Grudziądz

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Grudziądz
Panorama of Grudziądz Old Town district

Flag
Coat of arms
Motto: Grudziądz - miasto na szczęście
(Grudziądz - city of good luck)
Grudziądz is located in Poland
Grudziądz
Coordinates: 53°29′33″N 18°46′34″E / 53.4925°N 18.77611°E / 53.4925; 18.77611
Country  Poland
Voivodeship Kuyavian-Pomeranian
County city county
Established 11th century
Town rights 1291
Government
 • Mayor Robert Malinowski
Area
 • Total 57.76 km2 (22.30 sq mi)
Elevation 50 m (160 ft)
Population (2010[1])
 • Total 96,042
 • Density 1,700/km2 (4,300/sq mi)
Time zone CET (UTC+1)
 • Summer (DST) CEST (UTC+2)
Postal code 86-300 to 86-311
Area code(s) +48 056
Car plates CG
Website http://www.grudziadz.pl

Grudziądz [ˈɡrud​͡ʑɔnt​͡s] ( listen) (German: Graudenz, Latin: Graudensis) is a city of 96 042 inhabitants (2010) on the Vistula River in northern Poland. Situated in the Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship (since 1999), the city was previously in the Toruń Voivodeship (1975–1998).

Contents

[edit] History

 This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (December 2010)
Polish-Swedish war (1656), depicted by Erik Dahlbergh

[edit] Early history

Initially a defensive gród founded by Polish ruler Bolesław Chrobry,[2] the settlement adopted Kulm law in 1291 while under the rule of the monastic state of the Teutonic Knights and became a city. In 1440, the city joined the Prussian Confederation, and between 1466 and 1772 the city belonged to the Polish province of Royal Prussia.

[edit] Prussia and Germany

Following the First Partition of Poland in 1772, the city was annexed by the German Kingdom of Prussia and became part of the unified German Empire in 1871.

City walls of Grudziądz, the southern side, 14th/15th century

The city was the site of a military prison for Polish activists - those released formed Gromada Grudziądz in Portsmouth on 1835, as part of the Great Emigration movement[3]

After the construction of a railroad bridge across the Vistula in 1878, Graudenz became a rapidly growing industrialized city as well as a district centre in 1900.

A light cruiser of the German Imperial Navy, built in 1912-1914, was named after the city.

[edit] Prussian rule and Germanization

In the 18th and 19th centuries the city was part of the area affected by the Prussian Partition of Poland where Germanisation was enforced, beginning in 1772. Frederick had previously regarded the Polish government as the worst in Europe, apart from Turkey, scorning the aristocratic anarchy there[4] Guided by the interests of the state but not believing in the importance of race, he preferred to introduce German and Frisian workers and peasants, who in his opinion were more suitable for building up a new civilization than the "physically and morally ruined serfs of the Polish nobility".[5][6] Frederick settled around 300,000 colonists in the eastern provinces of Prussia. Using funds for colonization, German craftsmen were placed in Polish cities[7] A second colonization wave of Germanisation was pursued by Prussia after 1832.[8] Laws were passed aimed at Germanisation of the Polish inhabited areas and 154,000 colonists were settled by the Prussian Settlement Commission before World War I. Professor Martin Kitchen writes that in areas where the Polish population lived alongside Germans a virtual apartheid existed, with bans on the Polish language and religious discrimination, besides attempts to colonize the areas with Germans[9]

To resist Germanisation,[10] Polish activists started to publish the newspaper "Gazeta Grudziądzka" in 1894. It advocated the social and economical emancipation of rural society and opposed Germanization, publishing articles critical of Germany; German attempts to repress its editor Wiktor Kulerski only helped to increase its circulation.[11]

From 1898 to 1901, a secret society of Polish students seeking to restore Polish independence operated in the city, but the activists were tried by German courts in 1901, frustrating their efforts.[12]

In Grudziądz German soldiers were stationed in the local fortress as part of the Germanization measures, and the authorities placed soldiers with a chauvinistic attitude towards Poles there.[13] The German government introduced stationed military, merchants and state officials to influence population figures,[14] and in the 1910 census 84% of the population of the town and 58% of the county was recorded as German.[15]

Census figures published by the German Empire have been criticised as unreliable and Polish historians believe they have a high degree of falsification; potential pressure on census takers (predominantly schoolteachers) was possible, and a bilingual category was created, further complicating the results.[16] Some analysts have asserted that all people registering as bilingual were classified as Germans[17]

Memorial to Wiktor Kulerski in Grudziądz, founder of Gazeta Grudziądzka

The Polish population in this heavily Germanised city has been estimated at around 12-15% during this period.

The Polish population rose steadily before the First World War.[18][19]

In the German election of 1912, the National Liberal Party of Germany received 53% of all votes, whilst Polish candidates won 21% of votes. In 1912, Wiktor Kulerski founded the Polish Catholic Peasant Party in the city, which aimed at protecting the local Polish population[20]

In 1913, the Polish Gazeta Grudziądzka reached a circulation of 128,000, making it the third largest Polish newspaper in the world.[11]

[edit] Interwar years

On January 23, 1920, in accordance with the Treaty of Versailles, Grudziądz became part of the Polish state. At that time Josef Włodek, the newly appointed Polish mayor, described his impression of the town as "modern but unfortunately completely German"[21]

Between 1926 and 1934 the number of Germans (34,194 in 1910) rose from 3,542 to 3,875.[22] Some Polish authors emphasize a wider emigration pattern motivated chiefly by economic conditions and the unwillingess of the German minority to live in the Polish state.[23]

The German author Christian Raitz von Frentz writes that after the First World War ended, the Polish government tried to reverse the systematic Germanization of the past decades[24]

Prejudices, stereotypes and conflicts dating back to German rule influenced Polish policies towards minorities in the new independent Polish state.[25]

The Polish authorities, supported by the public (e.g. the “explicitly anti-German” Związek Obrony Kresów Zachodnich), initiated a number of measures to further Polonization.[26] The local press was also hostile towards the Germans.

Fearful of a re-Germanization of the city, the Polish paper Słowo Pomorskie (23.19.1923) criticized the authorities of Grudziądz for tolerating the local German amateur theatre "Deutsche Bühne". The theatre was funded by money from Berlin[27] Created before the war, its actors were mostly German officers stationed with the local garrison [28] The mayor responded by pointing out that the theatre was being monitored because of suspected “anti-state activities”. According to Kotowski, this episode indicates that even the most minor activities of the German minority were closely scrutinized by the Polish authorities beginning with the earliest phase of Polish policy towards the German minority.[29] The German theatre was re-opened by the Nazis in 1943,[30] while the last director of the Polish theatre in the city in the years 1922-24 was murdered by them[31]

In the 20 years between the world wars, Grudziądz served as an important centre of culture and education with one of the biggest Polish military garrisons and several military schools located both in and around the city. A large economic potential and the existence of important institutions like the Pomeranian Tax Office and the Pomeranian Chamber of Industry and Trade, helped Grudziądz become the economic capital of the Pomeranian Voivodeship in the interwar period. Grudziądz's economic potential was featured at the First Pomeranian Exhibition of Agriculture and Industry in 1925, officially opened by Stanisław Wojciechowski, President of the Second Polish Republic.

The famous granaries

The 64th and 65th Infantry Regiments and the 16th Light Artillery Regiment of the Polish Army were stationed in Grudziądz during the 19 years of the inter-war period. They were part of the 16th Infantry Division, which had its headquarters in the city, as did the cavalry's famous 18th Pomeranian Uhlans Regiment. The Grudziądz Centre of Cavalry Training educated many notable army commanders. Military education in Grudziądz was also provided by the Centre of the Gendarmerie, the Air School of Shooting and Bombarding, and the N.C.O. Professional School, which offered courses for infantry reserve officer cadets.

Historical population
of Grudziądz

1880 17,321
1905 35,958
1980 90,000
1990 102,300
1995 102,900
1999 102,434
2000 100,787
2006 99 578
2007 99 090
2010 96 042

In 1920 a German-language school was founded.[32] In 1931 the Polish government decreed a reduction in the number of German classes in the school and requested lists of Catholic children and those pupils with Polish-sounding names which they viewed as victims of Germanization, from the German school. Although the list was not prepered, some of the children were transferred, which led to a school-strike.[33] The German school followed ideas and customs as those in Nazi Reich.[34] It was headed by a Nazi sympathiser Hilgendorf who praised Nazi ideology[35] The Polish authorities were alarmed when a notebook of one female student was discovered by them, which contained the Nazi party anthem, the Horst Wessel Lied and revisionistic text. The discovery caused outrage and calls to dismiss Hilgendorf due to his irrendist beliefs[36] In November 1933 two German craftsmen were killed by a Polish mob during a local election campaign.[32]

[edit] World War II

German population in Grudziądz welcomes invading Nazi forces.

On September 3, 1939 military troops of Nazi Germany entered Grudziądz and, as Graudenz, annexed the city into the Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia, starting a five-year long occupation lasting till the end of World War II.

[edit] German atrocities

Further information: Intelligenzaktion Pommern

Poles and Jews were classified by the German state as Untermenschen and subjected to repressions and murder, with their ultimate fate as enslavement and extermination; Grudziądz was the location of the German concentration camp Graudenz, a subcamp of Stutthof concentration camp.

In early September, 25 Polish citizens were detained as hostages - priests, teachers and other members that enjoyed the respect of local society. They were threatened with execution if any harm came to the Ethnic Germans from the city who were detained and held by the Polish authorities during the invasion of Poland. After their initial release on the return of the members of the German minority, they were re-arrested and most of them were shot.[37] On 9 September a further 85 people were imprisoned by the Germans [38] The German authorities destroyed the city's monuments to Polish independence[39] and banned Polish priests from speaking Polish during church masses[40]

On 4 September the Einsatzgruppe V demanded a list of names of all members of the 600-strong Jewish community within 14 hours, as well as as list of all their possessions. They were also fined 20.000 zlotych [41]

On 6 September the whole city was covered with posters demanding that Jews and "mixed races" of category I and IInd degree (so-called 'Mischlinge, i.e. persons of mixed race) gather at the headquarters of the Einsatzgruppe V (established in the local school). Around 100 people responded to the demand and were immediately arrested and robbed. After this they were transported to an unknown destination and disappeared - it is believed that they were most likely executed by the Germans in the Mniszek-Grupa forests.[42][43]

On 19 October occupied Grudziądz was visited by the NSDAP Gauleiter (regional chief) Albert Forster. In a public speech to the Volksdeutsche, he declared that the area was to become "one hundred percent" German, and that Poles "have nothing to do here, and should be evicted"[44]

[edit] Participation of the local German minority in the mass murder of Poles and Jews
Monument to Poles murdered by the German minority organisation Selbstschutz near Książe Góry

Alongside the military and Einsatgruppen administration, the first structures of Selbstschutz were established - a paramilitary formation of members of the German minority in the region. The head of Selbstschutz in Grudziądz was Doctor Joachim Gramse.[45][46] In October 1939, Selbstschutz created an interment camp for Poles seeking to restore Polish independence, whose commandant was a local German Kurt Gotze.[47]

Teachers, officials, social workers, doctors, merchants, members of patriotic organisations, lawyers, policemen, farmers and 150 Polish priests were held in this camp. It is estimated that around 4000 to 5000 people went through it.[48] Other arrested Poles were held in the cellars of Grudziądz fortress.[49] The local Germans who ran the camp established their own "court" which decided the fate of the prisoners. The "court" comprised: Kurt Gotze, Helmut Domke, Horst Kriedte, Hans Abromeit (owner of a drugstore), Paul Neuman (barber).[50] Based on their decisions, some of the prisoners were sent to concentration camps, 300 were murdered en masse; only a few were released.[48][51] Those sentenced to death were mostly executed through shooting by the Selbstschutz in Księże Góry near Grudziądz; in October and November 1939 several hundred people were murdered there and their bodies buried in five mass graves.[52] The victims were usually shot at the edges of already dig out graves[53]

Further executions were carried out in desolate areas of Grudziądz: on 11 November 1939 near Grudziądz Fortress, the Selbstschutz executed 10 Polish teachers, 4 Polish priests and 4 women.[54] Additionally, 37 people were murdered in Grudziądz city park.[55] On 29 October 1939 a unit of Selbstschutz mass-murdered 10 Polish hostages as revenge for posters that had appeared in the city calling for resistance against Nazi rule.[56]

[edit] End of German occupation

As the result of heavy fighting in 1945, over 60% of the city was destroyed. Soviet Major Lev Kopelev covered those battles and the final surrender of the German garrison in his book "To Be Preserved Forever". He describes the joint psychological warfare of March 1945 in the city by the Red Army and members of the NKFD. As the war ended, the German-speaking population of the city fled or was expelled to Germany.[32] The city became home to Poles moved from the Polish areas annexed by the Soviet Union.

[edit] Notable residents

See also: Category:People from Grudziądz

[edit] Education

  • Nicolaus Copernicus University
  • Grudziądzka Szkoła Wyższa

[edit] International relations

See also: List of twin towns and sister cities in Poland

[edit] Twin towns — Sister cities

[edit] Gallery

  • Night-time landscape

  • Hospital

  • Former Jesuit college, today City Council

  • Spichrzowa Street

  • Memorial to a Polish soldier in the main square

  • Tram at Legionów street

  • St. Mary's Church

  • Church of St. Francis Xavier

  • Music School

  • Chełmińska street

  • St. Mikołaj (Nicholas) church

  • Miejski Park

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ - registered press Faktygrudziadz.pl
  2. ^ Wielka encyklopedia polski: Tom 1 Wojciech Słowakiewicz, Jacek Słowiński, Piotr Turkot page 270 Fogra, 2000
  3. ^ Historia Polski, 1795-1918 Stefan Kieniewicz Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, 1975 page 142
  4. ^ Ritter, Gerhard (1974). Frederick the Great: A Historical Profile. Berkeley: University of California Press. pp. 172. ISBN 0-520-02775-2. 
  5. ^ Ritter, Gerhard (1974). Frederick the Great: A Historical Profile. Berkeley: University of California Press. pp. 180. ISBN 0-520-02775-2. 
  6. ^ Believing Germans to be more industrious, he would even refer to Poles as "slovenly trash” (ibid. p 180).
  7. ^ Fryderyk II Stanisław Salmonowicz Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich, 1985 "Z funduszy na kolonizację osiedlano w miastach fachowców z krajów niemieckich"
  8. ^ Wielka historia Polski t. 4 Polska w czasach walk o niepodległość (1815 - 1864). Od niewoli do niepodległości (1864 - 1918) Marian Zagórniak, Józef Buszko 2003 page 186
  9. ^ A history of modern Germany, 1800-2000 Martin Kitchen Wiley-Blackwel 2006, page 130)
  10. ^ Kraj a emigracja. Ruch ludowy wobec wychodźstwa chłopskiego do krajów Ameryki Łacińskiej (do 1939 roku) Muzeum Historii Polskiego Ruchu Ludowego 2006, page 290
  11. ^ a b Kraj a emigracja. Ruch ludowy wobec wychodźstwa chłopskiego do krajów Ameryki Łacińskiej (do 1939 roku) Muzeum Historii Polskiego Ruchu Ludowego 2006, page 285
  12. ^ Filomaci Pomorscy: tajne związki młodzieży polskiej na Pomorzu Gdańskim w latach 1830-1920 Jerzy Szews Polska Akademia Nauk, Instytut Historii Nauki, Oświaty i techniki, Zakład Dziejów Oświaty, 1992 - page 129
  13. ^ Studia i materiały do dziejów Wielkopolski i Pomorza , Tom 18,Wydanie 1 Polskie Towarzystwo Historyczne. Oddział w Poznaniu, page 119, Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe
  14. ^ Historia Polski 1795-1918. Andrzej Chwalba. Page 444 Wydawnictwo Literackie 2007
  15. ^ (in German) Gemeindelexikon für die Regierungsbezirke Allenstein, Danzig, Marienwerder, Posen, Bromberg und Oppeln. Berlin: Königlich Preußisches Statistisches Landesamt. 1912. 
  16. ^ (Neither German nor Pole: Catholicism and National Indifference in a Central European Borderland James E. Bjork 2008 page 152-153 University of Michigan Press
  17. ^ National Identity and Weimar Germany: Upper Silesia and the Eastern Border, 1918-1922 T. Hunt Tooley page 13 University of Nebraska Press)
  18. ^ Przegląd zachodni, Tom 34, Instytut Zachodni, Instytut Zachodni., 1978 page 214
  19. ^ Życie kulturalno-literackie Grudziądza w latach 1918-1939 Eugenia Sławińska Gdańskie Towarzystwo Naukowe, 1980 - 211, page 11
  20. ^ Dzieje Wielkopolski: Lata 1793-1918 Jerzy Topolski Wydawn. Poznańskie 1973, page 503,
  21. ^ Borodziej, Wlodzimierz; Endres, Gerald; Lachauer, Ulla (2009) (in German). Als der Osten noch Heimat war. Rowohlt. p. 127. ISBN 978-3871346446.  Quotation:"Es habe auf ihn,..., den Eindruck einer modernen und "leider völlig deutschen" Stadt gemacht,"
  22. ^ Kotowski, Albert S. (1998) (in German). Polens Politik gegenüber seiner deutschen Minderheit 1919-1939. Forschungsstelle Ostmitteleuropa, University of Dortmund. p. 55. ISBN 3-447-03997-3. http://books.google.de/books?id=KVg_tMs_ZPIC&pg=PA365&dq=Goetheschule+Graudenz#v=onepage&q=%20Graudenz&f=false. 
  23. ^ Niemiecka mniejszość narodowa w Polsce w latach 1919-1939, Paweł Kacprzak, Wydawnictwo Państwowej Wyższej Szkoły Zawodowej,Studia Lubuskie. 2007, 3, s. 145-158
  24. ^ A Lesson Forgotten: Minority Protection Under the League of Nations: The Case of the German Minority in Poland, 1920-193 page 8 LIT Verlag Berlin-Hamburg-Münster, 1999
  25. ^ Polens Politik gegenüber seiner deutschen Minderheit 1919-1939 Albert S. Kotowski p. 43
  26. ^ Polens Politik gegenüber seiner deutschen Minderheit, 1919-1939 (Studien der Forschungsstelle Ostmitteleuropa an der Universität Dortmund). S. 94.
  27. ^ Mniejszość niemiecka na Pomorzu w okresie międzywojennymPrzemysław Hauser UAM, 1998, page 219
  28. ^ Historia Pomorza: 1850-1918, pt. 2. Polityka i kultura Gerard Labuda, Stanisław Salmonowicz - 2002, page 398 -
  29. ^ Polens Politik gegenüber seiner deutschen Minderheit, 1919-1939 (Studien der Forschungsstelle Ostmitteleuropa an der Universität Dortmund). S. 94-95.
  30. ^ Pamiętnik teatralny: kwartalnik poświẹcony historii i krytyce teatru, Tom 46 Państwowy Instytut Sztuki (Poland), Instytut Sztuki (Polska Akademia Nauk) page 464
  31. ^ Rocznik Gdański , Tom 50,Wydanie 2, Gdańskie Towarzystwo Naukowe. Wydział I Nauk Społecznych i Humanistycznych, page 215
  32. ^ a b c Borodziej, Wlodzimierz; Endres, Gerald; Lachauer, Ulla (2009) (in German). Als der Osten noch Heimat war. Rowohlt. ISBN 978-3871346446. 
  33. ^ Eser, Ingo (2010) (in German). Volk, Staat, Gott, Die deutsche Minderheit in Polen und ihr Schulwesen 1918-1939. Nordost Institut, University of Hamburg. p. 415. ISBN 978-3-447-06233-6. http://books.google.de/books?id=SE4yRIlcs48C&pg=PA532&dq=graudenz#v=onepage&q=graudenz&f=false. 
  34. ^ Mniejszość niemiecka na Pomorzu w okresie międzywojennym Przemysław Hauser UAM, 1998, page 293
  35. ^ Mniejszości narodowe i wyznaniowe na Pomorzu w XIX i XX wieku:zbiór studiów Mieczysław Wojciechowski Uniwersytet Mikołaja Kopernika, 1998 - 292, page 82,90
  36. ^ Volk, Staat, Gott!«Die deutsche Minderheit in Polen und ihr Schulwesen 1918-1939 , page 585
  37. ^ Barbara Bojarska: Eksterminacja inteligencji polskiej na Pomorzu Gdańskim (wrzesień – grudzień 1939). Poznań: Instytut Zachodni, 1972, ss. 78-79.
  38. ^ Maria Wardzyńska: Był rok 1939. Operacja niemieckiej policji bezpieczeństwa w Polsce. Intelligenzaktion. Warszawa: Instytut Pamięci Narodowej, 2009, ss. 109–110.
  39. ^ Zbigniew Otremba: Grudziądz. Kronika miasta. Gdańsk: wydawnictwo Regnum, 2007, page 81–82. ISBN 978-83-920686-1-7
  40. ^ Jan Sziling. Niektóre problemy okupacji hitlerowskiej w Grudziądzu (1939-1945). „Rocznik Grudziądzki”. V-VI, ss. 448–449, 1962.
  41. ^ Jochen Böhler, Klaus-Michael Mallmann, Jürgen Matthäus: Einsatzgruppen w Polsce. Warszawa: Bellona, 2009,page. 89
  42. ^ Jan Sziling. Niektóre problemy okupacji hitlerowskiej w Grudziądzu. S. 450.
  43. ^ Barbara Bojarska: Eksterminacja inteligencji polskiej na Pomorzu Gdańskim. s. 124.
  44. ^ Zbigniew Otremba: Grudziądz. Kronika miasta. Gdańsk: wydawnictwo Regnum, 2007, ss. 81–82. ISBN 978-83-920686-1-7.
  45. ^ Jan Sziling. Niektóre problemy okupacji hitlerowskiej w Grudziądzu... „op.cit.”. page 451
  46. ^ Henryk Bierut: Martyrologia grudziądzan podczas okupacji hitlerowskiej. Grudziądz: Wydawnictwo Komitetu Ochrony Pamięci Walk i Męczeństwa w Grudziądzu, 1999, page 9
  47. ^ Henryk Bierut: Martyrologia grudziądzan podczas okupacji hitlerowskiej. Grudziądz: Wydawnictwo Komitetu Ochrony Pamięci Walk i Męczeństwa w Grudziądzu, 1999, s. 9.
  48. ^ a b Maria Wardzyńska: Był rok 1939... page 171.
  49. ^ Jan Sziling. Niektóre problemy okupacji hitlerowskiej w Grudziądzu...page 451.
  50. ^ Henryk Bierut: Martyrologia grudziądzan podczas okupacji hitlerowskiej. pages 10-11
  51. ^ Bogdan Chrzanowski: Eksterminacja ludności polskiej w pierwszych miesiącach okupacji (wrzesień − grudzień 1939) w: Stutthof: hitlerowski obóz koncentracyjny. Warszawa: Interpress, 1988, page 16.
  52. ^ Maria Wardzyńska: Był rok 1939....page 172
  53. ^ Henryk Bierut: Martyrologia grudziądzan podczas okupacji hitlerowskiej., page 54
  54. ^ Zbigniew Otremba: Grudziądz. Kronika miasta. Gdańsk: wydawnictwo Regnum, 2007, pages 81–82.
  55. ^ Maria Wardzyńska: Był rok 1939.... page 172.
  56. ^ Henryk Bierut: Martyrologia grudziądzan podczas okupacji hitlerowskiej, page 10-11.

[edit] External links

Media related to Grudziądz at Wikimedia Commons
City counties
Coat of arms of Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship
Land counties
Seat (not part of the county): Grudziądz
Urban-rural gminas
Coat of arms of Grudziądz County
Rural gminas

Coordinates: 53°29′N 18°46′E / 53.483°N 18.767°E / 53.483; 18.767

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