Extraordinary
DAD was born in Wolyn, Poland (now part of Ukraine), and came from a poor farming family. He had five brothers and five sisters.
When the Soviet army invaded in September 1939, the family was forcibly removed from their home and sent to a labour camp in Siberia.
Forced to do hard outdoor work in below-freezing temperatures on a starvation diet, two members of the family died.
Three years later, my father and his brothers were freed from the gulag and conscripted into a new Polish Army to fight under British command. He joined the Polish II Corps, commanded by Lieutenant General Wladyslaw Anders.
After serving in the Middle East, Dad fought in the 1944 Battle of Monte Cassino in Italy.
Twice wounded, he had a piece of shrapnel in his head for the rest of his life.
His bravery was recognised with the Virtuti Militari, Poland’s highest military honour. After the war, Dad came to England and was demobbed in 1947.
He settled in Derby, did various jobs and then found work at a textile mill. My mother Patricia was working at the Rolls-Royce factory in Derby, and she and my dad would notice each
other on the bus, at the cinema and walking in the city centre. One day in the early 1950s, Dad spotted her across the road, so introduced himself, which was pretty bold for those days. He had an independent spirit and my mother was a rebel who did not want a typical Englishman.
They fell in love and married in 1956. Some of Dad’s siblings had emigrated to the U.S. after the war and they convinced him to move to New Jersey. So he and Mum emigrated. My sister Valentina was born in 1961 and I came along in 1967. But my parents missed Derby and decided to return.
When Dad retired in 1985, he got an allotment, which he loved and spent a lot of time cultivating. So maybe there was an English streak in him after all! His faith was important to him: he went to Mass at the local Catholic church every Sunday and donated generously to church funds and his favourite charity, Christian Aid. He didn’t talk much about the war, but he did tell us he prayed constantly during the battles. When an artillery shell fell right in front of him and didn’t explode, he felt sure God was watching over him. He remained close to his fellow soldiers who had settled here, meeting up at the local Polish Club. And each Remembrance Day they would proudly wear their medals at Derby War Memorial to honour the fallen.
■ WALENTY KUBIS, born February 14, 1923; died December 7, 2020, aged 97.