Stanisław Maczek

General Stanisław Maczek (1892 - 1994) was the last Commander of the First Polish Army Corps under Allied Command, who had previously led the famous First Polish Armoured Division. A veteran of World War I, the Polish-Ukrainian and Polish-Bolshevik Wars, Maczek is most notable as the best known Polish armoured commander of World War II.

Biography

Stanisław Władysław Maczek was born March 31, 1892 in Lwów's suburb of Szczerzec, then in Austro-Hungarian Galicia. His family was of distant Croatian extraction and Maczek was a cousin of Vladko Maček, a Croatian peasant politician. After graduating from the Drohobycz-based gymnasium, in 1910 he joined the Philosophical Faculty of the Lwów University, where he studied Polish philology. Among his tutors were some of the most renown Polish philologists of the epoch, including Wilhelm Bruchnalski and Józef Kallenbach. He was also a student of professor Kazimierz Twardowski's lectures. During his studies he joined the Strzelec paramilitary organization, where he received basic military training. After the outbreak of the Great War, Maczek halted his studies wanting to join Piłsudski's Polish Legions, but instead was drafted to the Austro-Hungarian Army.

After receiving brief officer's training, Maczek was sent to the Italian front of World War I. Initially an NCO in the Tyrolean Regiment of the K.u.K. Army, he was promoted to the rank of second lieutenant in 1916 and in 1918 to lieutenant. As the only Polish battalion commander in Austro-Hungarian alpine regiments, Maczek gained much experience in mountain warfare which would prove valuable to his later career. On November 11, 1918, after receiving the news of the Armistice, Maczek simply disbanded his battalion and returned to newly-reborn Poland. Three days later he arrived to Krosno where he joined the Polish Army. Designated as the commander of a Krosno battalion, Maczek started a limited offensive against the forces of the West Ukrainian People's Republic (ZUNR) with the aim of relief of his besieged hometown. However, due to insufficient support, after initial successes at Ustrzyki, Chyrów and Felsztyn the Polish offensive got bogged down and the Polish-Ukrainian War turned into trench warfare for the rest of the winter.

In April 1919 Maczek was withdrawn from his unit and became the organizer and commander of the so-called volatile company (Polish: lotna kompania) within General Aleksandrowicz's 4th Infantry Division. The unit, created on Maczek's inspiration, was modelled after the German Sturmbatalionen of World War I, and was almost entirely motorized and well-equipped in heavy machine guns. The unit was formed mostly of the battle-hardened troops of the Krosno battalion and its combat value was well above the average of the Polish Army of the time. Because of that it served both as a stop-gap "armed firefighter" filling the front in defensive operations and fought with distinction in the Polish spring offensive. It took part in some of the heaviest fighting of the war, including the battles for Drohobycz, Stanisławów, Buczacz and finally ZUNR's capital, Stryj.

After the end of the Polish-Ukrainian fighting, Maczek was confirmed in the rank of major with seniority from June 1, 1919. He was then attached to General Iwaszkiewicz's Polish 2nd Army as a staff officer. A skilled front-line officer, Maczek repeatedly asked his superiors to give him command over a front-line unit rather than staff duty. His wish was fulfilled only after the Polish-Bolshevik War started and the 2nd Army suffered a defeat in the initial clashes with Semyon Budyonny's 1st Cavalry Army. In Jarosław Maczek formed a new volatile Rifle battalion, mostly composed of fresh recruits and horseless uhlans. Without sufficient training, the unit was moved to the front and Maczek again started to serve as a "firefighter" at the front. His unit covered the retreat of the Polish forces at Mosty Wielkie, after which it was attached to General Juliusz Rómmel's 1st Cavalry Division. It took part in the Polish assault on Waręż near Zamość, a tactical counter-assault on the rear of the advancing Budyonny's Cossacks directly preceding the victorious battle of Komarów.

After the end of hostilities, Maczek's battalion was officially named after him. However, after the treaty of Riga had been signed it was disbanded. Maczek did not resume his studies at the Lwów University and instead remained in active service. Between 1921 and 1923 he was commanding officer of an infantry battalion within the Lwów-based 26th Infantry Regiment. On August 1 of that year he was promoted to lieutenant-colonel and sent to the Higher Military School in Warsaw. He graduated the following year and until 1927 served as the head of the 2nd Detachment of the General Staff (intelligence) in Lwów. Later that year he moved to Grodno, where he became the deputy commander of the 76th Infantry Regiment. In 1929, after finishing his training, he became commander of the Grodno-based 81st Infantry Regiment and held that post until 1934. During that time, on January 1, 1931 he was promoted to colonel. In 1935 he was moved to Częstochowa, where he became the deputy commander of the prestigious 1st Legions Infantry Division.

In October of 1938 Maczek's experience as a commander of "volatile" troops was valued by his superiors. He was given command of the Polish 10th Motorized Cavalry Brigade, the first fully-motorized unit of the Polish Army. After the outbreak of the Polish Defensive War of 1939, the brigade was attached to the Kraków Army defending Lesser Poland and Silesia. Equipped with only light tanks and tankettes and with only one artillery battery, which left the unit with only eight heavier cannon, it went into battle on the first day of war. After the Battle of Jordanów, Maczek's unit faced the entire German XVIII Corps of General Eugen Beyer and successfully shielded the southern flank of the Polish forces, along the Beskides. Supported by merely several battalions of Border Guards and National Defence, the Polish motorized unit fought against two panzer divisions (4th Light Division under von Hubicki and 2nd Panzer Division under Veiel), as well as the 3rd Mountain Division under Eduard Dietl.

For five days Maczek’s brigade fought bravely and very efficiently, changing German blitzkrieg into a slow and bloody march. Despite numerical and technical superiority, the German units' daily gain was no better than 10 kilometres. Polish soldiers took advantage of difficult, mountaneous terrain, stopping German attacks and occasionally counter-attacking. However, after the front of the Kraków Army was broken to the north of the brigade's position, it was pulled out from the first line. The brigade then fought as a screening unit, defending the bridges and fords in Lesser Poland, until it arrived at Lwów and joined the city’s defenders. It was to form a mobile reserve during the battle for Lwów and allow other Polish units to withdraw towards the Romanian Bridgehead. However, the plan was made obsolete by the invasion of Poland by the Soviet Union on September 17. After two days, Marshal of Poland Edward Rydz-Śmigły ordered the brigade to cross the Hungarian border. Colonel Maczek’s brigade was interned in Hungary. The unit lost about half of its men, but was never defeated in open combat, gaining respect even from the enemy. It is considered to be the only Polish unit not to lose a single battle in 1939. It is to be noted that Maczek was not only esteemed by his superiors but also loved by his soldiers, who referred to him as Baca, a traditional Polish highlanders' name for a shepherd.

After the end of the September campaign Maczek made it to France, where he joined the re-created Polish Army and was promoted to the rank of brigadier-general. He was made the commanding officer of the Polish military camp in Coëtquidan. He then prepared a detailed report of the Blitzkrieg tactics, its usage, effectiveness and possible precautions. This report was however completely disregarded by French staff (the Germans captured it - unopened). He also started gathering all of the veterans of the 10th Brigade who made it to France in two camps in Painpont and Campeneac. His aim was to preserve the integrity of his former unit and prevent the conscription of some of the best-trained Polish soldiers into standard infantry formations, where their experience would be most probably lost. However, initially the French command was not interested in the formation of a Polish armoured unit and the Polish 10th Armoured Cavalry Brigade did not receive the necessary equipment. It was not until March 1940 that Maczek received a dozen obsolete FT-17 tanks, several dozen cars and motorcycles for training.

Everything changed, when Germany invaded France in the spring of 1940, by simply going around the Maginot Line. General Maczek's unit suddenly received all the equipment they had asked for, with one condition: they had to go into action immediately. That was impossible, because many Polish soldiers had no idea how to use the new equipment and there was no time for exercises. General Maczek decided to lead a small force of his best trained men, hoping that the rest of his unit would join them later. That small force was called 10th Armoured Cavalry Brigade (Polish: 10 Brygada Kawalerii Pancernej) in honour of the "Black Brigade" from 1939. On June 6, 10th Brigade had one tank battalion, two strong motorized cavalry squadrons, one anti-tank battery and one anti-aircraft battery. It was attached to the French 4th Army near Reims, and was ordered to cover its left flank. However, Maczek's unit was much too weak to do it successfully against German armoured divisions. Polish soldiers managed only to cover one retreating French infantry division by attacking German forces in Champaubert-Montgivroux. Later the brigade had to withdraw with the rest of French troops, and joined the French XXIII Corps. On June 16 the brigade attacked by night the town of Montbard over the Burgundy Canal. Maczek's soldiers completely surprised the Germans and took many prisoners.

However, the brigade by then was fighting alone, with the French units on both flanks either routed or in retreat. There were no French forces to take advantage of that victory, and the decimated Polish unit found itself surrounded and without fuel. On June 18, general Maczek decided to destroy useless equipment and to withdraw on foot. Later that day he had to split the remnants of his brigade into small groups, so they could pass the enemy lines. Many of Maczek's men, including the general himself, found their way through Vichy France, North Africa and Portugal to the United Kingdom, where a Polish armoured unit was recreated, while others joined the Polish and French resistance organizations in France and Belgium. Maczek shared the fate of his men and arrived to London.

Initially the British high command wanted to use the recreated Polish Army solely for defence of the coastline in Scotland between Aberdeen and Edinburgh, and the veterans of the Polish tank formations who arrived to the UK were pressed into the Polish 2nd Rifle Brigade under General Rudolf Orlicz-Dreszer. However, immediately upon Maczek's arrival the idea was abandoned and General Władysław Sikorski managed to convince the British government to create a Polish armoured unit instead. After years of training at the Blairgowrie training ground, in February 1942, General Maczek formed the 1st Polish Armoured Division. Equipped by the British authorities with State-of-the-Art Churchill and M4 Sherman tanks, it initially served in defence of the Scottish shoreline between Montrose and Dundee.

By the end of July 1944 the division has been transferred to Normandy, where it was to prove its worth during the 1944 invasion of Europe. Attached to First Canadian Army, Maczek's men entered combat on August 8 during Operation TotalizeOperation ''Totalize''. The division twice suffered serious bombings by Allied aircraft yet it achieved a brilliant victory against the Wehrmacht in the battles for Mont Ormel, 262 Hill and the town of Chambois. This series of offensive and defensive operations came to be known as the Battle of Falaise in which 14 German Wehrmacht and SS divisions were trapped in a huge Chambois pocket and subsequently destroyed. Maczek's division had the crucial role of closing the pocket at the escape route of those German divisions.

File:Tank Maczek.jpg

General Stanisław Maczek (top left), the division commander, in a leading tank.

After this decisive battle, General Maczek's Division continued to spearhead the Allied drive across the battlefields of France, Belgium, Netherlands, and finally Germany. The Division's "moment of glory" came when its forces captured the German port of Wilhelmshaven and accepted the surrender of the entire garrison, which included some 200 vessels of Hitler's navy, the Kriegsmarine. General Maczek commanded the First Armoured Division until the end of hostilities in Europe, and was promoted to major-general that same year. After the capitulation of Germany he went on to command the Polish I Corps and then became the commanding officer of all the Polish forces in the United Kingdom until their demobilization in 1947.

After the war he was deprived of Polish citizenship by the Communist government of the People's Republic of Poland and thus had to stay in Britain. As he was not considered an Allied soldier, the British authorities tragically declined him combatant rights and a military pension. Until the 1960s he worked as a bartender in a hotel in Edinburgh. He died December 11, 1994 at the age of 102. He is buried among his soldiers at the Polish military cemetery in Breda, in the Netherlands. Each year during Liberation Day festivities, Breda is visited by a large Polish contingent and the city of Breda reserves a special portion of the festivities for the fallen Polish soldiers.

Gallery

• Maczek in field battledress, 1944
  Maczek in field battledress, 1944
• 
  Maczek in his tank suit, 1944
• 'Thank you Poles' poster printed after liberation of Breda.
  'Thank you Poles' poster printed after liberation of Breda.

External links

• Captain Kazimierz DUDA - 1st Polish Armoured Division - C.K.M.