“They Drove Bierut off the Platform. Szczecin, April 1946”

Until 15 September 2026 the Museum of Cursed Soldiers and Political Prisoners of the Polish People’s Republic showed an exhibition by the Szczecin branch of the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) on the first anti-communist protest by Polish scouts, in Szczecin in April 1946.

The exhibition told the story of a rally the communists intended as a propaganda demonstration of support for the new authorities; instead it turned into a rally in support of Stanisław Mikołajczyk.

In April 1946 the communists organised a scout rally in Szczecin under the name “We Keep Watch on the Oder”. Some 50,000 people took part, including about 15,000 scouts. On 13 April 1946, on the platform of honour at the foot of the Chrobry Embankment, when Bolesław Bierut began to speak, the young people started shouting “Mikołajczyk!”, “Down with Bierut”, “Down with the communists”. Bierut had to give up his speech and left the platform in haste.

The exhibition marked the eightieth anniversary of the referendum staged by the communists. It was prepared by Piotr Semka and Artur Kubaj of the IPN’s Szczecin branch, and was open daily except Mondays, 10:00-16:00.

Context

Stanisław Mikołajczyk, leader of the Polish People’s Party and in 1943-1944 prime minister of the Polish government-in-exile in London, was in 1946 deputy prime minister of the Soviet-backed Provisional Government of National Unity and the communists’ main opponent inside the country. Two and a half months after the Szczecin rally, on 30 June 1946, the communists held a referendum and falsified its results. Szczecin itself had only just become Polish: before 1945 it was the German city of Stettin. Before Warsaw, the exhibition was shown in Szczecin: according to the Polish Press Agency it opened on 17 April 2026 as an open-air display of 21 panels on Plac Zgody, with photographs from the archives of the agency, the State Archives and the National Museum, among others.

After the show

According to Kurier Szczeciński of 13 July 2026 (in Polish), the IPN plans to take the exhibition to other Polish cities, including Kraków and Poznań; as of 16 September 2026 neither the museum nor the IPN had given dates. The two curators are also the authors of a book under the same title, which according to the Polish Press Agency (17 April 2026) was due in bookshops soon; the museum gives no publisher or price.

No reviews could be found; what is known about the show’s reception comes from the organisers. Reporting the opening of the Warsaw showing on 30 June 2026 (in Polish), the IPN quoted its deputy president Mateusz Szpytma, who stressed that young scouts played the leading part in the events. Kurier Szczeciński (13 July 2026, Alan Sasinowski): co-curator Artur Kubaj said Warsaw visitors were surprised to learn that in 1946 more Germans than Poles still lived in Szczecin - Warsaw saw how Szczecin drove Bierut out (in Polish).

Related exhibitions on now:

• “For the Soul and Character of the Polish Nation. The Freedom and Independence Association” - the same year, 1946, seen from the underground: the largest post-war independence organisation, at the same museum on Rakowiecka Street, until 31 December 2026.
• The Scout Cross. An Extraordinary History - the Szczecin protest was led by scouts; this show traces more than a hundred years of the Polish Scouting Association’s most important badge, at the Museum of Scouting; the museum gives no closing date.
• What Is This Queue For? The Polish People’s Republic in a Musical Mirror - what came next: how Poles responded to the communist system in 1944-1989, told through popular music, at the Polish History Museum until 6 December 2026.

Museum profile: Museum of Cursed Soldiers, Warsaw.