Józef Mackiewicz
Józef Mackiewicz was a Polish writer, novelist and political commentator; best known for his documentary novels Nie trzeba głośno mówić, and Droga donikąd. He staunchly opposed communism, referring to himself as an "anticommunist by nationality". Mackiewicz died in exile. His older brother Stanisław Mackiewicz was also a writer.
Life and career
Józef Mackiewicz was the son of Antoni Mackiewicz and Maria née Pietraszkiewicz originally from Kraków, a Polish noble family from the Polish-Lithuanian gentry of Bożawola coat of arms. He was born on 1 April 1902 in Saint Petersburg. Józef Mackiewicz was the younger brother of Stanisław Mackiewicz, a political publicist and Prime Minister of the postwar Polish government in exile from 1954 to 1955; and Seweryna Mackiewicz, mother of Polish writer Kazimierz Orłoś.In 1907 his family moved to Vilnius. In 1919, as a 17-year-old volunteer he participated in the Polish–Soviet War, first, as an uhlan of the Polish Army's 10th Lithuanian Uhlan Regiment, and then of the 13th Wilno Uhlan Regiment. He finished his military service during Poland's fight of independence as an uhlan of the. Similar to other young veterans of the war who entered university without their Matura graduation, Mackiewicz started his favourite subject of biological sciences at the University of Warsaw and then upon moving to Vilnius continued studies at the Vilnius University, but he never graduated with a degree. From 1923 he worked as a journalist for Słowo, a periodical published in Vilnius by his older brother Stanisław and fully sponsored and financed by the old noble families of the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Journalist work took him all over the Baltic republics and eastern Poland.
Mackiewicz married Antonina Kopańska with whom he had a daughter Halina, and upon divorce he was in a long-term relationship with Wanda Żyłowska, with whom he had a daughter Idalia. Then he began his lifelong relationship with a writer and journalist of Vilnius' Słowo Barbara Toporska, but they had no children. They married in 1939. Józef Mackiewicz's nephew was Kazimierz Orłoś.
World War II
On 17 September 1939 Soviet troops attacked eastern Poland as part of the joint German-Soviet Invasion of Poland. Upon the division of the country by occupying forces, the Vilnius region was transferred to then independent Lithuania. On the 18th, Mackiewicz published an article expressing joy at the Bolshevik's withdrawal from Vilnius, resulting in him being accused of anti-Polonism and pro-Lithuanianism. Mackiewicz remained in Vilnius, and between October 1939 and May 1940 he was a publisher and editor-in-chief of the Gazeta Codzienna, a Polish-language an anti-nationalist and anti-Soviet daily in Lithuanian-controlled Vilnius. In his articles, he attempted to initiate a political dialogue between Lithuanians and Poles. In May 1940, he was forbidden from further roles as a publisher and journalist by the Lithuanian government.After the 15 June 1940 invasion and annexation of Lithuania by the Soviet Union, Mackiewicz gave up his professional activity and worked as a lumberjack and wagon driver. In June 1941, the Germans occupied Lithuania. For the first four months of the occupation, Mackiewicz again worked as a journalist for the German-issued Polish-language newspaper Goniec Codzienny, in which he published several anti-Soviet articles, and excerpts from one of his books.
In 1942, he witnessed the Ponary massacre of some 100,000 mostly Polish Jews by German SD, SS and the Lithuanian Nazi collaborators Ypatingasis būrys, which he described in his 1969 book Nie trzeba głośno mówić. At the end of 1942 he was sentenced to death by the resistance for his work at Gazeta Codzienna and Goniec Codzienny. The sentence was not carried out, and later formally cancelled.
Discovery of Katyń Forest Massacre
In April 1943 Mackiewicz was invited by the international Katyn Commission, headed by German occupying authorities, to the site of Katyn massacre. Upon consent of the Polish government-in-exile, he assisted in the first excavations of the mass graves of the Polish officers killed by Soviet NKVD there in 1940. Upon his return to Vilnius, the local German-sponsored daily Goniec Codzienny published an interview with Mackiewicz titled "Widziałem na własne oczy". He later arrived in Italy where he worked for the II Corps (Poland) and, in this capacity, he edited a compilation of documents related directly to the Katyń Massacre under the title Zbrodnia katyńska w świetle dokumentów, published in 1948 with an introduction by General Władysław Anders. At the same time he wrote his own book under the title Katyń. Zbrodnia bez sądu i kary. Its first Polish language publication was destroyed by the publisher in London, UK, for political reasons. In 1949 he published its German language version, Katyn – ungesühntes Verbrechen, in Zürich, Switzerland. In 1951 he published the English-version of his book under a title The Katyn Wood Murders, the very first book in English on the subject. In 1952 he testified before the US Senate Committee known as "Select Committee to Investigate and Study the Facts, Evidence, and Circumstances of the Katyn Forest Massacre" about the genocidal nature the Katyń Massacre.Accusations of Collaboration with Nazi Germany
In 1942, Mackiewicz was accused of collaboration with the Germans during the occupation due to his work as a journalist and publisher at Gazeta Codzienna and Goniec Codzienny. In these articles, Mackiewicz put forth several ideas, notably that a return to the prewar borders of Poland was a pipe-dream and not a useful premise, which some local Poles then considered unthinkable.He also proclaimed that opposing just one invader, Germany, was synonymous with helping the second invader, the Soviet Union, because their intentions were identical, but that opposing communism was more important.
During the first four months of the German occupation, Mackiewicz worked as a journalist for the Nazi-controlled Polish-language propaganda newspaper Goniec Codzienny, in which he published several anti-Soviet articles, and excerpts from his novel Droga Donikąd.
This work under the Nazi occupation, and skepticism of a return to pre-war Polish borders, resulted in him being sentenced to death by the Special Court of the Home Army, however this was never carried out and later formally cancelled. The circumstances around this are unclear
According to Czesław Miłosz, he was not a collaborator. Miłosz says that In 1947, Mackiewicz was completely cleared of any wrongdoing, and that It is open to debate how much the popular criticism of his novels was influenced by the Soviet sympathies of his adversaries.
The accusations negatively influenced the Polish perceptions of Mackiewicz and his work, especially following World War II.