Wartime Service information Polish Soldier

[Sapperschild]

Zona would seem to be wife making it his wife Josefa Andrzejuk, daughter Trena/Jrena and son Jerzy Ludwik. In addition it lists his birthplace as Peckowo which would be inline with your friend's Dad, Peckowo/Reckowo.

[Sapperschild]

One of those documents also lists him as being a prisoner of war in 1939/40.

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[Phil]

Also that he worked for cigarettes while unemployed apparently.

[Temujin]

Excellent work Phil......good find on all the documents. Hopefully they will be able to confirm if this is the right man.......Also, documents indicated him relocating to Canada.

[Sapperschild]

I think this may be his emigration records to Canada

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[Sapperschild]

And a document for his son?

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[Sapperschild]

Info on Stalag X1 A, which these documents show he was held in

Stalag XI-A (also known as Stalag 341) was a German World War II prisoner-of-war camp (Stammlager), located just to the east of the village of Altengrabow and in the south of Dörnitz in Saxony-Anhalt, about south-west of Berlin.

Camp history

Pre-war

The camp was located on Truppenübungsplatz Altengrabow ("Altengrabow Military Training Area"), which had been in use by the German Army since 1893, and had served as the prisoner-of-war camp Dörnitz Altengrabow during World War I, holding around 12,000 POW of various nationalities.

World War II

In September 1939 it again became a prisoner-of-war camp, and was designated Stalag XI, before it was renumbered Stalag XI-A in November 1939.The camp housed Australian, French, British, Belgian, Serb, Russian, Italian, American, Dutch, Slovak and Polish POW, all in separate compounds, and served as the centre from which most of the POW were assigned to Arbeitskommando ("Work camps"). On 1 January 1945 more than 60,000 POW were registered there.

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[Sapperschild]

This is utterly amazing. We are in the process of trying to reach our friend to confirm if this is indeed, his father. We noticed that his P.O.W. picture contains the number 152/40. 152 is also referenced as the 'case number' on some of the documents you have provided, with 153 for his wife Josefa. This might be coincidence, but I doubt it. As you indicated, the fact that they emigrated to Canada is another positive indication that this might be the man we're looking for. Will let you know as soon as we can confirm with our friend. Anxiously waiting .....

[Sapperschild]

SUCCESS!!!!! We just spoke with our friend who has confirmed that these records do indeed belong to his father and mother, Boleslaw and Josefa Kowal. We have forwarded to him, a link to the Wartimes.ca site, as well as documents and links provided by Phil and Temujin. Needless to say, he was extremely surprised and happy to receive this information. I cannot imagine a better Christmas present for him and family. Thanks to Phil and Temujin for the work you do to source this information and to bring families together over time and generations. It is a gift beyond measure, one we know well. We began our own quest for information into our respective fathers' WW2 service, a number of years ago, and were fortunate to come to know Temujin at that time when he was with the 'Canada at War' WW2 site. Temujin generously responded to our tentative request for information with countless hours of research that pieced together our Dads' wartime experience from time of enlistment to discharge. Where once we knew next to nothing of their wartime experience, we can now share their stories with their children, grandchildren and future generations. I cannot imagine a more rewarding feeling than knowing the work you do can have such an impact. Well done and thank you both!

[Sapperschild]

This is wonderful news. If you need anything else, or have more questions we can help with, please let us know.

To you and your friend, have a great Christmas and Happy New Year

And I want to add, Great work Phil on finding the “main documents” for this discovery......I was pretty sure that we wouldn’t find anything, and I’m glad that I was wrong