Ksawery Antoni Świerkowski (1897−1979)

Librarian, bibliographer and book historian. He became professionally involved in books and librarianship after being relocated to Warsaw, where he received a job at the University Library in Warsaw. It was in 1922 and he had already had an episode related to the organization of a public library in his hometown. During this period, he began to fill in the shortages of his education, starting with the matriculation and library course (1922), he obtained his high school diploma in 1925 and in 1929 he graduated from the University of Warsaw with a master’s degree in history. Throughout his life, he was professionally associated with many libraries, including University in Warsaw, Krasiński Estate, the Warsaw Office of the Polish Library in Paris, or the National Library. He worked at the Department of Modern Polish History at the University of Warsaw, the Department of Civil Engineering of the Ministry of Military Affairs and the Central Board of the Ministry of Education. He was extremely involved in the matters of books and libraries, which he proved during the war by taking part in numerous security actions in Warsaw, for example in the Public Library. Immediately after the war, he was assigned to the Ministry of Education, where his main task was to secure the book collections of various libraries.

During several months of travel around the country, he visited Malbork twice. The route of his first journey, which began on June 4^th 1945, led among others via Płońsk, Włocławek, Toruń, Kwidzyn, Sztum and Malbork. During this time, the necessary research was made in the scattered collections. Świerkowski stayed in Malbork again from June 25^th  to July 8^th 1945. Together with Bogdan Horodyski and Wacław Aluchna he secured the priceless collections of the City Library in Gdańsk and the Theological Seminary in Pelplin, deposited by the Germans. At that time, in addition to the above-mentioned collections, the delegations managed to segregate a number of books from the shared library of the Castle Housing Board (Schlossbauverwaltung Marienburg) and the Society for the Reconstruction and Beautification of the Malbork Castle (Verein für die Herstellung und Ausschmückung der Marienburg). Years later, Świerkowski returned the old print with the provenance of the Castle Reconstruction and Beautification Society to the Library of the Castle Museum in Malbork.

(compiled by A. Siuciak)