September 1939. World War II began. Regular military operations against the aggression of the two invaders, in the absence of a military response from Western allies, were doomed to failure for Poland. Appropriate measures had to be taken to create an appropriate underground structure in the occupied state. This is how the Polish Underground State was created. It was necessary to create within it appropriate structures responsible, above all, for the fight against the occupation. We present the most important information about them, what was the genesis of their creation, what their activities looked like, and related interesting facts.
Even during the September campaign, it was realized that before the help from the Western allies could come, it would be necessary to undertake the underground activity. As we know, in 1939 no military help from the West came. Therefore, it turned out to be all the more important to create the structures of the future underground state. On the night of September 26-27, at the request of General Michał Karaszewicz-Tokarzewski, the Service for Poland's Victory was established. In this case, he obtained a power of attorney from Marshal Edward Rydz-Śmigły. Already in the first few months, about 20,000 people joined the SZP.
Another organization, established this time on the initiative of General Władysław Sikorski, was the Union for Armed Struggle, which was largely based on the structures of the Polish Armed Forces. The first commander of the ZWZ was General Kazimierz Sasnowski. Commanders of the German and Soviet occupation were also appointed, the first was General Stefan "Grot" Rowecki, and the second was the already mentioned General Michał Karaszewicz-Tokarzewski.
In 1942, the ZWZ was transformed into the Home Army, which, as a military division of the Polish Underground State, assumed the main burden of the fight against the occupant. The first commandant of the Home Army, Stefan Rowecki, was arrested in June 1943 and murdered in prison by the Germans in August 1944. He was succeeded by Tadeusz Komorowski "Bór". The last commander of the Home Army was Leopold Okulicki "Niedźwiadek", it was he who, on January 19, 1945, issued an order under which the Home Army was disbanded.
At the same time, civilian structures were also to be established. The Committee for the Country Affairs, established in exile, participated in this. It is true that in the spring of 1940, a Political Co-ordinating Committee was organized at the AGM, but the Committee for the Country Affairs decided to create the function of the Government Delegate for the country. In December 1940, the Prime Minister of the Polish government-in-exile appointed the first government plenipotentiary for the country, the aim of which was to build civil state administration. The first, Temporary Government Delegate, sent from France, was Jan Skrobohaty-Jakubowski. After him, the function of the Delegate was held by three more people, associated with various political parties still existing in underground Poland.
Important people in the history of the state
- Cyryl Ratajski- Labor Party- end of 1940 - August 5, 1942
- Jan Piekałkiewicz- People's Party- to be arrested by the Gestapo on February 19, 1943, murdered by the Germans in prison
- Jan Stanisław Jankowski - Labor Party - until arrested by the NKVD in March 1945
- Stefan Korboński (acting) - People's Party - from April 1945
- Jerzy Braun - Labor Party - from 27 June until the suspension of PPP activities
Source: J. Sawicki, How the foundations of the Polish Underground State were built, "Information Bulletin", No. 10/2020, p. 5; B. Otwinowska, Prisoner - Jerzy Braun, "Independence and Memory", No. 1/1997, p. 288; Polish Underground State, https://edukacja.ipn.gov.pl/download/210/376434/wystawaPPP1219m2.pdf, accessed: 29/09/2021, p. 6.
As part of the structures of civil administration in occupied Poland, departments dealing with matters for which individual ministries were responsible before the war began to operate, i.e. the ministries of "Internal Affairs, Treasury, Justice, Education and Culture, Agriculture, Industry and Trade, Labor and Social Welfare, Communication, Posts and Telegraphs, as well as those related to the needs resulting from the war - Liquidation of the Effects of War, Reconstruction and Public Works, as well as Press and Information ”(Sawicki, p. 5). It was also foreseen that Poland could regain its western territories, which was manifested in the establishment of the New Lands Office.
There were even organs that could be compared to the Parliament within the Polish Underground State. In February 1940, the Political Coordinating Committee was created. It was composed of representatives of the most important political parties and the commander of the ZWZ. The Committee operated in this form until the spring of 1943 when it was transformed into the National Political Representation, which in turn was transformed into the Council of National Unity in January.
It is worth stopping by for its activities. On March 15, 1944, it made a declaration of what the Polish nation is fighting for. The main goal, of course, was to rebuild sovereign Poland. During the Warsaw Uprising, an Appeal was sent to the Polish Nation. Politically, an alliance with the USA, Great Britain, and France was assumed, as well as friendly relations with the USSR, as long as it acknowledged the Polish borders established at the time of the conclusion of the Riga pact. Germany was expected to include East Prussia, Opole Silesia, and part of Pomerania in Poland as compensation for the war. On July 1, 1945, the Council issued a Manifesto to the Polish Nation and the United Nations. It was a kind of protest against the agreement of powers in Yalta in February 1945 and its consequences for Poland at the end of World War II (Szubarczyk, pp. II-III).
An important part of the activity of the broadly understood resistance movement was the civil fight. In this context, at some stage in the Polish underground, there were two headquarters: the Civil Struggle Management, which was subordinate to the Government Delegate for the country, and the Conspiratorial Struggle Management operating within the Home Army Headquarters. Later, both of these structures were combined and the Directorate of Underground Struggle was created. In May 1942, with an appropriate appeal of the KWC, civil combat orders were specified, which at the same time defined the limits of submission to the occupant (Hull, p. 20). The activities supervised by the KWC concerned various possibilities of non-military resistance by the society, e.g. sabotages in workplaces or persuading people to boycott the recommendations issued by the Germans.
An important part of the fight against the invader was also the propaganda fight. Characteristic of that time was the famous anchors of Fighting Poland, painted in various places (see photo). It was part of the so-called small sabotage, also subject to KWC, carried out mainly by Wawer. Other manifestations of it were hanging white and red flags on the occasion of national holidays, painting Polish white eagles, tearing off German posters and announcements, putting up leaflets, or placing in various places inscriptions such as "Poland is fighting" or calls such as "work slowly" and discrediting analogous German inscriptions. In this context, you can also come across numerous curiosities.
The propaganda activity carried out with the use of various publishing houses in the Polish Underground State was extremely extensive. During the occupation, about 1,400 magazines were published throughout Poland, 325 of which in print. In May 1940, the rules of behavior towards the occupiers were published in the press body "Polska Żyje", it was necessary to: use the Polish language, not to facilitate the activities of the Germans in any way, including through work, to boycott German publications and advertisements, not to place bilingual signs, not to undertake occupiers in their homes and not to summon them to settle disputes between Poles (Sawicki, p. 7). Action N, the aim of which was to conduct propaganda activities against the Germans, cannot be omitted either. As part of it, propaganda magazines in Germany were printed, impersonating the publications of the anti-Nazi opposition. According to Jacek Sawicki, examples of such magazines were "Der Soldat" and "Der Hammer".
As Jacek Sawicki writes about it, thanks to the attitude and approach of the population to the structures of the Underground State, it was even possible to create educational structures and an underground judiciary. Having a peculiar administration of justice within the Polish Underground State was of great importance because, apart from the occupation, a major problem for Polish society was the growing level of crime. The legal basis for the enforcement of the law was the Penal Code of 1932, as were the regulations issued during the occupation years, e.g. those of May 1940.
Importantly, even the death penalty was envisaged for "treason, espionage, provocation, denunciation, persecution, and harm to the Polish population" (Szyprowski, pp. 2-3). The judgment was initially dealt with by the ZWZ Hood Courts, established on April 16, 1940, and later by the Special Military Courts operating at the Home Army Headquarters and district headquarters.
Bibliography:
- W. Grabowski, Polish Underground State - civil aspects (in :) K. Persak, P. Machewicz (ed.), Polish 20th century: World War II, Bellona, Warsaw 2010.
- E. Hull, Citizen, Soldier, Partisan - Aspects of Underground Statehood 1939 - 1945, "Legal Studies", No. 11/2010.
- J. Sawicki, How the foundations of the Polish Underground State were built, "Information Bulletin", No. 10/2020.
- B. Szyprowski, Legal basis and operation of the judiciary of the Main Headquarters of the ZWZ / AK, "Wojskowy Przegląd Prawniczy", No. 3/2012.
- B. Otwinowska, Prisoner - Jerzy Braun, "Independence and Memory", No. 1/1997.
- Polish Underground State, https://edukacja.ipn.gov.pl/download/210/376434/wystawaPPP1219m2.pdf, accessed: 29/09/2021.
- P. Szubarczyk, Phenomenon of PPP, "Historical Supplement of the Institute of National Remembrance", No. 7/2007.
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