Soltysik, Adam Wincenty

Date of birth:: July 6th, 1895 (Lubatówka)
Date of death:: March 3rd, 1971 (Saint George's, Grenada)
Service number:: 1895/140
Nationality:: Polish

Biography

A Polish surgeon, lieutenant colonel in the Polish Army and subsequent Polish Armed Forces. He died March 3, 1971 in Saint George’s, Grenada.

The Soltysik family was not a military family by choice but by circumstance.

Curriculum Vitae
Adam Wincenty Sołtysik was born July 6, 1895 to a large family (3rd of 9 siblings) in Lubatówka, Poland, under Austro-Hungarian occupation. His parents were Antoni Sołtysik (died 1935) and Anna née Dąbrowska (1864–1962). He studied medicine at the university in Lublin. At the end of World War I, as a former officer of the first war and on Poland’s newly regained independence from the tripartite occupiers - the Austro-Hungarian, Russian, and German empires - he was admitted to the newly formed Polish Army and appointed to the rank of second lieutenant.

He was married to Zofia née Gordziewicz (1898–1979), and was stepfather to her son by her first marriage Jerzy Jan Lerski (1917-1992). They both had a son, Jan (John) K M Sołtysik (1925–1979).

By 17th November 1918, as a second lieutenant, he participated and was wounded in the defence of Lwów (now Lviv) during the Polish-Ukrainian war. He was promoted June 1, 1919 to the rank of physician captain in the corps of sanitary officers, a group of sub-doctors.

In 1923, 1924, he was an officer of the surgical department of the 6th Sanitary Battalion in Lviv, he was assigned to District Hospital No. VI (later renamed: 6th Regional Hospital) in Lwów, where he worked in the 1920s through 1930s. During this period he was promoted to the rank of senior head of the surgical department effective January 1, 1931.

As of March 1939, with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel he was head of the surgical ward of the 6th Regional Hospital where he was a valued surgeon. As a member of the editorial committee of the journal "Chirurg Polski" (Polish Surgeon)" published his research, i.e. "W sprawie ran postrzałowych kręgosłupa" - Warszawa 1935 (On bullet wounds to the spine" - Warsaw 1935).

During the pre-war mobilization period of 1939, he was appointed as head of surgery at the evacuation hospital ("EWA"). After the outbreak of World War II in 1939, he worked as a chief surgeon at the 6th Regional Hospital.

In April 1940 with Poland completely overrun from the west by the Germans and from the east by the Russians pursuant to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Agreement, Dr Adam Soltysik, his wife Zofia ("Zosia") and teenaged son Jan were arrested by the invaders and new occupiers, the Russian NKVD (predecessors of the KGB) and exiled along with over 150,000 Poles that year from eastern Poland into the forced labour camps of Siberia and the steppes of Semipalatinsk, all as part of the ethnic cleansing of eastern Poland for future occupation by the USSR, Ukraine and Belarus. Ironically his arrest as a medical doctor and deportation was a fortunate occurrence for Dr Soltysik as it allowed him to escape the execution of thousands of Polish officers by the Russian state secret police NKVD, predecessors of the KGB. His future would have been different had he been detected as a high ranking military officer.

Following the 1941 German attack on the Soviet Union in breach of their Molotov- Ribbentrop agreement, Stalin joined the Allied forces and signed an "amnesty" allowing the release of Poles to form a Polish army to fight the Germans as one of the allied forces. In fact two such Polish armies were created - one under Soviet command and the Polish 2nd Corps under British command, often referred to as "Anders’ Army" in honour of Polish General Anders.

On being released after 2 years together with his wife Zosia and teenaged son Jan, joined Polish Armed Forces in the USSR and was appointed commander of the 6th medical battalion, which was part of the 6th Lwów Infantry Division. On exiting the Soviet Union territory this Polish army became the Polish 2nd Corps "Anders Army" under British command in the Middle East and Italy in 1941–1944.

In May 1944 the Polish 2nd Corps was moved into southern Italy and assigned the mission of a 4th and finally successful attempt at securing the Benedictine monastery overlooking the town of Cassino. This was part of the German Gustav line of defence, and the Battle of Monte Cassino was one of the most ferocious of the 2nd world war.

During the Italian campaign Dr Soltysik performed surgery on the many wounded and was assisted by his future daughter-in-law, Wanda Serwatowska (see photo above, standing at left), also a survivor of the Siberian exile, member of Anders Army and nurse in the operating theatre. One of Dr Soltysik’s patients was his own son Jan who was shot in the arm while throwing a grenade to neutralize a German defence position during the uphill Battle of Monte Cassino thus singlehandedly saving his comrades from being slaughtered and for which Jan was awarded the Polish Virtuti Military (equivalent to the Victoria Cross).

After the war, the Polish 2nd Corps was transferred to the United Kingdom where upon demobilization the Crown was faced with accommodating an army of 110,000 Poles, the vast majority of whom were experienced in the horrors of Soviet occupation and refused to be repatriated to a homeland under communist occupation. The few who returned were summarily prosecuted, imprisoned and/or executed by the Soviet occupiers.

The British Crown established the Polish Resettlement Corps and through the Colonial Office and arrangements were made for Dr Soltysik to move first to Grenada around 1947-48. There was a brief assignment to Dominica circa 1951-52 and then he returned to Grenada where he was the surgeon and gynaecologist at the St, George’s Colony Hospital until his retirement in early to mid 1960s.

Some of the narratives around Dr Soltysik include being called "Papa" by many Grenadians who often did not have the means with which to pay for medical services. In 1954 hurricane Janet destroyed much of Grenada and the hospital found itself short of equipment. Dr Soltysik donated from his salary to help acquire needed equipment. He was on the list for the 1959 year end awards and in January,1960 he received the M.B.E. from the hands of the Colonial Administrator James Monteith Lloyd.

During his tenure at the Colony hospital Dr Soltysik was assigned living quarters initially at The Observatory and then at The Villa ‘A’ overlooking the Carenage. On retirement he built and operated SALUS Clinic adjacent to his new home at Richmond Hill.

During the very early 1950s Dr Soltysik reconnected with a young Polish doctor from his hometown of Lwów / Lviv - Dr Maciej Zwiersz (later "anglicized" to Matthias Zeville) - who had been assigned to the same hospital as Dr Soltysik in Lwów, and after the war with his wife another Siberia survivor who also coincidentally was operated on by Dr Soltysik in pre-war Lwow, and after the war was assigned to Bequia, St.Vincent where two of their three daughters were born. Several other Polish doctors were assigned to Grenada among them Adolf "Dolek" Bierzyński, Jan (John) Słomiński, others such as Dr Bastyra to Trinidad and several others.

Dr Soltysik died on March 3, 1971 at the St.George’s Hospital, St,George's, Grenada, BWI