Wieleń is a town in Czarnków-Trzcianka County,

Greater Poland Voivodeship Greater Poland Voivodeship ( ) is a Voivodeships of Poland, voivodeship, or province, in west-central Poland. The province is named after the region called Greater Poland (''Wielkopolska'' ). The modern province includes most of this historic re ...

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 on the river Noteć.

History

Part of Poland since the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

, Duke Władysław Odonic of

Greater Poland Greater Poland, often known by its Polish name Wielkopolska (; ), is a Polish Polish historical regions, historical region of west-central Poland. Its chief and largest city is Poznań followed by Kalisz, the oldest city in Poland. The bound ...

brought the

Cistercians The Cistercians (), officially the Order of Cistercians (, 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 Benedict, as well as the contri ...

to Wieleń in 1239. Wieleń was a private town of Polish nobility, including the Czarnkowski and Sapieha families, administratively located in the Poznań County in the Poznań Voivodeship in the Greater Poland Province of the Polish Crown. Zofia Czarnkowska erected the early

Baroque The Baroque ( , , ) is a Western Style (visual arts), style of Baroque architecture, architecture, Baroque music, music, Baroque dance, dance, Baroque painting, painting, Baroque sculpture, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished from ...

Church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary and a hospital in Wieleń, and Piotr Paweł Sapieha built a Baroque palace. As a result of the

First Partition of Poland The First Partition of Poland took place in 1772 as the first of three partitions that eventually ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth by 1795. The growth of power in the Russian Empire threatened the Kingdom of Prussia an ...

, in 1772 it was annexed by

Prussia Prussia (; ; Old Prussian: ''Prūsija'') was a Germans, German state centred on the North European Plain that originated from the 1525 secularization of the Prussia (region), Prussian part of the State of the Teutonic Order. For centuries, ...

, under the Germanized name ''Filehne''. After the successful Greater Poland uprising of 1806, it was regained by

Poles Pole or poles may refer to: People *Poles (people), another term for Polish people, from the country of Poland * Pole (surname), including a list of people with the name * Pole (musician) (Stefan Betke, born 1967), German electronic music artist ...

and included within the short-lived

Duchy of Warsaw The Duchy of Warsaw (; ; ), also known as the Grand Duchy of Warsaw and Napoleonic Poland, was a First French Empire, French client state established by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1807, during the Napoleonic Wars. It initially comprised the ethnical ...

. After its dissolution in 1815, it was re-annexed by Prussia, and from 1871 to 1919 it was also part of

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. Until 1919, Filehne was the capital of the Filehne district in the Bromberg administrative region in the Prussian Province of Posen. According to the census of 1905, the town had a population of 4,407, of which 3,748 (85%) were

Germans Germans (, ) are the natives or inhabitants of Germany, or sometimes more broadly any people who are of German descent or native speakers of the German language. The Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany, constitution of Germany, imple ...

. After

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, in 1918, Poland regained independence, and the Greater Poland Uprising broke out, whose goal was to reunite the region with

. On January 18, 1919, the town was captured by Polish insurgents, and afterwards most of the town was restored to Poland and became part of the Poznań Voivodeship. The border between

and Poland ran along the Noteć river and therefore, the small part of the town lying north of the river, including the Prussian Eastern Railway station of ''Filehne Nord'' remained in Germany as part of the Netzekreis district in the Prussian Province of Grenzmark Posen-West Prussia. Gradually, new building activities began in the German part of Filehne, and people (some of whom had lost their properties in the Polish part) were successfully settled, with subsidies from the state. In 1925, only 62 inhabitants lived here, in 1933 there were 749. On December 23, 1927, the German part of Filehne became an independent municipality with the name ''Deutsch Filehne''. In 1937, the name was shortened to Filehne. After the joint German-Soviet

invasion of Poland The invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign, Polish Campaign, and Polish Defensive War of 1939 (1 September – 6 October 1939), was a joint attack on the Second Polish Republic, Republic of Poland by Nazi Germany, the Slovak R ...

, which started

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

in 1939, it was occupied by Germany until 1945. Towards the end of

, the town was occupied by the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

and was restored to Poland in its entirety. The remaining German population was expelled in accordance with the

Potsdam Agreement The Potsdam Agreement () was the agreement among three of the Allies of World War II: the United Kingdom, the United States, and the Soviet Union after the war ended in Europe that was signed on 1 August 1945 and published the following day. A ...

Historical monuments

Sapieha Palace (18th century) * Baroque Church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary and Saint Michael (1615–1630) * Bismarck Tower (1902)

Sports

The local

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

team is . It competes in the lower leagues.

People

* Moritz Lazarus (born 1824 here–1903), Jewish philosopher * Abraham Baer (1834–1894), Jewish Kantor * Joseph S. Manasse (1831–1897), early settler of

San Diego San Diego ( , ) is a city on the Pacific coast of Southern California, adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a population of over 1.4 million, it is the List of United States cities by population, eighth-most populous city in t ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

* Louis Waldenburg (1837–1881), German physician * Aron Freimann (1871–1948), Jewish bibliographer, historian ; Residents: * Hermann Wilhelm Ebel * , Polish teacher, soldier, poet, author of the Polish scout anthem, principal of the local Polish gymnasium in 1926–1928

References

External links