The Cursed Soldiers, also known as the indomitable soldiers, despite the end of World War II and the introduction of post-Yalta order in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, did not give up their weapons and fought for Poland's independence. They were punished with death for resistance and the authorities at that time did everything to ensure that their memory would not survive.
The topic of the Cursed Soldiers, the so-called Second Conspiracy, only became more widely known in the early 1990s thanks to the exhibition "Żołnierze Wyklęci - antykomunistyczne podziemie zbrojne po 1944 r." [Cursed Soldiers - anti-communist armed underground after 1944] organised at the University of Warsaw in 1993. The legislative initiative for the introduction of the new public holiday – Cursed Soldiers National Remembrance Day – was taken by President Lech Kaczyśski, upheld by President Bronislaw Komorowski and implemented by the Act of 3 February 2011.
The date of the holiday was not chosen accidentally – it was on 1 March 1951, after a show trial, that the leaders of the 4th Main Board of the Association of the independence organization "Wolność i Niezawisłość" [Freedom and Independence] were shot in the Warsaw prison in Mokotów. The communists then killed the president of the organisation, Lieutenant Colonel Łukasz Ciepliński, and his associates: Adam Lazarowicz, Mieczysław Kawalec, Józef Rzepka, Franciszek Błażej, Józef Batory and Karol Chmiel. Their bodies were buried in an unknown location.
At the University of Lodz, the tragic fate of the Cursed Soldiers was the subject of scientific research and lectures by, among others, the late Prof. Dr hab. Przemysław Waingertner from the Faculty of Philosophy and History, Head of the Department of Recent History of Poland, who died suddenly on 31 January this year. We would like to remind you today of the lecture given by Professor Waingertner on the subject of the Cursed Soldiers.
Source: Communications and PR Centre, University of Lodz