Pruszków ( yi, ‏פּרושקאָוו) is a city in east-central

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

, situated in the

Masovian Voivodeship The Masovian Voivodeship, also known as the Mazovia Province ( pl, województwo mazowieckie ) is a voivodeship (province) in east-central Poland, with its capital located in the city of Warsaw, which also serves as the capital of the country. Th ...

since 1999. It was previously in Warszawa Voivodeship (1975–1998). Pruszków is the capital of

Pruszków County __NOTOC__ Pruszków County ( pl, powiat pruszkowski) is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Masovian Voivodeship, east-central Poland. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish local governme ...

, located along the western edge of the

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...

urban area. In the 1990s and 2000s the city was synonymous with the "Pruszków gang", one of two major organised crime groups in the country. Currently it is best known for being the country's cycling centre with a purpose built indoor velodrome.

History

Pruszków was incorporated as a town in 1916 during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, although the village was first mentioned in chronicles in the 15th century. Within the

Polish Crown The Crown of the Kingdom of Poland ( pl, Korona Królestwa Polskiego; Latin: ''Corona Regni Poloniae''), known also as the Polish Crown, is the common name for the historic Late Middle Ages territorial possessions of the King of Poland, incl ...

, it was a private village of Polish nobility, administratively located in the

in the Greater Poland Province. The development of the town was aided by the construction of the Warsaw-Vienna Railway in the 19th century and the construction of the Elektryczna Kolej Dojazdowa (now Warszawska Kolej Dojazdowa), Poland's first electrified commuter train line, in 1927. In the late 19th century, industry developed intensively in Pruszków. There were needles,

porcelain Porcelain () is a ceramic material made by heating substances, generally including materials such as kaolinite, in a kiln to temperatures between . The strength and translucence of porcelain, relative to other types of pottery, arises main ...

faience Faience or faïence (; ) is the general English language term for fine tin-glazed pottery. The invention of a white pottery glaze suitable for painted decoration, by the addition of an oxide of tin to the slip of a lead glaze, was a major a ...

, and

soap Soap is a salt of a fatty acid used in a variety of cleansing and lubricating products. In a domestic setting, soaps are surfactants usually used for washing, bathing, and other types of housekeeping. In industrial settings, soaps are use ...

factories in Pruszków. A large psychiatric hospital opened in the outlying village of Tworki in 1891 and is still operating to this day.Tworki is an administrative part of Pruszków today During World War I, a battle between German and

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

forces took place in Pruszków on 12–18 October 1914 (part of

Battle of the Vistula River The Battle of the Vistula River, also known as the Battle of Warsaw, was a Russian victory against the German Empire and Austria-Hungary on the Eastern Front during the First World War. Background By mid-September 1914 the Russians were dri ...

). Despite the initial success of the German forces on 12 October, they were push-backed out of town after successful Russian counter-attack on 14th. An intense artillery fire by both sides caused severe damages to many buildings in Pruszków including train station, power plant, and two churches. In August 1915 Pruszków was taken by the German forces without a fight. Within interwar Poland, it was administratively located in the Warsaw County in the Warsaw Voivodeship.

World War II

The city was occupied by Germany following the German–Soviet

invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland (1 September – 6 October 1939) was a joint attack on the Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union which marked the beginning of World War II. The German invasion began on 1 September 1939, one week aft ...

, which started

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

in September 1939. On 14 December 1939, the Germans murdered 46

Poles Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, who share a common history, culture, the Polish language and are identified with the country of Poland in C ...

from Pruszków during the large

Palmiry massacre The Palmiry massacre was a series of mass executions carried out by Nazi German forces, during World War II, near the village of Palmiry in the Kampinos Forest northwest of Warsaw. Massacres Between December 1939 and July 1941 more than 1700 ...

. Before the invasion, the city had a large Jewish population. In 1940, the German occupation authorities established a Jewish ghetto in Pruszków, in order to confine its

Jewish population As of 2020, the world's "core" Jewish population (those identifying as Jews above all else) was estimated at 15 million, 0.2% of the 8 billion worldwide population. This number rises to 18 million with the addition of the "connected" Jewish pop ...

for the purpose of persecution and exploitation. "The War Against The Jews."
''The Holocaust Chronicle,'' 2009. Chicago, Il. Accessed 21 June 2011. The ghetto was liquidated on 31 January 1941, when all its 1,400The statistical data compiled on the basis o
"Glossary of 2,077 Jewish towns in Poland"
by ''

Virtual Shtetl The Virtual Shtetl ( pl, Wirtualny Sztetl) is a bilingual Polish-English portal of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, devoted to the Jewish history of Poland. History The Virtual Shtetl website was officially launched on June ...

Museum of the History of the Polish Jews POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews ( pl, Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich) is a museum on the site of the former Warsaw Ghetto. The Hebrew word ''Polin'' in the museum's English name means either "Poland" or "rest here" and relates to a ...

, as well a
"Getta Żydowskie," by ''Gedeon''
and "Ghetto List" by Michael Peters at www.deathcamps.org/occupation/ghettolist.htm . Accessed 12 July 2011.–3,000 inhabitants were transported in cattle trucks to

Warsaw Ghetto The Warsaw Ghetto (german: Warschauer Ghetto, officially , "Jewish Residential District in Warsaw"; pl, getto warszawskie) was the largest of the Nazi ghettos during World War II and the Holocaust. It was established in November 1940 by the G ...

, the largest ghetto in all of Nazi occupied Europe with over 400,000 Jews crammed into an area of . From there, most victims were sent to

Treblinka extermination camp Treblinka () was an extermination camp, built and operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland during World War II. It was in a forest north-east of Warsaw, south of the village of Treblinka in what is now the Masovian Voivodeship. The camp ...

.Warsaw Ghetto

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) is the United States' official memorial to the Holocaust. Adjacent to the National Mall in Washington, D.C., the USHMM provides for the documentation, study, and interpretation of Holocaust hi ...

(USHMM),

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

Richard C. Lukas, ''Out of the Inferno: Poles Remember the Holocaust'', University Press of Kentucky 1989 – 201 pages. Page 13; also in Richard C. Lukas, ''The Forgotten Holocaust: The Poles Under German Occupation, 1939-1944'', University Press of Kentucky, 1986
Google Print, p.13
Gunnar S. Paulsson, "The Rescue of Jews by Non-Jews in Nazi-Occupied Poland," ''Journal of Holocaust Education'', Vol.7, Nos.1&2, 1998, pp.19-44. Published by Frank Cass, London.Edward Victor
"Ghettos and Other Jewish Communities."
''Judaica Philatelic''. Accessed 20 June 2011. During the 1944

Warsaw Uprising The Warsaw Uprising ( pl, powstanie warszawskie; german: Warschauer Aufstand) was a major World War II operation by the Polish underground resistance to liberate Warsaw from German occupation. It occurred in the summer of 1944, and it was led ...

, the Nazis created the large '' Durchgangslager 121'' (''Dulag 121'') transit camp in Pruszków on the site of the Train Repair Shops (Zakłady Naprawcze Taboru Kolejowego) to intern the evacuees expelled from

the capital ''The Capital'' (also known as ''Capital Gazette'' as its online nameplate and informally), the Sunday edition is called ''The Sunday Capital'', is a daily newspaper published by Capital Gazette Communications in Annapolis, Maryland, to serve ...

. Around 550,000 Warsaw residents and approximately 100,000 more from its outskirts were incarcerated in the camp. The SS and

Gestapo The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one orga ...

segregated the Poles, who were then either deported to forced labour in Germany, sent to

Nazi concentration camps From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany operated more than a thousand concentration camps, (officially) or (more commonly). The Nazi concentration camps are distinguished from other types of Nazi camps such as forced-labor camps, as well as con ...

, or expelled to more southern locations of German-occupied Poland. Approximately 650,000 Poles passed through the Pruszków camp in August, September and October 1944. Approximately 55,000 were sent to concentration camps, including 13,500 to Auschwitz, 12,000 to Ravensbrück and 8,700 to

Mauthausen Mauthausen was a Nazi concentration camp on a hill above the market town A market town is a settlement most common in Europe that obtained by custom or royal charter, in the Middle Ages, a market right, which allowed it to host a regu ...

. They included people from a variety of social classes and occupations (government officials, scholars, artists, physicians, merchants, and blue-collar workers), in varying physical conditions (the injured, the sick, invalids, and pregnant women), and of various ages from infants only a few weeks old to the elderly, aged 86 or more. In a few cases, these were also people of different ethnic backgrounds including Jews living on "Aryan papers."''Księga Pamięci. Transporty Polaków z Warszawy do KL Auschwitz 1940-1944''
Memorial Book: Transports of Poles from Warsaw to Auschwitz Concentration Camp 1940-1944.
Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum. On the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising. Accessed 13 July 2011. The Germans murdered several Polish Catholic monks and nuns in the camp. Following the Soviet westward offensive, on 26 March 1945, the 16 members of the Polish Underground Government were invited by the Russians for talks, to a house in Pruszków on Armii Krajowej Street. They were captured by the Soviet

NKVD The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (russian: Наро́дный комиссариа́т вну́тренних дел, Naródnyy komissariát vnútrennikh del, ), abbreviated NKVD ( ), was the interior ministry of the Soviet Union. ...

agents, transported to USSR, imprisoned, tortured and sentenced in

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 millio ...

during the so-called

Trial of the Sixteen The Trial of the Sixteen ( pl, Proces szesnastu) was a staged trial of 16 leaders of the Polish Underground State held by the Soviet authorities in Moscow in 1945. All captives were kidnapped by the NKVD secret service and falsely accused of var ...

Post-war Poland

After World War II, Pruszków became one of Masovia's largest industrial centers. Due to its proximity to Warsaw, it is now home to several factories and companies, including Herbapol,

Daewoo Electronics Winia Electronics, formerly named Daewoo Electronics, is a South Korean home appliances company and a member of South Korean Winia Group. Established in 1971, it has since grown into a global business with more than 64 production sites, research ...

, L'Oréal Cosmetics as well as logistic centers. It is also an important sports center, with a sports gymnasium, soccer stadium and a cycling course.

Crime

The most well known of the Polish organised crime groups in the 1990s was the so-called "Pruszków gang" and their arch-nemesis' the " Wołomin gang", with whom they fought bloody turf wars. Eventually the groups were finally crushed by the Polish police in cooperation with the German police in a spectacular raid on the A2 motorway between

Konin Konin (german: Kunau) is a city in central Poland, on the Warta River. It is the capital of Konin County and is located within the Greater Poland Voivodeship. Prior to 1999, it was the capital of the Konin Voivodeship (1975–1998). In 2021 the p ...

and

Poznań Poznań () is a city on the River Warta in west-central Poland, within the Greater Poland region. The city is an important cultural and business centre, and one of Poland's most populous regions with many regional customs such as Saint Joh ...

in September 2011.

Population

The town's population has grown significantly, from 16,000 in the early part of the 20th century to 60,068 in the 2014 census by the Central Statistical Office of Poland.http://stat.gov.pl/files/gfx/portalinformacyjny/pl/defaultaktualnosci/5515/3/9/1/rocznik_demograficzny_2015.pdf

Sports

The city's local football team is Znicz Pruszków. It plays in the third division but in the past it competed in the

second division In sport, the Second Division, also called Division 2 or Division II is usually the second highest division of a league, and will often have promotion and relegation with divisions above and below. Following the rise of Premier League style compet ...

between 2007-2010 and 2016-2017.

Robert Lewandowski Robert Lewandowski (; born 21 August 1988) is a Polish professional footballer who plays as a striker for La Liga club Barcelona and captains the Poland national team. Recognised for his positioning, technique and finishing, Lewandowski is co ...

played for Znicz from 2006 to 2008, whereas Pruszków-born Jacek Gmoch and Radosław Majewski also played in Znicz: Gmoch from 1953 to 1958, Majewski from 2002 to 2006. The city has two professional basketball teams: women's and the basketball section of the football club, men's Znicz Basket Pruszków. The Pruszków Arena is a modern indoor

velodrome A velodrome is an arena for track cycling. Modern velodromes feature steeply banked oval tracks, consisting of two 180-degree circular bends connected by two straights. The straights transition to the circular turn through a moderate easement ...

Buildings and structures

256 metres tall chimney of former "Pruszków II Power Plant", now used as radio tower.

Education

* Physical Culture and Tourism High School (Wyższa Szkoła Kultury Fizycznej i Turystyki)

Notable people

* Leszek Cichy (born 1951), mountaineer and high-altitude climber * Jacek Gmoch (born 1939), footballer and football manager * Ałbena Grabowska (born 1971), writer, neurologist *

Bronisław Komorowski Bronisław Maria Komorowski (; born 4 June 1952) is a Polish politician and historian who served as President of Poland from 2010 to 2015. Komorowski served as Minister of Defence from 2000 to 2001. As Marshal of the Sejm, Komorowski exercis ...

(born 1952), former Polish president, spent part of his childhood in Pruszków * Jan Lechoń (1899–1956), poet, spent part of his childhood in Pruszków * Radosław Majewski (born 1986), footballer * Konrad Morawski (1913–1985), television and theatre actor

References

External links

* * *
Alleycat races in Pruszków
*
Museum of Ancient Mazovian Metallurgy

Jewish Community in Pruszków
on Virtual Shtetl] {{DEFAULTSORT:Pruszkow Cities and towns in Masovian Voivodeship Pruszków County Masovian Voivodeship (1526–1795) Warsaw Governorate Warsaw Voivodeship (1919–1939) Holocaust locations in Poland