The story of 18-year-old Grzegorz Przemyk, brutally beaten to death by the communist services, is known throughout Poland. He described the crime committed against a high school graduate in the 1980s in a shocking book entitled “Let there be no traces” reporter Cezary Lazarewicz. Based on the reportage, a movie with the same title was made a few years ago.
The unimaginable suffering that the 18-year-old suffered at the hands of the militiamen in the 1980s shocked the whole country. Barbara Sadowska, Grzegorz’s mother, experienced the greatest trauma. The Polish poet and anti-communist opposition activist died just three years after her beloved son. Sadowska’s relatives remember that she could not accept the death of her only child until the end.
Barbara Sadowska. Poet and anti-communist activist
Barbara Sadowska was born in 1940 in Paris. She attended art high school, but at the age of 17 she made her debut as a poet in Nowa Kultura. She published her works until the mid-1970s, because then she joined the democratic opposition. This automatically meant that her work would not be published in communist Poland.
Her only beloved child was born in 1963. When Grzegorz turned three years old, Barbara separated from his father. The man moved out of the apartment at Hibner Street in Warsaw, and the mother and son stayed just the two of them.
Death of Grzegorz Przemyk. The militia brutally beat the 18-year-old
The ordeal of the 18-year-old began on May 12, 1983. It was just after the suspension of martial law, and Grzegorz Przemyk and his friends celebrated well written final exams. First, they drank wine at Grzegorz’s house. Barbara wasn’t there. Then they went to the Old Town for a walk – they wanted to feel the storm that they had previously watched from the balcony.
On the Castle Square, the militia approached the high school graduates. The officers demanded to show documents, Grzegorz refused. Then they were taken to the police station at Jezuicka Street, which no longer exists today. It was there that a monstrous crime took place, which soon shocked not only Polish society. The brutal torture of the 18-year-old was also loud outside our country.
At the police station, the communist officers beat Grzegorz to such an extent that he had to be transported by ambulance to the hospital on Hoża Street. From there he was to be placed in a psychiatric hospital, but Barbara did not agree. She took her beloved, severely beaten son home. However, the 18-year-old required immediate medical care, so the next day he was transported to a hospital in Solec. There, a decision was made to perform an operation that lasted several hours. It was an uneven race against time, because it was too late for Grzegorz. The injuries to the internal organs were so extensive that the 18-year-old died. It happened exactly on May 14, 1983 – three days before his 19th birthday.
The communist authorities, after Grzegorz’s death, later tried to slander and discredit his mother publicly. In addition, medical records were falsified, a staged, orchestrated trial was organised, in which it was pretended in every way that it was about finding out the truth. Finally, the orderlies who assisted in transporting the tortured boy to the hospital were sentenced, and the militiamen – who tortured Barbara Sadowska’s son to death – remained unpunished.
A mother’s despair after the death of a child. “Looked like a broken twig”
Hundreds of people came to Grzegorz Przemyk’s funeral, which became a nationwide event. According to Hanna Krall’s interview for “Gazeta Wyborcza”, Barbara came wearing a denim jacket. Why? The prominent reporter explained that Barbara wanted to wear clothes that belonged to her child.
The tragic and sudden death of Grzegorz broke the poetess forever. “It looked like a broken twig, as if someone had broken it in half. I didn’t know what to do. Nobody knew (…)” – these words about the desperate mother were written by the woman’s friend, the poet Wiktor Woroszylski, quoted by many sources.
Meeting with the Pope. “Baby, how can I comfort you?”
In June 1983, Barbara Sadowska’s meeting with Pope John Paul II, who visited Poland a month after Grzegorz Przemyk’s funeral, resounded loudly.
Barbara Sadowska had neither the strength nor the will to live. She had been in the hospital before, on a drip. Friends brought her to the audience with the Pope. Later, the media often quoted the memories of her friend, Ligia Urniaż-Grabowska, who accompanied her broken mother.
I held her in my arms because she couldn’t stand up
Urniaż-Grabowska said. He took me with her in his arms, I began to pull out so that they were together, and she fell on his chest. His face was right in front of me, full of compassion and pain. I heard him whisper to her: “Child, what can I tell you, how can I comfort you?” she recalled.
Barbara Sadowska passed away on October 1, 1986, three years after the death of her only child. She died of lung cancer. Mother and son were buried in the same grave at Powązki Cemetery in Warsaw.
Sources: historia.pl/”Let there be no traces” – Cezary Łazarewicz/agencja-informacyjna.com/newsweek.pl/wyborcza.pl/interia.pl
Source: Gazeta
Bruce is a talented author and journalist with a passion for entertainment . He currently works as a writer at the 247 News Agency, where he has established himself as a respected voice in the industry.
