The Polish Bolsheviks kill 58,000 German Nationals in the Danzig corridor In the months leading up to the German invasion the Polish Army and independent Bolshevik units had been slaughtering German nationals in the Danzig corridor. Mass killings of thousands of civilian ethnic Germans (Volksdeutsche) by both civilian and Russian NDVK Jews, who were confident that Poland would quickly defeat Germany. Many apparently expected to take possession of German farms and businesses. An estimated 58,000 German civilians lost their lives in the massacres carried out prior to the 1939 invasion.
As for these photos allegedly showing "murdered Volksdeutsche" from the video above.
They are from the English-language publication "Polish Atrocities Against the German Minority in Poland" by Volk und Reich Verlag, Berlin 1940.
Dead people shown on these photos are probably as much "German" as those who "attacked" the Gleiwitz radio station were "Polish".
These who don't know about the Gleiwitz incident - Germans dressed concentration camp prisoners in Polish military uniforms, ordered them to "attack" their own radio station, and then killed them - showing to the world dead bodies of "Polish soldiers" whose invasion of Germany was repulsed.
The Polish Bolsheviks kill 58,000 German Nationals in the Danzig corridor In the months leading up to the German invasion the Polish Army and independent Bolshevik units had been slaughtering German nationals in the Danzig corridor. Mass killings of thousands of civilian ethnic Germans (Volksdeutsche) by both civilian and Russian NDVK Jews, who were confident that Poland would quickly defeat Germany. Many apparently expected to take possession of German farms and businesses. An estimated 58,000 German civilians lost their lives in the massacres carried out prior to the 1939 invasion."
My eyes are aching from seing too many lie-words concentrated over a too small surface.
But I like the idea of "independent Polish Bolshevik units" and "civilian and Russian NDVK (what is this?) Jews" fighting for Polish regime of Sanacja...
How strange that this seems to have escaped the attention of wikipedia!
It surely has not. But wikipedia moderators are faster than all gunmen of the Wild West altogether.
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Bydgoszcz was by no means the only place where German armed sabotage took place.
Some excerpts about German armed sabotage against soldiers of Polish 55th Infantry Regiment in Leszno:
Excerpt from "History of 55. Infantry Regiment" by Piotr Bauer:
"(...) At the same time in the city itself, local Germans made their presence felt. Around 9:00 AM from the villa of ethnic German - Hesing - rifle and machine gun fire was opened towards the building of the Garrison's Headquarters and soldiers of 2nd company stationing nearby. The first soldier of the regiment was KIA as the result of this fire - rifleman Paweł Koprykowski. To avoid further losses, on order of captain L. Snitko, several artillery shots were fired towards the villa, destroying the light machine gun which was firing. As the result of this fire one of saboteurs was KIA and 3 were wounded. Saboteurs made their presence felt in various points of the city. But situation was quickly brought under control again. (...)"
Here is the account of lieutenant Korwiński describing the death of rifleman Koprykowski:
"(...) Just in the moment, when rifleman Paweł Koprykowski was submitting me a report, a shot was fired. Koprykowski fell dead on the spot. We realized, that fire was opened from the window of the villa on the opposite side of the street. Doors to the building were barricaded. Thus we opened fire from AT gun and through the hole struck in the wall we entered the building. On the floor we found an abandoned rifle and cartridge case. There was no one in the rooms. We went to the basement. Barricaded. We shouted to them to open. No result. So we threw a grenade there. After the explosion one German man in civilian clothes came out, but his face looked militarily - apart from him also two women. The saboteur rushed to escape across the garden. Our shots reached him. (...)"
And this is what happened to German saboteurs captured in Leszno:
Excerpt from memoirs of general Roman Abraham, "War Memoirs from over Warta and Bzura":
"(...) On 3 September in Srem a trial before the martial court of the brigade against 14 German saboteurs accused of aggravated assaults against military units in Leszno took place. (...) At 14:00 chairman of the court submitted for my approval of 12 delivered judgements of death. I replaced the penalty for two of the convicted - the youngest and the oldest of them - from death penalty to 10 years of heavy prison, and approved the rest of the sentences. At 16:00 the sentences were carried out. (...)"
Of course the scale of German sabotage in Leszno was minimal compared to the scale of that in Bydgoszcz.
But casualties suffered by Polish forces as the result of armed sabotage were real - both in Leszno and in Bydgoszcz.
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Slightly diffferent numbers are given by Polish wikipedia article about the battle of Leszno:
"On 1 September 1939 at 5:00 AM artillery bombardment of Leszno conducted by German artillery positioned near Fraustadt started. Mainly the railway station, army barracks and houses in the city center were fired at, but without major casualties. Polish units already managed to abandon their quarters and occupy designated defensive positions. The first line was defended by 1st and 3rd companies of I./55. Inf.Rgt. with support of one artillery platoon and AT guns [2nd company of I./55. Inf.Rgt. stayed in reserve near the Garrison's Headquarters].
After artillery preparation German attack conducted by units of 252. Inf.Div. (from OKH reserves) and 61. Grenzschutz Inf.Rgt. started. Germans approached the suburbs of Leszno, after which they were repulsed by Polish defenders. At that time in Leszno there was commander of 55. Inf.Rgt., colonel Wladyslaw Wiecierzynski, who personally supervised the defence. Meanwhile around 9:00 AM combats inside the city itself beginned, they were started by German saboteurs and some of the ethnic German inhabitants of Leszno who opened fire at the Garrison's Headquarters in Leszno. Polish soldiers found themselves under fire from windows of houses in various parts of the city. In such a situation counteractions aimed at suppression of German sabotage were started. Until the end of the day 16 German saboteurs were killed and further 19 were captured red-handed with weapons in their hands. 400 German inhabitants of Leszno were arrested. The martial court of Wielkopolska Cav. Brig. [found six of them guilty and] sentenced 5 of them to death and one, due to his old age, to life inprisonment.
As revenge for the German attack and sabotage, gen. Roman Abraham ordered to conduct a limited night attack against the German side of the border. It was conducted by a group under command of captain Edmund Lesisz consisting of 2nd company of 55. Inf.Rgt. supported by HMG platoon, platoon of armoured cars & artillery platoon under captain L. Snitko. The group left Leszno at 4:00 PM. It was lifted to the border by buses. After combats against German border guard and patrol of motorcyclists, at 6:00 PM Poles captured village Geyersdorf, firing at encountered enemy soldiers and burning a dozen or so grain stacks. Polish artillery fired at Fraustadt. Further recon was carried out by 3rd platoon of lieutenant Stefan Perkiewicz, which approached the suburbs of Fraustadt.
After dusk the raiding party at gen. Abraham's command returned to Leszno. (...)"
In Leszno we have the same pattern of events as in Bydgoszcz - German regular army is attacking the city from outside, while irregular armed saboteurs open fire inside the city, to Polish rear units or reserves (in this case 2nd company of 55. Inf.Rgt. was waiting in reserve).
Wikipedia is a bit unclear here:
Until the end of the day 16 German saboteurs were killed and further 19 were captured red-handed with weapons in their hands. 400 German inhabitants of Leszno were arrested. The martial court of Wielkopolska Cav. Brig. [found six of them guilty and] sentenced 5 of them to death and one, due to his old age, to life inprisonment.
- 16 saboteurs were killed in combats
- 19 saboteurs were captured red-handed (and executed or sentenced to 10 years of heavy prison)
- in addition to this, 400 more Germans were arrested - of these 400, only 6 were found guilty, of whom 5 were executed and 1 sentenced to life inprisonment. The remaining 394 arrested Germans were probably released (some of them could also be interned and transported eastward).
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To show that I am not whitewashing Poles but trying to describe those events as they really were (in all shades of white and black), let's mention that - apart from combats against sabotage - there are a few sources which suggest some actual crimes against Germans. I came across an account by one high-ranking Polish officer from the HQ of 27th Infantry Division, which suggests that there were some incidents of this type. But this officer explicitly writes that those crimes were not commited by regular units of the Polish army, but rather by semi-regular ON or civilian self-defence:
Translation:
"(...) [describing events on 5 September] After installing main headquarters in grange Żółwin, I looked in farm buildings. In the barn a mass, maybe more than 100, women and children, of German nationality. They had deadly pale faces, they were hungry. I asked, what were they doing there. It turned out, that bandits were conducting their own policy and revenge. On our way there we indeed had seen numerous dead bodies. Those locked people were to be burned. Sudden appearance of our units scared away the vagabonds. I immediately ordered those people to go back to their homes. There were more of such cases of lawlessness. This was done by cowards, who did not belong to units fighting at the frontline, and used their own discretion in lynching. I will not say, that those were volunteers from National Defence [ON] battalions, but already in the POW camp in Skierniewice I saw scenes, when civilians recognized individuals, who had commited extrajudicial executions. (...)"
- fragment from memoirs of Lt.Col. Stanisław Bobrowski, Chief of Staff of 27. Infantry Division.
As you can see from this account, Polish soldiers of 27. Infantry Division actually saved the lifes of those German civilians.
On the other hand, Bobrowski's account is based on testimony of those 100 Germans whom he personally found in that barn.
So Bobrowski basically believed what those Germans told him - without investigating whether that was true or not.
It means, that those Germans could be lying when claiming that they were hiding there from "bandits".
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BTW - already on previous pages of this thread I admitted, that apart from executions of "confirmed saboteurs" sentenced by martial courts, there were also some cases of extrajudical executions of "alleged saboteurs". And in this excerpt above, Bobrowski says the same thing.
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Grange Żółwin was located at 53°4'1"N 18°7'15"E - to the south-east of Bydgoszcz:
Someone said something bad about Poland! Good thing Domen is here to inform us about how Poland totally invented space travel and civil rights, and anything else is a Nazi/ Communist/ Jewish lie.
There were indeed localised massacres and killings of Germans in Poland, many of them in reaction to the German invasion. I am unsure of the truth of the Bromberg Massacre; I checked, and Richard J. Evans doesn't mention it in his The Third Reich trilogy, but he may not have bothered since it was a Polish event. He also is far from an expert on anything except Germany; his comments about Stalin are very incorrect, for example.
Regardless, while there were several incidents involving the murder and mistreatment of ethnic Germans by the Poles, the majority of the incidents were manufactured or exaggerated by the Nazis, both before and after their invasion of Poland.
Someone said something bad about Poland! Good thing Domen is here to inform us about how Poland totally invented space travel and civil rights, and anything else is a Nazi/ Communist/ Jewish lie.
There were indeed localised massacres and killings of Germans in Poland, many of them in reaction to the German invasion. I am unsure of the truth of the Bromberg Massacre...
Regardless, while there were several incidents involving the murder and mistreatment of ethnic Germans by the Poles, the majority of the incidents were manufactured or exaggerated by the Nazis, both before and after their invasion of Poland.
My thoughts exactly. Poland didn't actively persecute or massacre ethnic Germans, not that this inconvenient fact was an obstacle to the Nazis. Unfortunately, because this is favorable to Poland we'll never hear the end of it...
The Polish Bolsheviks kill 58,000 German Nationals in the Danzig corridor In the months leading up to the German invasion the Polish Army and independent Bolshevik units had been slaughtering German nationals in the Danzig corridor. Mass killings of thousands of civilian ethnic Germans (Volksdeutsche) by both civilian and Russian NDVK Jews, who were confident that Poland would quickly defeat Germany. Many apparently expected to take possession of German farms and businesses. An estimated 58,000 German civilians lost their lives in the massacres carried out prior to the 1939 invasion.
I dunno about you guys but this likes neo-Nazi propaganda to me? Oh, wait it is. The Vanguard News Network is a white supremacist organization run by noted Neo-Nazi and hate monger Alex Linder.
EDIT: Damn, that was some good sarcasm.
Kaiserguard said:
Actually, it was. The Congo genocide was arguably the worst excess of colonial rule of all of modern history.
It all seems like pretty normal colonial stuff. The only difference being the scale. The Brits in Kenya did fun stuff with bayonets, ears and string - up to and including amputation prior to execution.
Interestingly - and shockingly - a few decades before the German invasion, Leopold II did commit one of the worst atrocities ever known to human history. He had 30 million Congolese killed, primarily by having the force publique amputate their limbs. Had Germany invaded Belgium at the time, nobody would have given a damn, given that Belgium was near-universally loathed because of this. It was a many fold times worse than the Armenian genocide or the rape of Belgium, and certainly comparable to the Holocaust and the Stalinist massacres.
More conservative estimates are usually beginning at 10 million, as this source mentions.
Note that the Holocaust is not necessarily exclusively about the Nazi genocide of Jews (which is 7 million) but also gays, political prisoners, Soviet POW's, Poles and Russians. If you count them, the tally would become 20+ million. Though that was all in a time span of 5 years, while the Congo genocide lasted at least a decade.
That's probably at the upper margins of the estimates but its not unreasonable. Basically, a lot of Congolese people died as a result of outright murder while a hell of a lot more people died as a result of complete societal collapse as lots of working age people were enslaved and whole populations were forced to flee from slavers with disease and famine doing most of the damage. There's firsthand accounts of whole towns with just old people left.
That's probably at the upper margins of the estimates but its not unreasonable. Basically, a lot of Congolese people died as a result of outright murder while a hell of a lot more people died as a result of complete societal collapse as lots of working age people were enslaved and whole populations were forced to flee from slavers with disease and famine doing most of the damage. There's firsthand accounts of whole towns with just old people left.
Someone said something bad about Poland! Good thing (...) Poland totally invented space travel and civil rights, and anything else is a Nazi/ Communist/ Jewish lie. (...) I checked, and Richard J. Evans doesn't mention it in his The Third Reich trilogy, but he may not have bothered since it was a Polish event. He also is far from an expert on anything except Germany; his comments about Stalin are very incorrect, for example.
Yeah, pretty much. The lower estimates are based simply take the estimated population before the fun really started and compare it to the population after the fun was stopped. That produces a decline of about a third. But if you adjust it for natural increase i.e. the number of births less deaths between the periods you end up with the half. The high estimates use the same adjusted methodology but argue that that the methods used to derive the base population estimate (the one before the genocide) significantly understated the size of the population. That's not unreasonable, given that the Census undercounts among remote disadvantaged groups in contemporary first world countries can be pretty large (in the order of 10-15%) (Source: bitter experience). Obviously, in poorer states with weaker institutions where the population is actively hostile to the government and the Census determines tax allocations (via poll taxes, usually levied at the district level) the Census undercounts... can be very large. As an example, colonial records often understated populations in South-East Asia by as much as a half and sometimes more. As a result, it was fairly common to arbitrarily revise the counts up to account for this. The trick was figuring out how much evasion was going on. Because if the count was too high, the taxation burden might fall too heavily and cause problems and if it was to low the colonials wouldn't have enough to cover important stuff like their wages.
Yeah, pretty much. The lower estimates are based simply take the estimated population before the fun really started and compare it to the population after the fun was stopped. That produces a decline of about a third. But if you adjust it for natural increase i.e. the number of births less deaths between the periods you end up with the half. The high estimates use the same adjusted methodology but argue that that the methods used to derive the base population estimate (the one before the genocide) significantly understated the size of the population. That's not unreasonable, given that the Census undercounts among remote disadvantaged groups in contemporary first world countries can be pretty large (in the order of 10-15%) (Source: bitter experience). Obviously, in poorer states with weaker institutions where the population is actively hostile to the government and the Census determines tax allocations (via poll taxes, usually levied at the district level) the Census undercounts... can be very large. As an example, colonial records often understated populations in South-East Asia by as much as a half and sometimes more. As a result, it was fairly common to arbitrarily revise the counts up to account for this. The trick was figuring out how much evasion was going on. Because if the count was too high, the taxation burden might fall too heavily and cause problems and if it was to low the colonials wouldn't have enough to cover important stuff like their wages.
I am unsure of the truth of the Bromberg Massacre; I checked, and Richard J. Evans doesn't mention it in his The Third Reich trilogy, but he may not have bothered since it was a Polish event. He also is far from an expert on anything except Germany; his comments about Stalin are very incorrect, for example.
I am astonished how cheerfully and shamelessly you have just admitted ignorance of western historians. A historian who wrote a book about the III Reich without having reliable knowledge about Stalin and about Polish 20th century history - this can be the case only in ignoramus "wild west" world.
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Regarding the events in Bydgoszcz (Bromberg) and its vincinity.
Several up to date reports of Polish military units:
Situational report No 4 of the chef of staff of Army "Pomorze" (Col. Dipl. Dr. Ignacy Izdebski) to the chef of Staff of the Commander in Chief (marschall Rydz-Śmigły) from the early morning (6:00 AM) on 3 September 1939:
"Sending communication officers [to Bydgoszcz ?] gives no results because of activity of numerous sabotage bands"
Communicate No 4 of the chef of staff of Army "Pomorze" from 03.09.1939, 8:30 AM:
"German organizations form sabotage bands, which in every opportunity attack our units, supply columns and destroy communications [...] On 2 IX 39 in the afternoon hours between localities Stawki and Rozanna (road Chełmno - Kosowo - Rozanna) a sabotage band destroyed around 40 cars with ammunition. In the locality Łęgnowo (east from Bydgoszcz) a band fired at transports of 13. Inf.Div., in the region of Chełmża fire fights against saboteurs during night".
Communicate No 6 from 3 September (18:00 PM) sent by Col. Izdebski to the High Command of the Polish army:
"In Bydgoszcz during combats on the bridgehead massive acts of sabotage from the German side took place [...]. Sabotage acts: apart from already reported sabotage acts in Bydgoszcz, sabotage acts against telephone and telegraph lines were reported. In Toruń a German civilian threw a hand grenade - he was killed by a passing soldier."
Report of the commander of Army „Pomorze”, Gen. Władysław Bortnowski, to the chef of Staff of the Commander in Chief, Gen. Wacław Stachiewicz about dramatic situation in Bydgoszcz:
“Constant fire of German saboteurs at our rears […] whereas lynches commited on German population by soldiers together with civilian population are not possible to come over, because police is no longer present on majority of the area. Everywhere around us fires started either by bombings or by arsons, it could be noticed that Germans have been setting houses on fire in order to signal directions of further strikes [to their military units].”
Report of the chef of staff of 15th Inf.Div., Lt. Col. Dipl. Józef Drotlew from 4 September:
“The entire division (despite sabotage actions of armed population in Bydgoszcz) withdrew in the night to the south”.
Report of the commander of the company of observation balloons Cpt. Kasprzycki from 4 September:
“On 3 September during an uprising of German saboteurs in the city of Bydgoszcz elder private Juliusz Wiśniewski from the 1st company of observation balloons was wounded in his leg. He was sent to the military hospital in Bydgoszcz on 3 September.”
Quotation from the ”Prawda o Bydgoszczy” (“Truth about Bydgoszcz” – lecture published by Polish Ministry of Information and Documentation in December of 1939:
“During the night from 2nd to 3rd of September from the entire frontline [of Army “Pomorze”?] reports saying about participation in combats of civilian Germans, who were attacking Polish units and conducting various acts of sabotage, started to pour in. Only these reports caused the decision of the command of the front to execute saboteurs caught with arms or red-handed without trials. The frontline was 25 kilometres from Bydgoszcz. On 3 September the threat of being captured hung over Bydgoszcz. Germans from Bydgoszcz immediately started an action aiming at causing panic, which achieved temporary results. Army and police received then an order to kill saboteurs caught with arms or red-handed and to bring to field courts those Germans, participation of whom in sabotage was not fully evidenced. Intensity of fire in the entire city was very big. Saboteurs were openly fireing from windows, Polish soldiers were fighting fire with fire, capturing flats occupied by saboteurs in heavy combats. In the afternoon on 3 September 1939 officers, who were conducting regular combat against saboteurs, as well as police authorities gave reports, which were saying about killing around 160 saboteurs caught with arms. The most characteristic detail is the fact that out of these 160 killed saboteurs, only 10 were identified as inhabitants of Bydgoszcz. The others were unknown. […] Police reports were saying about capturing several MGs of German system from saboteurs, identical to these used by the German army. From the above it appears, that on 3 September firm and severe pacification of an organized, directed from outside German sabotage took place. At the same time no any acts of murdering innocent Polish citizens – Germans – took place; not even mentioning cases of killing German women and children.”
Lucy Beaker-Bill, “The agony of Poland. An English eyewitness”, 6 March 1940:
(translation of the Polish version of her account quoted by Tomasz Chincinski in his book):
“Germans from Bydgoszcz […] were thinking that German forces would reach the city almost immediately after crossing the border. They were supported by many armed men, which crossed the border during the days preceeding the invasion, especially from Danzig. There were many criminalists among them. At the beginning shots from German houses were fired and several Poles were killed or wounded. Many times when I was walking along the street, I could hear whistling bullets. There were no Polish units in the city. Polish army withdrew towards the line Torun – Poznan, leaving only sentry units and artillery, to repulse the German attacks. On 3 September these units started to withdraw through Bydgoszcz. Around midday the last group marched across the streets. Local Germans were thinking that German units were yet very close to the city, and they opened fire to the Polish army. Regular salvos could be heard from big German houses along the main street […] Several artillery missiles were directed towards the Polish Straz Obywatelska. Most of policemen were mobilized. Instead of regular army, they were entering houses, arresting people who were shooting and immediately executing them. Similar events took place in other parts of the city. German butcher and his wife were arrested with rifles and ammunition on the tower of the Jesuit church, from which they were fireing. In total around 200 armed Germans were arrested and executed, but this was not murdering innocent people. This happened later, when Germans entered the city. Fire lasted for the next two days. I could personally see a Polish supervisor, who was shot in his head, and a man from the Red Cross, who was passing away because of wound caused by a hand grenade.”
And if it comes to German documents – they confirm existence of at least few sabotage organizations in Bydgoszcz. For example documents of Breslau Abwehra confirm existence of Kampf-Organisation “Kleiss” in Bydgoszcz yet since the end of June 1939. This organization numbered some 150 members and was commanded by a man of the same surname (Kleiss). It was subordinated to the K-Organisation Posen which numbered in total 2077 saboteurs. This information is confirmed by BA-MA, OKW – Amt Ausland/Abwehr (OKW/Amt Ausl/Abw), RW 5/147 (dated 30 VI 1939). Since August of 1939 also the sabotage group (Kampf-Organisation) under command of Otto Meister existed in the nearbyhood of Bydgoszcz (it numbered 10 members). From the report of general Erwin Lahousen written on 18.09.1939 (BA-MA, RW 5/168) we know that German sabotage organizations (K-Organisationen and S-Organisationen) suffered heavy casualties in Bydgoszcz on 03.09.1939. In this document Gen. Erwin Lahousen orders officials of II Unit of Abwehra and plenipotentiaries of OKW to organize medical care for saboteurs WIA in Bydgoszcz and material help for families of those saboteurs who were KIA in Bydgoszcz on 03.09.1939. This document also mentions the OKW plenipotentiary which was organizing help for saboteurs and their families in Bydgoszcz - his surname was Girschner.
It is very probable (although not yet fully confirmed) that German sabotage in Bydgoszcz was part of a bigger sabotage operation codename “UnternehmenTannenberg”. There was an operation codename “Sonderaktion Tannenberg”, which was part of “Unternehmen Tannenberg”. According to Brigadefuhrer-SS Heinz Jost „Sonderaktion Tannenberg” caused heavy casualties to „Volksdeutsche used during this action”. According to Oberfuhrer-SS Rasch „Sonderaktion Tannenberg” was carried out mainly by the region SD Danzig (other sources – including Polish – also confirm participation of saboteurs from Gdansk in combats in Bydgoszcz on 3 IX). G. Schubert writes more about it.
Most probably also members of SS participated in sabotage in Bydgoszcz – two leaders of the German minority in Bydgoszcz, Hans Kohnert (chef of the local Deutsche Vereinigung) and Gero von Gersdorf (Kohnert’s deputy) were promoted to Oberfuhrer-SS (Kohnert) and Sturmbannfuhrer-SS (Gersdorf) soon after the Polish Campaign, on 13.11.1939. Their promotion was for “special achievements […] in combat of national groups against Poland” and was the result of recommendation by Obergruppenfuhrer-SS Werner Lorenz, chef of Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle (VOMI). German sources (BA, Personal records of Hansjochen Kubitz Sturmbannfuhrer-SS, SSO 223-A) confirm that this organization (VOMI) was directing “operations of groups of German minority in combat against nations of hostile states and by such actions it helped the Wehrmacht very much” during the WW2, both in Poland and Yugoslavia.
Also one of Polish Army officers in his accounts from 1940 (in London) said, that German saboteurs arrested in Bydgoszcz on 03.09.1939 told him during investigations, that Gersdorf was the leader of German sabotage in Bydgoszcz (source: The German Fifth Column in Poland, [London 1940], p. 83, account No 4 of Major J. Z.).
Soldiers of 116 Allgemeine SS Regiment (which was created in Bydgoszcz and was stationing there until the end of October 1939) were recruited from former members of Selbschutz Westpreussen, which formally started its activity after Wehrmacht entered Bydgoszcz (which took place on 05.09.1939). But personal records of soldiers of 6 company from this 116 SS regiment say that 03.09.1939 was the first day of service in Selbschutz of members of this company.
This is confirmed by BA, SS – Unterführer und Mannschaften Verzeichnis der Mikrofilme, SM I0014.
Also Willy Kamenz reveals some very interesting detailes and surnames connected with sabotage in the nearbyhood of Bydgoszcz (including the town of Naklo) - this is described in detail by Tomasz Chincinski in his book.
There was also another sabotage organization - Sabotage-Organisationen Gruppe 12 – subordinated to Breslau Abwehr, task of which was to “knock out” the power plant in Bydgoszcz and destroy telephone / telegraph lines between Inowroclaw and Toru. Polish reports confirm destroying telephone and telepgraph lines in this area by saboteurs. However, Polish sources do not confirm any attempts of knocking out the power plant in Bydgoszcz.
Let's also underline, that Polish self-defence was acting in accordance with the international law, while German civilian rebels were not:
From the IPN (Polish Institute of National Remembrance) bulettin No 12-1:
"Lawful situation:
The starting point of the lawful reflection is the Hague Convention from 1907, which defines the rules of conducting a ground war. According to this convention the fighting side, so the side which has the combatant rights, is also civilian population of an unoccupied territory, which spontaneously puts up resistance, to oppose the enemy invasion, and doesn't have enough time to organize itself into an army, which means: to provide equal uniforms and operate under one, uniform command. Polish civilian population of Bydgoszcz, carrying out executions on Germans or participating in them, had got status of a fighting side, which means that the victorious side couldn't punish members of a fighting side for killings commited during combat. The status of Prisoners of War belonged to all inhabitants of Bydgoszcz who went to arms on 03.09.1939 and 04.09.1939. Prisoners of War cannot be judged for killings commited on those who were considered by them as enemies, participants and members of German sabotage. It allows to say, that on 03.09.1939 and 04.09.1939 Polish population of Bydgoszcz acted in accordance with the Hague Convention about conditions of conducting ground warfare, it had got status of a fighting side and spontaneously going to arms in the face of danger caused by the approaching Wehrmacht, was entitled to identical protection as Prisoners of War.
Some Polish citizens of German nationality, including inhabitants of Bydgoszcz - reports of Polish units which were found by us in military archives confirm this - took part in sabotage operations against Poles, especially against Polish army. That's why actions of civilian inhabitants of Bydgoszcz, legitimized by the Hague Convention, were in agreement with the international law. Executions of Germans were carried out as part of the anti-sabotage actions and were carried out not because they were Germans, but because they were suspected for cooperation in sabotage actions against the Polish army. This suspicion was justified also by what had previously oozed out of Bydgoszcz to the Main Office of Reich Safety and what later enabled the Germans preparing the list of Poles designated to be executed.
Under such circumstances there are no grounds to start an investigation by the IPN prosecutor.
During our previous investigations we established, that before the German Invasion of Poland in Bydgoszcz and in the entire Pomorskie Voivodeship such conditions were created, in which organizational structures of Selbschutz could start their activity since the beginning of the invasion. Members of this organization, as they described their own tasks, were to prevent attacks on German population by Polish population and Polish military forces. But in reality since the beginning of its existence until December of 1939 Selbschutz was acting in a genocidal way, organizing commandos, which were carrying out massive executions of Poles as part of the action aiming at extermination of Polish intelligence and command classes in Pomerelia - code name "Undertaking Firtree Mountain", operation worked out in the Main Office of Reich Safety by Werner Best. We know that those name lists [of Poles determined for extermination] were prepared by doctor Emil von Augsburg, after the end of the Second World War important functionary of western German secret service - Gehlen's Institute - employed there as a specialist of Polish matters.
[...]
The turning point of the German historiography concerning the first days of WW2 in Bydgoszcz is the book of Gunther Schubert, "Das Unternehmen Bromberger Bluttsontag. Tod einer Legende" Author - educated historian - contrary to German opinions proves that an "uprising" prepared by saboteurs from the III Reich took place in Bydgoszcz."
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However, I have read that Nazi Germany did not recognize these provisions of the Hague Convention.
I.e. according to Nazi Germany's internal law, civilian population resisting German invasions, were simple bandits, not combatants. That was against international law, but was in accordance with internal law of Nazi Germany (just like persecuting Jews was in accordance with internal law of Nazi Germany).
They were justified according to their own state law - but such line of defence did not succeed during the Nuremberg Trials.
A noted scholar of the Third Reich doesn't know every little detail about Poland or the Soviet Union.
More like "the" noted scholar of the Third Reich. Evans is likely the single most respected historian of Germany from its unification to the 1950s in the entire world.
We should probably just ignore Domen from here on out. I mean in every thread. Even Domen can't post to himself infinitely.
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!!!):
– lecture published by Polish Ministry of Information and Documentation in December of 1939:
