Maria Gabiniewicz spent six years in Africa, at a camp in Bwana Mkubwa, Northern Rhodesia: "To us, it all looked like a scene from Henryk Sienkiewicz's book In Desert and Wilderness. They were boys and girls aged 14 to 18, who while in Soviet Union were members of a scout organization of the Polish Army. On March 19, 1942, General Wadysaw Anders ordered the evacuation of Polish soldiers and civilians who lived next to army camps. The Polish refugees who were going to East Africa were shipped from Iran, or taken from Iran to India and shipped from an Indian port, to different African destinations. [15] The single man has not been traced; the woman, Josefa Bieronska, moved to South Africa with her children. Language--U. Kholm, 1943. The resettlement from Abercorn was called Operation Polejump. which I can't recall at the moment. Witness History speaks to one of them. Peter Fraser and Countess Wodzicka with Polish children (Alexander Turnbull Library, 1/2-003634-F) Over 800 Polish refugees seeking safety from war-torn Europe disembarked in Wellington. Harvard University. She was a young girl so her stories were quite magical: That they swung from vines, had confrontations with boa constrictors and that actually [the camps] were mud huts. Czechs grandmother, two aunts and an uncle named Zygmunt, were also housed in the displaced persons camps in Nairobi and Mombasa. . ul. There was also a simple apprenticeship system for the youth. Altogether, 257,660 citizens of the Second Polish Republic (190,942 adults and 66,718 kids) received the passports; 1,583 refused and were sent either to prisons or gulag. Both settlements had hospital facilities run by Polish doctors and nurses. (03.06.2019), Polish tractor maker Ursus signed a huge contract with Tanzania's National Service Corporation Sole. Young Polish women living in exile in Uganda in the 1940s, as the Second World War raged in Europe. [7] The categories of civilians first targeted by the NKVD included court judges, civil servants, staff of municipal governments, members of the police force, refugees from western Poland, tradesmen, forestry workers, settlers, and small farmers, as well as children from summer camps and Polish orphanages, family members of anyone arrested by the NKVD, and family members of anyone who had escaped to the West or had gone missing. History and implementation 4.2. There were also teachers, so schools were built. Within two years of the exiles arrival in Uganda, a unique community life developed in both the settlements, Koja and Nabyeya, which now had primary schools, secondary schools and a secondary economics school. This was a small fraction of the approximately 1.7 million Polish citizens who had been arrested by the Soviets at the beginning of the war. In Tanganyika, the largest settlement was Tengeru (4,000 refugees) and smaller camps were located in Kigoma, Kidugala, Ifunda, Kondoa, and Morogoro. And the most infamous German death camps had been located in Poland. Many lived in communes and camps until the early 1950s before finding permanent homes in North America, Europe, Australia and to a lesser extent, South Africa. Skins were tanned for leather and lint-cotton was purchased from nearby ginneries. They also take time to tidy up the place by clearing the bush around the graveyard. http://lemko.org/genealogy/addresses.htm, Records from the Central W arsaw, P oland The refugee center that Dr. Tade Daniel Omoshoto set up in a southwestern residential neighborhood of Warsaw doesn't look like much . Children were taken care of by the Polish Red Cross and residents of Bombay. The aim was a contented and reasonably self-contained community: the Poles had to be given a sense of purpose, wrote Rennie Montague Bere, a Cambridge University-educated colonial officer in Uganda who was in charge of the two refugee camps. We were mentally shaped by such organizations, as Sodality of Our Lady, and The Eucharistic Crusade. http://wilson.ctstateu.edu/lib/archives/polish/, http://www.poland.pl/articles/index.htm?c=421, http://www.ap.gdansk.pl/english/linki/poland.php, http://www.loc.gov/rr/european/archiwum.html, http://www.mapywig.org/m/wig500k/MAPA_POLSKI_1_500_000_KRAKOW_11.jpg, http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.CHAP7.ADDENDA.HTM, http://www.videofact.com/english/samples/E_2/E19_part1.html, http://www.iyp.org/polish/history/antypolonizmy/jedwabne_en_124.html, http://www.videofact.com/english/samples/E_2/E19_part2.html, Polish It lasted until 16 January 1943, at which point it was effectively revoked. Polish children in Tengeru, Tanzania in 1946. Tehran was a gate, through which we were sent, in groups, to different parts of the world. camp) Poland, Archives: Language--U. N'iu Iork, Paryzh, 1990. well as for the formation of a Polish army on Soviet soil. Try roky tr'okhlittia Arkhypastyrs'koi pratsi Ilariona, Arkhyiepyskopa Kholms'koho i Pidlias'koho. Ukrainian Catholics and Orthodox in Poland and Czechoslovakia. After the Polish Army had left the Soviet Union, the attitude of the Soviets towards the remaining Poles worsened. concerns and construction projects in Southern Rhodesia. . his evil empire. Father Waclaw Zajaczkowski even This was knows. + Copies of insurance death claims from the Polish Roman Catholic Union of Language--P. Varshava, 1990. They also murdered about 65,000 Poles in this terror.2, In one notorious massacre, in incredibly cold calculation, the NKVD-the Soviet secret police--systematically executed possibly 14,471 former polish officers, including political leaders, government officials, state archives, goverment archives of Poland, English version: http://www.archiwa.gov.pl/?CIDA=43, Polish home 00-202 Warszawa Living in Africa was very difficult for the Poles who were unfamiliar with local customs and languages and were not used to tropical weather. 22, 1941. medical experiments, and terror bombing, and in the concentration and death Many Poles left Iran for India, thanks to the efforts of Polish consul in Bombay, Eugeniusz Banasinski. Between March 24 and April 4, 33,069 soldiers left the Soviet Union for Iran, as well as 10,789 civilians, including 3,100 children. Pictures taken at Nairobi station, when hundreds of refugee Polish women and children, deportees rescued from Soviet captivity in Siberia, passed through on their way to build a new life in Uganda. My two aunts lived in Koja Camp for several years and spoke of their time there with great affection. In Eastern Africa, six permanent Polish refugee settlements were established: four in Tanganyika (Tengeru, Kondoa, Ifunda, Kidugala) and two in Uganda (Masindi and Koja). recruited families willing to take in a hundred orphans. Krakivs'ki Ukrainoznavchi Zoshyty. Additional Polish transports arrived in late 1943. It had a clubroom, a hospital, and a gym. Bolicza 2, Addresses of Ukrainian I will never forget the journey on trucks through the mountains from Ashgabat to Tehran. With a few days, Germany invaded Poland, triggering World War II. At Isfahan Polish orphanage, a children's camp was opened, where 2,300 children and 300 adults stayed and eight elementary schools were created. He was even more grateful at Yalta, when the Western Allies Archiwum Panstowe w Przemyslu The delicate balance between the Soviet Union and the Western Allies had to be maintained, it seems, at any cost. The last camp that was built in Northern Rhodesia at Abercorn (today's Mbala, Zambia). The first transport of Polish refugees from the Soviet Union arrived at the Tanga port in Tanganyika on August 27, 1942. The Kondoa settlement had 430 people, who lived in twenty barracks built of clay. The Millenium of Christianity in Rus'-Ukraine. Consuls together with delegates of the Polish Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare dealt with Polish refugees. Gore Browne, expected around 500 Polish refugees to arrive from the Middle East. Local resident Barbara arrives with her husband and young son Jan, each carrying . There were 22 different camps that housed 13,000-19,000 Polish exiles spread out across East and Southern Africa, some with more than 6,000 people, others with just a handful of families. PHOTO | UGANDA NATIONAL ARCHIVES. One of the administrators lived in a building that also had a community centre where films were shown. it housed several camps for the thousands of orphaned Polish children, it See for full text and footnotes: "It was a friendly existence, side by side," she told DW. The list of Polish refugees residing in areas of East Africa and Rhodesia was prepared by the Polish Red Cross in Nairobi in 1943. A commandant usually a British official stood at the head of the administration of each of the settlements. However, in October 1946, the Secretary of State in London pronounced that refugees who could get a job in the area for at least 6 months, or had a sum of money sufficient to sustain themselves, could stay. However, during first years of war the rate of German and Soviet murder of the Poles was much higher than that of the Jews. Language--U. Varshava, 1997. . In Kenya, they were located in Rongai, Manira, Makindu, Nairobi, and Nyali near Mombasa. The refugees finally left Iran after a few months, and were transported to a number of countries, such as Lebanon, Mandatory Palestine, India, Uganda, Kenya, Tanganyika, Northern and Southern Rhodesia, South Africa, New Zealand, and Mexico. The Polish population, both civilian and military, was evacuated to Iran from the Soviet Union in two stages from March to September 1942. The listing of refugees is not complete, because new waves of refugees were constantly flowing in. Gadam. That the Western Allies knew all about the deportations is clear from their relief efforts in their behalf in the Soviet Union and the Middle East. Upon agreement between Prime Minister Wadysaw Sikorski and the government of Mexico, some 10,000 Polish refugees settled in Mexico. Marunchak, Mykhailo (1914). 22sm. Polish evacuees had to travel by train to Krasnovodsk, where they took a ship across the Caspian Sea to Iran. They were housed in the Polish Children's Camp located in Pahiatua. The Polish migration to Africa has its roots in an event from August 1939. The Jewish population of 8,700,000 was trapped under the control of the Berlin government; at least sixty percent (or about 5,100,000) were exterminated by the Germans during World War II. At its peak, Koja accommodated around 3,000 Polish refugees. The expected end of the war limited further evacuations. All are eager to help the Allied Cause in any way possible. Ukraintsi v Pol'shi pislia Druhoi Svitovoi Viiny 1944-1984. http://www.poland.pl/articles/index.htm?c=421 The possibility of relegating Polish civilians to northern and southern Rhodesia and the Union of South Africa was also taken into account. Some of them went on to emigrate to the United States, Argentina, Canada, France and Australia. Language--U. Varshava, There's lots more.Continue on with Poland page 2. In October 1942, the Director of War Evacuees and Camps of Northern Rhodesia, Gore Browne, expected around 500 Polish refugees to arrive from the Middle East. They also kept some small livestock such as chicken. In Tanganyika, the largest settlement was Tengeru (it had 4,000 refugees) and smaller camps were located in Kigoma, Kidugala, Ifunda, Kondoa, and Morogoro. (Vydano u spivpratsi z Fundatsiieiu Doslidzhennia Lemkivshyny. Although provisions were made to resettle several thousand Poles in that country, only two transports arrived in the summer and fall of 1943 with a total of 1,432 refugees. THE TRUTH ABOUT JEDWABNE AND HEROIC DEEDS OF THE POLISH NATION IN THE 20TH CENTURY by Prof. Iwo Cyprian Pogonowski, See full text in: http://www.iyp.org/polish/history/antypolonizmy/jedwabne_en_124.html. Wherever they went the Polish refugees encountered effusive good will not only on the part of the respective governments that invited them but also on the part of the native populations. Children were the vast majority of the refugees. For many, the help provided by the United States and Great Britain was too little and too late. Their home became a deserted hacienda in Santa Rosa, near Leen. To accommodate the refugees, a sprawling stationary camp was established in Isfahan. The largest Polish settlement in Tengeru had 947 houses. Nothing looked like Poland, but adults in our camp did their best to emphasize our roots. Many of those who wound up in New Zealand and the Union of South Africa remained where they were brought. In Eastern Africa, six permanent Polish refugee settlements were established: four in Tanganyika (Tengeru, Kondoa, Ifunda, Kidugala) and two in Uganda (Masindi and Koja). Food was purchased locally from contractors. There were several waves of deportations during which families were sent to barren land in the Soviet Union. The main street of the camp was named after General Tadeusz Br-Komorowski. The expected end of the war limited further evacuations. For the plight of Poles who remained in the Soviet interior until the defeat of Germany, see Polish population transfers (194446) and the population exchange between Poland and Soviet Ukraine. Western Poland during the massive population exchanges following World War II. The second wave of deportations by the Soviet occupational forces across the Kresy macroregion, affected 300,000 to 330,000 Poles, sent primarily to Kazakhstan. When they arrived they . order.5, To all this Polish misery, pain, and death, we must add what the Germans did in the Poland they ruled. And from 1939 to 1941, they deported en mass about 1,6000,000 Poles, including 400,000 Jews. T.4. ch.1,3-4, 1990. For tens of thousands the Soviet Union became their final resting place before the war's end. http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2014/01/08/world/europe/ap-eu-poland-katyn-massacre.html?emc=eta1&_r=0, Then there were the Soviet deportations. Polish territory was occupied, so the government could only count on the Britons help in finding shelter for the population. In 1940, following the invasion and annexation of large parts of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, there was a mass de-Polonisation of the occupied territory, and between 320,000 and one million Polish nationals were rounded up and deported to the Urals and Siberia. But such isolation was not the norm in the rest of the camps in East Africa. A Polish Child's WWII Journey. He was assisted by the camp manager appointed by the Polish Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare. African radio stations ran programs in the Polish language and there waseven a Polish press. Chicken and eggs were plentiful. US membership $20; Canadian membership is $25. The [following] article In Kenya, the camps were located in Rongai (outside Nairobi), Manira, Makindu, Nairobi, and Nyali in Mombasa. 8s. Dyrektor mgr Krzysztof Patek Northern Rhodesia 3.1. How a displaced Polish family found refuge in Tanzania, Tanzania joins projects financier Africa50, Bola Tinubu: Nigeria's political 'godfather', Tinubu declared Nigeria's president-elect. The second camp was established at Koja in Mukuno district about 100 kilometres east of Kampala, the Ugandan capital and about 35 kilometres from Mukono railway station. What became of the rest? Crime was rampant inside and outside ghettos. about one in ten of all adult males,1 and murdered. and intellectuals.3 Some 4,254 of these were uncovered in mass graves in Katyn Forest by the Nazis in 1941, who then invited an international group of neutral representatives and doctors to study the corpses and confirm Soviet guilt.4 For more about Katyn, see: VHO.org. 1,400 people arrived on board ship, then they were transported to Dar es Salaam. Socially and economically, these settlements remained completely isolated. In order to ensure the highest quality of our services, we use small files called cookies. Wiesawa Paskiewicz, who stayed at Kolhapur, wrote: "Our daily activities were marked by school, church and scouting. After a short stay, they too were dispatched across the border to Colonia Santa Rosa. (0-22) 831-32-06 do 08 The two refugee camps in Uganda were built at Koja, on the shores of Lake Victoria and Nyabyeya, Budongo Forest Reserve in Masindi district in northwestern Uganda. Also: Language. July 30, 1941, provided for the release of all Poles in Soviet exile as By the end of 1945, another 4,300 were evacuated to Lebanon; by 1946, that number rose to 6,000. When Canadian Jonathan Durand traveled to Africa for the first time as a 20-year-old, he experienceda strange sense of being at home, an odd feeling for a young white man. ; ; ; [][][]; (); 1/2; Language--U. Vinnipeh, 1969. Unlike elsewhere, upon graduation the teens were placed either in schools operated by religious orders or in technical colleges. Polish refugees in Africa. Eighty percent of the food consumed by the Jews was smuggled into the ghettos by Poles. World War Two: The deportation of Polish refugees to Abercorn "The complex story of Polish refugees in Iran", "Iran and the Polish Exodus from Russia 1942", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Evacuation_of_Polish_civilians_from_the_USSR_in_World_War_II&oldid=1096111774, Articles using infobox templates with no data rows, Articles with unsourced statements from June 2020, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Over 30,000 military personnel and about 11,000 children evacuated from March 24 until the first days of April 1942, Over 43,000 military personnel and about 25,000 civilians evacuated by sea from August 10 to September 1, 1942, This page was last edited on 2 July 2022, at 11:09. Still, thousands of distraught Poles remained there, sent to kolkhozs. One of the camps was in Abercorn, in the remote Northern Province. This thesis explores why the camp was built in such a remote area . Just in the city of Bydgoszcz, for example, Germans murdered about 10,000 non-Jewish civilians in four months of occupation. 21sm. Zaproszenia ze strony Komitetu Narodowego Amerykanw Polskiego Pochodzenia, Ko?a Oficerw Rezerwy w Nowym Jorku. list of polish refugees in east africa and rhodesia list of polish refugees in east africa and rhodesia. Only three or so trips were allowed, so, sadly, those who arrived too late were unable to get out. obituaries and death notices found in the Dziennik Chicagoski, 1890-1971. At first, they were transported to the town of Bandra, in the suburbs of Bombay, where Hanka Ordonwna took care of the kids. [19], The first Polish refugees came to Palestine in summer 1942. Humanity's history of migration by sea from Troy to Lampedusa, Polish tractors plowing a furrow to Africa, 'EU must rethink its approach to migration', Ukraine updates: Zelenskyy calls for ICC Russia probe, NATO: Finland forges ahead of Sweden toward membership, More than mercenaries: Russia's Wagner Group in Africa, Russian troops step up fight to cut off Bakhmut supply lines. 23cm. 1 November 1944. 492s. Hankiewicza 1 This number does not include those shot for failing or straying out of line during deportation, or disobeying an As a history student, he was surprised about the lack of information about Poles seeking sanctuary in Africa his professor had never heard of Polish refugee camps on the continent. After the hell that we survived, Tehran was a different world. In my view, this toll is the direct and indirect responsibility of the new Polish government (although aided, abetted, and promoted by the Soviets), as I will establish in the next section. Africa provided another safe harbor for the Poles. M23 has been accusing the DRC of ignoring a promise to integrate its fighters into the army. Podlesice Zivilarbeiterlager (public servants Their ships docked at Mombasa, the Kenyan port, and from there they scattered in various directions in East and Southern Africa - from the Equator to the Cape of Good Hope. By. living conditions and brought the devastating contagious diseases under control, Polish exiles at a camp in Uganda. Contact our Media sales & Licensing team about access. Copies of Haller's Army Roma J. Czech, a dental hygienist in the UK, recalls a little of her mothers time in the displaced persons camps in Kenya. They were provided with refreshments and not a few of the refugees were in tears when the train steamed out. t.3/4, 1995. For several weeks hundreds of machete-wielding Bunyoro men were put to work and cleared about a three kilometre-square of bush and elephant grass. The date is May 2000 and it comes Several scout groups, schools, training centers, a Women's Auxiliary Service, and an Officers' Legion were established. The next groups arriving in October were directed to Tengeru, Kondoa, Ifunda and Kidugala. He reveals them in his book "Flight Across the Sea." Society volunteers offer a limited research service to members for a reasonable Because The Polish refugees housed in the various camps in Iran, Lebanon, Palestine, India, and Africa moved to Great Britain and its dominions, Canada and Australia, from where some of them later emigrated to the United States; some also settled in Argentina. It is a miracle that we survived, with thousands dead.[12]. [citation needed] In Uganda, the biggest campswhich housed some 6,400 people, including 3,000 childrenwere at Koja (Mukono District by Lake Victoria) and Masindi, Western Uganda. The dead were not included in the census, because . In the second stage of evacuation from the interior, more than 43,000 military personnel and about 25,000 civilians left with General Wadysaw Anders across the Caspian Sea to Iran. Like the Nazis in the west of the country, the Soviet Union began to carry out ethnic cleansing. There was a mast with a huge Polish flag, and the White Eagle on the gate."[12]. They were going from Kigoma to Dar es Salaam and from there by ship to the United Kingdom, where their next of kinoften husbands and sons who had been fighting in the warwere getting courses and training for civilian jobs. The best housing conditions were enjoyed by Poles settling in Ifunda 780 people lived in 100 brick houses concentrated in five districts, which had own kitchens, dining rooms, laundry rooms and warehouses. of hostages, reprisal raids, forced labor, "euthanasia," starvation, exposure, The second world war was not fought to save the Jews. Panstwowe w Rzeszowie Scouting was popular. The housing was primitive: dwellings made of clay, with roofs made of grass and banana leaves. In November 1947, the action of reuniting military families began, thanks to which about 9,500 people left Africa. 29. list of polish refugees in east africa and rhodesia. The majority refused to return to the country. But Poles were reluctant to return to their homeland, which was under staunch Soviet control. IWM collections, This media is not currently available. Another transport arrived at the Mombasa port in Kenya on September 19. The settlements in Koja and Tengeru ended their activities only in the second half of 1952. In Africa, Polish schools, churches, hospitals, civic centers, and manufacturing and service cooperatives were founded and Polish culture prospered. [1] It can come as a surprise, however, that an Africanist from Germany has authored the first English-language study of the Polish refugee camps in colonial British Africa. The dead were buried at various graveyards in East and Southern Africa. READ: How a displaced Polish family found refuge in Tanzania. Camp life was organized, there was a school, scouts, and religious life. 4. Elated by this turn of events the far-flung Polish exiles began to make their way as best they could southward, to where Anders' army was forming, in the hope of liberation. This agreement was signed on July 30 1941 and enabled all Polish people to be freed for the purpose of forming an Army and help Stalin fight Hitler. In August 1945 the number of Polish refugees in Northern Rhodesia was 3,419 of which 1,227 stayed in camps in the capital Lusaka, 1,431 in Bwana Mkubwa at the Copperbelt,164 in Fort Historian Erik Lindner takes a long look back to discover answers to this question. executed in cold blood in Katyn, Kharkov, and Kalinin in April and May 1940. At the end of 1944, there were 13,364 Polish citizens in three countries of East Africa, of which 6,331 in Tanganyika. You can change the settings of your browser at any time. A few hundred people remained in Tanganyika. The Poles living in the settlements in the then Tanganyika formed well-organized communities with an efficiently functioning educational system, cultural and sporting activities. Snakes and other natural perils were commonplace. In World War Two Polish refugees were deported from Poland to the Soviet Union, to Uzbekistan and to Persia. In the Kidugala settlement, 798 Poles lived near the deserted post-German Protestant mission. Altogether, in 1943-44 there were 26 schools for Polish refugees in the Near East.[12]. Nowoisiad-Ostrowska depicted quite a sociable image with singing songs in the evening, listening together to the radio in order to be informed about the war in Europe, and doing craftwork with other women in the evenings.[14]. Zustrichi. Houses made of clay, in the heart of Africa. PHOTO | UGANDA NATIONAL ARCHIVES. In Uganda, the camps were located in Masindi and Koya on Lake Victoria. Arrested Polish gentiles were to be turned over to the Germans for execution. This operation was complicated, time-consuming and cost-intensive, especially in the conditions of the ongoing war. Further Polish transports went to India by sea, from the port of Ahvaz to Bombay. Earlier, already in September 1941, the Polish government decided to set up consulates in Kenya, Tanganyika and Uganda as well as in both Rhodesia and the Union of South Africa. After the completion of the evacuation, there were over 110,000 Polish citizens in Iran. These countries included: Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. They worked as farmers, and their first transport came through India in October 1943 with 720 people, most of them women and children. papers in Archiwa IJP, Polish version, http://dione.ids.pl/~ijp/pol/aog4.html or Polish Within a few weeks, the Soviets invaded Poland from the east. The Soviet Red Army had taken the Polish officers prisoner after invading eastern Poland in September 1939. With a few days, Germany invaded Poland, triggering World War 2. [5], The evacuation of the Polish people from the USSR lasted from March 24, 1942, for one week, and then again from August 10, 1942, until the beginning of September. the Poland - Soviet Union Border during 1945 -1950 Approximately 90% of them were non-Jewish Poles, with most of the remaining ones Jewish. A Polish press, located in Palestine and Iran, printed the much-needed educational materials used in refugee schools throughout the Middle East. Subject: UKRAINIANS IN POLAND [2] There were four waves of deportations of entire families with children, women, and elderly people aboard freight trains from 1940 until 1941. Care had been taken in planning the settlement to avoid giving it the look of a military barracks. It appeared in the "Miedzy Nami" in one of Canadian newspapers "They were young, and these intercultural encounters have shaped their humanity.". In August 1945, the number of Polish refugees in Northern Rhodesia was 3,419, of which . Unfortunately, due to bad health conditions caused by the poor living standard in the Soviet Union and the hardships of traveling, more than 2,100 people (5.7% of the total) died in Iran due to dysentery, typhoid, malaria and diseases caused by malnutrition. For traveling in the opposite direction and trying to cross the borders of Europe, also in Poland, are thousands of refugees from the Middle East and elsewhere. At that time, the Poles were the largest minority of European origin in East Africa. From Persia half of them were deported to East and Southern Africa. Often it was not accurate, especially as far as dates Unable to return to war-torn Poland, some 116,000 Polesliving in the Soviet Union were evacuated to Iran, which had been invaded by the Anglo-Soviet alliance. UNHCR also aims to improve durable solutions such as local integration opportunities and increase public awareness of refugees and asylum issues. Wood scavenged from the surrounding wilderness was used for fuel, and a bakery was eventually established that baked over one thousand loaves of bread daily. came to be known as the "City of Polish Children." Ukrains'ki hovirky u Pol'shi. Sea transports were sent to the transit camps in British India (the port of Karachi in todays Pakistan) and from there to the settlements in India, Africa, Mexico and New Zealand. Zahal'na biblioteka. In America, the date of the arrival of the first transport aboard the USS Hermitage (on June 25, 1943 consisting of 706 refugees, including 166 children) was a State secret. Durand's grandmother made it to England in 1949. Mexico. ul. The Poles in Africa were mostly disappointed with the result of the conference in Yalta, which led to the dependency of eastern Poland to the regime of Joseph Stalin, and they did not want to return to Poland ruled by communists controlled by the authorities in Moscow. After Yalta [9] In this small window of opportunity, Anders' Army was formed, which attracted not only soldiers who had been kept in Soviet camps, but also thousands of civilians, and Polish orphanages with children whose parents had perished in the Gulag. Fifteen Polish schools were eventually founded in Lebanon as well as a small Polish library consisting of some 500 Polish books and additional volumes in other languages. Having unloaded H.M. Troopship Nevasa at Karachi, then in India, now West Pakistan they were tasked to sail to Khorramshahr, in Persia, now Iran on the 17th of March 1944. America. 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