Vengeance of the Swallows

Forced to endure occupation by both the Soviets and the Nazis, the author’s family also faced the terror of Ukrainian “ethnic cleansing” by nationalist forces. The horror of the Nazi forced-labor camps wherein millions of Europeans were enslaved is vividly recounted, as is the family’s time in displaced persons camps. Hundreds of thousands of refugees, unable or unwilling to return to their own countries, waited for the chance to enter these camps under the American Occupation Forces. The author’s family subsequently immigrated to America.
The book is based on family memories and recorded accounts; U.S. interviews and European published oral histories; published English, Polish, Ukrainian, German and Russian sources; U.N. documents and Nuremberg testimonies; and recent information from Warsaw.

Tadeusz Piotrowski is a professor of sociology at the University of New Hampshire in Manchester where he also teaches courses in anthropology and the Holocaust, and where he served as the Associate Dean of Faculty. He has received many awards including the Outstanding Associate Professor Award. He lives in Manchester.

Tadeusz Piotrowski
Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 299
Bibliographic Info: 31 photos, maps, tables, notes, index
Copyright Date: 2009 [1995]
pISBN: 978-0-7864-4701-5
eISBN: 978-1-4766-1033-7
Imprint: McFarland

Acknowledgments      vii
List of Abbreviations      xi
Preface      xiii

BOOK I POLAND
1. Ryświanka      3
2. Dies Irae      23
3. Tales of Terror      60
4. Farewell Forever, Ryświanka      103

BOOK II GERMANY
5. In the Eye of Satan      115
6. Meiningen, Ach Meiningen      135
7. Of Displaced Persons      143

Between pages 170 and 171 are 16 pages of plates containing 24 photographs and 5 maps

BOOK III AMERICA
8. Sweet Land of Liberty      173
9. To Kill a Hummingbird      176
10. The Slings of Fortune      186
11. Reunion      206

Afterword      211
Notes      213
Index      247

Winner, Cultural Achievement Award from the American Council for Polish Culture
“Piotrowski’s eloquent memoir explores the fate of the non–Semitic population of Europe during the war”—Booklist; “blends a scrupulous narrative…with the experiences of a Polish family…a greater impact on the informed reader than more detached studies”—Choice; “among the most eloquent and best documented memoirs”—The Sarmatian Review; “a truly fascinating book…uncommonly readable and rich in scholarly documentation”—Polish Heritage; “remarkable”—Zgoda.