"Wojtek with a soldier" | Foundation For Building a Statue of Wojtek in Sopot
Picture this: it’s May, 1944, Monte Cassino. You’re a soldier, a young one, lost in the midst of a battle. Suddenly, a mysterious figure emerges from a nearby cloud of dust; four paws, brown fur, tiny nose…is that a bear?
You would think that you’re hallucinating, but, as a matter of fact, this bear is not only real, but also a soldier. Private (and later, corporal) Wojtek of the Polish II Corps was born in 1942 in Iran. The story of how Wojtek joined the army starts somewhere around Hamedan, Iran, where he first crossed paths with the II Corps, which consisted of soldiers deported to the USSR after the 1939 Soviet invasion of Poland. These soldiers were evacuated together with civilian refugees and were trying to return back to Europe on foot.
During one of the breaks the group had to take, they encountered a young boy with a bag on his neck, who looked hungry. They invited him in for a meal and quickly realized that whatever he had in the bag was moving. It turned out that the boy was carrying a young cub whose mother was shot by the hunters. Hearing this, Irena (Inka) Bokiewicz, one of the civilian refugees, convinced a lieutenant to buy the said cub. For a bit of money and food, a knife and a bar of chocolate, Wojtek became a part of the marching group.
Irena, and then the II Corps soldiers, did their best to raise the cub into a healthy adult bear. Until he was old enough to digest food properly, they fed him condensed milk using an old vodka bottle. When he grew a little, Wojtek was pampered with fruits and sweets, which he loved above everything else, and sometimes rewarded with beer, which soon became his favourite drink. He also drank coffee in the mornings and smoked cigarettes (sometimes eating them instead). Mimicking the soldiers, he would salute them and sometimes walk on his hind legs. He enjoyed playing tag and wrestling, which the soldiers taught him from a very young age.
No matter how human he might seem, Wojtek was still a bear, which created some hilarious scenarios. Allegedly, one day, Wojtek saw some female undergarments hung out on a rack to dry. For whatever reason, he grabbed the undergarments and started running chaotically around the camp, with the two half-naked girls chasing him all around and a pair of underwear on his face. The soldiers apologized to the girls and invited them for dinner, who soon came to love Wojtek. Not only was Wojtek a great companion for the soldiers, but as it turned out, also a great wingman.
"Wojtek with soldiers" | Kurier Historyczny
You might have guessed that Wojtek was very popular, and you would be right: this adorable apex predator quickly rose to the top, becoming the mascot of the 22nd Artillery Company, a part of the Polish II Corps.
"The Badge of the 22nd Artillery Company" | World War II Museum in Gdańsk
1944 changed everything, as the 22nd Artillery Company received orders to head to Italy to participate in a campaign against the Germans there. The regulations of the ship that the Company boarded forbade pets on board. When there’s a will, there’s a way though: the witty soldiers put down Wojtek as a private, making him officially enlist into the military. In the Battle of Monte Cassino, a deciding one for the campaign, he was told to carry boxes of ammunition. The 90-kilogram beast could carry entire boxes of heavy artillery ammunition, which normally required at least four human soldiers to be moved, allegedly not dropping a single one. For his contribution in the battle, Wojtek was promoted to corporal.
After the campaign, Wojtek was stationed in an airfield near the Scottish border with England with the rest of the 22nd Artillery Company. He spent his days there playing with the soldiers and locals, becoming an honorary member of the Polish-Scottish association. After the war, he was moved to the Edinburgh Zoo, where he lived until his death in 1963. The soldiers frequently visited him in the zoo, sometimes throwing him cigarettes to eat. He recognized most of the soldiers and reacted to being spoken to in Polish.
"Wojtek's Statue in Duns" | Jim Barton
The story of this bear who bore arms, who liked beer and who was probably the biggest enemy of the Nazis (weighing 500 kg at death) is truly entertaining, and perhaps somewhat inspiring. If a bear can be a successful soldier, is there anything that is truly impossible in this world?
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