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Starachowice is a city in southeastern Poland (historic Lesser Poland), with 49,513 inhabitants (31.12.2017). Starachowice is situated in the Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship (since 1999); it was formerly in the Kielce Voivodeship (1975–1998). It is the capital of
Starachowice County __NOTOC__ Starachowice County ( pl, powiat starachowicki) is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, south-central Poland. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish ...
. It is situated upon the River Kamienna, a tributary of the Vistula River, among hills and forests.


History

In the location of present-day Starachowice, a
forge A forge is a type of hearth used for heating metals, or the workplace (smithy) where such a hearth is located. The forge is used by the smith to heat a piece of metal to a temperature at which it becomes easier to shape by forging, or to th ...
existed, which in the 16th century belonged to the Starzechowski family (most probably, the name of the town comes from this family). The oldest known mention of Starachowice comes from 1547. The settlement, which was built around the forge, belonged until 1817 to the
Cistercians The Cistercians, () officially the Order of Cistercians ( la, (Sacer) Ordo Cisterciensis, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint ...
from
Wąchock Abbey Wąchock Abbey ( pl, Opactwo Cystersów w Wąchocku) is a Cistercian abbey in Wąchock, Poland. Located near the larger town of Starachowice in the Świętokrzyskie Mountains of south-eastern Poland, Wąchock is best known for the architecture ...
, located nearby. It was the monks who in 1789 initiated construction of a
blast furnace A blast furnace is a type of metallurgical furnace used for smelting to produce industrial metals, generally pig iron, but also others such as lead or copper. ''Blast'' refers to the combustion air being "forced" or supplied above atmospheric ...
(see also
Old-Polish Industrial Region {{unreferenced, date=March 2017 Staropolski Okręg Przemysłowy (Old Polish Industrial Region) is an industrial region in northern part of Lesser Poland. It is the oldest and in terms of area covered, largest of Polish industrial regions. Most of th ...
). In the meantime Polish bishop Bogusław Radoszewski founded the town of Wierzbnik in 1624, which was granted town rights by Polish King Sigismund III Vasa. Three annual
fair A fair (archaic: faire or fayre) is a gathering of people for a variety of entertainment or commercial activities. Fairs are typically temporary with scheduled times lasting from an afternoon to several weeks. Types Variations of fairs incl ...
s and three weekly markets were organized in the town, however it developed slowly, while Starachowice developed faster. Both settlements were administratively located in the Sandomierz Voivodeship in the Lesser Poland Province of the Polish Crown. In the Third Partition of Poland, in 1795, the area was annexed by Austria, in 1809 it passed to the short-lived Polish Duchy of Warsaw, and in 1815 it passed to so-called
Congress Poland Congress Poland, Congress Kingdom of Poland, or Russian Poland, formally known as the Kingdom of Poland, was a polity created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna as a semi-autonomous Polish state, a successor to Napoleon's Duchy of Warsaw. It w ...
in the Russian Partition of Poland. In 1815, the furnace was taken over by the government of
Congress Poland Congress Poland, Congress Kingdom of Poland, or Russian Poland, formally known as the Kingdom of Poland, was a polity created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna as a semi-autonomous Polish state, a successor to Napoleon's Duchy of Warsaw. It w ...
, and in the following years, the industrial settlement of Starachowice emerged as main center of
metallurgy Metallurgy is a domain of materials science and engineering that studies the physical and chemical behavior of metallic elements, their inter-metallic compounds, and their mixtures, which are known as alloys. Metallurgy encompasses both the sc ...
. According to a plan devised by Stanisław Staszic, metal industry was developed along the Kamienna river, and the settlement of Starachowice was its center. As part of
anti-Polish Polonophobia, also referred to as anti-Polonism, ( pl, Antypolonizm), and anti-Polish sentiment are terms for negative attitudes, prejudices, and actions against Poles as an ethnic group, Poland as their country, and their culture. These incl ...
repressions following the unsuccessful Polish
January Uprising The January Uprising ( pl, powstanie styczniowe; lt, 1863 metų sukilimas; ua, Січневе повстання; russian: Польское восстание; ) was an insurrection principally in Russia's Kingdom of Poland that was aimed at ...
, the Russian administration stripped Wierzbnik of its town rights in 1870, which were restored in 1916. After Poland regained independence in 1918, the government in Warsaw decided to build an arms factory in Starachowice. On October 12, 1920, ''The Society of Starachowice Mining Company'' signed a contract with ''Main Office of Supplying the Army''. Soon afterwards, works on construction of artillery ammunition factory began. ''Zakłady Starachowickie'' (''Starachowice Works''), which was an industrial complex including ammunition factory, artillery equipment factory and iron works, was main Poland’s producer of such materiel. It also manufactured the 75 mm Armata wz.02/26,
105 mm Armata wz. 29 The 105 mm Armata wz. 29 was a field gun produced in France and Poland that was used by Poland, Nazi Germany, and Finland during World War II. History After the defeat of the Central Powers during World War I the Allies agreed to reconstitute ...
, 1 20 mm Armata wz. 78/09/31,
Bofors 40 mm Bofors 40 mm gun is a name or designation given to two models of 40 mm calibre anti-aircraft guns designed and developed by the Swedish company Bofors: *Bofors 40 mm L/60 gun - developed in the 1930s, widely used in World War II and into the 1990s ...
, and Bofors 37 mm guns, used by the Polish Army in 1939. The very town of Starachowice was not created until April 1, 1939, when the ancient town of Wierzbnik was merged with the settlement of ''Starachowice Fabryczne'' and the village of ''Starachowice Górne''. At first, the new town was named ''Starachowice-Wierzbnik'', and in 1952 the name was changed into Starachowice. During the German invasion of Poland, which started World War II, the '' Einsatzgruppe II'' entered Starachowice on September 27, 1939, to commit various crimes against Poles. During World War II it was occupied by Germany and in 1940 the Germans carried out mass arrests of local Polish
intelligentsia The intelligentsia is a status class composed of the university-educated people of a society who engage in the complex mental labours by which they critique, shape, and lead in the politics, policies, and culture of their society; as such, the in ...
. Poles were used as
forced labour Forced labour, or unfree labour, is any work relation, especially in modern or early modern history, in which people are employed against their will with the threat of destitution, detention, violence including death, or other forms of ex ...
in the local factory. During the Holocaust, the ghetto in Wierzbnik was liquidated on October 27, 1942, and many of its prisoners were sent to the death camp Treblinka. The remaining Jewish residents of Starachowice and Wierzbnik were sent to German labor camps in the vicinity. Those camps were liquidated in the summer of 1944. The remaining survivors were deported to
Auschwitz Auschwitz concentration camp ( (); also or ) was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It con ...
where many of them met their deaths at the hands of the Schutzstaffel. There was a munition plant there where Jewish slave labor was used. In 1944, during and following the Warsaw Uprising, the Germans deported thousands of Varsovians from the Dulag 121 camp in
Pruszków Pruszków ( yi, ‏פּרושקאָוו) is a city in east-central Poland, situated in the Masovian Voivodeship since 1999. It was previously in Warszawa Voivodeship (1975–1998). Pruszków is the capital of Pruszków County, located along t ...
, where they were initially imprisoned, to Starachowice. Those Poles were mainly old people, ill people and women with children. 10,000 Poles expelled from Warsaw stayed in the town, as of 1 November 1944. During World War II, Starachowice was an important center of the Home Army, where units of Jan Piwnik and
Antoni Heda Antoni Heda (11 October 1916 – 15 February 2008) was a Polish military commander and a notable veteran of the Polish resistance movement in World War II and later independence movement against Soviet occupation following the war. Among the best ...
operated. At least three local Polish boy scouts were killed by the Germans during the war. After the war, the town prospered as an important industrial center. Besides ''Starachowice Works'', truck producer
FSC Star Fabryka Samochodów Ciężarowych "Star" (FSC Star), also known simply as Star, was a Polish truck manufacturer. The name comes from the City of Starachowice, where the factory is located. Their first vehicle was the ''Star 20'' in 1948. The mos ...
was opened in 1948. A Star truck was used as the basis for the first Popemobile for Pope John Paul II's during his first visit to his home country as Pope of the Roman Catholic Church (1979). When capitalist system was reintroduced in 1989, the situation in Starachowice worsened, and unemployment grew drastically. The town currently has a special economy zone with lower tax rates to help the settlement of new industry.


Sport

There is the Municipal Stadium in the city. Local football teams are: *
Star Starachowice A star is an astronomical object comprising a luminous spheroid of plasma held together by its gravity. The nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked eye at night, but their immense distances from Earth make ...
, a football club which for several years played in the Second Division * Juventa Starachowice - football club


Notable people

*
Bogusz Bilewski Bogusz Bilewski (25 September 1930 in Starachowice – 14 September 1995 in Wrocław) was a Polish actor. In 1974 he portrayed a secondary role in the Academy Award-nominated film ''The Deluge'' under Jerzy Hoffman. Selected filmography * ...
(1930–1995), Polish actor *
Krystyna Janda Krystyna Jolanta Janda (born 18 December 1952) is a Polish film and theater actress best known internationally for playing leading roles in several films by Polish director Andrzej Wajda, including ''Man of Marble'' (''Człowiek z marmuru'', 1976 ...
(born 1952), Polish film and theater actress *
Krzysztof Lipiec Krzysztof Bogdan Lipiec (born 11 October 1959 in Starachowice) is a Polish politician. He was elected to the Sejm on 25 September 2005, getting 4697 votes in 33 Kielce district as a candidate from Law and Justice list. He was also a member of ...
(born 1959), Polish politician and member of the Sejm (Polish parliament) * Rafał Wójcik (born 1972), Polish long-distance runner *
Radosław Majecki Radosław Majecki (born 16 November 1999) is a Polish professional Association football, footballer who plays as a Goalkeeper (association football), goalkeeper for AS Monaco FC, Monaco. He plays for the Poland national football team, Poland nati ...
(born 1999), Polish professional goalkeeper


International relations


Twin towns — Sister cities

Starachowice is twinned with:


References


{{Authority control Cities and towns in Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship Starachowice County Sandomierz Voivodeship Radom Governorate Kielce Voivodeship (1919–1939) Holocaust locations in Poland