General Stanslaw Kozicki

 I finished writing this article yesterday August 30th.  Today there is a front page report in The Guardian  "Six arrested after killing of Polish man in suspected hate crime." All the more reason to remember what we owe to Poland.

GENERAL STANISLAW  KOZICKI

In this photo behind the grave in the foreground are three in a row,  all of Polish                             soldiers.  The one leaning behind beside the path is of a Polish general. There are                             two more Polish grave not clearly visible behind these, and one more behind the                                photographer, 7 in all.

In the July 2016 edition of Leominster News Councillors Felicity Norman, Deanne Evans and Clive Thomas deplored  instances of abusive behaviour towards foreign people following the Brexit referendum.  The largest group of people to settle here in recent years has come from Poland.  But in nearly every part of the country you will find descendants of Polish people who came here during and after WW2.   I said descendants but of course there are still some of the original people still alive including a wonderful woman who lives near me.

The Battle of Britain is often portrayed as a lone British struggle but other nationalities were involved, the largest contingent being Polish.  Two squadrons were entirely Polish and Polish pilots flew in other squadrons as well.  303 Polish Squadron had the  highest  Hurricane Squadron  hit rate of them all.  One of the reasons for this was that their pilots were more battle hardened having unsuccessfully fought the Nazis in their own country and desperately wanting to retaliate.

Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding, who led Fighter Command wrote  -

  "Had it not been for the magnificent material contributed by the Polish squadrons and their unsurpassed gallantry, I hesitate to say that the outcome of the Battle would have been the same."

In other words their contribution was critical.    It is ironic therefore that although we declared war in 1939 in support of Poland, Polish forces were excluded from the London victory celebrations in 1946 because of fear of antagonising Stalin – political correctness.

In 2012  I heard about Polish graves in Leominster cemetery. When I investigated  I found 7 graves, all of soldiers who seem to have died at Barons Cross Hospital in 1947 or 1948. Some graves were in reasonable condition but I nearly overlooked one which had sunk and on which the writing was obscured by soil and vegetation.  It was the most neglected looking of them all.  Carefully clearing this I read in English - TO THE MEMORY OF MAJOR GENERAL  STANISLAW KOZICKI   POLISH  ARMY     DIED JULY 13 1948 AGED 55 YEARS.    

From several sources I pieced together the following information. 

He was born in Lviv which is now in Ukraine. At first he was in the Austro-Hungarian army and later joined the Polish army where he rose to high rank finally becoming Head of the Armed Forces Department in the Polish War Ministry.  In 1938 he returned home after some weeks away to find that his wife, Helenam 5 year old daughter Alice,  her 16 year old tutor Zofia and their 18 year old maid Jozefa, had all been bludgeoned to death.   His batman had done this to cover up a theft and was found a few days later and committed suicide with a pistol he had stolen from the General.  There is a photo of the general at the funeral which I found in an online copy of a Polish newspaper of the time.

                                General Kozicki at the funeral of his wife and daughter  1938

When Polish forces surrendered in September 1939 along with thousands of others he crossed the border into Romania.  (Poland and Romania then had a common border).  The Kingdom of Romania interned him from September 1939 until February 1941. When Romania came under Nazi influence he was made a prisoner of war in Germany first in Stalag VI E in Dorsten and then in Stalag VI B in Dössel.   It is said that he behaved with great dignity as a prisoner and annoyed the Germans by his anti-Hitler stance.

GRAVE OF GENERAL STANISLAW KOZICKI IN LEOMINSTER CEMETERY

    The following is  written in English around the grave.

TO THE MEMORY OF MAJOR GENERAL  STANISLAW KOZICKI

POLISH  ARMY     DIED JULY 13 1948 AGED 55 YEARS

I obtained a  copy of the general's death certificate from the Hereford Record Office. It describes him as "General Polish Regular Army"  and that he died "suffering from acute heart failure (auricular fibrillation).   

This grave is relatively new presumably erected after the death of Dr  Tumidajski's wife.  Like him she was born in what is now Ukraine and very nearly made it into the new century dying on December 13th 1999.

          There are many questions concerning  these graves.  Four are military ones  and so I presume that these men were serving military when they died and the other three, including the General were no longer serving soldiers.  It is quite possible that all seven were not in Britain during WW2 but came after the war on resettlement programmes. Despite the reason for us going to war these men either could not or did not wish to return to their homeland because of the new political situation.

 I obtained from Hereford copies of the death certificates of four of these men but Hereford does not have those of the other three.  Where are they?  Might it be possible to trace relatives?

Olympic Games -The Local Connection

OLYMPIC GAMES – THE LOCAL CONNECTION

Thursday August 18^th 2016.   The Olympic Games are in full swing with Team GB performing impressively well. Today I drove from Leominster to Much Wenlock in neighbouring Shropshire, less than an hour away.  During these games I have heard little said about the Wenlock connection.

However in the Wenlock parish church there is a plaque commemorating local doctor, William Penny Brookes, (1809 – 1895) a great philanthropist and ardent believer in Physical Education. He wished to make this part of everyone’s education, especially that of working class people.  He set up a library and reading room and in 1850 an Olympian Class which in 1860 became the Wenlock Olympian Society.

Under the plaque is another added in 2012, the year of the London Games.   

DR WILLIAM PENNY BROOKES 1809-1895

HIS DEDICATION AND VISION BORE FRUIT IN

THE REBIRTH OF THE OLYMPIC GAMES, ATHENS 1896

HIS IMAGINATION, A WORLDWIDE INSPIRATION

IN THANKSGIVING 2012   XXX OLYMPIAD

The grave of Dr Brookes and family members is in the churchyard.  In 1994 Juan Antonio Samaranch, then President of the International Olympic Committee, laid a wreath on this grave saying, "I came to pay homage and tribute to Dr Brookes, who really was the founder of the modern Olympic Games".

In histories of the modern games you normally find the French Baron de Coubertin credited as founder but he wrote in 1890 “If the Olympic Games….is revived today it is not to a Greek that one is indebted but to Dr W.P. Brookes.”   High praise indeed!

Briefly the timeline is as follows -

1850  Brookes established the Wenlock Olympian Class to hold annual games.

1859 Local Olympian Games were held in Athens for the first time open to Greek speakers.  Brookes heard about this and sent £10 for a prize and thus established a Greek connection.  He later formed a friendship with the Greek Ambassador in London.

1860    The first Shropshire games were held in Shrewsbury and subsequently in different towns in the county thus establishing the idea of circulating the games.  

1866 Brookes with two others had founded the National Olympian Association which held a very successful three day event at Crystal Palace that year.

1889  The young French nobleman, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, the organiser of the International Congress on Physical Education visited  England to find out about PE in our schools and Brookes invited him to visit for the 1890 Wenlock games which he did.  The now 81 year old doctor and the 27 year old Frenchman spent long hours discussing an international Olympic revival to be held in Athens and Coubertin wrote enthusiastically about his visit in the French ‘Revue Athlétique.’  In the same year Brookes had successfully lobbied Parliament to make PE compulsory in schools.

  

To find out more about this wonderful story visit the Wenlock Museum and Information Centre in the square.  There you will find literature and an interesting display about the good doctor and the games as well as much else of local interest.  Pick up a leaflet “THE OLYMPIAN TRAIL around Much Wenlock” which takes you to various points associated with Brookes and the games. Incidentally the mascot for the London Games was called Wenlock!

A few years ago I visited Olympia, Greece, home of the original games. You can still see the tunnel from which the athletes emerged rather like footballers today. The Games then had a religious significance and one difference you might notice from today is that the competitors were all naked.  Greeks from towns and settlements all over the ancient world came to compete and even those at war with each other temporarily set aside their differences.  Those games were held for over a thousand years until banned in 393 AD because they were considered pagan.  

 Modern Greece became independent of the Ottoman Empire in 1832 and was much smaller than today, only in 1947 reaching its present size. In 1890 most Greeks did not live in Greece but in parts of the Ottoman Empire.   So while there was a games movement in Greece the country had many political and economic problems and the Government felt unable to organise the games.

 The International Congress made Brookes an honorary member and in 1894 planned the first modern Olympics for Athens 1896.  Because of ill health Brookes was unable to attend the Congress and sadly died four months before the first games of modern times. 

 The name and place are being remembered on the other side of the world.   .  Professor Sanada of the Tokyo Olympics committee has written “The vision of Tokyo 2020 involves sport, education and culture and we in Japan recognise the importance of the legacy of Brookes and the Wenlock Olympian Society.”

    

The Plaques in the parish church                             Grave of Dr Brookes and family

(Photos  S. Mollah)