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• NIGHT WITHOUT AND END - »FAILED CORRECTION«

News

 Barbara Engelking

On Estera Siemiatycka, sołtys Edward Malinowski, and lawsuits

<<< back to part 1

Act II: The 1949-1950 Trials

In May 1948, twelve residents of the village of Malinowo sent a letter to the prosecutor at the District Court in Białystok, in which they accused Edward Malinowski (son of Stanisław), sołtys during the occupation, of “collaborating with Germans and harming the villagers in various ways” [...], that “he assigned those he did not like to go to Prussia”, and “in addition to this, sołtys Malinowski Edward handed over to the gendarmes eighteen Jewish people hiding in the forest of the Malinowo village, whom the gendarmes shot;” in 1947, together with relatives, “they brought to the village a gang of »Jaskółka«[15] in the number of twelve armed people”, who beat several villagers that were conflicted with the Malinowskis, and in 1948, “»Jaskółka«’s gang took tax money from the post-war sołtys of Malinowo, Jan Wyszyński.” [16]

This letter set in motion a series of testimonies, given by witnesses before the prosecutor and concerning sołtys Malinowski’s activities. Testifying against sołtys Malinowski were: Kazimierz Mielik, Kamil Kosiński, Franciszek Kosiński, Zenon Kosiński, and Edward Malinowski (son of Adolf). Kazimierz Mielik testified that “at the end of 1943 the Germans came, the gendarmes, and entered Malinowski’s house, where they stayed from eight in the morning until two or three in the afternoon. In the evening, they left the house together with Malinowski. Malinowski ordered the people from the Malinowo village to gather and go to help the Germans in the manhunt. Obeying Malinowski’s orders, the people reached the forest next to the village, about one kilometer from the village, and having reached a ditch, they stopped. In that ditch, there were simply [...] eighteen Jews, women, a child and men. Malinowski asked those Jews to come out of the shelter and when they did so, the Germans ordered them, that is the Jews, to undress, and then shot them.”[17]  Zenon Kosiński testified on the May 5, 1949, “that when the Germans came for those Jews, they first went to Edward Malinowski, who was sołtys, and with him they went to the bunker where the Jews were hiding, and he called for them to come out from the bunker: you’ll be fine, and when they came out, the Germans told them to undress and shot [them].[18]

Defendant Edward Malinowski (son of Stanisław) was interrogated on June 9, 1949. He was arrested the following day. He refused to plead guilty and testified that “it was the forester from the village of Czarna Wielka that showed the place where the Jews were hiding in the forest to the German gendarmes.”[19] On August 10, 1949, the court set the date of the trial for September 6 that year. Two days later, the following events took place in Malinowo, which were described by the wife of the defendant, Maria Malinowska, during the interrogation: “On August 12, 1949, at 9 p.m., I was sleeping in my room, when two unknown men with long rifles entered the room [...] and immediately told me and my son Tadeusz “tell us who accused my husband Edward Malinowski of collaboration with the Germans”. [...] Then I said that may husband’s accusers were: Malinowski Adolf and his son Edward, Kosiński Franciszek and his son Zenon, Kosiński Kamil and Milik Kazimierz. They wrote it down on a piece of paper and without saying a word they went away in an unknown direction, because it was dark and raining.”[20]

The men then went to the then sołtys of the village, Jan Wyszyński. Wyszyński recognized one of them: „it was ‘Jaskółka’ armed with a rifle and a pistol, [...] the other individual was armed with a rifle.”[21] They asked sołtys where the Kosiński and Malinowski families lived. They went to them and beat them up, then returned to sołtys and, suspecting that he had reported their arrival to milicja (the police), they also beat him and his wife “with sticks and butts of their rifles.” After this beating they took two pairs of old boots worth about 15,000 zlotys.[22] Another of those beaten that evening, Edward Malinowski (son of Adolf), testified that “members of the aforementioned gangs of unknown affiliation, under the command of »Jaskółka« came to our village several times, taking clothes, bicycles, etc. from individual farmers. In addition, in August 1949 the same »Jaskółka«, together with two other members of his gang, came to my house and severely beat my father and me.[23] Zenon Kosinski, in turn, testified during the interrogation that on August 12 »Jaskółka« came to them with his friend: “he started beating me with a rifle butt and then kicking me, saying that I accused the same Malinowski Edward, son of Stanislaw.”[24]

The information about the beatings of Malinowo inhabitants can be found also in MO [Milicja Obywatelska, People’s Police] reports for August 1949: “on 12 August [19]49, at 10 p.m. the gang of »Jaskółka«”consisting of four men, dressed in uniforms of Polish Army and in civilian clothes, armed with automatics, rifles and pistols, in the village of Malinowo, Grodzisk commune, beat up inhabitants of the above mentioned village, citizens Kosiński Zenon, Wyszyński Jan and Wyszyńska Bronisława, as a result of which the above listed suffered grievous bodily harm.”[25] “Report on activity for the month of August 1949” provided further details about the beating of the inhabitants of Malinowo on August 12: “in the village of Malinowo, Grodzisk commune, members of this gang [of »Jaskółka’s«] beat up the residents of the aforementioned village that testified in a trial against the former sołtys [concerning] the German occupation of the aforementioned village, suspected of collaboration with the Germans, with whom »Jaskółka« maintained contact. He learnt about the witnesses’ testimonies from the family of the suspected sołtys, who learnt about the above from the court defender.”[26]

Moreover, another document states that on August 13, 1949. “The gang [of »Jaskółka«] in an temporary collaboration with the gang of “Miedziak,”[27] committed a murder of Doctor Adolf Czajkowski, a resident of Drohiczyn, who on the previous day had provided medical aid to the residents of the village of Malinowo, Grodzisk commune, beaten by the aforementioned gang.”[28] As a result of the incident in Malinowo, the wife and son of the former sołtys, Edward Malinowski (son of Stanisław), were arrested. The Military Court in Białystok sentenced Tadeusz Malinowski to one year and six months’ imprisonment for indicating the place of residence of the farmers who were robbed,[29] and Maria Malinowska to six months’ imprisonment.[30]

Such circumstances – beating and intimidation of witnesses – preceded the main trial of sołtys Edward Malinowski (son of Stanisław). As scheduled, it took place on September 6, 1949, during a session of the Białystok Regional Court in an off-site session in Bielsk Podlaski. Most of the prosecution witnesses, i.e. Franciszek, Zenon, and Kamil Kosiński, did not appear at the session (for which the court fined them 10,000 zlotys each), nor did Kazimierz Mielik, who had left the village of Malinowo for an unknown destination. Moreover, the wife and son of the accused Edward Malinowski could not appear (they were in jail).

Edward Malinowski did not plead guilty to the charges against him, he testified that “one day in 1943 gendarmes from Grodzisk and Dziadkowice came to him in a number of about thirty men. They ordered him to summon forester Półtorak from Malinowo. He was away, so the forester from Czarna Wielka was summoned. When he came, the Germans ordered Malinowski to „”take six men with shovels from the village and follow them.” They took part in the manhunt for the hiding Jews and witnessed the shooting of the Jews by the Germans.[31]

One of the witnesses who appeared at the main hearing was Maria Wiśniewska (Estera Siemiatycka), who testified: “during the German occupation I was hiding as a Jew in the forest near Malinowo. Nobody wanted to take me in. So I went to sołtys Malinowski, and he took me in. For a good few weeks I hid in Malinowski’s barn and he fed me, even though I was penniless. At night his barn was full of Jews, Malinowski gave them food. I owe Malinowski my life, because he had Aryan papers made for me, and then, upon my request, reported that I was evading forced labor. I was then arrested and sent back to Germany. I used to visit Malinowo on my leave. At the time of the murder of the Jews, I was in Germany. I only received a letter from Edward Malinowski, son of Adolf, in which he wrote me that a forester had delivered the Jews into German hands and that the Jewish partisans had killed him for that.”[32] Two other Jews, Chuna Kapłan and Lejb Prybut, testified that sołtys Edward Malinowski (son of Stanisław) had also helped them during the German occupation.[33] The hearing was adjourned and resumed over a year later, on November 6, 1950. The Kosińskis, this time brought the court by the police, gave a completely different testimony – they did not incriminate sołtys Malinowski. After the beating before the previous trial, they apparently had reasons to fear for their health and lives. Zenon Kosinski testified: “People said that the Germans ordered the Jews to come out of the shelter, maybe the defendant ordered them too, I don’t know because I wasn’t there,” and Franciszek Kosinski stated that he “didn’t testify at the Security Office that the defendant handed over the Jews. [...] I don’t know what mangle they’ve made in the report.” [34] The court acquitted Edward Malinowski (son of Stanisław), charging the State Treasury with the costs of the proceedings. Witnesses fined for not appearing at the first trial wrote a letter to the court asking for the fine to be remitted, and explained that they could not appear at the first trial because they had been beaten. The court remitted the fine.[35]

Commenting on the trial of sołtys Edward Malinowski years later, Estera Siemiatycka (then Maria Wiltgren[36]) said in a 1996 interview: “After the war ended, he would have been given the death penalty. [...] I saved him, even though he did a lot of harm to me.”[37] One may wonder why Estera testified like that during the trial of sołtys Malinowski. Various interpretations are possible, but I think that the most likely explanation is of psychological nature: she was grateful to him for saving her life, she wanted to repay him with good in spite of all the evil she had suffered from him.

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