Józef Rządzki’s chess pieces

These chess pieces were made from prison bread. Józef Rządzki, known by the underground name “Boryna”, made them while imprisoned on Rakowiecka Street in 1948. He was a Polish Army officer, a member of the Freedom and Independence Association and a prisoner of the Stalinist period. The set was preserved in the museum collection as a personal relic of its maker.

In 2026, the pieces were displayed at the Warsaw exhibition about WiN, alongside objects connected with other imprisoned activists. The Warsaw edition included an additional room with biographies of members and people who had worked with the organisation. The same display featured an embroidered handkerchief given to Barbara Sadowska by fellow prisoners and a cross made by Rudolf Chorzempa from a toothbrush. Such objects document prisoners’ handiwork using materials available to them in confinement.