Traveling to History: Four, Part I
Mashie Miaskiewicz: A Salem War Hero Comes Home Part 1
By James F. Lee
Mieczyslaus (Mashie) Miaskiewicz’s Army photo.
This is a two-part series on the extraordinary story of Mashie Miaskiewicz
Part I – Growing Up on Derby Street
Many people in Salem remember the Miaskiewicz sisters, Christine and Theresa. They were French and Spanish teachers at Salem High, respected and feared for their no-nonsense approach in the classroom. I had Christine for French around 1968, and I can attest she was tough, but fair. And really very nice.
What we students didn’t know back then was that their brother was a war hero, shot down and killed over the former Yugoslavia during World War II. Our parents probably knew, but to us kids World War II happened a million years before.
The story of that brother, Mieczyslaus, known as Mashie, didn’t end in 1944, when he was killed. In fact, his story ended only a few years ago.
Before he became a hero, Mashie Miaskiewicz (pronounced Mis-kev-itch) grew up in Salem.
His father Czeslau (Chester) emigrated from Poland as a teenager in 1905, eventually making his way to Salem; his birth year listed in various documents as 1887, 1888, or 1889. Although his mother Anastasia Zmijewska was born in Nanticoke, PA in 1890, several members of the Zmijewska family later moved to Salem. Like so many Poles in Salem, they both worked in the leather industry. Together they had 11 children, eight boys and three girls. They were devout Catholics.
Korn Leather Company in Peabody. Czeslaw Miaskiewicz worked here for many years. His son Mashie followed his footsteps and worked here until he left Salem for the U.S. Army Air Corps in 1942. (Courtesy of the Peabody Historical Society and Museum).
The Miaskiewicz family lived for many years at 167 ½ Derby Street in the Kotarski Building, a large brick building of tenements and shops right across the street from the Derby mansion. In 1938, the Kotarski Building was demolished to make way for the development of the Salem Maritime National Historic Site; today the site is open space.
The family likely utilized the St. John’s Society, a fraternal organization that offered insurance and sick benefits to members, and promoted a marching band, drill team, and athletic teams. St. John’s Society records list a Czeslaw Mieszkiewicz, 17 (note different spelling), as a new member on May 5, 1907. The society was housed in St. Joseph’s Hall at 160 Derby Street, a building that still stands today at the corner of Derby Street and Palfrey Court.
Chester and Anastasia’s son, Mieczyslaus (sometimes spelled as Mecelaus) was born in 1916, the second surviving child. Mashie grew up on Derby Street. As a young man, he would have been familiar with Hawryluk’s tailor shop, Mysliwy’s grocery, Soboczinski’s restaurant, and Pocharski Brothers funeral home, all on Derby Street. Mashie’s surviving sibling, Theresa, wrote that Mashie attended St. John’s Polish School on Herbert Street, where Polish language was part of the curriculum. The site of the school is now a parking lot. According to Theresa, he was also a member of St. Cecilia’s Choir in Boston.
His friends included Kelly Doran and Ed Chemelski. They liked sports and would work out at the YMCA or go bowling. They may have participated in the many St. Joseph’s Society athletic teams.
Like so many men in Salem back then Mashie’s father was a leather worker, employed for many years at Korn’s leather factory in Peabody. It was hard work, dirty work, smelly work and sometimes dangerous, but it was good pay and steady. I can attest to that. My father worked for 40 years in a leather factory. We could smell him when he entered the house after work. When I was a kid, the only time I saw him not working was when he contracted chrome poisoning, a hazard from the factory.
The four-story Kotarski building at 167-69 Derby Street. Mashie Miaskiewicz lived here for most of his childhood. Demolished in 1938. (Peabody Essex Museum photograph).
The Miaskiewicz’s first-born child, Francis, became a priest, but Mashie followed his father to Korn’s. In a telling entry in the 1934 issue of the Salem Street Guide, Francis, then about 22, is listed as a student; Mieczyslaus, barely 18, is identified as a leather worker like his father. Could it be that the second son was needed to make money for the family so that the first-born could study for the priesthood? For a devout Catholic family such as theirs, having a priest in the family would be a major blessing, even if it required great sacrifice.
By 1936, Chester and Anastasia had saved enough to buy a house on Arbella Street, a less crowded, tree-lined street, between Bridge Street and Collins Cove, a neighborhood then with a strong Polish influence, but with Irish and English as well. Mashie and five siblings moved with them. Today, Theresa, the only surviving child of the eleven, still resides there.
Mashie’s insular world came to an end with the advent of World War II. His sister said that he wanted to contribute to our country in any and every way he could. He enlisted in the Army in 1942.
Next learn about Mashie Miaskiewicz’s army experience.
Sources:
In the Heart of Polish Salem: An Ethnohistorical Study of St. Joseph Hall and Its Neighborhood, (Stanton and Becker, NPS, 2009).
Email correspondence with Theresa Miaskiewicz via Thomas Miaskiewicz.
U.S. City Directories, Salem, MA, 1922-1943, and U.S. Census, accessed via Ancestry.com.
