Preliminary Inventory of the Władysław Gomułka miscellaneous papers
Finding aid prepared by Hoover Institution Library and Archives Staff
Hoover Institution Library and Archives
© 2012
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Stanford University
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Title: Władysław Gomułka miscellaneous papers
Date (inclusive): 1950-1983
Collection Number: 2012C49
Contributing Institution: Hoover Institution Library and Archives
Language of Material:
Polish
Physical Description:
3 manuscript boxes
(1.2 Linear Feet)
Abstract: Photocopy of memoirs; original letters and notes; police interrogation files; interview transcripts of associates of Gomułka;
and photographs; relating to communism in Poland and political conditions in Poland.
Creator:
Gomułka, Władysław, 1905-1982
Physical Location: Hoover Institution Library & Archives
Access
The collection is open for research; materials must be requested in advance via our reservation system. If there are audiovisual
or digital media material in the collection, they must be reformatted before providing access.
Use
For copyright status, please contact the Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
Acquisition Information
Acquired by the Hoover Institution Library & Archives in 2012.
Preferred Citation
[Identification of item], Władysław Gomułka miscellaneous papers, [Box no., Folder no. or title], Hoover Institution Library
& Archives.
Biographical Note
Władysław Gomułka, a Polish communist leader, was the first general secretary of the Polska Zjednoczona Partia Robotnicza
(Polish United Workers' Party), serving from October 1956 to December 1970. Suspected by Stalin of trying to turn Poland into
another Yugoslavia and, although seen by many sympathetic Poles as trying to find a "Polish road to socialism," Gomułka ultimately
failed in his efforts to turn the Polish People's Republic into a modern and prosperous European country. The margin of freedom
allowed Poland by Moscow was indeed narrow, but Gomułka's own ideological rigidness and lack of understanding and empathy
for Polish national traditions and aspirations led to his demise.
Gomułka was imprisoned and investigated for "right-nationalist deviation" in preparation for a planned show trial that would
strengthen Stalinist orthodoxy in the party. He was held in a Ministry of Public Security villa near Warsaw during most of
1951-54 and interrogated frequently. Unlike some of his former associates and tens of thousands of ordinary Poles, he was
not physically abused but was under considerable psychological stress, isolated from his family and sources of outside information.
His wife was imprisoned in a nearby house, but the two knew nothing of the other's whereabouts. The couple's son, Ryszard,
remained free.
After Stalin's death and the subsequent "thaw" in the Kremlin, Gomułka was released, in December 1954, and gradually resumed
his government and party functions. He died in 1982.
Scope and Content of Collection
The collection consists of Gomułka's early memoirs, the interrogation file compiled during his imprisonment in 1951-54, transcripts
of oral history interviews with his two secretaries, and other documents and photographs.
The most important and unique material in the collection documents Gomułka's imprisonment and investigation. The interrogation
file includes the undelivered correspondence of Ryszard with his parents. It was never sent to the ministry's archives but
was kept by a top member of the old regime.
The complete typescript of Gomułka's memoirs is the biggest item in the collection. That work, covering the author's life
through 1945 and edited by Andrzej Werblan, was published in two volumes in 1994; the original text however, is much longer
and covers many events not included in the published version. Additionally, the collection contains transcripts of oral history
interviews with two of Gomułka's assistants, Walery Namiotkiewicz and Stanislaw Trepczynski, which were conducted in the Central
Committee Archives in 1983, a year after Gomułka's death.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Poland -- Politics and government -- 1945-1980
Statesmen -- Poland
Communism -- Poland
Polska Zjednoczona Partia Robotnicza
W spomnienia (Memoirs) vol. 1, edited by Andrzej Werblan
box 1
Na czele lewicy zwiazkowej
box 1
W szkole partyjnej Komintemu
box 1
ZSRR i KPP a sprawa niepodleglosci Polski
Wspomnienia (Memoirs) vol. 2, edited by Andrzej Werblan
box 2
W Bialymstoku i Lwowie - pod rzadami radzieckimi
box 2
Stosunk.i z obozem londynskim
box 2
Poslowie - jak powstaly wspomnienia Wladyslawa Gomulki, by Ryszard Strzelecki-Gomulka
box 3
Interrogation file of Wladyslaw Gomulka by Ministry of Public Security functionaries
1952-1954
Scope and Contents
Includes August 4, 1954 "directive" by Deputy Minister of State Security Roman
Romkowski to deprive Gomulka of access to newspapers and fruit because of his
"insinuations and slanders directed at the leadership of the Party." Handwritten
notes like this, on ordinary paper, initialed and not signed, dominate the file. There
was little semblance of conventional legality in the procedures; the party and its top
enforcers were the highest law of the land.
box 3
Correspondence
1950-1957
Scope and Contents
Includes two letters of Ryszard Gomulka to his father and one from his mother, Zofia
Gomulka, February and April 1954 and Gomulka's June 15, 1954, appeal "to the Government of the Polish People's Republic via
the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party" a form of
address in keeping with the complete supremacy of the party over the government
for release for health reasons.
box 3
Gomulka's notes regarding workers' strikes and disturbances in cities on the Baltic coast
1970 December 12-14
box 3
Miscellaneous papers (copies) received from Ryszard Strzelecki
box 3
Walery Namiotkiewicz and Stanislaw Trepczynski interviewed about Wladyslaw Gomulka - transcripts of interview conducted in
the Central Party Archives
1983 Nov-Dec
box 3
Gomulka and Prime Minister Jozef Cyrankiewicz visit a summer camp for "youth
activists," Mielno.
1960 July
box 3
Gomulka speaking at the Conference of World Communist Parties in Moscow
1960 November
Scope and Contents
Standing between Prime Minister Jozef Cyrankiewicz and Gomulka's
closest Politburo associate, Zenon Kliszko.
box 3
The Politburo of the Polish United Workers' Party
1959
Scope and Contents
Gomulka is in the center. The tall young man behind Gomulka is Edward Gierek, the future leader of a party coup, which deposed
Gomulka in December 1970.
box 3
One of Gomulka's last photographs as the party's first secretary
1970 December 7
Scope and Contents
The occasion is a West German state visit to Warsaw. Chancellor Willy
Brandt is at the far right and Gomulka, left of center. Cuban cigars and cognac being
enjoyed by the party leadership are an eerie prelude to the events of the following
week: drastic increases in food prices and workers' revolt that ended Gomulka's
career.
