Przyszowice massacre

File:Przyszowice massacre tombstone.jpg

Tombstone to the victims of Przyszowice massacre. It lists the victims with the statement: murdered by the Red Army.

The Przyszowice massacre (Polish: Zbrodnia przyszowicka or Polish: tragedia przyszowicka) was a war crime committed by Red Army on civilian inhabitants of Polish village of Przyszowice in Upper Silesia in the days of January 26 to January 28, 1945. During the events between 54 to over 60 - possibly up to 69 men and women aged between 10 days and 78 years were killed (although most of the victims were adult men). In addition, the Soviet soldiers burnt roughly 70 houses and raped several dozen women of all ages.

After the start of the Soviet January offensive in early 1945, the Red Army broke through from the line of the Vistula river well into German-held territory of occupied Poland. By late January the scattered forces of the Wehrmacht were withdrawn to the line of the Oder river, already on the pre-war territory of the Third Reich. However, several units were ordered to prepare tactical counter-attacks, notably in the region of Upper Silesia, on the Polish-German borderland. On January 23rd the Soviet forces seized the town of Gleiwitz (Gliwice), one of the major industrial centres of the area. However, the following day the Germans counter-attacked and a three days long battle for the area started. Eventually victorious, on January 26 the Russians entered the village of Przyszowice, the last Polish village before the Polish-German border.

During the following two days a massacre of local inhabitants ensued. The Soviet soldiers set several dozen houses in flames and started shooting at the civilians trying to extinguish the flames. Over 60 and possibly up to 69 civilians lost their lives. Among the victims were four former prisoners of the Auschwitz concentration camp who had escaped from a death march the previous day. Except for two of the escapees who were Italian and Hungarian, the rest of the victims were Polish civilians - including two former soldiers of the Polish Army, recently freed by the Soviets from a prisoner of war camp. In addition to the mass murder of civilians, the Soviet forces looted the village and raped numerous women.

The reason for the massacre remains unknown. Some authors believe that the Soviet soldiers wanted to take revenge for the losses suffered by the Red Army in the skirmishes with the Wehrmacht in the area. During the fights for Przyszowice, the Soviets suffered 101 casualties and lost roughly 40 tanks. Moreover Soviet soldiers likely did not know they were still on Polish soil and instead believed they finally entered the territories of Nazi Germany; Przyszowice was one of the most westwards villages of the Second Polish Republic, on the pre-war border between Poland and Germany.

Following the massacre the victims were buried in a mass grave on a local cemetery. Two people were also killed in the summer that year, alredy after the end of the war, when Red Army troops were returning from Germany: a men by a Soviet plane in June; and a women in July by a group of Soviet soldiers stealing a cow. During the years of Communist rule in Poland factual knowledge of the events was censored by propaganda of the People's Republic of Poland. Until 1989 all mentions of the tragedy were censored, while the mass grave was kept anonymous. It was not until the 60th anniversary of the event in 2005 that a memorial stone was erected on the cemetery. The ceremony was held by bishop of Legnica Stefan Cichy, personally an eye-witness of the massacre and a relative of one of the victims

Around that time the Katowice branch of the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) started an investigation on the events, as well as on similar massacres carried out in Gliwice and Ruda Śląska-Halemba. During the investigation various documents provided by the Defence Ministry of the Russian Federation were examined, however no people responsible for the killings could be identified. It is salso till unknown which units of the Red Army were responsible for the massacre. In the effect of the investigation the 1945 events in Przyszowice were declared a crime against humanity by IPN; it is estimated that at least a thousand civilians were killed in Silesia by the Soviets, many of them etnic Poles and Silesians; most of them, about 800, in the Gliwice massacre.

See also

• Red Army atrocities (WWII)
• World War II atrocities in Poland

Further reading

• Template:Pl icon Krystyna Gordoń (2005). Trzy dni z dziejów Przyszowic. Przyszowice: Towarzystwo Miłośników Przyszowic. p. 104. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)