Rawicz prison in the Stalinist years

A heavy prison

From 1945 to 1964 the prison was called the Central Prison in Rawicz — this is how it is described in the archival inventory of the Institute of National Remembrance, which holds the personal files of prisoners from that period (IPN branch archive in Poznań)¹. During the German occupation it was a Zuchthaus, a heavy prison; after the war the communist authorities held many members of the independence underground there, including soldiers of the Home Army².

Juvenile political prisoners

Elwira J. Kryńska, a historian of the youth underground, writes that young people convicted for political activity were sent to the heavy prisons of Rawicz, Wronki, Sztum, Strzelce Opolskie and Fordon. Rawicz and Wronki were high-security prisons, to which prisoners were transferred as a punishment, among others from the camp for juveniles in Jaworzno³.

Number of juvenile political prisoners in Poland (after Krzysztof Szwagrzyk)³:

Bogumił Studziński in Rawicz

After the verdict of 19 April 1951 Studziński served his sentence in Rawicz^4,5. His memoir, W lochach socjalizmu, is an account of his time in this prison⁴.

He was released in February 1955 — according to his biographies, conditionally and "under an amnesty"^4,5. Yet no amnesty was declared in 1955. Between the amnesties of 1947 and 1956 there was one more, enacted on 22 November 1952, which among other things reduced prison sentences of more than three years by one third^6,7. Its effect most probably took hold in 1955; exactly how it was applied will be shown by the court files at the IPN⁸.

Other testimonies

In 1988, the same year as W lochach socjalizmu, Poland's underground press published the memoir of Władysław Minkiewicz, „Mokotów, Wronki, Rawicz. Wspomnienia 1939–1954”⁹. From April to June 1954 Władysław Bartoszewski was also held in Rawicz¹⁰.

Political prisoners were released from Rawicz after the amnesty of 27 April 1956^2,7.