An Interview with Siberian Deportee Jan Górny

Today, the Center hosted an interview with Jan Górny, a Siberian deportee born in Lviv in 1937. He and his mother were deported deep into the USSR on February 10, 1940. Following the so-called amnesty, he ended up in a Polish refugee settlement in India. In 1947, he arrived in Kraków.

Jan Górny donated valuable materials to the Center’s archives, including copies of letters written by his mother and by himself during his exile and stay at the Polish refugee settlement in Valivade (India). The letters were addressed to his father and grandparents, who remained in Poland.

The donated materials also included photographs from an album his mother had made for Jan on the occasion of his First Holy Communion. They depict life before the war, as well as daily, cultural, religious, and scouting life in the transit camp in Karachi and the Polish refugee settlement in Valivade. The collection also includes photos documenting the family’s life after their return to Poland.
Thank you for this extraordinary meeting!

An Interview with Siberian Deportee Jan Górny