The buliding at 25 Szucha Avenue was built in the years 1925-1930 and designed by Zdzislaw Maczenski. Before World War II the Ministry of Religious Beliefs and Public Enlightenment (Polish: Ministerstwo Wyznań Religijnych i Oświecenia Publicznego) was situated there. During the German occupation, Szucha Avenue was in the centre of the so-called police district which had the status “only for Germans”, and the street's name was changed to Strasse der Polizei (engl. Police Street). The Office of Security Police and the Security Service of the Warsaw District were placed in the building of the Ministry. A Gestapo detention centre was working there - a place of interrogations of prisoners brought in from Pawiak and captured during street roundups.

Interrogations were extremely brutal. The victims were beaten with batons, whips and sticks. They had broken bones, crushed genitals, eyes and teeth knocked out, they were strangled, burned and flooded. Tortures took place in the interrogation room, where members of victims's families were often present. Among prisoners were also people of Jewish descent. In March 1944, the Warsaw chronicler Emmanuel Ringelblum was interrogated in the building at Szucha Avenue. Also Irena Sendlerowa was tortured there.

The building was damaged during World War II. Nowadays it is the abode of the Ministry of National Education. According to a resolution of the Ministry which was signed on 23 July 1946, cellars of building where Gestapo prison was placed, were approved as a place of martyrdom. It was decided that they will be preserved in its original state. 18 April 1952 the Mausoleum of Struggle and Martyrdom was opened there.

Mausoleum of Struggle and Martyrdom, Branch of Pawiak Prison Museum – Division of Museum of Independence.

25 Jana Chrystiana Szucha 25 Avenue, 00-580 Warsaw

tel. 22 629 49 19, e-mail: [email protected], strona www: https://muzn.pl/