Płonna is a village in eastern

Lesser Poland Lesser Poland, often known by its Polish name ''Małopolska'' (; ), 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 cult ...

in the Lesser Beskid mountains, Bukowsko rural commune, located near the towns of

Medzilaborce Medzilaborce (, ''Midzhilabirtsyi''; , ''Mizhlabirtsi''; ) is a List of towns in Slovakia, town in northeastern Slovakia close to the border with Poland, located near the towns of Sanok and Bukowsko (in southeastern Małopolska). Its population is ...

and Palota (in northeastern

Slovakia Slovakia, officially the Slovak Republic, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the west, and the Czech Republic to the northwest. Slovakia's m ...

). Płonna is about from

Sanok Sanok (in full the Royal Free City of Sanok — , , ''Sanok'', , ''Sianok'' or ''Sianik'', , , ''Sūnik'' or ''Sonik'') is a town in the Subcarpathian Voivodeship of southeastern Poland with 38,397 inhabitants, as of June 2016. Located on the San ...

in south-eastern

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

. It is situated below the main watershed at the foot of the Słonne Mountain, and has an elevation of . Since 1999 it is situated in the

Subcarpathian Voivodship Subcarpathian Voivodeship is a voivodeship, or province, in the southeastern corner of Poland. Its administrative capital and largest city is Rzeszów. Along with the Marshal, it is governed by the Subcarpathian Regional Assembly. The name deriv ...

(

province A province is an administrative division within a country or sovereign state, state. The term derives from the ancient Roman , which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire, Roman Empire's territorial possessions ou ...

); previously in Krosno Voivodship (1975–1998) and

district, ( east of Sanok),

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christianity, Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest#Christianity, priest, often termed a parish pries ...

Bukowsko.

History

Płonna was founded in 1433 by Bal. During 966–1018, 1340–1772 (

Ruthenian Voivodeship The Ruthenian Voivodeship (; ; ) was a voivodeship of the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland from 1434 until the First Partition of Poland in 1772, with its center in the city of Lwów (lat. Leopolis) (modern day Lviv). Together with a number of ot ...

) and 1918–1939 Płonna was part of Poland. During 1772–1918 it belonged to the Austrian empire, and later the Austrian-Hungarian empire when double monarchy was introduced in Austria. In 1785 the village lands comprised . Prior to the Second World War, the village was populated by a majority of Lemko Greek Catholics, and some Jewish families. In Spring, 1946, the village was burned by the Polish Communist Army for the Polish government (PKWN), and all villagers that the Polish Army could locate were forcibly deported. In 1947, during Akcja Wisla (Operation Vistula), the remainder of Lemkos who were not previously sent to Soviet Ukraine were finally captured and deported to former German territories that Poland had acquired as a provision of the Yalta Conference. Their land plots were joined to form a collective farm, the remains of which still remain in the village, and the church was turned into a barn. The church at Płonna is on the main road and easily accessible. Filial churches were located in Wysoczany ( away) and Kożuszne (). The cemetery contains only a few headstones.

Holocaust History

Płonna was the site of a "special camp" in 1942. The camp was used to hold Jews from the

, Lesko and Dobromil

powiat A ''powiat'' (; ) is the second-level unit of local government and administration in Poland, equivalent to a county, district or prefecture (Local administrative unit, LAU-1 ormerly Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics, NUTS-4 ...

s, that is if they weren't shot in their village or taken to the work camp in Zwangsarbeitslager Zaslaw, east of Bukowsko. Apparently at least 13,000 people were held at Zaslaw and then transported to

Belzec extermination camp Belzec (English: or , Polish: , approximately ) was a Nazi German extermination camp in occupied Poland. It was built by the SS for the purpose of implementing the secretive Operation Reinhard, the plan to murder all Polish Jews, a major p ...

. Elderly Jews were shot in the woods near Zaslaw, according to "The Holocaust: The Jews in the County of Cracau".

Population

References

Literature

Adam Fastnacht Adam Fastnacht (27 July 1913, in Sanok – 16 February 1987, in Wrocław) doctor hab., historian, editor.Anna Fastnacht-Stupnicka. Obecność przeszłości (''O Adamie Fastnachcie''). Rocznik Sanocki, Sanok, 2006 He was a Polish historian, researc ...

, Nagórzany n:Slownik Historyczno-Geograficzny Ziemi Sanockiej w Średniowieczu (Historic-Geographic Dictionary of the Sanok District in the Middle Ages), Kraków, (II edition 2002), . * Jerzy Zuba "W Gminie Bukowsko". Roksana, 2004, . Translated by Deborah Greenlee. Arlington, TX 76016.

External links