• OUR LADY of CZĘSTOCHOWA: st Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland; source: own collectionOUR LADY of CZĘSTOCHOWA
    St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland
    source: own collection
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Roman Catholic
St Sigismund parish
05-507 Słomczyn
85 Wiślana Str.
Konstancin deanery
Warsaw archdiocese, Poland

  • St SIGISMUND: St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland; source: own collectionSt SIGISMUND
    St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland
    source: own collection
  • St SIGISMUND: XIX c., feretory, St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland; source: own collectionSt SIGISMUND
    XIX c., feretory
    St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland
    source: own collection
  • St SIGISMUND: XIX c., feretory, St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland; source: own collectionSt SIGISMUND
    XIX c., feretory
    St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland
    source: own collection
  • St SIGISMUND: XIX c., feretory, St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland; source: own collectionSt SIGISMUND
    XIX c., feretory
    St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland
    source: own collection
  • St SIGISMUND: XIX c., feretory, St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland; source: own collectionSt SIGISMUND
    XIX c., feretory
    St Sigismund parish church, Słomczyn, Poland
    source: own collection
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Martyrology of the clergy — Poland

XX century (1914 – 1989)

personal data

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surname

WERSOCKI

forename(s)

John (pl. Jan)

  • WERSOCKI John - Commemorative plaque, St Stanislaus church, Sankt Petersburg, source: ipn.gov.pl, own collection; CLICK TO ZOOM AND DISPLAY INFOWERSOCKI John
    Commemorative plaque, St Stanislaus church, Sankt Petersburg
    source: ipn.gov.pl
    own collection

function

diocesan priest

creed

Latin (Roman Catholic) Church RCmore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2014.09.21]

diocese / province

Mogilev archdiocesemore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2013.06.23]

nationality

Belarusian

date and place
of death

22.12.1937

Alma‐Ataform.: Verny
today: Almaty, Almaty reg., Kazakhstan

more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2020.07.31]

alt. dates and places
of death

11.12.1937

details of death

Arrested by the Russians on 08.03.1927.

On 25/28.08.1927 sentenced to 5 years of slave labour by a criminal Russian OGPU Council kangaroo court.

From 02.01.1928 jailed in ITL SLON Solovetsky Islands concentration camp.

In 06.1930 moved to Anzer Island concentration sub–camp.

On 05.07.1932 tried again in a special trial against Catholic priests held in ITL SLON — for „conducting secret religious ceremonies”.

Got sentence extended to 10 years of isolation from other priests.

On 25.08.1932 deported to Alma Ata in Kazakhstan — possibly to ITL KarLag concentration camp.

Next moved to Semipalatinsk within the same system of camps.

Then on 07.09.1937 arrested again.

Transported to Alma Ata.

On 11.12.1937 sentenced to death by the genocidal Special Council NKVD kangaroo court (known as «NKVD Troika») and murdered in prison.

cause of death

murder

perpetrators

Russians

sites and events

11.08.1937 Russian genocideClick to display the description, Great Purge 1937Click to display the description, Forced exileClick to display the description, ITL KarLagClick to display the description, Trial of 05.07.1932Click to display the description, OLP AnzerLagClick to display the description, ITL SLONClick to display the description

date and place
of birth

07.02.1888

Halshanytoday: Halshany ssov., Ashmyany dist., Grodno reg., Belarus
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2022.01.06]

alt. dates and places
of birth

17.02.1888

presbyter (holy orders)
ordination

1915

positions held

1919 – 1927

administrator — Zabiałytoday: Volyntsy, Volyntsy ssov., Verkhnyadzvinsk dist., Vitebsk reg., Belarus
more on
be.wikipedia.org
[access: 2023.01.18]
⋄ St George RC parish ⋄ Dryssa / Siebieżdeanery names/seats RC deanery

till c. 1927

administrator — Dryssatoday: Verkhnyadzvinsk, Verkhnyadzvinsk dist., Vitebsk reg., Belarus
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2022.07.16]
⋄ Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary RC parish ⋄ Dryssa / Siebieżdeanery names/seats RC deanery

vicar — Smolensktoday: Smolensk oblast, Russia
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2022.01.06]
⋄ Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary RC parish

c. 1917

vicar — Minsktoday: Minsk city reg., Belarus
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2020.07.31]
⋄ Holy Trinity RC parish ⋄ St Rock RC church (on „Golden Hill”)Minsktoday: Minsk city reg., Belarus
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2020.07.31]
RC deanery

1910 – 1915

student — Sankt Petersburgtoday: Saint Petersburg city, Russia
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2020.07.31]
⋄ philosophy and theology, Metropolitan Theological Seminary

sites and events
descriptions

11.08.1937 Russian genocide: On 11.08.1937 Russian leader Stalin decided and NKVD head, Nicholas Jeżow, signed a «Polish operation» executive order no 00485. 139,835 Poles living in Russia were thus sentenced summarily to death. According to the records of the „Memorial” International Association for Historical, Educational, Charitable and Defense of Human Rights (Rus. Международное историко‐просветительское, правозащитное и благотворительное общество „Мемориал”), specialising with historical research and promoting knowledge about the victims of Russian repressions — 111,091 were murdered. 28,744 were sentenced to deportation to concentration camps in Gulag. Altogether however more than 100,000 Poles were deported, mainly to Kazakhstan, Siberia, Kharkov and Dniepropetrovsk. According to some historians, the number of victims should be multiplied by at least two, because not only the named persons were murdered, but entire Polish families (the mere suspicion of Polish nationality was sufficient). Taking into account the fact that the given number does not include the genocide in eastern Russia (Siberia), the number of victims may be as high as 500,000 Poles. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2016.03.14]
)

Great Purge 1937: „Great Terror” (also «Great Purge», also called „Yezhovshchyna” after the name of the then head of the NKVD) — a Russian state action of political terror, planned and directed against millions of innocent victims — national minorities, wealthier peasants (kulaks), people considered opponents political, army officers, the greatest intensity of which took place from 09.1936 to 08.1938. It reached its peak starting in the summer of 1937, when Art. 58‐14 of the Penal Code about „counter‐revolutionary sabotage” was passed , which became the basis for the „legalization” of murders, and on 02.07.1937 when the highest authorities of Russia, under the leadership of Joseph Stalin, issued a decree on the initiation of action against the kulaks. Next a number of executive orders of the NKVD followed, including No. 00439 of 25.07.1937, starting the liquidation of 25,000‐42,000 Germans living in Russia (mainly the so‐called Volga Germans); No. 00447 of 30.07.1937, beginning the liquidation of „anti‐Russian elements”, and No. 00485[2] of 11.08.1937, ordering the murder of 139,835 people of Polish nationality (the latter was the largest operation of this type — encompassed 12.5% of all those murdered during the «Great Purge», while Poles constituted 0.4% of the population). In the summer of 1937 Polish Catholic priests held in Solovetsky Islands, Anzer Island and ITL BelbaltLag were locked in prison cells (some in Sankt Petersburg). Next in a few kangaroo, murderous Russian trials (on 09.10.1937, 25.11.1937, among others) run by so‐called «NKVD Troika» all were sentenced to death. They were subsequently executed by a single shot to the back of the head. The murders took place either in Sankt Petersburg prison or directly in places of mass murder, e.g. Sandarmokh or Levashov Wilderness, where their bodies were dumped into the ditches. Other priests were arrested in the places they still ministered in and next murdered in local NKVD headquarters (e.g. in Minsk in Belarus), after equally genocidal trials run by aforementioned «NKVD Troika» kangaroo courts.

Forced exile: One of the standard Russian forms of repression. The prisoners were usually taken to a small village in the middle of nowhere — somewhere in Siberia, in far north or far east — dropped out of the train carriage or a cart, left out without means of subsistence or place to live. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.12.20]
)

ITL KarLag: Russian Rus. Исправи́тельно‐Трудово́й Ла́герь (Eng. Corrective Labor Camp) ITL Rus. Карагандинский (Eng. Karagandskiy) — concentration and slave forced labor camp (within the Gulag complex) — with headquarters in the city of Karaganda, Karaganda Oblast in Kazakhstan. Founded on 17.09.1931. One of the largest in the Gulag complex. It covered an area of 300 by 200 km, with its center in the Dolynka village, c. 45 km from Karaganda. One of the tasks was to grow food, especially animal husbandry, for the emerging centers of coal mining and heavy industry in Kazakhstan. Prisoners slaved in camp workshops (metal processing, drawing, tailoring), in the production of construction materials, in a glassworks, a sugar refinery, a vegetable drying plant, in coal mines, limestone mining, and in fishing. At its peak, c. 65,000 prisoners were held there: e.g. 45,798 (01.01.1943); 50,080 (01.01.1944); 53,946 (01.01.1945); 60,745 (01.01.1947); 63,555 (01.01.1948); 65,673 (01.01.1949); 54,179 (01.01.1950); 45,675 (01.01.1951). In total, c. 1,000,000 people passed through the camp, including many women and children. Many died. It ceased operations on 27.07.1959. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2019.10.13]
)

Trial of 05.07.1932: Russian trial of Catholic priests held in Solovetsky Islands and Anzer Island, accused of „creation of an anti‐Russian group that conducted anti‐Russian agitation, clandestinely celebrated Mass and religious rites and maintained an illegal contact with a free worker for purposes of transmitting abroad information of an espionage character about the situation of Catholics in the Russia”. The prisoners were given prolonged sentences in concentration camp and spread them among the various Gułag camps.

OLP AnzerLag: Russian ros. Отдельный лагерный пункт (Eng. Separate Camp Unit) OLP on the Anzer Island on White Sea. On the Island, 47 km2, belonging to Solovetsky Islands archipelago, Russians organised one of the first concentration camps in Russia (part of ITL SLON Solovetsky Islands concentratoin camp). In 1930s c. 32 Catholic priests were held there most of who perished. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.12.20]
)

ITL SLON: Russian Rus. Исправи́тельно‐Трудово́й Ла́герь (Eng. Corrective Labor Camp) ITL Rus. Солове́цкий ла́герь осо́бого назначе́ния Ла́герь (Eng. Solovetsky Special Purpose Camp) SLON — concentration and slave forced labor camp (within what was to become Gulag complex) — headquartered in Solovetsky Islands in Arkhangelsk Oblast. Founded on 13.10.1923 in a famous Orthodox monastery. In the 1920s, one of the first and largest concentration camps in Russia. The place of slave labor of prisoners — at forest felling, sawmills, peat extraction, fishing, loading work on the Murmansk Railway Main Line, in road construction, production of food and consumer goods, at the beginning of the construction of the White Sea ‐ Baltic canal, etc. The concept of the later system of Russian Gulag concentration camps prob. had its origins in the Solovetsky Islands camp — from there the idea spread to the camps in the area covered by the construction of the White Sea ‐ Baltic canal, i.e. ITL BelBaltLag, and from there further, to the entire territory of the Russian state. From the network of camps on the Solovetsky Islands — also called the Solovetsky Islands archipelago — prob. also comes the concept of the „Gulag Archipelago” created by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. It is estimated that tens to hundreds of thousands of prisoners passed through the Solovetsky Islands concentration camps. At its peak, c. 72,000 prisoners were held there: e.g. 14,810 (12.1927); 12,909 (03.1928); 65,000 (1929); 53,123 (01.01.1930); 63,000 (01.06.1930); 71,800 (01.01.1931); 15,130 (1932); 19,287 (1933) — c. 43,000 of whom were murdered, including the years 1937‐1938 when c. 9,500 prisoners were transported from the camp and murdered in several places of mass executions, including Sandarmokh, Krasny Bor and Lodeynoye Polye. Among them were many Catholic and Orthodox priests. After the National Socialist Party came to power in Germany in 1933, a German delegation visited the ITL SLON camp, to „inspect” Russian solutions and adopt them later in German concentration camps. It operated until 04.12.1933, with a break from 16.11.1931 to 01.01.1932, when it was part of and later became a subcamp of the ITL BelBaltLag camp. It operated as such until 1939 (from 1936 as a prison). (more on: old.memo.ruClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2024.04.08]
)

sources

personal:
biographies.library.nd.eduClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.12.20]
, kamunikat.fontel.netClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2015.05.09]
, cyclowiki.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2019.10.13]

bibliographical:
Fate of the Catholic clergy in USSR 1917‐1939. Martyrology”, Roman Dzwonkowski, SAC, ed. Science Society KUL, 2003, Lublin
original images:
ipn.gov.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2019.02.02]

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