Expulsion of Poles by Nazi Germany
Expulsion of Poles by Nazi Germany | |
---|---|
Part of Anti-slavic sentiment |
The Expulsion of Poles by Nazi Germany during
The German Government had plans for the extensive colonisation of territories of occupied Poland, which were annexed directly into Nazi Germany in 1939. Eventually these plans grew bigger to include parts of the General Government. The region was to become a "purely German area" within 15–20 years, as explained by Adolf Hitler in March 1941. By that time the General Government was to be cleared of 15 million Polish nationals, and resettled by 4–5 million ethnic Germans.[1]
The operation was the culmination of the expulsion of Poles by Germany carried out since the 19th century, when Poland was partitioned among foreign powers including Germany.
Racial policies
Following the
The World War II expulsions took place within two specific political entities established by the Nazis, divided from each other by a closed border: one area outright annexed to the Reich in 1939–1941, and another called the General Government, a precursor to the further expansion of the German administrative settlement area. Eventually, as Adolf Hitler explained in March 1941, the General Government would be cleared of all Poles and the region turned into a "purely German area" within 15–20 years, and in place of 15 million Poles, 4–5 million Germans would live there. The area was to become "as German as the Rhineland".[4]
There was a special institution set up in November 1939 in German-occupied Poznań to coordinate the expulsion.[5] Initially named the Special Staff for the Resettlement of Poles and Jews (Sonderstab für die Aussiedlung von Polen und Juden), it was soon renamed to Office for the Resettlement of Poles and Jews (Amt für Umsiedlung der Polen und Juden), and eventually renamed to Central Bureau for Resettlement (UWZ, Umwandererzentralstelle) in 1940.[5] The main seats of the UWZ were located in Poznań and Gdynia, with an additional major branch located in Łódź and minor branches located in various other towns, including Kępno, Wieluń, Sieradz and Zamość.[6] The UWZ also supervised the network of resettlement camps for Poles.[7] In the resettlement camps, Poles were subjected to brutal searches and racial selection, families were often broken up and children were taken from their parents.[8] Poor conditions, low food rations, lack of medical care and brutal treatment resulted in high mortality in the resettlement camps for Poles, which was in contrast to the conditions in the camps for German colonists, managed by Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle, the main agency responsible for coordinating German settlement in occupied Poland.[9] Poles were then deported to new destinations in overcrowded freight trains that lacked any sanitary facilities.[8]
By 1945 one million German
Expulsions from Polish territories annexed by Nazi Germany
The first lands that were subject to mass expulsions, Germanization and extermination (see
Some villages were destroyed to make place for
Together with so-called "wild expulsions", in four years of Nazi occupation 923,000 Poles were ethnically cleansed from the territories annexed by Germany into the Reich.[21] According to research conducted by Czesław Łuczak, the Germans expelled the following numbers of Poles from areas annexed into the Reich as well as all others in the period of 1939–1944:[22]
Name of territory | Number of displaced Poles |
---|---|
Warthegau region (including Greater Poland and Łódź )
|
280,606[23] |
Silesia | 81,000 |
Pomerelia | 124,000 |
Białystok | 28,000 |
Ciechanów (Northern Mazovia) | 25,000 |
"Wild expulsions" of 1939 (Pomerelia mostly) | 30,000 – 40,000 |
Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany (total) | 918,000 – 928,000 |
Zamość region | 100,000 – 110,000 |
proving grounds )
|
171,000 |
Warsaw uprising )
|
500,000 |
Grand total on all occupied Polish territories | 1,689,000 – 1,709,000 |
Greater Poland
Between 1939 and 1940, Nazi expulsions from German-occupied Greater Poland (Wielkopolska) affected 680,000 Poles.[24] From the city of Poznań in Reichsgau Wartheland alone, the Germans expelled 70,000 Poles to the General Government.[25] The deportations conducted under the leadership of SS-Obergruppenführer Wilhelm Koppe, were supervised by SS-Standartenführer Ernst Damzog, who was also in charge of the daily operation of the Chełmno extermination camp.[26] By 1945, half a million German Volksdeutsche from Eastern Europe, including the Soviet Union, Volhynia,[25] Bessarabia, Romania as well as the Baltic Germans, had been resettled into this area during the action called "Heim ins Reich".
Pomerelia
From 1939 to 1940 in German-occupied Pomerelia (named Danzig-West Prussia by the Germans), the expulsions affected 121,765 Poles.[27] A total of 130,000 Volksdeutsche were resettled there including 57,000 Germans from Eastern Europe, including Soviet Union, Bessarabia, Romania and the Baltic states.
Silesia
In Silesia, the Germans operated a network of forced labour camps for expelled Poles from the region, which were known as Polenlager.
In 1940 and 1941 the Germans evicted 17,000 Polish and Jewish residents from the western districts of the city of Oświęcim; from all places located directly adjacent to the Auschwitz concentration camp and also from the villages of Broszkowice, Babice, Brzezinka, Rajsko, Pławy, Harmęże, Bór, and Budy.[28] The expulsion of Polish civilians was a step towards establishing the "Camp Interest Zone" meant to isolate the camp from the outside world, and to expand economic activity designed to meet the needs of the SS. Ethnic German and Volksdeutsche settlers were being shipped in instead.
The years 1940 to 1944 marked the expulsion of 50,000 Poles from the Żywiec area including 18,000–20,000 Poles during the Action Saybusch operation conducted by the Wehrmacht and Ordnungspolizei in late 1940.[29] The first of these actions took place on 22 September 1940.[30] Aktion Saybusch lasted from September to December 1940, with some 3,200 Volksdeutsche brought in Heim ins Reich (Home into the Empire) from Romanian Bukovina. Until the end of the Second World War a third of the Polish population was expelled from this region out of a total of 50,000 inhabitants. Poles were forcibly removed from the region and replaced with about 4,000 Volksdeutsche settlers from Eastern Galicia and Volhynia who were given new latifundia.
Łódź area
The Łódź area was attached by the Germans to occupied Greater Poland (Wielkopolska), renamed Reichsgau Wartheland. The first expulsions from the city of Łódź (renamed Litzmannstadt) took place in 1939. The Nazis, helped by the local Volksdeutsche, expelled Polish families from the osiedle "Montwiłła" Mireckiego first.[31] Until 1940, all 5,000 residents of this subdivision were expelled. Between 1939 and 1945, from the entire Łódź area ("Regierungsbezirk Litzmannstadt") including Łódź itself, Sieradz, Pabianice and other settlements,[32] 444,000 persons of Polish ethnicity were expelled – almost 25% of its population.
Expulsions from the General Government
This article needs additional citations for verification. (June 2021) |
The territory of the German district called the General Government was the second main area of expulsions after the German-annexed more western provinces of Poland. The entity itself was seen only as a temporary measure by the Germans, and served as a large concentration area for Poles to perform hard labour to further Germany's industry and war effort. Eventually it was to be cleared of Poles as well.
Zamość
116,000 Poles were expelled from the region of
Warsaw
Among the expulsions from the metropolitan centres of Poland, the largest took place in its capital. In October 1940, 115,000 Poles were expelled from their homes in central
See also
- Nazi crimes against the Polish nation
- Flight and expulsion of Germans (1944–1950)
- Expulsion of Poles by Germany in the 19th and 20th centuries
- Repatriation and expulsion of Poles (in two major waves) after World War II
- Kidnapping of children by Nazi Germany
Notes and references
- ^ a b Janusz Gumkowski and Kazimierz Leszczynski, "Hitler's War; Hitler's Plans for Eastern Europe", 1961, in Poland under Nazi Occupation, Polonia Publishing House, Warsaw, pp. 7-33, 164-178.
- ^ Wojciech Roszkowski, Historia Polski 1914–1997, Warsaw 1998
- ISBN 0-521-85254-4
- ISBN 9042006889– via Google Books
- ^ ISBN 978-83-8098-174-4.
- ^ Wardzyńska, pp. 35–38
- ^ Wardzyńska, p. 37
- ^ a b Wardzyńska, p. 38
- ^ Wardzyńska, pp. 37–38
- ^ Michael Sontheimer, "When We Finish, Nobody Is Left Alive" 05/27/2011 Spiegel
- ^ Wardzyńska, p. 7
- ^ Wardzyńska, pp. 7–8
- ^ Wardzyńska, p. 8
- ISBN 0-393-02030-4
- ISBN 1-56584-549-8
- ^ ISBN 0-7818-0528-7
- ISBN 0-679-77663-X
- ^ Walter S. Zapotoczny, "Rulers of the World: The Hitler Youth"
- ^ a b Wardzyńska, p. 15
- ^ Wardzyńska, p. 14
- ^ a b c Zygmunt Mańkowski; Tadeusz Pieronek; Andrzej Friszke; Thomas Urban (panel discussion), "Polacy wypędzeni" Archived 2015-10-18 at the Wayback Machine, Biuletyn Instytutu Pamięci Narodowej IPN, 5 (40), May 2004 (Bulletin of the Institute of National Remembrance. Issue: 05/2004, page 628.
- ISBN 832100010X [page needed]
- ISBN 0313260079
- ISBN 978-83-7427-391-6.
- ^ ISBN 0-8032-5979-4
- )
- ISBN 978-83-7427-391-6
- ^ "Article about expulsions from Oświęcim in Polish". Archived from the original on 2008-10-03. Retrieved 2011-02-10.
- ^ Jan Śleziak „Pamiętnik wysiedlonego z Żywiecczyzny” Żywiecka Agencja Wydawnicza, Kamesznica 2007
- ^ A. Konieczny, "Wysiedlenia ludności polskiej powiatu żywieckiego w 1940 roku" ("Saybusch Aktion"), Studia Śląskie. Seria nowa, t. XX, Opole 1971
- ^ Nazi expulsions at Osiedle "Montwiłła" Mireckiego. Archived 2019-01-07 at the Wayback Machine Łódź. Official website, 2011. (in Polish)
- ISBN 83-87749-96-6
Further reading
- Piotr Setkiewicz, "The expulsion of Polish civilians from the area around the Auschwitz camp, 1940-1941." Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum
- (Polish, German) Witold Sienkiewicz, Grzegorz Hryciuk, Zwangsumsiedlung, Flucht und Vertreibung 1939 - 1959: Atlas zur Geschichte Ostmitteleuropas. Bonn, 2009. ISBN 978-83-7427-391-6
- (Polish) Bogdan Chrzanowski, "Wypędzenia z Pomorza." Biuletyn IPN No. 5/2004, May 2004.
- (Polish) Maria Rutowska, Wysiedlenia ludności polskiej z Kraju Warty do Generalnego Gubernatorstwa 1939-1941. Instytut Zachodni, ISBN 83-87688-42-8
- (Polish) ISBN 83-210-0010-X
- (Polish) Czesław Łuczak, Położenie ludności polskiej w Kraju Warty 1939 - 1945. Wydawnictwo Poznańskie, 1987
- Deportacje Polaków z północno-zachodnich ziem II Rzeczypospolitej 1940-1941. Źródła do historii Polski. Praca zbiorowa. Oficyna Wydawnicza RYTM, 2001. ISBN 83-88794-45-0
- Ryszard Dyliński, Marian Flejsierowicz, Stanisław Kubiak, Wysiedlenie i poniewierka. Wspomnienia Polaków wysiedlonych przez okupanta hitlerowskiego z ziem polskich "wcielonych" do Rzeszy 1939-1945. Wyd. Poznańskie, Poznań, 1985. ISBN 83-210-0529-2
- "Wysiedlenia, wypędzenia i ucieczki 1939-1945." Atlas ziem Polski. Demart, 2008. ISBN 978-83-7427-391-6
- Czesław Madajczyk, Generalny Plan Wschodni: Zbiór dokumentów. Główna Komisja Badania Zbrodni Hitlerowskich w Polsce, Warszawa, 1990
- Czesław Madajczyk, Generalna Gubernia w planach hitlerowskich. Studia, PWN, Warszawa. 1961
- Czesław Madajczyk, Polityka III Rzeszy w okupowanej Polsce. Warszawa, 1970
- Andrzej Leszek Szcześniak, Plan Zagłady Słowian. Generalplan Ost. Polskie Wydawnictwo Encyklopedyczne, Radom, 2001
- L. Chrzanowski, "Wypędzenia z Pomorza," Biuletyn Instytutu Pamięci Narodowej, 2004, nr 5 (40), ss. 34 – 48.
- W. Jastrzębski, Potulice. Hitlerowski obóz przesiedleńczy i pracy, Bydgoszcz 1967.