Ambassador Romuald Spasowski House
This house hosted the Polish Ambassador and his family, until the Spasowskis defected to the United States.
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Built in 1926, this stately two-story, Colonial Revival-style, stone house can be found in the suburban neighborhood of Forest Hills. In 1979, the Polish government purchased the house at the encouragement of then-ambassador Romuald Spasowski (1920-1995), a lifelong diplomat and member of the Communist Party of Poland, who was fulfilling his second tour of duty as ambassador to the United States.
When Spasowski arrived in DC in 1978 for this second tour, his family occupied the "cramped suburban apartment" provided by the Polish government for previous ambassadors. Spasowski soon realized the Polish chancery on Sixteenth Street was essentially a "security espionage unit" where the servants and staff were reporting back to the KGB. Suffocated by Soviet surveillance and by their cramped quarters, the Spasowskis insisted that the Polish government provide an official residence for them. The government purchased the house at 3101 Albemarle Street, and for the next two years, it would serve as home to the Spasowskis, as well a "safe house" for them during the "Polish Crisis," until the ambassador defected to the United States in 1981. The house was then vacant until 1988, but for the following two decades, it again served as the official Polish ambassador's residence.
DC Inventory: April 27, 2017
National Register: September 8, 2017
