function

diocesan priest

creed

Latin (Roman Catholic) Church RCmore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2014.09.21]

diocese / province

Gniezno and Poznań archdiocese (aeque principaliter)more on
www.archpoznan.pl
[access: 2012.11.23]

date and place
of death

31.08.1942

KL Dachauconcentration camp
today: Dachau, Upper Bavaria reg., Bavaria state, Germany
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2016.05.30]

alt. dates and places
of death

01.09.1942

details of death

prisoner camp's numbers

21933Click to display source page (KL DachauClick to display the description), 3883Click to display source page (KL BuchenwaldClick to display the description)

cause of death

extermination: exhaustion and starvation

perpetrators

Germans

sites and events

KL DachauClick to display the description, KL BuchenwaldClick to display the description, KL PosenClick to display the description, PuszczykowoClick to display the description, 26.08.1940 arrests (Warthegau)Click to display the description, Reichsgau WarthelandClick to display the description, Ribbentrop‐MolotovClick to display the description, Pius XI's encyclicalsClick to display the description, Greater Poland UprisingClick to display the description

date and place
of birth

16.12.1892Birth certification on:
photos.szukajwarchiwach.gov.pl
[access: 2025.04.13]

Poznańtoday: Poznań city pov., Greater Poland voiv., Poland
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.07.18]

parents

KOPPE Casimir
🞲 ?, ? — 🕆 ?, ?

MICHALSKA Mary
🞲 ?, ? — 🕆 ?, ?

presbyter (holy orders)
ordination

11.03.1922

Gnieznotoday: Gniezno urban gm., Gniezno pov., Greater Poland voiv., Poland
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.12.18]
Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary RC archcathedral churchmore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2025.03.14]

positions held

others related
in death

JANISZEWSKIClick to display biography Joseph

sites and events
descriptions

KL Dachau: KL Dachau in German Bavaria, set up in 1933, became the main German Germ. Konzentrationslager (Eng. concentration camp) KL for Catholic priests and religious during World War II: On c. 09.11.1940, Reichsführer‐SS Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS, Gestapo and German police, as a result of the Vatican's intervention, decided to transfer all clergymen detained in various concentration camps to KL Dachau camp. The first major transports took place on 08.12.1940. In KL Dachau Germans held approx. 3,000 priests, including 1,800 Poles. The priests were forced to slave labor in the Germ. „Die Plantage” — the largest herb garden in Europe, managed by the genocidal SS, consisting of many greenhouses, laboratory buildings and arable land, where experiments with new natural medicines were conducted — for many hours, without breaks, without protective clothing, no food. They slaved in construction, e.g. of camp's crematorium. In the barracks ruled hunger, freezing cold in the winter and suffocating heat during the summer, especially acute in 1941‐1942. Prisoners suffered from bouts of illnesses, including tuberculosis. Many were victims of murderous „medical experiments” — in 11.1942 c. 20 were given phlegmon injections; in 07.1942 to 05.1944 c. 120 were used by for malaria experiments. More than 750 Polish clerics where murdered by the Germans, some brought to TA Hartheim euthanasia centre set up in Schloss Hartheim in Austria and murdered in gas chambers. At its peak KL Dachau concentration camps’ system had nearly 100 slave labour sub‐camps located throughout southern Germany and Austria. There were c. 32,000 documented deaths at the camp, and thousands perished without a trace. C. 10,000 of the 30,000 inmates were found sick at the time of liberation, on 29.04.1945, by the USA troops… (more on: www.kz-gedenkstaette-dachau.deClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.08.10], en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2016.05.30])

KL Buchenwald: In German Germ. Konzentrationslager (Eng. concentration camp) KL Buchenwald concentration camp, founded in 1937 and operational till 1945, Germans held c. 238,380 prisoners and murdered approx. 56,000 of them, among them thousands of Poles. Prisoners were victims of pseudo‐scientific experiments, conducted among others by Behring‐Werke from Marburg and Robert Koch Institute from Berlin companies. They slaved for Gustloff in Weimar and Fritz‐Sauckel companies manufacturing armaments. To support Erla‐Maschinenwerk GmbH in Leipzig, Junkers in Schönebeck (airplanes) and Rautal in Wernigerode Germans organized special sub‐camps. In 1945 there were more than 100 such sub‐camps. Dora concentration camp was initially one of them, as well as KL Ravensbrück sub‐camps (from 08.1944). On 08.04.1945 Polish prisoner, Mr Guido Damazyn, used clandestinely constructed short wave transmitter to sent, together with a Russian prisoner, a short message begging for help. It was received and he got a reply: „KZ Bu. Hold out. Rushing to your aid. Staff of Third Army” (American). Three days later the camp was liberated. (more on: www.buchenwald.deClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.08.10], en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.08.10])

KL Posen: The German camp established at Fort VII of the former Prussian Germ. Festung Posen (Eng. Poznań Fortress), built in 1876‐1880 in Poznań, formally until mid‐11.1939 operating as the Germ. Konzentrationslager (Eng. concentration camp) KL Posen, a term used in «Liber Albus» also for the later period of the camp's operation. It was the first such camp established by the Germans on Polish soil — in the case of Greater Poland, incorporated directly into the German state in 1939. As early as 10.1939, at KL Posen, the Germans for the first time used gas to murder Polish civilians, particularly psychiatric patients. Its first commandant was the génocidaire SS‐Sturmbannführer Herbert Lange, who later used his acquired „experience” in murdering Poles to murder Jews, i.e. to establish the first — even before the start of genocidal program Germ. „Endlösung der Judenfrage” (Eng. „Final Solution of the Jewish Question") — Germ. Vernichtungslager (Eng. extermination camp) VL Kulmhof in Chełm on River Ner. From 11.1939, the camp functioned as a prison for the Germ. Geheime Staatspolizei (Eng. Secret State Police), i.e. Gestapo, and as the Germ. Übergangslager (Eng. transit camp), before dispatching prisoners to concentration camps such as KL Dachau or KL Auschwitz. On 28.05.1941, the camp was renamed a police prison and correctional slave labor camp, Germ. Arbeitserziehungslager (Eng. labor and education camp), i.e. AEL. At its peak, the camp carried out seven to nine executions daily, with prisoners being hanged en masse, and some being taken to executions outside the camp grounds. In total, the Germans murdered c. 20,000 residents of Greater Poland at KL Posen, including many members of the Polish intelligentsia, officials, landed gentry, participants in the 1918‐1919 Greater Poland Uprising, patients and staff of psychiatric hospitals, and more than a dozen priests. Hundreds of Catholic priests passed through the camp before being sent to concentration camps, primarily KL Dachau. From 03.1943, the period of transformation of the camp into industrial plants of the German armaments industry began (e.g. from 25.04.1944, the Telefunken Gesellschaft für drahtlose Telegraphie m.b.H. factory, manufacturing radio i.a. for submarines and aircraft). (more on: www.wmn.poznan.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2019.02.02], en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.12.27])

Puszczykowo: In Puszczykowo near Poznań, in the houses of several Catholic congregations, the Germans organized internment and transit camps. E.g. in the religious house of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit — Spiritans — the Germans in 09.1939 organized a transit camp for interned Catholic priests and children destined for Germanization. 28 friars of the Congregation and other priests from Polish and Czech dioceses were kept there. It functioned till the spring of 1940, when the prisoners were transported to concentration camps. In the Congregation of the Brothers of the Sacred Heart of Jesus motherhouse, the Germans in c. 1941, after expelling the friars, organized a transit camp for the displaced nuns, the Congregation of the Shepherdess' Sisters of Divine Providence, and then prob. turned it into a camp for Jews, then for Germ. „Hitler‐Jugend” (Eng. „Hitler youth”), and finally for the German army Wermacht. (more on: www.jozefpuszczykowo.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2015.09.30])

26.08.1940 arrests (Warthegau): In the Germ. Reichsgau Wartheland (Eng. Warta Country Reich District), a new province created by the Germans in occupied Greater Poland, its Germ. Gauleiter (Eng. district leader), criminal Arthur Greiser, sought to make the province under his jurisdiction a Germ. „Mustergau” (Eng. model district). One of the pillars of his policy was the postulate Germ. „Ohne Gott, ohne Religion, ohne Priesters und Sakramenten” (Eng. „without God, without religion, without priest and sacrament”). In 1940, the preparation of the practical assumptions of this policy in the Germ. Gauleiter Greiser's Office was led by a German Evangelical theologian, Germ. Regierungsrat (Eng. Government Counselor) and head of the department for religious affairs, Germ. Kirchenreferent (Eng. Church Referent), Wilhelm Dudzus. On 10.07.1940, prob. at a party meeting in Munich, he revealed the „13 Points”, which were to become the basis of German policy in the Germ. Reichsgau Wartheland. The content of the „13 Points” de facto became public knowledge — for which, incidentally, he was dismissed from his position in early 1941. Point 1 read: „There are no churches in the national sense, but only religious groups in the sense of associations”, and Dudzus added that „Churches cease to be corporations under public law”. In point 2, he informed that „There are no relations with groups outside the Germ. Reichsgau, nor any ties of a legal, financial, or service nature with the Reich Church”. And explained: „The churches of the Germ. Reichsgau Wartheland are to be independent” and that „The union of the Catholic Church with the Vatican will be dissolved”. And in point 12, it informed that „All religious institutions and monastic associations are subject to dissolution because they are contrary to the German concept of decency and nationality policy”. These demands were then implemented step by step. One of the first manifestations of this policy was the arrest of hundreds of Polish priests on 26.08.1940. They were gathered — along with priests previously held in e.g. in IL Lond internment camp in Ląd on the Warta River — in the DL Scheglin transit camp in Szczeglin, near Mogilno. From there, three days later, they were deported to the KL Sachsenhausen concentration camp. The culmination of this policy was the regulation Germ. „Verordnung des Reichsstatthalters im Wartheland über religiöse Vereinigungen und Religionsgesellschaften im Reichsgau Wartheland” (Eng. „Regulation of the Reich Governor in Wartheland regarding religious associations and religious unions in Reichsgau Wartheland”), issued on 13.09.1941 by Germ. Gauleiter Arthur Greiser, by which the Germans de facto outlawed the Roman Catholic Church in the Germ. Reichsgau Wartheland.

Reichsgau Wartheland: After the Polish defeat in the 09.1939 campaign, which was the result of the Ribbentrop‐Molotov Pact and constituted the first stage of World War II, and the beginning of German occupation in part of Poland (in the other, eastern part of Poland, the Russian occupation began), the Germans divided the occupied Polish territory into five main regions (and a few smaller). The largest one was transformed into Germ. Generalgouvernement (Eng. General Governorate), intended exclusively for Poles and Jews and constituting part of the so‐called Germ. Großdeutschland (Eng. Greater Germany). Two were added to existing German provinces. From two other separate new provinces were created. Greater Poland region was one of them, incorporated into Germany on 08.10.1939, by decree of the German leader Adolf Hitler (formally came into force on 26.10.1939), and on 24.01.1940 transformed into the Germ. Reichsgau Wartheland (Eng. Warta Country Reich District), in which the law of the German state was to apply. The main axis of the policy of the new province, the territory of which the Germans recognized as the Germ. „Ursprünglich Deutsche” (Eng. „natively German”), despite the fact that 90% of its inhabitants were Poles, was Germ. „Entpolonisierung” (Eng. „Depolonisation”), i.e. forced Germanization. C. 100,000 Poles were murdered as part of the Germ. „Intelligenzaktion”, i.e. extermination of Polish intelligentsia and ruling classes. C. 630,000 were forcibly resettled to the Germ. Generalgouvernement, and their place taken by the Germans brought from other areas occupied by Germany (e.g. the Baltic countries, Bessarabia, Bukovina, etc.). Poles were forced to sign the German nationality list, the Germ. Deutsche Volksliste DVL. As part of the policy of „Ohne Gott, ohne Religion, ohne Priesters und Sakramenten” (Eng. „No God, no religion, no priest or sacrament”) most Catholic priests were arrested and sent to concentration camps. All schools teaching in Polish, Polish libraries, theaters and museums were closed. Polish landed estates confiscated. To further reduce the number of the Polish population, Poles were sent to forced labor deep inside Germany, and the legal age of marriage for Poles was increased (25 for women, 28 for men). The German state office, Germ. Rasse‐ und Siedlungshauptamt (Eng. Main Office of Race and Settlement) RuSHA, under the majesty of German law, abducted several thousand children who met specific racial criteria from Polish families and subjected them to forced Germanization, handing them over to German families. After the end of hostilities of World War II, the overseer of this province, the Germ. Reichsstatthalter (Eng. Reich Governor) and the Germ. Gauleiter (Eng. district head) of the German National Socialist Party, Arthur Karl Greiser, was executed. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2024.06.21])

Ribbentrop‐Molotov: Genocidal Russian‐German alliance pact between Russian leader Joseph Stalin and German leader Adolf Hitler signed on 23.08.1939 in Moscow by respective foreign ministers, Mr. Vyacheslav Molotov for Russia and Joachim von Ribbentrop for Germany. The pact sanctioned and was the direct cause of joint Russian and German invasion of Poland and the outbreak of the World War II in 09.1939. In a political sense, the pact was an attempt to restore the status quo ante before 1914, with one exception, namely the „commercial” exchange of the so‐called „Kingdom of Poland”, which in 1914 was part of the Russian Empire, fore Eastern Galicia (today's western Ukraine), in 1914 belonging to the Austro‐Hungarian Empire. Galicia, including Lviv, was to be taken over by the Russians, the „Kingdom of Poland” — under the name of the General Governorate — Germany. The resultant „war was one of the greatest calamities and dramas of humanity in history, for two atheistic and anti‐Christian ideologies — national and international socialism — rejected God and His fifth Decalogue commandment: Thou shall not kill!” (Abp Stanislav Gądecki, 01.09.2019). The decisions taken — backed up by the betrayal of the formal allies of Poland, France and Germany, which on 12.09.1939, at a joint conference in Abbeville, decided not to provide aid to attacked Poland and not to take military action against Germany (a clear breach of treaty obligations with Poland) — were on 28.09.1939 slightly altered and made more precise when a treaty on „German‐Russian boundaries and friendship” was agreed by the same murderous signatories. One of its findings was establishment of spheres of influence in Central and Eastern Europe and in consequence IV partition of Poland. In one of its secret annexes agreed, that: „the Signatories will not tolerate on its respective territories any Polish propaganda that affects the territory of the other Side. On their respective territories they will suppress all such propaganda and inform each other of the measures taken to accomplish it”. The agreements resulted in a series of meeting between two genocidal organization representing both sides — German Gestapo and Russian NKVD when coordination of efforts to exterminate Polish intelligentsia and Polish leading classes (in Germany called «Intelligenzaktion», in Russia took the form of Katyń massacres) where discussed. Resulted in deaths of hundreds of thousands of Polish intelligentsia, including thousands of priests presented here, and tens of millions of ordinary people,. The results of this Russian‐German pact lasted till 1989 and are still in evidence even today. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2015.09.30])

Pius XI's encyclicals: Facing the creation of two totalitarian systems in Europe, which seemed to compete with each other, though there were more similarities than contradictions between them, Pope Pius XI issued in 03.1937 (within 5 days) two encyclicals. In the „Mit brennender Sorge” (Eng. „With Burning Concern”) published on 14.03.1938, condemned the national socialism prevailing in Germany. The Pope wrote: „Whoever, following the old Germanic‐pre‐Christian beliefs, puts various impersonal fate in the place of a personal God, denies the wisdom of God and Providence […], whoever exalts earthly values: race or nation, or state, or state system, representatives of state power or other fundamental values of human society, […] and makes them the highest standard of all values, including religious ones, and idolizes them, this one […] is far from true faith in God and from a worldview corresponding to such faith”. On 19.03.1937, published „Divini Redemptoris” (Eng. „Divine Redeemer”), in which criticized Russian communism, dialectical materialism and the class struggle theory. The Pope wrote: „Communism deprives man of freedom, and therefore the spiritual basis of all life norms. It deprives the human person of all his dignity and any moral support with which he could resist the onslaught of blind passions […] This is the new gospel that Bolshevik and godless communism preaches as a message of salvation and redemption of humanity”… Pius XI demanded that the established human law be subjected to the natural law of God , recommended the implementation of the ideal of a Christian state and society, and called on Catholics to resist. Two years later, National Socialist Germany and Communist Russia came together and started World War II. (more on: www.vatican.vaClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2023.05.28], www.vatican.vaClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2023.05.28])

Greater Poland Uprising: Military insurrection of Poles of former German Germ. Posen Provinz (Eng. Poznań province) launched against German Reich in 1918‐1919 — after the abdication on 09.11.1918 of the German Emperor William II Hohenzollern; after the armistice between the Allies and Germany signed on 11.1.1918 in the HQ wagon in Compiègne, the headquarters of Marshal of France Ferdinand Foch — which de facto meant the end of World War I — against the German Weimar Republic, established on the ruins of the German Empire, aiming to incorporate lands captured by Prussia during partitions of Poland in XVIII century into Poland. The Republic of Poland, reborn on 11.11.1918, initially formally included only the so‐called Germ. Königreich Polen (Eng. Kingdom of Poland), i.e. the territory that had been under Russian rule until 1915 and then under the control of Central States (Germany and Austria–Hungary), but did not include the Prussian partition. Started on 27.12.1918 in Poznań and ended on 16.02.1919 with the armistice pact in Trier, forced by the victorious Entente states, which included provisions ordering Germany to cease operations against Poland and, importantly, recognizing the Polish insurgent Greater Poland Army as an allied armed force of the Entente. De facto it turned out to be a Polish victory, confirmed in the main peace treaty after World War I, the Treaty of Versailles of 28.06.1919, which came into force on 10.01.1920 and in which most of the lands of the Prussian partition were recognized as Polish. Many Polish priests took part in the Uprising, both as chaplains of the insurgents units and members and leaders of the Polish agencies and councils set up in the areas covered by the Uprising. In 1939 after German invasion of Poland and start of the World War II those priests were particularly persecuted by the Germans and majority of them were murdered. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2016.08.14])

sources

personal:
www.wtg-gniazdo.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2012.11.23], www.wbc.poznan.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2015.04.18], www.puszczykowo.info.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.07.06], photos.szukajwarchiwach.gov.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2025.04.13], www.ipgs.usClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2012.11.23]
bibliographical:
„Martyrology of the Polish Roman Catholic clergy under nazi occupation in 1939‐1945”, Victor Jacewicz, John Woś, vol. I‐V, Warsaw Theological Academy, 1977‐1981
„International Tracing Service (ITS), Bad Arolsen, GermanyClick to display source page”, Arolsen Archives
original images:
www.wbc.poznan.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2016.05.30], www.wbc.poznan.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2016.05.30], www.wbc.poznan.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2015.04.18], www.parafiapuszczykowo.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.01.06]