The article shows the reorganisation of the People’s Republic of Poland security apparatus in 1956, using the example of Opole Voivodship. For many consecutive years, the executive of Security Service was dominated by the Public Security officers. Over time, the security apparatus has progressively expanded its staffing capabilities, moving towards the level from before November 1956, while at the same time drastically improving the level of education and professional qualifications of officers. As the result, reorganisation of security apparatus performed between 1956 and 1957 caused temporary weakening, later becoming even more dangerous and effective force in the service of the communist system.

Text presents the complexities of the reorganisation of the Gdańsk’s Security apparatus between 1956 and 1957. It depicts the attitude of the society towards the officers of the Public Safety Office during October ’56 and their concerns about the reorganisation and therefore the dismissal from the apparatus. Main part of the article contains the description of the process of reorganisation, in which it shows the statistics gathered by the author during research on this topic, both in the voivodship apparatus and field. Article also presents the fate of the fired Gdansk officers in term of employment and further education. An attempt was also made to describe the beginnings of the Gdansk Security Service, the successor of Security Office.

This work allows to trace the origins and growth of the structures of Military Intelligence of the Armed Forces of People’s Republic of Poland. It shows numerous, especially since the 60s, changes in the structures, naming, and assigning of departments. The time range that has been covered is the period since the origin of the communist military intelligence, that is, 14 May 1943, when on the order of, then still Colonel, Zygmunt Berling, 1st Reconnaissance Company was appointed. End occurs when the Minister of Defence ordered on 22 August 1991 to exclude the Second Directorate for Intelligence and Counterintelligence, from the structures of the General Staff and appoint Inspectorate of the Military Information Services (WSI), which answered directly to the Minister of National Defence. This is where the history of the communist intelligence service ends, however the communist system has theoretically finished over two years ago.

Main point of this article is the analysis from the local perspective of the reorganisation of political police, which was initiated after Wladyslaw Gomulka came to power in 1956. This moment is considered as on the key points of the post-war history of Poland, which clearly divides the period when communists came into full power, introducing Stalinism and period of post totalitarian dictatorship of the communist party. The socio-political and economic crisis at the time meant a definitive collapse of the current model of exercising power based mainly on violence from the public security apparatus. New party leaders wanting to stabilise the internal situation of the country was forced to make numerous declarations regarding greater respect for the law and civil liberties and to limit the role of political police in the state. This was followed by the announcement of the reorganisation of the police services in November 1956, whose assumptions at various speeds were implemented in the following year. The article analyses the statistics allowing to verify and complete the image of the researched socio-occupational group presented in the literature of the subject. Also article describes the problems relating to the changes in numbers and content in the network of the Social Security’s agentural-information network in Bydgoszcz Voivodship.

Article presents events which led Captain Stanisław Szymonik, security service officer working at the Permanent Representation of the People’s Republic of Poland to the UN, to join in 1964 US counterintelligence. Szymonik’s descent deserves approximation not only because he had no prior place in literature of the subject but also its worth a note because of the special character of tasks performed by him and his knowledge of a number of officers of the communist security apparatus and their working methods. The scale of loses was reflected in convicting the officer to the death penalty.

Jan Lewiarz in the days of People’s Republic of Poland was an important figure in the life of Russian Orthodox Church. He deserved it by rebuilding church structures in the province of Rzeszow, that had been damaged as a result of the Operation Vistula. His activity, however, had a political character, as it was directed against the Greek Catholic Church, repressed by the Communists. Cooperation with the security apparatus, which lasted more than forty years, casts a shadow on the life of Jan Lewiarz. Of his own will he also wrote denunciations to the religious authorities. He used his collaboration with the communist apparatus for strengthening his position in the Orthodox Church, fighting opponents and for gaining material benefits.

Article shows the history of Irena Imbery, who after leaving the prison sought the further meaning of life. She has found it in The Congregation of Sister Servants of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus in Krakow, where she joined by the end of 1951 as sister Orencja. Article presents various repressive actions done towards her person by the security apparatus, and also towards her close ones and other people in the order.

Article contributes to the problem of cooperation between the representatives of minority communities and Security Authorities of People’s Republic of Poland. Jan Ilnicki, Ukrainian living in Wroclaw from the end of World War II, was recruited for cooperation in 1957. For communistic secret police his case had a special meaning, because Ilnicki in the recent past was an employee of the German Intelligence Service. The article presents all directions of his cooperation with the country’s security authorities. Attention was also paid to the appearance of the negative emotions fear and uncertainty, among others. They have accompanied him during work under pressure of constant surveillance by the Security Service.

The clergy and faithful of the diocese of Wloclawek, created after the end of World War II in the so-called Recovered Territories faced many problems. They dealt with prosaic matters related to their poor material condition, decreasing population due to the strong influence from the Roman Catholic Church, general trend towards secularization of the society and evangelicals permanently emigrating aboard and the need to meet the requirements of the so-called socialist state. With regard to the last problem, on the basis of the archival sources, preserved at Church and National Archives, an attempt to at least partially describe the dimension of the depravity of the state towards the priests of the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession.

After the Second World War, all of the social and environmental groups in Poland that were active before the war came under the interest of security apparatus. It also included national minorities, like Lithuanian minority which ended up in the new frontiers of the Polish state. According to the work of the Security Service created in the 80s, the operational activities carried out for it were mainly due to: the interest in the emigrant nationalist centres of the Lithuanian minority in Poland, treating their territory as a kind of springboard for activities directed against the USSR, and the trend to cooperate with emigration centres of other nations. An important element in all of the activities was not allowing the Lithuanian Socio-Cultural Society to, as described, to have nationalist goals. Operational activities were impossible with the use of agents that were part of such a distinctive nation both in terms of language and culture also with members being close to each other. Like in other cases getting someone recruited didn’t guarantee the cooperation from their behalf.

Lustration act 1992 sparked public debate. Sought to answer the question how the materials collected by the Security Service are reliable, which testimonies, denunciations are the result of pressures, which came from fulfilling the civic duty; who should get the status of victim, and who to consider as a secret co-worker. One of the controversial figure is Tanencapf Mendel, director of the Jewish school in Legnica and local activist of the Socio-Cultural Society of Jews. After Looking through his case and reading the quote below we get the view that we are dealing with one of the victims of the totalitarian system „under surveillance periodically in the framework of the case object »Association« […] During the inspection, it was found that he is negatively disposed toward the People’s Republic of Poland. He shows a pro-Israel tendency […]. Invigilated person got registration questionnaire […], in order to carry out systematic surveillance operations, because as a member of the Board TSKŻ in Legnica he was able to use this association to promote the views of Zionism and anti-socialism”. Further analysis of the source material, however, makes this assumption weaker. In August of 1972 Mendel Tanencapf sent to the Chairman of the State Security Committee of the USSR in Moscow a letter in which he asks for a certificate confirming he's collaboration with the NKVD... The question whether we are dealing with victims or the informer appears to have no clear answer.

The priest Hawryil Kostelnyk (1886–1948), being a priest of the Ukrainian Greek-catholic Church, agreed to cooperate with the Security Services (KGB) in the Soviet Union during the period of the intensive war with the Church announced by the communist leaders. Before that he had a great authority in that Church, as a well-known philosopher, journalist and philologist. His collaboration with the authorities of the NKVD/KGB began in 1944, when visiting Moscow he decided voluntarily to initiate a close cooperation with the Soviet Security Services. So, he received from KGB an urgent and important task to fulfill: to prepare and to realize in 1946 the Council within the Greek-catholic Church (KGK) in L’viv. As the consequence of the decisions of this „Council” the KGK should to break the unity with the Vatican and start to legalize the process of the connection to the body of the Russian Orthodox Church (RKP). The main reasons of that cooperation with the KGB authorities of Fr. H. Kostelnyk still raise many doubts, as well as his death: he was killed in 1948, probably shot by a KGB officer. That is why the individual of Kostelnyk, including the details of his death were covered with many myths. His life story was kept as a secret during the period of the communist regime in Ukraine. When the communism in Ukraine has fallen, many historical researchers began to deal with the historical person of H. Kostelnyk, proving facts and declassifying the myths about his life and also about his mysterious fate. This became possible thanks to the many sources in the state archives of Ukraine which now are open for the scientific research.