If the Germans hunted for specific people, they picked them up precisely. Sometimes, however, they just took all the guests of a crowded cafe or restaurant along with their staff, the best food, and cash. Taking ordinary clients as hostages, the Nazis wanted to put pressure on the Polish underground.
The owner of a cafe or restaurant operating in occupied Poland was also exposed to serious consequences. If the premises were visited by people from the underground, there was a risk that in the event of a German air raid, for example, illegal brochures or weapons would be found next to one of the guests. In such a case, suspicions fell not only on the man caught red-handed, but also on the man who had just sold him a plate of soup.
Between the Home Army and Germany
The world of gastronomy was in a vice - between the Polish Underground State and the occupation authorities. Regardless of views and patriotism, each restaurateur had to take into account that a direct threat would also threaten him from the Home Army. After all, he could not predict whether the underground authorities had passed a sentence against one of the regulars of the place. It wasn't his fault if he unwittingly fed a Gestapo informant or other traitor. The problem was that the executors of the Home Army did not ask about blame. For them, all that mattered was the elimination of the enemy by any means necessary.
It could have been a grenade thrown through a cafe window or a burst of automatic pistol. In such a situation, it was extremely easy to find casualties, and in addition, the restaurateur himself (if he did not get a ricochet) later had to explain himself to the Gestapo.
There are many examples. For example, paper 993 / Under the code name "Wapiennik" of the Home Army Headquarters, one of the tasks of which was the liquidation of people convicted by the sentences of the underground courts, he carried out actions in catering establishments. It was the same unit whose members, the Bąków brothers, were able to capture the previously confiscated pig with weapons in their hands.
During the occupation, restaurateurs had to fear not only the Gestapo raids, but also the actions of the Polish underground, which sometimes liquidated informers in cafes or restaurants.
One of the "cafe actions" was carried out on October 8, 1943 in the "Za Kotarą" bar. The target was Józef Staszauer, an officer in the Communications Department of the Home Army Headquarters, and at the same time a Gestapo informant. There was a shootout with Gestapo men in the bar, but the soldiers of "Wapiennik" managed to complete the task without losing any of their men. "Behind Kotara" died Staszauer with his wife and brother-in-law, seven Germans and Poles cooperating with them, as well as four accidental witnesses, including the actress Maria Malanowicz who was employed there.
At the same time, the conspiratorial tops wanted to maintain the best possible relations with restaurateurs, and these depended mainly on whether the rank and file of the Home Army - who wanted to eat something, learn something or meet their friends - were able to behave. That is, leave all signs of your "work" behind the door of the premises. "It is simply reprehensible to enter a cafe (if only to buy cookies or look around at those present) if you have a gun, illegal blotting paper or even just notes with addresses" - was the instruction of the Polish Underground State, quoted by Tomasz Szarota.
Given that the last thing to suspect the conspiratorial authorities was a multiplication of nonsensical dos and don'ts, something had to be wrong. In the former Polish capital, there were many establishments that cooperated with the underground and served as contact boxes, their staff was involved in the fight against the occupant, and the owner quietly fed the wounded.
The female art of survival in Aleksandra Zaprutko-Janicka's book "Occupation from the kitchen".
The Germans finally went one step further. They started to open Gestapo-owned cafes on their own to investigate the Polish underground. Among others, the underground "Information Bulletin" of April 26, 1940 warned against this trick, mentioning "Grand-Café" and "Gospodę Włóczęgów" by name. The names of suspicious premises were also passed on from mouth to mouth, along with descriptions of the spies. The documents of the Polish Delegation to Poland also contain information about which of the guests or staff of various premises maintains good relations with the Gestapo or who is the informer. Anna Strzeżek writes about it in her book From consumption to conspiracy .
Risky "cheeky"
Each exit to the city was associated with the threat of arrest, but the restaurants still lacked free tables. One of the people who took no risk was a swashbuckling old man, Stefan Maciejowski, the uncle of the famous pre-war motorist Halina Regulska. He had his own habits, established over the years, and he did not intend to change them for the sake of the Germans. The gray haired gentleman with wire glasses and a lush mustache liked to wander around the city and collect gossip. As Regulska wrote in her memoirs, an indispensable ritual for him was to go out for a "foam cup" at Pomianowski's confectionery on the corner of Marszałkowska and Wilcza streets.
One day he saw that a German gendarme was standing in front of the entrance to the premises. Not wanting to back away from him, he went inside with his head raised. The pastry shop was completely empty. Only a dead pale waitress stood in the center. Uncle, not realizing what had happened here, sat down at the table and demanded his "waffle". The waitress's hands were shaking, she was unable to serve .
Stefan Maciejowski almost paid for his love for the "little cheek" with arrest by the Germans. The photo shows guests of one of the pre-war confectioneries in Warsaw.
Literally a moment earlier, the Gestapo had raided the pastry shop and arrested almost all those present. They only left a deadly terrified waitress. The gendarme, standing in front of the premises, belonged to a larger group that chased out clients. Mr. Stefan got away with it this time. But we do not know whether he got his longed-for "waiting".
The occupation diarists repeatedly said that even the brutal German authorities were unable to suppress the basic social impulse - the need to be in the company of other people . It was enough for the cafe to have erzac-tea and fake cheesecake on the menu, and it was not empty. If, in addition, there was a permit for an inn - providing a weak, but still protection against the raid of the uniformed - success was guaranteed. Stefan Korboński, the Government Delegate for Poland at the end of the war, wrote about it bluntly:
People flooded the worm with what and what they could. The desire to break away from the gloomy reality, the uncertainty of tomorrow, the awareness that I am alive today and that I will be gone tomorrow, created a mood of full hopelessness, and it is known that it is a good drink for anxiety. In addition, there was a lack of all entertainment, especially in the underground, living in constant tension, a danger that required relaxation from time to time. Alcohol provided the necessary counterbalance.
Even the brutal German occupation could not suppress the need for people to be with others. Illustrative photo.
Everyone noticed such a dependence, even children. Maria Kwiatkowska, a girl who lived in a small town during the war, recalled that among the people visiting her family there was a childless married couple called Jagoda, simple people. They ran a fast food shop in their home. They served moonshine and appetizers (legs in jelly, onions with bread and other such delicacies). Kwiatkowska said directly:they were drinking the entire neighborhood. The guests who visited the restaurant run by Jagodów lacked moderation. The sight of people drunk, sleeping side by side on the grass in front of their house, was the order of the day .
Dark blue policemen and all those who felt a sudden need to drink their sorrows also came to the guest thresholds. The event did not end with spending all the cash and handing over all possible goods for exchange. Marriage allowed customers to drink on credit, and it also happened that they treated completely insolvent people. As long as the fun continued.
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The article was based on materials collected during the writing of the book "Occupation from the kitchen". Click and buy your copy at a discount at our bookstore.