Nowe Skalmierzyce (german: Neu Skalmierschütz, 1943-45 Kalmen) is a town and its surrounding municipality in

Ostrów Wielkopolski County Ostrów (Polish for "river island") may refer to: Places Poland ; Greater Poland Voivodeship * Ostrów Wielkopolski, a town in Greater Poland Voivodeship (west-central Poland) * Ostrów, Greater Poland Voivodeship in Greater Poland Voivodeship ( ...

Greater Poland Voivodeship Greater Poland Voivodeship ( pl, Województwo wielkopolskie; ), also known as Wielkopolska Voivodeship, Wielkopolska Province, or Greater Poland Province, is a voivodeship, or province, in west-central Poland. It was created on 1 January 1999 o ...

, in west-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 populous ...

. The town has a population of 5,093 (2006 est.), while the municipality,

Gmina Nowe Skalmierzyce __NOTOC__ Gmina Nowe Skalmierzyce is an urban-rural gmina (administrative district) in Ostrów Wielkopolski County, Greater Poland Voivodeship, in west-central Poland. In 1999 the administrative seat of the gmina was moved from the town of Nowe Ska ...

, which is a mixed urban-rural ''

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 ...

'' that includes the town, has a population of 15,191. The town has a land area of only 1.58 km², which results in a

population density Population density (in agriculture: standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geographical term.Matt RosenberPopul ...

of 3,223.4 persons/km², the seventh-highest density of all towns in Poland, and the second-highest density (after

Swarzędz Swarzędz (German: ''Schwersenz'') is a town in west-central Poland with 29,766 inhabitants. It is the seat of a mixed urban-rural commune called Gmina Swarzędz with 40,166 inhabitants. The town is situated in the Poznań metropolitan area, in ...

) of the urban portion of any Polish urban-rural gmina (''gmina miejsko-wiejska''). The gmina has a land area of 125.42 km². Nowe Skalmierzyce ("New Skalmierzyce") adjoins the urbanized village of Skalmierzyce, which is in fact the administrative seat of the gmina.

History

Nowe Skalmierzyce originally developed as a customs post on the border between

Prussia Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an em ...

and Russian-controlled

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 19th century. In 1908 it was separated from the old village of Skalmierzyce, and it remained a separate settlement since. After

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 ...

, in November 1918, Poland regained independence, and shortly after the Greater Poland Uprising broke out, which aim was to reintegrate the region of

Greater Poland Greater Poland, often known by its Polish name Wielkopolska (; german: Großpolen, sv, Storpolen, la, Polonia Maior), is a Polish historical regions, historical region of west-central Poland. Its chief and largest city is Poznań followed ...

with Poland. Nowe Skalmierzyce was the first settlement in the area to be liberated by Polish insurgents. Afterwards, within interwar Poland, it formed part of the

Poznań Voivodeship Poznań Voivodeship was the name of several former administrative regions (''województwo'', rendered as ''voivodeship'' and usually translated as "province") in Poland, centered on the city of Poznań, although the exact boundaries changed over t ...

. During the

German occupation German-occupied Europe refers to the sovereign countries of Europe which were wholly or partly occupied and civil-occupied (including puppet governments) by the military forces and the government of Nazi Germany at various times between 1939 an ...

(

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 ...

), a transit camp for Poles expelled from the region was operated in the local school. Poles were deported from the camp either to the

General Government The General Government (german: Generalgouvernement, pl, Generalne Gubernatorstwo, uk, Генеральна губернія), also referred to as the General Governorate for the Occupied Polish Region (german: Generalgouvernement für die be ...

(German-occupied central Poland) or to

concentration camps Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simply ...

. Nowe Skalmierzyce was granted town rights in 1962.

Sights

In the town, there are monuments commemorating the Greater Poland Uprising of 1918–1919 and the prisoners of the former Nazi German transit camp for Poles expelled from the region.

Sports

The local

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

club is . It competes in the lower leagues.

References

External links

Official website
{{Authority control Cities and towns in Greater Poland Voivodeship Ostrów Wielkopolski County