn in 1996. Since then, aware of how little was generally known of the episode of WWII, he has worked with Bronia translating this book into English, so that a wider readership might learn of this hidden, secret history of Soviet aggression and Stalin’s contempt for suffering humanity. Tel: 01772 336986 E-MAIL spicots@appleonline.net PUBLISHERS:
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‘STALIN’S ETHNIC CLEANSING IN EASTERN POLAND’ - The Book
October 2000
is a compilation of the experiences of some 130 Poles, drawn from the many thousands driven into exile by Stalin’s KGB (NKWD), from 1939 to 1948. It first appeared in Polish in 1996 with the title "Z KRESOW WSCHODNICH R.P NA WYGNANIE’ published by the Ognisko Rodzin Osadnikow Kresowych ( Association of the Families of the Borderland Settlers). In translation these ‘Tales of the Deported 1940-1946’ is entitled ‘STALIN’S ETHNIC CLEANSING’
Bronia Kacperek, herself one of the deported as a girl of 12 has lived in England since 1948. Trained as a teacher, she married and lived in London prior to moving to Preston, Lancashire. She is a member of that town’s twinning committee with particular concern for its links with Kalisz in Poland. For some years she has served as chairman of the Association of Borderland Settlers as well as Chairman of Preston SPK (Polish COMBATANT’S Association). Tel: 01772 774898
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