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Guide

Prisoners of war of 1939

This guide is for families of soldiers taken prisoner after the 1939 campaign. About 400,000–420,000 went into German captivity and about 230,000–250,000 into Soviet captivity. The Germans sent officers to Oflags and other ranks to Stalags, and later released many of the latter for labour or to go home. In Soviet captivity the NKVD separated officers and policemen and in the spring of 1940, under the decision of 5 March, murdered nearly 22,000 Polish citizens at Katyń, Kharkiv, Kalinin and other places.

How to search

  1. 01Start with keepsakes: postcards and letters from the camp (with the prisoner number and the name of the Stalag or Oflag), photographs, the identity disc, release papers. Establish full name, father's first name, date and place of birth, rank and unit in September 1939 and where he was captured: that decides whether to search in Germany or in the USSR.
  2. 02For German captivity the first address is the Central Museum of Prisoners of War at Łambinowice-Opole. A request for a search or for a certificate of captivity goes by email or post, with your own details and at least the prisoner's full name and date and place of birth; a request left incomplete after the museum asks for more goes unanswered. The German POW card index was handed after the war to the prisoners' home countries, and only fragments remain in the Bundesarchiv.
  3. 03The second address is the Polish Red Cross Information and Tracing Bureau, which holds the original card files of Polish prisoners in the camps and copies of the lists of prisoners from Kozielsk, Ostashkov and Starobelsk. A request for a certificate is made in writing on the bureau's tracing forms. If the prisoner was released for work in the Reich, traces may be in the Arolsen Archives (see the guide 'Forced labourers').
  4. 04If the trail ends in Soviet captivity in the spring of 1940, check the Cemetery Books of the Katyń Museum: a search of victims buried at Katyń, Mednoye and Kharkiv, with father's name, year of birth and place of death. The Katyń Families Federation's 'Nasi Bliscy' portal has a name index, portraits, memoirs and letters from the camps.
  5. 05For prisoners murdered under the same decision but taken from NKVD jails in the eastern provinces (the so-called Ukrainian list), and for soldiers released from captivity and later arrested or deported, search the IPN's Index of the Repressed by surname, father's name and year of birth.
  6. 06The International Committee of the Red Cross in Geneva holds Second World War prisoner records, but because of its digitisation project it has suspended archivists' research until further notice. It still considers humanitarian requests only: from the person concerned, for administrative formalities or compensation claims, or to establish the identity of a natural parent or grandparent.

Where to search

We checked the addresses and holdings on these institutions' own websites. Their rules can change, so check their current pages before sending a request.

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