Tag #157505 - Interview #100414 (Michal Warzager)

When we arrived in Legnica, we didn’t know anything here. People simply moved into apartments, whatever they could find. They were empty apartments left by the Germans who had been resettled. We moved into an apartment on Grodzka Street, along with a friend – there were four apartments in one building. He went to work at the steelworks, and I found work with the Russians, in a tank factory. [There was a Soviet Army headquarters in Legnica, stationed in Poland under the Warsaw Pact, and therefore in addition to numerous barracks there was an entire military infrastructure.] It was only called a tank factory – there wasn’t a tank in sight, though, all we did was repair the engines. I worked there until they closed down the factory and left. [Editor’s note: Some parts of military infrastructure were moved back to the USSR a few years after the war.] I remember they didn’t pay well at all, and the work was hard. After that I found a job at Elpo – the Legnica Clothing Factory. They welcomed me with open arms. I worked there as a locksmith for 22 years, right up until I retired.