 On April 23, 1947, by a decree of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Polish Workers' Party, COP Jaworzno was selected for the detention of civilians during the Operation Vistula deportation campaign.The first transportation of 17 prisoners from Sanok reached the special subcamp of Jaworzno on May 5 and the number of these prisoners eventually totalled almost 4,000 (including over 700 women and children); the vast majority of them arrived in 1947.Most of them were people suspected of sympathy towards the rebels of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) and those otherwise selected from the Operation Vistula transports (including more than 100 Lemko intelligentsia and 25 mostly Greek Catholic priests).