Two Kids Found a 66-Year-Old Love Letter in a Bottle Among WWII-Era Ruins

Every kid dreams of finding hidden treasure while out exploring. A message in a bottle is a very close second.

Two 10-year-old boys, Eryk and Kuba, were poking around the crumbling WWII bunkers on Stogi Beach in Gdańsk, Poland when they spotted what looked like an old soda bottle. At first, they thought it might be a joke. But curiosity won. Inside was a faded letter, sealed for decades.

Getting to it wasn’t easy. The glass wouldn’t give, and eventually, they had to break the bottle. “There were several cards in the bottle, but only one of them was legible. The others were faded, and one was completely destroyed,” Eryk told local news outlet Trojmiasto.pl.

Two Kids Found a 66-Year-Old Love Letter in a Bottle. Does Anyone Know Rysia?

What remained was a handwritten love letter from 1959, penned by a woman named Rysia. She was attending a summer course in Tarnów, hundreds of miles away from where her letter would wash ashore. It was addressed to “my beloved Bunny.”

“My dear, I’m a terrible egoist, I only write about myself, but it is you I think about all the time,” she confessed.

Rysia wrote about sleepless nights and motorbikes roaring past her window, each one bringing back memories of her lover. She described loneliness, her daily routine, and longing that leaped off the page. “You could go wherever you want, but I sit alone,” she wrote.

Even while professing her devotion, Rysia’s loneliness seeps through the page. “I assure you that I am quiet and modest, I don’t strike up acquaintances with anyone—I simply avoid men,” she wrote. “There is no one familiar here.” There’s a tender desperation in her tone. Like someone trying to hold on tight to a long-distance love, all while gently confessing how isolated she feels.

After showing the letter to a teacher, the boys sent photos of it to the Regional Museum in Tarnów with help from their parents. The hope is that someone—Rysia, her Beloved Bunny, or their relatives—can be found.

For now, Eryk is keeping the letter safe in a briefcase at home.

It’s not gold or jewels, but maybe it’s better than treasure. It’s one fragile piece of a love story that refused to stay buried or lost at sea.