Barbara

Among the civilians held at Stalag IVB in November 1944 was seventeen-year-old Barbara Rawicz-Nowicka, who had been in the Polish Home Army during the Warsaw Uprising.  Barbara wrote an open note to the RAF prisoners in the camp, so that she could improve her English and it was Bill Smith, with his flair for letter writing, who responded.  Over the next two weeks they exchanged notes and he sent her chocolate and cigarettes from his Red Cross parcels.  In return, she wrote him letters about herself and her life in Poland, and made him a small handkerchief as a present (now on display at the Air Force Museum of New Zealand).

See below to read one of Barbara’s letters.

• Barbara's Letter p.1
• Barbara's letter to Bill Smith

After two weeks, Barbara was moved to Altenburg, a slave labour camp which was a sub-camp of the notorious Buchenwald concentration camp, and Bill never saw or heard from her again, and probably assumed she had died there.  Recent investigations have revealed, however, that Barbara survived the War and married a Polish officer. They moved to London where she lived until she died in 2006.

Next section: Liberation & Repatriation.