Zawady is a

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to ...

Białystok County __NOTOC__ Białystok County ( pl, powiat białostocki) is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Podlaskie Voivodeship, north-eastern Poland, on the border with Belarus. It was created on 1 January 1999 as a result o ...

Podlaskie Voivodeship Podlaskie Voivodeship or Podlasie Province ( pl, Województwo podlaskie, ) is a voivodeship (province) in northeastern Poland. The name of the province and its territory correspond to the historic region of Podlachia. The capital and largest cit ...

, in north-eastern Poland. It is the seat of the

gmina The gmina (Polish: , plural ''gminy'' , from German ''Gemeinde'' meaning ''commune'') is the principal unit of the administrative division of Poland, similar to a municipality. , there were 2,477 gminas throughout the country, encompassing over 4 ...

(administrative district) called Gmina Zawady. It lies approximately west of the regional capital

Białystok Białystok is the largest city in northeastern Poland and the capital of the Podlaskie Voivodeship. It is the tenth-largest city in Poland, second in terms of population density, and thirteenth in area. Białystok is located in the Białystok Up ...

. The village has a population of 320.

History

Zawady was founded in the early 15th century. By the 16th century, it had a

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

parish. In 1827, the village had a population of 224. Following the joint 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 opposin ...

in September 1939, the village was first

occupied ' (Norwegian: ') is a Norwegian political thriller TV series that premiered on TV2 on 5 October 2015. Based on an original idea by Jo Nesbø, the series is co-created with Karianne Lund and Erik Skjoldbjærg. Season 2 premiered on 10 October 2 ...

by the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

until 1941, and then by Germany until 1944. On June 21, 1943, a unit of the ''

Uderzeniowe Bataliony Kadrowe {{Polish Underground State sidebar Uderzeniowe Bataliony Kadrowe (''UBK'', English: ''Striking Cadre Battalions'') were armed anti-Nazi resistance units organized by the right-wing Polish organization Konfederacja Narodu. They existed between 1942 ...

'' Polish resistance organization crushed a German gendarmerie post in Zawady. On July 13, 1943, the Germans pacified the village, murdering 58 Poles from Zawady and Laskowiec at nearby Łysa Góra.

References

Villages in Białystok County 15th-century establishments in Poland Populated places established in the 15th century Łomża Governorate Białystok Voivodeship (1919–1939) Warsaw Voivodeship (1919–1939) Massacres of Poles Nazi war crimes in Poland {{Białystok-geo-stub