Legnica - Oficjalny Portal Miasta

bip

[2008] Józef Wojciechowski

Józef Wojciechowski – born on 21st February 1915 in Podhajce. died on 19.09.2009. He was a soldier of the September campaign in 1939. He was taken prisoner by Soviets however he managed to escape from transport to Starobielsk. During the Soviet’s occupation he worked for the Liberty for Poland Service and for the Underground Home Army in Podhajce. He commanded a platoon and later on a company. He was arrested by Soviet NKWD on 17 January 1945 and sentenced to imprisonment in the Soviet’s Vorkuta prison camps.
After his imprisonment he came back Poland in May 1956. He worked in the railway station in Legnica. He learnt and studied and was granted the title of Master of Arts in Law by the University of Wrocław in 1962. He is a retired legal adviser. He was awarded a Medal for Participation in the II World War, the Cross of the Underground Home Army, a Medal of the Polish Army granted by the Government in Emigration in London, the Knight’s Cross of Poland Regeneration, the Silver Cross of Merit with Swords, a Golden Honorary Order for Special Merits for the Society of Lovers for Lvov and South – East Borderlands.
He was a member of the PAX Association, and he is a charter member of the Society of Lovers for Lvov and South – East Borderlands. Today, in spite of his old age, he is a very active member of this Society, making lectures on patriotism and borderlands. He supports social initiatives with his own funds, among others, he worked for the Social Committee for Renovation of the Church in Podhajce in the nineties. He is an activist of the War Victim Unin in Legnica, the Soviet camp Prisoners’ Union, the Polish Association of Retired and Disabled Persons, the Society of Ex-Inhabitants of Brzeżany.
Being the only one prisoner of Vorkuta camps living in Legnica, he granted Jan Stanisław Smalewski a book-long interview which was published by the Institute of National Memory in Wrocław in December 2007. In this book he tells the history of his life and first years of living in Legnica. He describes Legnica as his own town which replaced his home Pohdajce.
After coming back from imprisonment, Józef Wojciechowski devoted his long life to local community of Legnica. Due to his moral and patriotic attitude and his fight for liberty, he is an outstanding example of the noble personality, a sample to be followed for the modern generations inhabiting Legnica.