- 1
On a portrait of Our
Lady of Czestochowa
- hanging at the altar in
St James's Catholic Church
- in Renfrew there is an
inscription which pleads
-
- Przywroc
Nam Wolnosc
- Ojczyzny
-
- Beneath the portrait
there is a small silver plaque
- dedicated to the memory
of three fallen Polish
- airmen who died in
March 1941,
- 'Saving Our
Church'.
-
 - These airmen were part
of 309 Polish Squadron
- which was formed at
Renfrew in November 1940.
-
- On the night of 13
March 1941, German bombers
- commenced their heavy
raids on Clydebank
- which resulted in an
appalling loss of human life
- and caused considerable
damage.
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- 2
Renfrew did not
escape that night and bombs
- and incendiaries fell
on the town.
-
- During the night of the
13th, L
Cpl Pawel Radke,Aircraftsman Antoni
Ptaszkowski and
Zygmunt
Sokolowski were
at St James's and at great risk to themselves were
extinguishing incendaries. The incendaries had caused
a number of fires in the church. Two of the airmen
were killed by a bomb, the other died the
following day
in Alexandria Hospital. They were in their
twenties.
-
- When 309 Squadron
transferred to Dunino in Fife in May 1941, it
presented to the church
- the
portrait of Our Lady
- as a token of their
appreciation to the people of Renfrew.
-
- Parishioners never
forgot their sacrifice and in October 1982, at a
special Mass, a
silver plaque in
memory of these airmen and the portrait of the Black
Madonna was blessed and dedicated by Bishop McGill.
The plaque was crafted by a local Polish jeweller - Mr
Eugeniusz Waclawski who also had the portrait
restored.
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- 3
Members
of the Polish community in the west of
- Scotland,
both young and old, along with Polish
- ex-combatants
participated in a moving ceremony
- at
Renfrew.
-
- In an
article by Fr. Canning in the Scottish
- Catholic
Observer of 5th November 1982 he noted
- the
words of Bishop McGill that Renfrew would
- be ever
grateful to the three Polish airmen who
- gave
their lives so heroically in trying to save
- St
James' Church in the terrible blitz of 1941, the
- scars
of which are to be seen in the pews to this
- day.
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- 4
Arkleston
Cemetery
- Nearby
Renfrew is Arkleston Cemetery which
- contains
the graves of the three young Polish
- airmen
of 309 Squadron who were killed during
- the
'blitz' on Clydebank.
-
- Their
graves are marked by two CWGC stones
- standing
side by side at Arkleston cemetery, near the M8
motorway and close to the main runway of Renfrew
airfield before it was incorporated into
the M8.
-
- A brief
account of the incident which led to their deaths is
given in (3) above.
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