In late August 1939, while on holiday in the mountains with her mother, Kitty went canoeing, and ended up disappearing down the river. After realising her daughter was missing, Lola informed the police, who began searching for her. Eventually, Kitty returned with her canoe by train, and found her mother in a frantic state—not only because of her daughter's disappearance, but because she had received a phone call from Karol telling them they must return home straight away. Kitty's brother, Robert, was also on holiday with his friends at the time, and was too summoned home. Arriving home to find that Karol had packed up all their possessions, her father sent Kitty and her mother to board the train to Lublin straight away (she had not known at the time, but already the Germans had placed machine guns on the rooftops of the town, and had been shooting at citizens). Two days later (still prior to the Nazis' invasion of Poland on 1 September), Karol and Robert joined them in Lublin; the two had managed to board one of the last trains out of the town, with the remaining citizens being forced to flee by foot—it later transpired that many of these people were eventually gunned down in their attempts to escape, when the invading forces caught up with them. Karol had arranged for the family's possessions to be sent on to Lublin by train, however they never arrived, due to the fact that the train had been bombed. Kitty considers the family's flight from Bielsko the first time she felt the effects of the war.