Many victims of German repression during World War II remain nameless. In order to save their memory from oblivion, the IPN has created the straty.pl. project. We want to restore the memory of these victims so that future generations of Poles will remember how many ordinary citizens were subjected to repression, and that thousands of them paid the ultimate price for freedom.  

On 31 October 2024, we are launching a nationwide information campaign about the straty.pl. “Personal losses and victims of repression under German occupation in 1939-1945” project  and the straty.pl. database. We are also looking for people who will help us document these repressions and thanks to whom we will be able to enter the names of more people into our database - a virtual memorial to the heroes of World War II.

Time is running out. Most of the witnesses to those events have already passed away. That is why it is so important to reach out to people who can share their memories, their parents’ grandparents’ and relatives’ accounts, as well as any relevant documents that may be in their possession.

We want to reach the widest possible audience, especially families who may not know that:

- it is possible to find information about the fate of loved ones in the IPN straty.pl,

- it is possible to supplement data in the database,

- it is possible to report people who are not yet in it.

We appeal to families, institutions and witnesses of history to help complete the data on victims whose fate has not yet been documented.

As part of the nationwide information campaign, volunteers wearing T-shirts with the IPN logo will appear on the streets of Polish cities. They will not only distribute leaflets and information brochures, but will also provide application forms for the database ( formularze zgłoszeniowe). Anyone who has information about people who may be included in the database will be able to fill out the form on the spot, or send the completed form back to the Institute of National Remembrance.

Posters depicting individuals who are listed in the straty.pl database will also appear in many places in Poland. Some of the posters will feature images of people whose identities have not yet been established, which is why information about them is not yet in the Institute's database. However, the images come from the IPN's archival resources and may be the key to discovering more stories. We hope that thanks to these posters the victims of German occupation will cease to be anonymous. Because no individual story should be forgotten!

Głównym celem programu, którego efektem jest ogólnodostępna internetowa baza straty.pl, jest przywrócenie pamięci o obywatelach polskich, którzy zginęli lub doświadczyli represji podczas niemieckiej okupacji.  

The “Personal losses and victims of repression under German occupation in 1939-1945” - straty.pl database

straty.pl, is a publicly available database, which contains detailed information on persons murdered, repressed, missing or deported during the German occupation.

Purpose:

The main objective of the program, which results in a publicly accessible online database strat.pl, is to restore the memory of Polish citizens who died or experienced repression during the German occupation of Poland. 

What can be found in the database

The database contains data such as the victim's name, date and place of birth, last place of residence, as well as the circumstances of death, arrest or deportation. The information comes from various sources, including: materials collected by the Main Commission for the Investigation of German Crimes in Poland, state archives, documents from concentration camps, witness accounts, memoirs and numerous publications. The database includes victims of executions, inmates of concentration and labor camps, deportees to forced labor, civilian war victims, and those murdered as a result of pacification.

The straty.pl project was inaugurated in 2006 on the initiative of the Institute of National Remembrance and the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and the KARTA Center to collect and document the fate of World War II victims.

Program development

In January 2022, the Institute of National Remembrance assumed full responsibility for the straty.pl project. The Institute has intensified its efforts to incorporate into the database all materials relating to personal losses and victims of repression under German occupation that are in the resources of the IPN throughout Poland. The project is constantly evolving, enriching the archival resources with previously unknown stories. This is a step towards a comprehensive reconstruction of the picture of wartime losses, with attention paid to each and every forgotten story.

The straty.pl database contains information on 5.5 million victims and those subjected to repression, 5 million of whom have been identified by name. To date, we have already entered 370 thousand archival units from our collection, which is 80% of the total selected materials. We have managed to merge 480 thousand records and enter 945 thousand new ones. We expect to complete the database next year.

Watch a statement of the IPN President Karol Nawrocki, Ph.D.