Mokotów Prison Massacre

During the massacre, some prisoners actively resisted the Nazis, which allowed several hundred people to escape to the area controlled by the insurgents.

Soon after the Germans entered Warsaw (28 September 1939), the former Polish penitentiary at 37 Rakowiecka Street was adapted for the needs of the occupying forces.

The Gerichtsgefängnis in der Rakowieckastrasse 37 was henceforth a prison under the authority of the German special courts (Sondergericht), and its residents remained in the hands of the Gestapo after serving their sentence.

Many Polish employees of the prison secretly cooperated with the underground Service for Poland's Victory – later with the Home Army.

On July 23, 1944, in connection with the approaching Eastern Front, the release of prisoners sentenced to imprisonment for up to five years began – mainly Germans and Volksdeutsche, and later Poles.

The task of conquering the prison and the neighbouring tenement houses was entrusted to the First Assault Company, commanded by Lieutenant Antoni Figura "Cat" from the "Baszta" Regiment.

This unit consisted of about 80 soldiers (including nurses) and its armament was very modest – 3 machine guns, 20 rifles, 15 pistols, 130 grenades and 30 bottles with "Molotov cocktails".

The German crew, reinforced from the nearby SS barracks, stopped the attack, disarmed and captured Polish guards.

There, SS-Obersturmführer Martin Patz, the commander of subunit of the 3rd SS Battalion of Armored Grenadiers (SS-Pz.

This decision was also confirmed by the SS and Police commander for the Warsaw district, SS-Oberführer Paul Otto Geibel, who additionally ordered the execution of Polish guards.

According to the testimony of Antoni Józef Porzygowski,[13]I heard that the SS was approaching my cell and then I hid under the bed [...] SS-man lifted up the bed, started kicking me with his legs and led me out [...] I was led one by one to the pit near the boiler room on the walking square from Niepodległości Avenue side.

It was difficult for me to get out of the corpses.The slaughter, which took place in the prison courtyard, was perfectly visible from the windows of the cells, and the Poles who watched it realized that they were condemned to death and had nothing to lose.

In ward 6, prisoners broke the cell door or made holes in the walls using benches, and then they escaped to the corridor and set fire to the straw and mattresses, thus scaring off the Germans.

[10][14] At night, under the cover of darkness and heavy rain, the prisoners began to move to the attic and then to the steep roof of the building.

[5] The found bodies, with the exception of those taken care of by the families, were buried temporarily in eight mass graves in Niepodległości Avenue.

In December 1945 all bodies were again exhumed and transferred to the Military Cemetery in Powazki, where they were buried in the insurgent quarters.