Reichsgau Wartheland

The Reichsgau Wartheland (literally Reichsgau , area of Reich, Wartheland , country of the Warta , name of the local river), in the beginning called Reichsgau Posen , indicated, for the Nazi S, the occupied territory of Large-Poland, annexed and incorporated in the Third Reich after the defeat of the Polish army in 1939, in opposition to the Polish areas managed by the general Gouvernement of Poland. The Reichsgau Wartheland , sometimes briefly called Warthegau , covered a surface of 43.905 km ² for 4.693.700 inhabitants in 1941. The area was mainly inhabited by Polish, with however a German minority significant. During the Second world war, a great number of Polish will be expelled towards the general Government, and in particular 70.000 citizens of the town of Poznań, under cover of the Generalplan Ost Nazi aiming to displacement towards the East or the elimination of the Aryan populations not European.

Invasion

The question of the acts of retortions of Polish towards the members of the minority German community, during the first week of the countryside of Poland, remains a question highly discussed. Divergent points of view over the number and the way in which the German minority could suffer from slaughters or summary executions Sunday September 3rd 1939, and the days following, in particular in the area of Bydgoszcz (in German, Bromberg ) and in Western Poland, while the Wehrmacht continued its striking down advance. The figure of 60.000 dead will be diffused later by propaganda Nazi and the event, known under the name of Sunday strapping of Bydgoszcz , exploited to justify repression against Polish.

Occupation

To Wartheland, the Nazi S aim at a total germanisation, a complete assimilation of the territory in Reich, with the political plan, cultural, social and economic. The schools teaching Polish are closed, the renamed cities and streets. Tens of thousands of trade and companies are monopolized without compensation with the owners. Panels in the public places announce “Prohibited with Polish, to the Jews and the dogs”.

The Catholic church is repressed in Wartheland more severely than anywhere elsewhere. The Nazis systematically close the churches, the seminars and the convents. The priest S are assassinated, imprisoned or off-set with the general Government.

This movement of germanisation also includes/understands a program of installation of German of the the Baltic and other areas in the farms and houses occupied by the Jews and Polish, programs implemented by the Gauleiter of Wartheland, Arthur Greiser. With the end of the year 1940, the S expelled 325.000 Jews and Polish of Wartheland and the corridor of Dantzig in direction it general Government after having confiscated their goods. The children and the old men die on the way or in the provisional camps of transit of Potulice, Smukal and Toruń. In 1941, 45.000 additional people are thus moved.

End of the war

At the beginning of 1945, the Russian forces push back German through Poland. The German population flees in the disorder, decimated by the rigor of the winter or Soviet repression. It is considered that approximately 50.000 German of Wartheland perished for the period. The captured men are dispatched in Soviet camps with the Kazakhstan.

See too

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