Bolesław Bierut

Biography

Bolesław Bierut was a Polish communist who led Poland during the Stalinist period after the Second World War. Born near Lublin, he left school early, worked in the cooperative movement and joined the Polish Socialist Party–Left before associating with the new Communist Workers' Party of Poland in 1918. He spent the interwar years as a party activist and Comintern agent, including periods in the Soviet Union, and was jailed in Poland in the 1930s.

During the war he was a member of the Soviet-backed Polish Workers' Party. From the end of 1943 he chaired the State National Council, the communist-controlled underground parliament, and he took part in the Potsdam Conference in 1945 as a Polish representative. After the rigged 1946 referendum and the 1947 elections consolidated communist rule, the Legislative Sejm elected him president.

When the Polish United Workers' Party was formed in 1948 Bierut became its leader. He presided over the adoption of the 1952 constitution, which replaced the presidency with a collective Council of State, after which he served as prime minister until 1954. His rule was marked by political repression and a cult of personality. He died in Moscow in March 1956, shortly after attending the Soviet party congress at which Khrushchev denounced Stalin.