Documents of the Nowy Tomyśl District Council

The deportees to Zbąszyń registered their requests, which would have improved their dramatic situation in that overcrowded border town, if they had been fulfilled. Some of them tried to get out. They would send letters asking for release. Initially they addressed them to the “Magnificent District Council of Nowy Tomyśl”. After a couple months of deepening desperation, they started writing letters directly to Felicjan Sławoj-Składkowski, the Polish Prime Minister at the time. They referred to the businesses they needed to lead, to the families awaiting their support or to their declining health. The families tried to get others out. They submitted letters from quite often distant destinations in Poland. They assured of their funds to provide livelihood for “the misfortunate of Zbąszyń”. They guaranteed that after a short stay at home and recovery the ones from Zbąszyń would eventually emigrate from Poland. All of them were charged 5,50 zloty, which used to be quite a significant sum at the time, just to process their claims. Some of the trapped in Zbąszyń managed to obtain a “certificate of poverty”, attesting the loss of property by the deportation and excusing from the charge. Beside a couple of exceptions, all of them – the ones from Zbąszyń as well as the ones from the outer world – ultimately received the same response. A short note, copied on a duplicating machine and finished with the sentence: “All the persons expelled from Germany to Poland are to stay at the present places until further dispositions”.