Comment: Community of Plock paid a high price for defending the town against the Bolsheviks in 1920. It suffered material damages, moral losses and death of about 100 civilians. During a battle which lasted 21.5 hours many people, including women, children and old people were killed or wounded or suffered morally. According to estimated data Bolshevik soldiers committed 52 rapes on women (including 4 nurses), often in presence of their families - husbands, mothers, children, terrorizing victims and their household members with guns.

After entering Plock on the 18th of August about 3 p.m. the Bolsheviks committed many acts of looting. They were taking everything that has any value - not only money and valuables, but also shoes, underwear, bed linen, everyday use objects, such as combs, pencils, matches, as well as food. They were tearing jewellery off women, robbing them of earrings, rings and watches. Houses were not only being looted but also devastated - the Bolsheviks were breaking furniture, tearing books, smashing glass, even throwing soot out of ovens in search for money and jewellery. What was not of any value for them or what they could not take with them was being destroyed.

The invaders were storming in private houses on the pretext of search for Polish soldiers. Then they were looting and torturing victims threatening them and their families with death. Beating, shouting and swearing created atmosphere of terror.

Looting and raping women by the Red Army soldiers took place with approval and even encouragement of their commanders and political commissioners, who earlier had promised soldiers that after the town was captured they would be given permission to plunder for two days.

Bands of Kozaks were penetrating Plock churches taking everything they could and brutally treating priests and monks. In the Mariavites monastery looting took place during a holy mess and a prefect priest Filip Feldman was robbed and insulted in presence of his parishioners. The monastery was a few times intruded by drunken soldiers who were plundering rooms in search for nuns who were saved from raping by a brave behavior of a prelate Feldman. In a parish church a curate Franciszek Gowor was twice taken to a cemetery to a place where dead bodies of Polish soldiers had been brought and there intimidated. He had a gun put to his head and was threatened that if he did not give away gold and weapons and did not reveal a hiding place of Polish soldiers he would die. He was also twice forced to undress for a search and three times put against the wall as if he was going to be shot.

Along with Catholics also community of a Jewish district fell victim to the Bolsheviks - private flats, shops and Jewish charity and social institutions were looted (among stolen property were products from American charity supplies). Total losses of the Jewish community reached about 400 thousand Polish marks.

Announcement of the Town Hall issued on the 24th of August 1920 summoned people of Plock to testify on crimes committed by the Bolsheviks in the town. Testimonies were obligatory. They were heard at a public prosecutor's office in Plock and a Plock Agency of the 2nd Department of Staff of Command of General District in Warsaw. Avoiding the interrogation fell under penal sanction. Registration of moral losses and material damages suffered by residents of particular streets was dealt with by Housing Department of the Town Hall. A committee appointed by town authorities to assess material losses completed inspection until the end of December 1920 and estimated total loss at about 17 million Polish marks, about 20 thousand rubles and 200 US dollars. The whole food supplies of the town (crops, potatoes, other products) were destroyed. About 800 families suffered in result of fights and looting.

Accounts of victims, i.e. private persons and institutions, survived in Records of town of Plock, contain information on both material damages - destruction of buildings, broken windows, and moral losses - rapes, acts of intimidation. (Krystyna Banka)

External description: Original, in Polish, paper, 9 loose sheets (13 pages), part of a unit size 255x370 mm, containing 182 sheets on the subject, notations by other person on margin, on the back and between actual text of accounts.

Location: State Archive in Plock, Records of town of Plock, cat. no. 25173, sheets: 4-4v, 24, 26, 82-83, 88, 90, 136-136v, 138, 180-180v.