Bishop Sipovich new file

20 on 23 June. Ceslaus Sipovich describes it in the chronicle: "On 23 June 1938 the Chief of the Braslau secret police and the county sheriff (starosta) came to the monastery of the Belarusian Marian Fathers in Druia and ordered the fathers to leave. They threatened that if the fathers didnt leave voluntarily, they would break into the monastic enclosure and drag them out by force. The (police) car and the monastery were surrounded by armed police. The Fathers, without hurrying, finished celebrating their holy masses... Out of respect for their priestly dignity the Fathers did not let the police to drag them by force to the car... A crowd of people gathered, women began to cry loudly; a photographer came, but just as he was about to take a picture of the Fathers getting into the car, a policeman stopped him..." The four priests expelled were Joseph Dashuta, Casimir Smulka, Vitalis Khamionak and George Kashyra. They stopped for a short time again only a few miles away, in the house of the landowner Huz, a friend of Druia, waiting for further developments. In the monastery, apart from the superior, Father Òysik and another Polish priest, Fr Oksiutowicz who came to help him from Warsaw, there remained only the clerics who had come from Vilna for the summer vacation. Their turn came on Friday 8 July. They were engaged in haymaking in the monasterys meadow, when at 6 p.m. the local police chief came with expulsion orders for five clerics, namely Casimir and Boniface Sarul, Anthony Padziava, Anthony Aniskovich and Ceslaus Sipovich. The chief, a local man, well known to all, was very embarassed and explained to the clerics that he was only carrying out the orders. Then the chronicle writes: "Anthony Padziava (he was arranging hay in the cart A.N .) came down from the cart, went to take a swim in the river Dzvina, then in the presence of all kissed the ground and said: Good bye, my beloved land, you have been our provider. Another student (Sipovich A.N. ) when left alone began to cry bitterly. Why? He could not say himself... After a short consultation about whether to sign the expulsion papers brought by the chief of police, in a tense atmosphere Father Òysik said: We did everything we could to make Fathers come back. To no avail. The Nuncio himself refused to speak on our behalf. Having understood that the resistance of the clerics... would be ineffective... it was agreed that if the following 24 hours brought no change, they would give up and, according to the wish of the Superior, conform to the order as set out in the (expulsion) paper each one of them received... On the same day the Father Superior left for Vilna. The clerics remained, waiting for the Father Superiors telephone call. If such a call did not come by 6 p.m. on Saturday, they were to leave the monastery and go to their parents... On the same Friday clerics Padziava and Sipovich cycled to Kanstantynava to see the exiled Fathers... Father K. Smulka, together with Padziava and Sipovich, went on the shore of the lake... (Father Smulka) was saying: It is good that they persecute us. What is bad is that they persecute us only for the national idea. And we have never been directly involved with it. The Poles, by expelling us, have done a foolish thing; it is quite clear that nothing good will come from it for them. On Saturday morning all the clerics began slowly getting ready to go to their parents... Sipovich... went to (say goodbye) to the sisters of the Holy Eucharist... Coming out into their courtyard Sipovich met a teacher of the Druia school Sajkowski, whom he knew well. They greeted each other. Hallo and goodbye, said Sipovich. in a few hours time I must be out of Druia. Sajkowski grabbed the hand of the cleric and, as it seemed at that time, sincerely and convincingly said: God is my witness, now I believe that they persecute priests in Russia. These words were very significant, because Sajkowski was a Pole... On Saturday 9 July at about 5 p.m. the young Marians left their nest... For a short time they stayed in their villages. Soon the Very Reverend Father Superior