This article is unique, as it tells in detail about the activities of the units of the Polish Home Army on the territory of the Belarusian Polesie, about its largest structure in that region - the 47th Brest contour of the AK or better known under the unofficial name “Basta gang”. The article was written on the basis of documents from the archives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the NKVD and the stories of witnesses of the events of 1945-1950 that we have collected. From the lips of the Akovites themselves and those who fought with them, as well as simply those who accidentally "ran into them". Many facts in this article are heard for the first time and they are almost not found in the well-known literature about the anti-Soviet post-war underground. The material has been collected since the 1990s, after the collapse of the USSR, when much began to be revealed.
Authors of the article: Olga Zaitseva and Oleg Kopylov, Faculty of History, Vladimir State University, Russia. The article was written in 2000, but was published for the first time in 2015.
Introduction
On September 1, 1939, World War II began. Poland was attacked by Nazi Germany and the country, under the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, was divided between the Reich and the Soviet Union. The western part went to the Germans, and the eastern part went to the USSR, which became part of the Byelorussian SSR. The Polish government, led by Władysław Sikorski, fled to Paris and then to London. And on June 22, 1941, the Reich attacked the Soviet Union. First of all, the former Polish lands - Brest, Grodno, Vilno and others - came under attack.
It was in these territories that the emergence of a large partisan movement began, the famous Belarusian red partisans … But in addition to them, representatives of the Polish nationality and simply ideological supporters of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth went into the forests. And on February 14, 1942, the Home Army was created on the basis of Polish national formations and former servicemen of the Polish army.
It was a regular army, created according to the structure of the Polish pre-war army. Submitted to the very same Polish government in London. Its first commander-in-chief is Stefan Rovetsky. The Home Army also operated in the former Polish territories - Western Belarus, Western Ukraine and the Vilna region of Lithuania.
Initially, the Home Army collaborated with the Red Army. AKovtsy made a certain contribution to the fight against the Nazi invaders in the rear. In January 1944-January 1945, the Home Army attempted to liberate Poland and its former lands. On August 1, the Akovites made an attempt to liberate Warsaw, raising an armed uprising there and launching an offensive, which was finally suppressed by the Germans on October 2. Attempts were made to liberate Lvov and Vilno. This operation was called the "Tempest" action. But the AK forces were not so strong, and the main merit belonged to the Red Army. The action of the Poles was drowned out.
On August 29, 1944, during Operation Bagration, the Red Army liberated Belarus, Lithuania and eastern Poland. But in these territories, numerous national partisan formations with a total number of about 60-80 thousand militants continued to operate, among whom was the AK. And they considered the newly arrived Soviet power as an enemy.
Undead army
On the territory of the USSR, during the war, the following military districts of the Home Army operated:
1. Vilensk district of AK (Vilna region of the Lithuanian SSR, Molodechno region of the Byelorussian SSR)
2. Novogrudok district of AK (Grodno and Baranovichi regions of the BSSR)
3. Belostok district of AK (part of the Grodno region of the BSSR bordering Poland)
4. Polessky district of AK (Brest and Pinsk regions of the BSSR)
5. Volynsky district of AK (Volyn and Rivne regions of the Ukrainian SSR) 6. Ternopil district of AK (Tarnopil region of the Ukrainian SSR)
7. Lviv district of AK (Lvov region of the Ukrainian SSR)
8. Stanislavovsky district of AK (Stanislavsk region of the Ukrainian SSR)
While the AK was in alliance with the Red Army, in 1942-1943 they successfully fought with the Germans, as well as with the units of the UPA in Ukraine. And it was in Ukraine, as well as in southeastern Poland, that they showed their ardent imperial ambitions, killing peaceful Ukrainian residents, in response to which the UPA units launched retaliatory actions against the Polish population - the famous "Volyn massacre" of 1942-1944.
After the retreat of the Germans from these territories in 1944, the situation changed. These territories remained in the USSR, with the exception of the Bialystok Territory, Grubieszow and Przemysl, which again went to Poland. This infuriated the local AK troops, and therefore many chose to stay in the forests and continue the fight against the Soviet regime.
Although during the war, some AK detachments had a conflict with the red partisans. Some of them even went to an alliance with the Germans to fight them: for example, Lieutenant Józef Svida, nicknamed "Lyakh", whose detachment operated in the area of the Novogrudok district of the AK, in 1944 received supplies from the Germans and beat the Red partisans, for which they wanted to execute him, but in the end they were pardoned.
After the war, only Vilensky, Novogrudok, Polessky and, partially, Bialystok districts of the AK remained active on the territory of the USSR. More precisely, even theirs remnants bordering on Poland: the modern territories of Grodno, and the western part of the Brest regions, as well as in the Lithuanian SSR in the Vilnius region. We will not go into the details of the AK activities in Grodno and Vilnius regions. In this article, we will consider the activities of the Home Army on the territory of the Brest region, on the territory of the so-called Polesie.
About the main character of the article
The story should start with a short biography of one person, by the name of Daniil Treplinsky. He was born around February 1919. His father Georgy Treplinsky was from Vilnius, came from the clan of a baptized Jew, his mother was Lithuanian. George first studied at a Catholic seminary as a priest and was sent to take care of the flock in the village of Yamno, which is near Brest. Only now he did not lead a very befitting life for a priest: he drank and often walked among women. And with one of them, an Orthodox Polish woman Katarina, he married and left the rank of priest. They had two sons, the youngest of whom was Daniel.
It is also known that Daniel studied at the University of Warsaw, but he left him after a year of study and returned to his homeland in Polesie. Shortly before the war he served in the Polish army. In 1937, he seemed to want to continue serving, but in 1939 he left her with the rank of sergeant.
And this year the Second World War began. Western Belarus, including Brest, became part of the USSR and became part of the BSSR. And then, in June 1941, the Germans launched a massive offensive against the USSR. By this time, Treplinsky lived in his native village and, according to some information, he had a wife. But the fact is different - he, like many other young local guys, left at the beginning of 1942 in the Home Army to fight the German invaders.
Treplinsky was reinstated in the rank of sergeant in the ranks of the AK. He was one of the henchmen of one of the commanders of the Polesie District of the AK, Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Dobrsky "Zhuk". It is also known about his activities during this period that he repeatedly took part in battles with the Germans, in the summer of 1943 he was wounded in one of the battles in the leg. In general, among ordinary fighters, he did not particularly stand out for his merits.
The finest hour of "Basta"
In August 1944, the territories of western Belarus, Lithuania and eastern Poland were liberated by the Red Army. About 30 thousand AK members continued to operate in these territories. Including in Polesie. The Polesie district of the AK was finally beheaded in December 1944, when the NKVD authorities arrested Lieutenant Colonel Henrikh Kraevsky. About 3.5 million AK militants in Polesie remained at the level of autonomous existence. And it was at this moment that Sergeant Treplinsky, nicknamed "Basta", decided to prove himself.
By the way, his pseudonym: he was also initially known under the nicknames "Cat" and "Copper", the second probably because of the reddish-brown hair color of Pan Treplinsky. "Basta" is his nickname since his youth. Translated from local Polish dialects, something like the modern Russian word "inadequate". Indeed, his character was not very good, to put it mildly. He is described as a very irritable and emotional person. But more on that later.
At this time, he is trying to get in touch with the emigrant government in London, but they did not convey intelligible instructions, except for recommendations "not to succumb to provocations." And then he took the initiative into his own hands: he rallied around himself a small group of AK fighters from this area, among whom was his former school friend, senior private Artemy Fedinsky, nicknamed "Victor", whom he made his henchman.
He went to a deceitful trick: he appropriated the rank of captain and named himself appointed to the new commander of the AK formations in Polesie. He sent delegations to the AK detachments that operated on the territory of the Brest and Zhabinka districts, which by that time were exhausted, and invited them to unite under his auspices. And, oddly enough, the overwhelming majority agreed. So he rallied around himself, at that time, about 200 AK fighters.
The newly minted captain "Basta" combined the structures of the Brest and Zhabinkovsky lines of the AK and created one 47 Brest bypass of the Home Army or known under a different name "the formation of the AK -" East Coast "", due to the location of the deployment of this bypass on the eastern bank of the Bug River.
Here is what his former colleague in 1937-1938 writes about "Baste", during the war a soldier of the 1st Polish division named after. Tadeusha Kosciuszko, Vladislav Gladsky:
“I learned that Daniel had commanded a group of Akovites for so many years only in the last 1960, almost 10 years later. You know … I was extremely surprised and amazed! I have known this gentleman since childhood, I studied with him at one time in the same class at the gymnasium. But he's … Mad! No, he is quite smart, educated, but he has no head! As well as special organizational skills, too ….
Basta reorganized the AK units in these territories. Let's start with the fact that many Poles in Polesie are Orthodox, in contrast to their brothers from the "mainland", from Poland, who, of course, are all zealous Catholics. Plus, they had a distinctive commonality. Therefore, they caused a certain contempt among ordinary Poles. And it so happened that not local Catholics from the "mainland" were at the high posts of the AK in this area. "Basta" corrected this, and now almost all of the officers and sergeants of the 47th Brest contour of the AK were Orthodox, and, with a few exceptions, removed the Catholics to rank-and-file positions.
Changing the command structure, he grouped the soldiers of the 47th Brest bypass of the AK into two "divisions". One operated in the Brest region, which he commanded personally, and the second, operating in the Zhabinka region, he handed over to his comrade Fedinsky "Viktor", to whom he also gave the rank of lieutenant. With the enlargement of the number of AK militants in the bypass, the departments were subdivided into "dancers" - smaller detachments of 2-3 dozen people each, which were headed by ranks ranging from a sergeant to a cornet. "Platzowki" in this contour operated in the area of certain villages, ie. for each village or several villages - one place. At the right moment, they united.
In the AK detachments, including the 47th Brest bypass, Polish pre-war uniforms were introduced, in particular the famous slingshot hats. However, many also wore captured German or Soviet uniforms and variations. A distinctive sign on the headdresses of many Akovites was the "Piast Eagle" - the heraldic symbol of Poland. Some wore white and red headbands, matching the color of the Polish flag. Many AK fighters attached rhinographs to their hearts - images of the Mother of God embossed on iron on a small chain. Some also wore a church rosary.
The bulk of the militants of the Basta gang were local Poles, as well as Belarusians loyal to Poland. Although among the fighters of the 47th contour of the AK there were both Russians (in the lists - Andreev S., Kiselev Y. and others), and Jews (Rubinstein M., Wagenfeld B. and others), and there was also one Azerbaijani, a certain Aliev A., and three Armenians: L. Badyan, G. Tadevosyan, E. Sargsyan.
Because the majority of the population in Polesie professes Orthodoxy, including the majority of local Poles, then the oath was given in the presence of an Orthodox priest. Orthodox services were often performed "for the health of the Fatherland and the Polish people." Although they often did things far from divine …
Over the entire period of the gang's existence, the following places of deployment can be distinguished: in the Brest region on the territory of the Telminsky, Chernavchitsky and Cherninsky village councils and in the Zhabinsky district of the Zhabinsky village council. On January 19, 1945, the third commander-in-chief of the AK, Leopold Okulitsky, announced the dissolution of the Home Army. But many units refused to obey the order. Then the heyday of the Basta gang began.
The Basta gang is acting
The very first action of the gang took place on January 22, 1945. All 200 Akovtsy under the command of the captain "Basta" attacked the temporary prison located near the village of Zelenets. These were two wooden barracks, in which criminals were temporarily housed, who, after rebuilding from the post-war devastation, were to be sent to normal prisons and camps.
Many of the prisoners were former AK militants, but among them there were also former punishers who served in the auxiliary police on the side of the Nazis. But half of the prisoners, after all, were ordinary criminals. In the evening the Akovites surrounded the prison and, after a short skirmish with the guards, they gained the upper hand. Of the 75 employees of the internal troops who guarded the prison, 19 fighters were brutally killed: many were not shot, but simply hacked with axes. The rest managed to retreat.
In the morning, "this tall man, standing in one uniform in such a fierce frost that morning," ordered the prisoners to be built and lined up his soldiers. He invited the prisoners to take an oath of allegiance to Poland and its people. And all 116 prisoners, as one, agreed and joined the ranks of the AK. Among the prisoners was the crime boss Alexander Rusovsky, an acquaintance of Lieutenant "Victor". He suggested that "Baste" make him one of the commanders of the detour, recommending him as a helpful and efficient person. Rusovskiy was given the rank of lieutenant and all newly minted Akovtsy were subordinate to him. Now the 47th Brest contour of the AK was replenished with another department, which operated on the territory of the Chernavchitsky village council.
Although uniforms were enough for the new fighters, on which the Akovites were even slightly obsessed, as well as on discipline in general, not everyone had enough weapons. The Basta gang controlled part of the railway on the Warsaw-Brest-Zhabinka route. And here the first benefit from Lieutenant Rusovsky took place - thanks to his connections, he found out when a train with captured weapons from the front would pass along this road. As a result, in February-April 1945 the Basta gang carried out 6 railway sabotage.
After the war, the Soviet government began to restore the structures of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the NKVD in the liberated territories. Structures of the AK began to try to combat this, including 47 bypass. On March 6, 1945, the cornet's dancer Gushchinsky, who was part of the department of Lieutenant Rusovsky, destroyed the police station in Chernavchitsy, and on March 11, the captain “Basta” with his akovtsy did the same in Telmy. And the same day later, on March 12, Lieutenant "Victor" did the same in Zhabinka. In total, according to Soviet data, only from the actions of the Basta gang in the Brest and Zhabinka districts, from January to April 1945, 28 servicemen of the power structures of the USSR were killed and 9 were wounded.
The Soviet leadership understood: a well-armed and trained army was operating on the territory of Western Belarus, against which a special intelligence apparatus and regular front-line units were needed. In particular, in May 1945, three companies of the Ministry of Internal Affairs with a total of 600 fighters were sent to the area where the Basta gang was deployed to the area of the villages of Gutovichi, Zalesye and Telma.
At first, they could not get on the trail of the bandits, and nevertheless, through one agent, they managed to find out the deployment of Captain Basta's gang. And on June 2, 1945, one of the first major clashes of the Soviet army against Polish bandits took place in the forest area of the village of Zalesye. 400 Red Army men against 200 AK militants.
In the morning, the operatives began combing the forest and, not having passed a kilometer, they were greeted by a sudden heavy fire. Akovtsy immediately began to defend themselves fiercely. It was part of the gang under the command of Captain Treplinsky himself. The number of his fighters was not very large, within a few dozen, and the Red Army at first wanted to get by with two companies of fighters, sending one to the village, to the reserve. However, this was only a part of his fighters: the other, as it turned out later, ran away to report the incident to Lieutenant Rusovsky.
The firefight in the forest lasted for two hours. The forces of the captain's gang were running out. But suddenly shots were heard from the north side of the village. The gang of Lieutenant Rusovsky approached with a part of the Basta militants. The attack was sudden, and the Akovites gradually began to surround the village. Many Red Army men were simply killed. And then they fled: some settled in 7 former trucks there, others ran to the loose, in search of where to hide. One of the vehicles with 32 Red Army men was blown up.
Soldiers of the Internal Troops of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs were defeated. In total, 41 were killed and 6 wounded from their side. The Polish bandits lost 16 people.
The survivors retreated to the village of Ochki and called for reinforcements from Brest, 3 companies in the number of approximately 300 fighters. However, there was a delay, and reinforcements did not arrive until 5 June. And the Akovtsy also had informants among the local residents, and therefore on the night of June 6 the village was surrounded by a gang of lieutenant "Victor" with the support of the cornet Vladimir Yankovsky "Rudik" from the dancer. The soldiers of the Ministry of Internal Affairs were again introduced by surprise. The bandits, during the attack, used, in addition to small arms, actively used grenades and even used captured German Panzerfaust. However, less than an hour passed before they disappeared as suddenly as they appeared. Apparently, they realized that their forces were still much less. The Soviet side lost 11 people and there were a lot of wounded and shell-shocked.
In total, in June-September 1945, 23 attacks on military units were committed in the Brest region alone, 4 of them in the Brest region and 1 in Zhabinkovsky, where the Basta gang operated. It was a real war, which was also fought in Grodno, Molodchenskaya and Baranavichy regions, as well as in Poland itself and the southern part of Lithuania.
The Soviet leadership realized that it is very difficult to fight against the formations of nationalists in this way, like banal military clashes, and also leads to accidental losses among the civilian population. Therefore, it was decided to expand the intelligence structure to identify small and main parts of the bandit formations.
Akovtsy also came to this truth, including those from the Basta gang. Pan Treplinsky decided to finally break the structures of the 47th Brest bypass of the AK into smaller parts. And since about 1946, he split large detachments into smaller ones, into dancers of 20-30 militants each. Each of these dancers had its own area of influence, as a rule, one village was under its jurisdiction. Well, Pan Captain, like many other field commanders of the AK, ordered to stop attacks on large military units of the Soviet Army and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and move on to smaller targets.
Nevertheless, the AK was at first quite a success. The fact that the Basta gang successfully attacked the Interior Ministry units several times attracted even more militants. Naturally, mainly Poles went there, who hated the USSR for the annexation of these territories from Poland, but, as mentioned above, Belarusians and people of some other nationalities went there. Many deserters from the Soviet Army and its former servicemen, as well as criminals and some police officers, went there. Even young people went there: there were cases in these villages that all the guys left the classrooms for the forest. Most of the AK fighters were in the 15-21 age range, although there were also older people. In June 1946, according to the NKVD, this gang had reached its largest number of about 500 people.
The Basta gang found among the population both many supporters and many opponents, more precisely those who were simply afraid of it. This gang terrified not only the soldiers of the USSR Armed Forces, employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the NKVD, but also ordinary supporters of the Soviet regime, and often even imaginary ones …
The Mother of God doesn't press on your heart?
We will begin this section with the story of Andrei Kireev, a former teacher from the village of Yamno, physical education teacher, which he told in 1992. At that time he was 82 years old, and after 5 years he passed away from old age. He perfectly remembered the events that took place in 1945-1946 in this and the surrounding villages of the Brest region and the captain "Bastu" himself and his gang, which he encountered personally.
“I myself am from Brest. In 1932 I learned to be a teacher, to be a teacher of physical education … In 1933, in June, I was assigned to Thelma. The only school in the neighborhood … That's how I lived in Yamny … In 1941, in June, the war began. Until 1944 I was in the partisans, and then, when the advice came, I went to the Red Army. I reached Berlin … After the war, at one time, I lived in Minsk, and then I came back here. I returned in January 1946 …
It somehow means that I once again came to work at school and I see that the Russian teacher, Natasha K., is crying. I ask her, they say, what happened. And she told me that her son, I really don't remember his name, was taken into the army, into the border troops, to the border with Poland. He wanted to come home, took a vacation, so he sent a telegram and said when he would come. And he still was not and was not. And a week later it turned out that he was killed … So I learned that there is such an Army of Home and that in our area there is some kind of "Basta" gang. And soon I not only heard …
Later, our headmistress told me about the Akovites. And the fact is that it was winter then, we went skiing, on a field near the forest. Well, she warned me not to take the children far into the forest, and the police gave me a papier, just in case, with a carob shop …
And so it seems like about a week after that I was skiing with the 8th or 9th grade. On the field. And, that means, I look towards the forest, and from there, from the hill, three people descend … I approached a little closer and took a closer look. Three in sheepskin coats, breeches, boots. With a weapon: two had pepashki, and one had a schmeiser. Two have these … Polish military caps, well, slingshots with eagles, and one has a German cap. Another had a red and white bandage. And here's the middle one … His face seemed painfully familiar to me! But in general, I realized that these were Akovites … I lifted my pepashka … I felt terrified … Well, I shouted at them, threatening with my machine gun, saying that I would shove their weapons into their asses. They looked at me so angrily … I thought it was over! But no - gone, the dogs …
In the evening I'm at home, so I'm sitting with my wife, we had dinner. And suddenly they bang on our door. I mean, I open the door and four people break in to us … One of them was the middle one, whom I met during the day. He ordered the one with the degtyarevsky machine gun to go out and stand at the door, and put two of them with carbines at the door. He took off his sheepskin coat - in a Polish uniform. In a harness, with stars on shoulder straps, with a collar embroidered like their officers', binoculars …
And bah! Yes, this is Treplinsky Danka! This was my former student! The guy is not stupid, he studied passably, but the mischievous guy was terrible! As soon as he was taken out a little, he began to throw chairs and because of this they tried not to mess with him. We even communicated well at one time - as an interesting interlocutor. Why, he molested a girl at school, and I told him once for that … He was angry with me then afterwards.
Well, it means he looks at me so viciously, sullenly … His eyes are huge, angry … And then suddenly he started somehow … Apparently he recognized me! We are all silent, but I'm waiting for what's next … I was already pouring sweat from fear! Well, then he sharply said so, they say you are not the same Pan Andrzej? He just called me by name … Well, I told him that yes, he is, your former teacher. He even smiled so slightly. It means he asked me again, they say, do I serve the Reds, am I a member of the party? Well, I was not a member of the party, and by Christ I swore to him that I was not, and that I could check through my own people!
So Danka sat down on the bench and asked for vodka and a piece of bread. I poured it for him, he drank it, took a bite … Then I asked the lads to pour it and give it a snack … Done! We sat down, were silent again … They dressed back in sheepskin coats, turned around to go and suddenly he turned to me and said that if I interfere with him or his people and, as he said, the holy cause of the struggle for the Fatherland, or the Communists will serve, then he will hang me by the ribs … And that he has ears and eyes on me now.
Of course I was scared! But at the same time, so, just … After all, there were no such cases for me! Therefore, I was with peace of mind and was not particularly afraid.
Here I am … Oh, yes, grade 9! With the very ninth grade that I was studying that day … First Guralnik left, then Katz … At first I did not understand where … And then I learned from my acquaintances - they are going to the Basta gang! This gang, or rather, as many expressed the "fighters for Rzeczpospolita", the Home Army, was on everyone's lips … And almost all of them supported! Either they were given to eat, then to wash in the bathhouse … Every week in Yamno, on Saturdays, at night, the baths were heated, and these people were washed!
I was not a supporter of the Soviets either, you know … But why this whole war? What were these bandits hoping for? Army! Craiova! A handful, which … And after all, young boys died, who live and live! And so somehow two did not appear in that class … Oh, yes, it was already in February! Well, I immediately understood where they were, I thought the boys were gone! And then I go back from work to my village … It was not far away! The path through the undergrowth adjoined, on the right side if you go further - a dense forest. Well, I mean, it’s getting dark… And I see these two trample near the forest! Both were in greatcoats, and one even had a slingshot on his head, and the other in a hat with earflaps. True, without a weapon … I went up to them, took out a Mauser pistol - just in case, the police gave it to me. Many teachers were given them out then because of such a situation … I began to threaten them with a pistol and took them to the police station … Fools!
Well, the next day, in the evening, they knocked on me … I thought, my wife was from a friend, well, I opened it … And then “Basta” came to me again with four bandits. One, the same machine gunner, stood at the door, and two, one with a carbine, the other with a Schmeiser, stood at the door. Together with "Basta" there was another Polish officer, also in an officer's uniform, whom I also recognized … Vovka Yankovsky it was …
They two looked at me angrily … Well, Vovka laid out everything to this leader of his. This Vovka was something like a beholder in Yamno … Well, he "Baste" laid out in front of me that I was breaking the mobilization in this theirs Army of Craiova. The fact that I did not let them ruin two boys. That's what I told him … And he called me red-ass scum, curv …
I was waiting for what would happen next … "Basta" took me by the throat … And in response I would kick him in the face, and he flew to the window! And I immediately hear … All these guns are cocked! He showed them with his hand, they say, do not shoot, and in an instant he flew up to me, fed my head and smacked me in the face with his knee. He shouted to all of them to stretch me on the table …
He took out the rope, made a noose … Those two stretched me out, and Yankovsky twisted my shirt. I was ready to die! And I already said goodbye to life! And it’s just because the young boys didn’t let them die before their time … They rolled up their sleeves … Yankovsky and Treplinsky took their pads, turned them over with their butts … And how let me thresh them on the ribs with butts! From the first blows from both sides, I thought that I would vomit blood, but from the second it happened … I also told him, they say, the Mother of God is not pressing on your heart? He had a little icon of the Mother of God on his left pocket, on his heart … I didn't even have the strength to shout … I thought that I had even stopped breathing, I didn't feel … They hit me like that five times … They put me through my head, through my hands, into that loop, and tightened it on my chest … They hung me so on a coat hook that next to the door was …
And well my wife came soon! I did not see how they left … I collapsed from such pain … They took me off the noose … First they took me to Brest, to the hospital, then to Minsk. For two months I was lying with broken ribs. It still hurts to breathe…. Since then I have not lived in Yamno anymore … Yes, I was scared! I would have been killed then … I returned here only in 67, when there were no more Akovites. But I heard such a thing from my acquaintances who remained here! These bandits killed many people. And most importantly, as a rule, for nothing! They saw that they went to the police - consider that there is no longer this person … Children were not even spared! And some kind of army …"
In addition to acting against the Soviet Army, the NKVD and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Akovites were distinguished by their particular cruelty towards supporters of Soviet power and even simply dissenting ones. Indeed, in those bloody years in Western Belarus, somewhere in the countryside, even just entering a government office could entail, at best, that people in shabby Polish uniforms would visit you, but if you do this regularly, then the worst could be expected.
Well, there is nothing to say about the fate of the chairmen of collective farms and members of the Communist Party. So, for example, members of the Basta gang, led personally by the leader of the gang, Captain Treplinsky, on March 9, 1945, in the very village of Yamno, was brutally murdered by an activist of the Communist Party, D. Tsygankov, along with his wife. The unfortunate ones were chopped up with axes.
On March 27 of the same year, the activist Sinyak I. was killed by the same gang in the village of Zbirogi. On April 11, in the village of Velyun, the Karshov family (AK sergeant Nikita Chesakovsky) killed the Karshov family, consisting of 6 people, the house where the victims were burned down. On April 19, in the village of Karabany, the platsuvka "Kuvshin" (AK sergeant Oleg Kuvshinovsky) killed a Red Army soldier and activist A. Novikov, along with his wife and half-year-old son. The house where the murdered were kept was also burned down.
And this is only a part of the crimes of the 47th roundabout of the "Vostochny Bereg" joint-stock company. According to archival data, in February-June 1945 alone, this gang in the territory of Telminsky, Chernavchitsky, Cherninsky and Zhabinkovsky village councils killed 28 people, mainly activists of the Communist Party with their families, including their children.
Naturally, since the AK was an opponent of the formation of Soviet power, the AKovtsy also cracked down on the Red Army and Interior Ministry employees. Often these killings were ill-founded and brutal. Any person from the listed categories was considered “an enemy of the Polish Motherland and its people”. For example, on December 4, 1945, in the same village of Karabany and in the same platsuvka "Kuvshin", a private and sergeant major of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Ushinsky V. and Blinov K. were detained and stabbed to death in the forest.
On January 7, 1946, in the village of Senkovichi, in the Zhabinsk district, a group of Akovtsy from the "Victor" department personally with its leader Lieutenant Fedinsky killed the lieutenant of the Ministry of Internal Affairs N. Kuznetsov, along with three more operatives. They were taken to a place near the forest from being slaughtered. The police station, where they were, was burned.
In August 1946, Captain Treplinsky ordered a large-scale action in the area where his AK unit was stationed. On August 20, near Zditovo, a gang of lieutenant "Victor" attacked a group of 63 cadets of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, who was at a military training camp. 52 managed to hide in nearby villages, but the rest faced a terrible fate: some were shot, others were burned in a tent, and the chief, senior lieutenant A. Chomsky and two more junior officers, were hanged by the ribs (the method of reprisal described in the story of Andrey Kireev) …
On August 23, one day, units of the gang of Lieutenant Rusovsky in Ivakhnovichi and Zelentsy blew up police stations and killed employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and rural activists, a total of 18 people. On August 24, units of the captain's gang "Basta" attacked Thelma, personally led by the captain, and Yamno, led by the cornet "Rudik". In Telmakh, he drove 11 Interior Ministry officers and 4 village activists into a police station and arson. With a crowd of people, he announced that "in free Poland, all the red-ass and Bandera bastards are expecting this." 8 people were killed in Yamno.
This major sortie by AK militants in the Brest region forced the NKVD and the Ministry of Internal Affairs to carry out a major sweep again, but more on that later.
From the quotation of Pan Captain Treplinsky, it was also mentioned about the Banderaites. Indeed, the Home Army fought against the OUN and UPA movements during the war, unleashing the so-called Volyn massacre of 1942-1944. However, this conflict, on a small scale, continued after the war.
The structures of the OUN and UPA also operated in Polesie. The fact is that many representatives of the Ukrainian nationality lived there, and the OUN considered Polesie "ethnic Ukrainian lands". Thus, they automatically subscribed to political rivals of the AK, on a par with the USSR. However, this hatred extended to ordinary Ukrainians as well.
So, back in April 1945, 4 immigrants from the Ukrainian SSR were killed by the Akovites from the department of Lieutenant Rusovsky in Zelentsy. In September 1945, in Bratylovo, a family of immigrants from the Ukrainian SSR G. Gorodnitsenko, consisting of 3 people, was killed by the dancer of the second lieutenant Sergiy Krupsky ("Gray").
In March 1946, the Polish-Ukrainian conflict in the Brest and Zhabinsk regions reached its peak. In the Zhabinka region then there was a shootout between the militants of the AK of lieutenant "Viktor" and the combat of the OUN of a certain "Falcon". The Banderaites retreated and no longer appeared in those places, but the Akovites decided to take revenge.
According to the archives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, early in the morning on March 11, 1946, a large gang of Akovtsy entered the village of Saleyki with an approximate number of 30 armed militants, led by the aforementioned head of the Zhabinsk department of the 47th Brest detour of the AK, Lieutenant Artemy Fedinsky "Viktor". Further we will give the story of a resident of that village, Ukrainian Galina Naumenko, who was then 23 years old.
“It's just the beginning of dawn, it was early morning. I hear someone rattling at the door. All of us, my mother, my sister and my husband woke up. My sister runs up to the window and shouts that Poles-bandits have entered the village …
They all of us Ukrainians that were in the village, about 40 people were taken to the center of the village, near one large house. The rest of the village stood up and began to look … And how they began to beat us! One bandit hit one girl with a rifle butt, and she died two days later …
We were all without weapons. And two men, as their leader-officer, attacked, and he shot them with a pistol. And he made the third shot upwards so that his people would calm down. They surrounded us and he loudly asked: "Which one of you is Bandera?" We were all silent. We have never had Bandera here. And then they pulled three of our men out of the crowd, put them to another house, and two machine gunners stood in front of them. That officer waved his hand at them, and they shot them.
Then he dismissed us to our homes and said that if we help Bandera, he will burn the whole village. We just started to leave, and the bandits caught up with us and began to molest the young girls … God had mercy on me and many other women, but my sister and three more … She left home and no one saw her anymore."
A total of 4 residents of the Saleyki village were killed then. Similar interethnic reprisals, mainly against Ukrainians by AK militants, continued until 1947.
