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]
RC Military Ordinariate of Polandmore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2014.12.20]

honorary titles

prelatemore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2014.11.14]
„Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice”more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2019.02.02]
War Order of Virtuti Militari — Silver (5th Class)more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2019.10.13]
September Campaign Crossmore on
pl.wikipedia.org
[access: 2023.11.24]
2 × „Cross of Valour”more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2019.04.16]
„Medal of Independence”more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2019.02.02]
Commemorative Medal for War of 1918–21more on
pl.wikipedia.org
[access: 2019.10.13]
Ten Years of Independence Medalmore on
pl.wikipedia.org
[access: 2019.10.13]

date and place
of death

04.1940

Tvertoday: Tver oblast, Russia
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.10.09]

alt. dates and places
of death

05.1940, 11.05.1940

details of death

cause of death

mass murder

perpetrators

Russians

sites and events

Tver (NKWD murders 1940)Click to display the description, «Katyn genocide 1940»Click to display the description, KLW OstashkovClick to display the description, Moscow (Butyrki)Click to display the description, KLW KozelskClick to display the description, PFL KozelshchynaClick to display the description, PFL FrydrikhivkaClick to display the description, Ribbentrop‐MolotovClick to display the description, Pius XI's encyclicalsClick to display the description, Silesian UprisingsClick to display the description, Polish‐Russian war of 1919‐1921Click to display the description, Polish‐Ukrainian war of 1918‐1919Click to display the description, Greater Poland UprisingClick to display the description, Thomas Zan SocietiesClick to display the description

date and place
of birth

19.07.1891

Puszczykowotoday: Puszczykowo urban gm., Poznań pov., Greater Poland voiv., Poland
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.07.25]

presbyter (holy orders)
ordination

19.12.1914 (Gniezno cathedralmore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2014.11.14])

positions held

others related
in death

DUBIELClick to display biography Alexander, JANASClick to display biography Mieczyslav, KACPRZAKClick to display biography Joseph, MARCOŃClick to display biography Mieczyslav, MASŁOŃClick to display biography Vladislav, MIKUCZEWSKIClick to display biography Joseph, MIODUSZEWSKIClick to display biography John, NOWAKClick to display biography Edmund, OCHABClick to display biography Vladimir, PASZKOClick to display biography Richard, ROMANOWSKIClick to display biography Victor, SKORELClick to display biography Joseph, SZWEDClick to display biography Bronislav, ZAKRZEWSKIClick to display biography Francis, DADACZYŃSKIClick to display biography Roman Joseph, GORGOLEWSKIClick to display biography Joseph, SMOLIŃSKIClick to display biography Joseph Tomislav, TRZYBIŃSKIClick to display biography Valentine, WILKANSClick to display biography Julian, DRUŻBACKIClick to display biography Nicholas, POGŁÓDEKClick to display biography Constantine

sites and events
descriptions

Tver (NKWD murders 1940): On 04.04‐22.05.1940 the Russians executed in Tver c. 6,314 Polish prisoners of war (POW) kept in Ostaszkov concentration camp. The prisoners were brought — Tver is c. 190 km from Ostashkov — to the NKVD HQ building (now Tver Medical Institute at Sovetskaya Str., formerly classical gymnasium) identified one by one in a basement room known as the „Lenin’s room”, handcuffed, taken to another room cellar with a door covered with felt, and then murdered by a shot from a German Walther P38 pistol into the back of the head. The bodies where next dumped into mass graves in ditches in the Miednoje forest, in the NKVD summer resort, and covered with sand by an excavator. The murders were part of an organized Russian genocidal operation against Polish prisoners of war, bearing all the hallmarks of genocide, known as the «Katyn genocide». (more on: pl.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2012.11.23], en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.05.09])

«Katyn genocide 1940»: On 05.03.1940, the Russian Commie‐Nazi authorities — the Politburo of the Russian Communist Party — made a formal decision to exterminate tens of thousands of Polish intelligentsia and military personnel held in Russian camps as a consequence of the German‐Russian Ribbentrop‐Molotov Agreement, the invasion of Poland and the annexation of half of Poland in 09.1939, and the beginning of World War II. The implementing act was order No. 00350 of the head of the NKVD, Mr Lavrentyi Beria, on the „discharge of NKVD prisons” in Ukraine and Belarus. On 03.03.1959, Alexander Shelepin, head of the Russian KGB, described it in a handwritten note: „Since 1940, the Committee for State Security under the Council of Ministers of Russia, has been keeping records and other materials relating to the prisoners of war and interned officers, gendarmes, policemen, etc., people from former bourgeois Poland shot that year. In total, based on the decision of the special troika of the NKVD of the USSR, 21,857 people were shot, of whom: 4,421 people in the Katyn Forest (Smolensk Oblast), 3,820 people from the Starobelsk camp near Kharkov, 6,311 people from the Ostashkov camp (Kalinin Oblast), and 7,305 people in other camps and prisons in Western Ukraine and Western Belarus. The entire operation of liquidation of the above–mentioned was carried out on the basis of the Resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU of 05.03.1940”. The operation — the murders were committed, among others, in Katyn, Kharkov, Tver, Bykovnia and Kuropaty — was coordinated centrally from the NKVD headquarters in Moscow. This is evidenced by the so‐called deportation lists of subsequent groups of Polish prisoners (usually about 100 people) from NKVD camps sent to places of execution, prepared and distributed a few days before the executions from Moscow. It is also evidenced by the earlier deportations of Polish priests from the Kozelsk, Ostashkov and Starobilsk NKVD camps to NKVD prison in Moscow, or their isolation, just before Christmas on 25.12.1939, prob. in order to deprive Polish prisoners of spiritual care at that time — clearly actions controlled from the NKVD HQ in Moscow. There are indications — i.e. four so‐called „NKVD‐Gestapo Methodical Conferences” of 1939‐1940: in Brest on Bug, Przemyśl, Zakopane and Cracow — of close collaboration between Germans and Russians in realization of plans of total extermination of Polish nation, its elites in particular — decision that prob. was confirmed during meeting of socialist leaders of Germany: Mr Heinrich Himmler, and Russia: Mr Lavrentyi Beria, in another German leader, Mr Hermann Göring, hunting lodge in Rominty in Romincka Forest in East Prussia. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2023.12.15])

KLW Ostashkov: Russian Rus. Концентрационный Лагерь для Военнопленных (Eng. POW Concentration Camp) KLW, run by genocidal Russian NKVD organization, for Poles arrested after the invasion in 1939, operating in 1939‐1940 in Ostashkov — in practice on Seliger lake Stolbnoy island and Svetlitsa peninsula, c. 11 km from Ostashkov, in a former Orthodox monastery, Niłowo‐Stołobieńska Hermitage, looted and shut down by Russian Bolsheviks in 1928. In 04.1940 6,570 were held captive there (in 11.1940 — 8397), out of which c. 6,300 were subsequently — as the fulfillment of Russian government decision to exterminate Polish intelligentsia and prisoners of war camps (Polish holocaust) — executed in Tver. Among the victims were officers of the Polish State Police, the Border Protection Corps KOP, Military Police, the Prison Service, officers and soldiers of the Polish Army, intelligence and counterintelligence officers of the Second Department of the General Staff, priests, employees of the judiciary, the fire brigade, foresters and military settlers from the eastern part of the Second Polish Republic. On another island of Lake Seliger, Gorodomla, in 1946‐1953 the Russians held a group of German specialists from Wernher von Braun's team, who, under the direction of Sergei Korolev, worked on Russian missiles. (more on: pl.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2012.11.23])

Moscow (Butyrki): Harsh transit and interrogation prison in Moscow — for political prisoners — where Russians held and murdered thousands of Poles. Founded prob. in XVII century. In XIX century many Polish insurgents (Polish uprisings of 1831 and 1863) were held there. During Communist regime a place of internment for political prisoners prior to a transfer to Russian slave labour complex Gulag. During the Great Purge c. 20,000 inmates were held there at any time (c. 170 in every cell). Thousands were murdered. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2020.05.01])

KLW Kozelsk: Russian Rus. Концентрационный Лагерь для Военнопленных (Eng. POW Concentration Camp) KLW, run by genocidal Russian NKVD organization, for Poles arrested after the invasion in 1939, operating in 1939‐1940 in Kozelsk — on the premises of the 18th century Orthodox Stauropygial Introduction of the Mother of God into the Temple Optyn Monastery, shut down and robbed by the Russian Bolsheviks in 1923. In 04‐05.1940, c. 4,594 people were detained there, who were then — as part of the implementation of the decision of the Russian authorities to exterminate dozens thousands of Polish intelligentsia and military personnel — murdered in Katyn. The prisoners included one rear admiral of the Polish Navy, four generals, c. 100 colonels and lieutenant colonels, c. 300 majors and c. 1,000 captains and captains of the Polish Army. Around half of them were reserve officers, including: 21 professors, associate professors and lecturers at universities, over 300 doctors, several hundred lawyers, several hundred engineers, several hundred teachers and many writers, journalists and publicists. There was also one woman, 2nd Leutenant pilot Janine Lewandowska. (more on: pl.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2012.11.23])

PFL Kozelshchyna: Russian Rus. Проверочно‐Фильтрационный Ла́герь (Eng. Testing and Filtration Camp) PFL, where the genocidal Russian NKVD organization carried out selection and isolation of the most „dangerous” or most valuable prisoners — established after the Russian invasion of Poland on 17.09.1939, the establishment of the NKVD Board for Prisoners of War and Internees on 19.09.1939 by the head of the NKVD, Lavrenty Beria, and the order to establish a number of camps for Polish POWs. Set up c. 500 m from the Kozelshchyna railway station, in the Poltava Oblast in Ukraine, by the Poltava‐Kremenchuk railway line. In 1939, c. 8,000 Polish POWs were held captive prior to being transported to other concentration camps. Police prisoners were kept in tents, rank‐and‐file soldiers in the buildings of the former Orthodox monastery church, shut after the Bolsheviks took power in Russia, and officers were kept in the rest of the church buildings, converted by the Bolsheviks mainly into state farm pigsties (emptied after the pigs died out during the erysipelas epidemic). Everyone was forced to do slave work, according to the principle „those who don't work, don't eat”. According to the survivers, place was cold and they had to queue for hours for water. (more on: www.insignis.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2023.12.15])

PFL Frydrikhivka: Russian Rus. Проверочно‐Фильтрационный Ла́герь (Eng. Testing and Filtration Camp) PFL, where the genocidal Russian NKVD organization carried out selection and isolation of the most „dangerous” or most valuable prisoners — established after the Russian invasion of Poland on 17.09.1939, the establishment of the NKVD Board for Prisoners of War and Internees on 19.09.1939 by the head of the NKVD, Lavrenty Beria, and the order to establish a number of camps for Polish POWs. Operated from 20.09.1939 to 02.1940 in the village of Frydrikhivka on Zbruch river, near the Ternopil‐Khmelnytsky railway line. C. 5,000 soldiers of the Polish Army, mainly officers, were held there. The prisoners spent the night between farm stables, some in the barracks in nearby Volochysk, some in the open air, without any facilities, food was not distributed regularly. It was a transit camp from which POWs were sent to other camps. (more on: pl.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2023.12.15])

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])

Silesian Uprisings: Three armed interventions of the Polish population against Germany in 1919‐1921 aiming at incorporation of Upper Silesia and Opole region into Poland, after the revival of the Polish state in 1918. Took place in the context of a plebiscite ordered on the basis of the international treaty of Versailles of 28.06.1919, ending the First World War, that was to decide national fate of the disputed lands. The 1st Uprising took place on 16‐24.08.1919 and broke out spontaneously in response to German terror and repression against the Polish population. Covered mainly Pszczyna and Rybnik counties and part of the main Upper Silesia industrial district. Suppressed by the Germans. 2nd Uprising took place on 19‐25.08.1920 in response to numerous acts of terror of the German side. Covered the entire area of the Upper Silesia industrial district and part of the Rybnik county. As a result Poles obtained better conditions for the campaign prior the plebiscite. The poll was conducted on 20.03.1921. The majority of the population — 59.6% — were in favor of Germany, but the results were influenced by the admission of voting from former inhabitants of Upper Silesia living outside Silesia. As a result the 3rd Uprising broke out, the largest such uprising of the Silesian in the 20th century. It lasted from 02.05.1921 to 05.07.1921. Spread over almost the entire area of Upper Silesia. Two large battles took place in the area of St. Anna Mountain and near Olza. As a result on 12.10.1921 the international plebiscite commission decided on a more favorable for Poland division of Upper Silesia. The territory granted to Poland was enlarged to about ⅓ of the disputed territory. Poland accounted for 50% of metallurgy and 76% of coal mines. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2020.05.25])

Polish‐Russian war of 1919‐1921: War for independence of Poland and its borders. Poland regained independence in 1918 but had to fight for its borders with former imperial powers, in particular Russia. Russia planned to incite Bolshevik‐like revolutions in the Western Europe and thus invaded Poland. Russian invaders were defeated in 08.1920 in a battle called Warsaw battle („Vistula river miracle”, one of the 10 most important battles in history, according to some historians). Thanks to this victory Poland recaptured part of the lands lost during partitions of Poland in XVIII century, and Europe was saved from the genocidal Communism. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.12.20])

Polish‐Ukrainian war of 1918‐1919: One of the wars for borders of the newly reborn Poland. At the end of 1918 on the former Austro‐Hungarian empire’s territory, based on the Ukrainian military units of the former Austro‐Hungarian army, Ukrainians waged war against Poland. In particular attempted to create foundation of an independent state and attacked Lviv. Thanks to heroic stance of Lviv inhabitants, in particular young generation of Poles — called since then Lviv eaglets — the city was recaptured by Poles and for a number of months successfully defended against furious Ukrainian attacks. In 1919 Poland — its newly created army — pushed Ukrainian forces far to the east and south, regaining control over its territory. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2017.05.20])

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])

Thomas Zan Societies: Secret societies of Polish youth, aiming at self‐education, patriotic in form and content, functioning 1830‐1920, in mutiny against enforced Germanisation and censure of Polish culture, mainly in secondary schools — gymnasia — mainly in Greater Poland (Wielkopolska) and later in Silesia. The first groups were formed in 1817. In 1897 a congress in Bydgoszcz was held when rules of clandestine activities were formulated. At other congress in Bydgoszcz in Poznań a „Red Rose” society was formed, heading all others groups in various gymnasiums and coordinating their activities. In 1900 „Red Rose” consolidated Philomaths organizations from Pomerania as well. After Toruń trial of Pomeranian Philomaths in Toruń Germans arrested 24 members of Thomas Zan Society from Gniezno. 21 of them were sentenced up to 6 weeks in prison and reprimands. All were relegated from schools without the right to continue education in secondary and higher schools in Prussia. Despite repression the Societies existed till 1918 and rebirth of Poland. (more on: pl.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2021.12.19])

sources

personal:
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[access: 2024.12.13], pl.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.08.10], www.wtg-gniazdo.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.01.06], pcbj.plClick to attempt to display webpage
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[access: 2019.10.13], 4historie.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.05.09]
bibliographical:
„Lexicon of Polish clergy repressed in USSR in 1939‐1988”, Roman Dzwonkowski, SAC, ed. Science Society KUL, 2003, Lublin
original images:
episkopat.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2019.10.13], audiovis.nac.gov.plClick to attempt to display webpage
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