be
regarded as "autochthonous" Polish. In October 1946 37,736 persons
were "verified" as Polish citizens while 30,804 remained
"unverified". A centre of such "unverified" Masurians was
the district of Mragowo (Sensburg), where in early 1946 out of 28,280 persons,
20,580 were "unverified", while in October, 16,385 still refused to
adopt Polish citizenship. However even those who complied with the often used
pressure by Polish authorities were in fact treated as Germans because of their
Lutheran faith and their often rudimentary knowledge of Polish. Names were
"Polonised" and the usage of the German language in public was
forbidden. In the late 1940s the pressure to sign the "verification
documents" grew and in February 1949 the former chief of the stalinist
secret Police (UB) of Łódź, Mieczyslaw Moczar, started the "Great
verification" campaign. Many unverified Masurians were imprisoned and
accused of pro-Nazi or pro-American propaganda, even former pro-Polish
activists and inmates of Nazi concentration camps were jailed and tortured.
After the end of this campaign in the district of Mragowo (Sensburg) only 166
Masurians were still "unverified".
In 1950 1,600 Masurians left the country and in 1951,
35,000 people from Masuria and Warmia managed to obtain a declaration of
their German nationality by the embassies of the USA and Great Britain in
Warsaw. Sixty-three percent of the Masurians in the district of Mragowo
(Sensburg) received such a document. In December 1956 Masurian pro-Polish
activists signed a memorandum to the Communist Party leadership:
"The history of the people of Warmia and Masuria is full of tragedy and
suffering. Injustice, hardship and pain often pressed on the shoulders of
Warmians and Masurians... Dislike, injustice and violence surrounds us...They
(Warmians and Masurians) demand respect for their differentness, grown in the
course of seven centuries and for freedom to maintain their
