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Józef Kuraś
Józef Kuraś (23 October 1915 – 22 February 1947), noms-de-guerre "Orzeł" (Eagle) and from June 1943 "Ogień" (Fire), was born in Waksmund near Nowy Targ. He served as lieutenant in the Polish Army during the invasion of Poland, and became the underground member of Armia Krajowa and Bataliony Chłopskie in the Podhale region. Soon after the end of World War II, he was one of the leaders of the so-called "cursed soldiers". Kuraś died in Nowy Targ on 22 February 1947 after attempting suicide, having been ambushed at Ostrowsko by units of the Polish secret police. A controversial historical figure, he has been accused of antisemitism and committing war crimes by multiple groups and organisations, including those representing Jewish and Slovak communities in Poland, and by scholars like Jan T. Gross. In 2006, the Polish president Lech Kaczyński opened an official memorial in Zakopane, in recognition of his resistance efforts. Early life Józef Kuraś was born in a Goral ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Waksmund
Waksmund is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Nowy Targ, within Nowy Targ County, Lesser Poland Voivodeship, in southern Poland. It lies approximately east of Nowy Targ and south of the regional capital Kraków. The village has a population of 2,439. History The current village was settled by German immigrants under Magdeburg Law in the years 1334-1338. Previously, a village under the name Wilcze Pole or ''Wolf's Field'' existed. During the Battle of Grunwald in 1410 the village became famous for sending five armed men to fight on the side of King Władysław II Jagiełło for which the village received land in the nearby Tatra Mountains - Hala Waksmundzka (Meadow of Waksmund) and Dolina Waksmundzka (Valley of Waksmund) near Morskie Oko. During the Second World War, on June 29, 1943 the village was the site of one of the worst massacres carried out by the Nazi occupiers in the Podhale region, after the break-up of the Tatra Confederation revealed that many me ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lech Kaczyński
Lech Aleksander Kaczyński (; 18 June 194910 April 2010) was a Polish politician who served as the city mayor of Warsaw from 2002 until 2005, and as President of Poland from 2005 until his death in 2010. Before his tenure as president, he previously served as President of the Supreme Audit Office from 1992 to 1995 and later Minister of Justice and Public Prosecutor General in Jerzy Buzek's cabinet from 2000 until his dismissal in July 2001. Born in Warsaw, he starred in a 1962 Polish film, '' The Two Who Stole the Moon'', with his identical twin brother Jarosław. Kaczyński was a graduate of law and administration of Warsaw University. In 1980, he was awarded his Ph.D. by Gdańsk University. In 1990, he completed his habilitation in labour and employment law. He later assumed professorial positions at Gdańsk University and Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw. During the communist period, Kaczyński was an activist in the pro-democratic anti-communist moveme ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Milicja Obywatelska
Milicja Obywatelska (), in English known as the Citizens' Militia and commonly abbreviated to MO, was the national police organization of the Polish People's Republic. It was established on 7 October 1944 by the Polish Committee of National Liberation, effectively replacing the pre-war police force. The Citizen's Militia would remain the predominant means of policing in Poland until 10 May 1990, when it was transformed back into ''Policja''. The term ''milicja'' had been adapted from the cognate term, ''militsiya'', used in several communist countries. The term is derived from ''militia'', which derives its etymology from the concept of a military force composed of ordinary citizens. In most cases it represented a state-controlled force used to exert political repression, especially with its elite ZOMO squads. Under both communist and post-communist governments, the Polish police system has traditionally operated under the auspices of national authority. Starting at the end of Wor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Polish Committee Of National Liberation
The Polish Committee of National Liberation (Polish: ''Polski Komitet Wyzwolenia Narodowego'', ''PKWN''), also known as the Lublin Committee, was an executive governing authority established by the Soviet-backed communists in Poland at the later stage of World War II.. It was officially proclaimed on 22 July 1944 in Chełm, installed on 26 July in Lublin and placed formally under the direction of the State National Council (''Krajowa Rada Narodowa'', KRN). The PKWN was a provisional entity functioning in opposition to the London-based Polish government-in-exile, which was recognized by the Western allies.. The PKWN exercised control over Polish territory retaken from Nazi Germany by the Soviet Red Army and the Polish People's Army. It was sponsored and controlled by the Soviet Union and dominated by Polish communists. Formation At the time of the formation of the PKWN, the principal Polish authority in German-occupied Poland was the Polish Underground State network of orga ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Małopolska
Lesser Poland, often known by its Polish name Małopolska ( la, Polonia Minor), is a historical region situated in southern and south-eastern Poland. Its capital and largest city is Kraków. Throughout centuries, Lesser Poland developed a separate culture featuring diverse architecture, folk costumes, dances, cuisine, traditions and a rare Lesser Polish dialect. The region is rich in historical landmarks, monuments, castles, natural scenery and UNESCO World Heritage Sites. The region should not be confused with the modern Lesser Poland Voivodeship, which covers only the southwestern part of Lesser Poland. Historical Lesser Poland was much larger than the current voivodeship that bears its name. It reached from Bielsko-Biała in the southwest as far as to Siedlce in the northeast. It consisted of the three voivodeships of Kraków, Sandomierz and Lublin. It comprised almost 60,000 km2 in area; today's population in this area is about 9,000,000 inhabitants. Its landscape ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Isaac Gutman
Isaac; grc, Ἰσαάκ, Isaák; ar, إسحٰق/إسحاق, Isḥāq; am, ይስሐቅ is one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites and an important figure in the Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. He was the son of Abraham and Sarah, the father of Jacob and Esau, and the grandfather of the twelve tribes of Israel. Isaac's name means "he will laugh", reflecting the laughter, in disbelief, of Abraham and Sarah, when told by God that they would have a child., He is the only patriarch whose name was not changed, and the only one who did not move out of Canaan. According to the narrative, he died aged 180, the longest-lived of the three patriarchs. Etymology The anglicized name "Isaac" is a transliteration of the Hebrew name () which literally means "He laughs/will laugh." Ugaritic texts dating from the 13th century BCE refer to the benevolent smile of the Canaanite deity El. Genesis, however, ascribes the laughter to Isaac's parents, Abra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Armia Ludowa
People's Army (Polish: ''Armia Ludowa'' , abbriv.: AL) was a communist Soviet-backed partisan force set up by the communist Polish Workers' Party ('PR) during World War II. It was created on the order of the Polish State National Council on 1 January 1944. Its aims were to fight against Nazi Germany in occupied Poland, support the Soviet Red Army against the German forces and aid in the creation of a pro-Soviet communist government in Poland. Along with the National Armed Forces, it was one of the military resistance organizations that refused to join the structures of the Polish Underground State or its military arm, the Home Army. The People's Army was much smaller than the Home Army, but propaganda in communist Poland espoused the myth that the reverse was the case. Due to their close affiliation with the Soviet Union, which de facto controlled Armia Ludowa and its predecessors, Armia Ludowa can be seen as both a part of the Polish resistance as well as the Soviet partisa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Volksdeutsche
In Nazi German terminology, ''Volksdeutsche'' () were "people whose language and culture had German origins but who did not hold German citizenship". The term is the nominalised plural of '' volksdeutsch'', with ''Volksdeutsche'' denoting a singular female, and ''Volksdeutsche(r)'', a singular male. The words ''Volk'' and '' völkisch'' conveyed the meanings of "folk". The Volksdeutsche (ethnic Germans at the time) shed their identity as Auslandsdeutsche (Germans abroad) and morphed into the Volksdeutsche in a process of self-radicalisation. This process gave the Nazi regime the nucleus around which the new Volksgemeinschaft was established across the German borders. ''Volksdeutsche'' were further divided into "racial" groups—minorities within a state minority—based on special cultural, social, and historic criteria elaborated by the Nazis. Origin of the term According to the historian Doris Bergen, Adolf Hitler coined the definition of ''Volksdeutsche'' which appeared in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
People's Party (Poland)
The People's Party (''Stronnictwo Ludowe'', SL) was a Polish political party, active from 1931 in the Second Polish Republic. An agrarian populist party, its power base was mostly farmers and rural population. In 1931 it was created from the merger of three other, smaller, peasant-based parties: centre-right Polish People's Party "Piast" (PSL "Piast"), centre-left Polish People's Party "Wyzwolenie" (PSLW) and left wing Stronnictwo Chłopskie (SCh). During the Second World War it was known as 'Stronnictwo Ludowe Roch' and its military arm, Bataliony Chłopskie, was part of the Polish resistance movement in World War II. After the end of the war, the People's Party under the leadership of Wincenty Witos decided to support Stanisław Mikołajczyk. However at the same time Polish communists named one of their proxy parties , and the old People's Party, now loyal to Mikołajczyk, changed its name into Polish People's Party (PSL). After Mikołajczyk's defeat in the rigged 1947 Polish ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tatra Confederation
The Tatra Confederation ( pl, Konfederacja Tatrzańska), or Confederation of the Tatra Mountains, was a Polish resistance organization operating in the southernmost Podhale region during the Nazi German occupation of Poland. The Tatra Confederation was founded in May 1941 in Nowy Targ – the historical capital of Podhale, by the poet and partisan, Augustyn Suski (''nom-de-guerre'' Stefan Borusa); with Tadeusz Popek as his deputy. The organization had its ideological roots in the peasant movement of the Goral Lands of interwar Poland. Wartime activities During the German occupation, the clandestine group had about 400–500 members. The main geographical area of its activity was the city of Nowy Targ itself and the village of Waksmund in the same county. At the end of summer 1941 the first combat unit of the Tatra Confederation was established, named Mountain Division (''Dywizja Górska'') led by Major Edward Gött-Getyński (''nom-de-guerre'' Sosnowiecki). The unit never b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Union Of Armed Struggle
Związek Walki Zbrojnej ( abbreviation: ''ZWZ''; Union of Armed Struggle;Thus rendered in Norman Davies, ''God's Playground: A History of Poland'', vol. II, p. 464. also translated as ''Union for Armed Struggle'', ''Association of Armed Struggle'' or ''Association for Armed Struggle'') was an underground army formed in Poland following its invasion in September 1939 by Germany and the Soviet Union that opened World War II. It existed from 13 November 1939 until 14 February 1942, when it was renamed into Home Army (''Armia Krajowa, AK''). ZWZ was created from an earlier organization, Service for Poland's Victory (''SZP''). In January 1940, it was divided into two parts: *areas under German occupation — commanded by Colonel Stefan Rowecki, headquartered in Warsaw; *areas under Soviet occupation — commanded by General Michał Karaszewicz-Tokarzewski, headquartered in Lwów. Formally, the ZWZ was directed from Paris, by General Kazimierz Sosnkowski (nom de guerre Jozef God ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Polish Armed Forces In The West
The Polish Armed Forces in the West () refers to the Polish military formations formed to fight alongside the Western Allies against Nazi Germany and its allies during World War II. Polish forces were also raised within Soviet territories; these were the Polish Armed Forces in the East. The formations, loyal to the Polish government-in-exile, were first formed in France and its Middle East territories following the defeat and occupation of Poland by Germany and the Soviet Union in September 1939. After the fall of France in June 1940, the formations were recreated in the United Kingdom. Making a large contribution to the war effort, the Polish Armed Forces in the West was composed of army, air and naval forces. The Poles soon became shock troops in Allied service, most notably in the Battle of Monte Cassino during the Italian Campaign, where the Polish flag was raised on the ruined abbey on 18 May 1944, as well as in the Battle of Bologna and the Battle of Ancona (both also i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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