29 September - 1 October 2023 Warsaw
Warsaw, the capital of Poland, is located in the central
part of Poland on the banks of the Vistula River. Like many European cities and towns, it has
had to re-invent itself from the destruction of WWII into Central Europe’s
financial hub and Poland’s most progressive city. Once the one of the most beautiful cities in
Europe and called the Paris of the North for its wide tree-line
boulevards and beautiful baroque buildings, the German invasion in 1939 and the
subsequent siege and Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943 and another uprising in
1944 resulted in the near total (85%) destruction of the city . With the painstaking reconstruction done
after the war (using pre-war photos of the buildings and bricks and stones
rescued from the piles of rubble), many people now refer to the city as the Phoenix
City.
No one is quite sure of the origins of the city. One legend has it that the name Warsaw is a
combination of two lovers, Wars and Sawa who lived near the Vistula River.
Another legend tells the story of a mermaid who told a fisherman on the Vistula
River that an indestructible city would be built there. The first evidence of a town was a small
trading settlement called Stare Brodno in the 10th and early 11th
centuries. In 1262, this settlement
became Jazdow and at the end of the 13th century, Jazdow merged with
another village called Warszowa. This
town continued to grow as a result of its location on trade routes through
Poland. In 1529, the Parliament of the
Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth met in Warsaw and elections for the king (this
position was not hereditary) were held here.
However, since 1040, the capital of Poland and the residence of the king
had been Krakow. In 1596, King Sigismund
III Vasa proclaimed Warsaw as the capital.
The age of Enlightenment in the latter half of the 18th
century saw commerce and culture grow in both Poland and Warsaw. The National Theater was built in Warsaw and
on 3 May 1791, the first constitution in Europe was ratified in Warsaw.
However, this period of time also saw Poland divided between
Prussian, Austro-Hungarian and Russian empires.
At the same time there were many uprisings by the Polish people that
were brutally crushed by the ruling empires leaving Warsaw a small provincial
town of South Prussia. In 1806, Poland was occupied by the French with Napoleon
declaring that Warsaw would be the capital city of the duchy of Warsaw. Following Napoleon’s defeat, Poland fell
under Russian rule. Still fighting for
national independence, the Poles instigated the Russo-Polish War of 1831 which
resulted in the storming of Warsaw and 30 more years of Russian rule. After another failed attempt in 1863 to
achieve independence (known as the January Rising in which over 200,000 Polish
insurrectionists were killed) , Warsaw became a provincial city of the Russian
Empire’s “Vistula Land.” Resigned to
their fate, the Warsaw citizens entered into a period of “positivism” to
preserve Polish culture at all costs. In
the early 1900s, it appeared that this was working – censorship was removed,
Polish schools and other cultural institutions were built, and Warsaw
experience a cultural renaissance. And
after WWI, Poland became an independent republic and Warsaw was again
proclaimed the national capital.
Unfortunately, the worst was yet to come – WWII, Hitler, and
Nazism. During the period between the
two world wars, Warsaw continued to grow both economically and culturally. The population grew to over 1 million
residents. Before the war, Warsaw had
one of the largest Jewish populations in the world and accounted for about 30%
of the Warsaw population. But all that
came crashing down on 1 September 1939 with the beginning of the Nazi siege of
Warsaw when the city was bombed by the German Air Force. Over 10,000 citizens were killed and over
50,000 injured during the 28-day siege.
With supplies depleted, Warsaw and the Polish army surrendered. During the Nazi occupation of Poland, its
cultural institutions were destroyed and many of its inhabitants and most of
its Jewish population were sent to concentration camps.
The Soviet Union also took part in this attack on Poland and
as a result Poland’s eastern territories became part of the USSR. About 10,000 Polish soldiers and citizens
were imprisoned or deported to other areas of the Soviet Union. The Polish officers and civilian leaders were
sent to a separate camp, where in April and May, 1940, about 22,000 of these
Polish leaders were murdered by the Soviets (in effect destroying the
leadership that may have formed an army in the future that was hostile to
Soviet interests). One of these
massacres occurred in the Katyn Forest in western Russia. Although the Soviet Union claimed that it was
German forces that killed these people, they finally admitted the truth in
1989. During the 2010 commemoration to
mark the 70th anniversary of the massacre, the plane carrying Polish
President Lech Kaczynski crashed killing all on board.
Following the German occupation in 1939, a Jewish ghetto was
built surrounded by a high wall, enclosing 450,000 Jews in a very small area. Many of its inhabitants died from disease and
starvation before the Germans had the chance to send them to concentration
camps. In April 1943, the residents
tried one last, heroic act of defiance in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising by
refusing to surrender to the Germans.
The Germans than began a month long, systematic burning of the Ghetto
resulting in the deaths of over 13,000 Jews and the total destruction of the
Great Synagogue. The Jewish quarter of
Warsaw was no more.
In the summer of 1944, the Polish resistance army made one
last attempt at defeating the Germans. This
was the biggest uprising of the war and although they came close to victory,
German reinforcements arrived and defeated the Poles. Between 150,000-180,000 Polish citizens died
during this uprising. In all upwards of
800,000 Warsaw inhabitants died during the war.
When the city was finally liberated by the Soviets on 17 January 1945,
the city was nearly totally destroyed.
Of over 1.3 million citizens before the war only about 153,000 remained. Throughout this entire time, the Soviet army
sat by and watched this decimation by the Nazis, neither intervening nor
allowing Allied forces access to Soviet air bases for airlifts of supplies to
the Polish resisters. Many Poles feel
Stalin allowed this to happen so that it would be easier for the Soviet Union
to take over control of Poland, which they did after defeating the German
forces.
On 1 February
1945, Warsaw was once again proclaimed the capital of Poland. And like the phoenix rising from the flames,
the citizens once again set out to rebuild their city, brick by brick. And after the fall of the Soviet Union in
1989, Poland became a representative democracy, with the President as head of
the state and the Prime Minister as head of the government. Today Warsaw is a very typical European
capital with its high-rise buildings and its rebuilt Old Town, its lush parks
and bustling shopping areas, and its many cafes and bustling night life. So come with us as we explore all the wonders
Warsaw as to offer.
We arrived this
morning after a short flight from Munich and traveled to our lodging, the Palm Apartments. The apartment is located not far
from the old town of Warsaw and very close to tram and bus routes.
This afternoon we walked up to the Tomb of the Unknown
Soldier in Pilsudski Square and Nicolaus Copernicus Monument.
The largest square in Warsaw, Pilsudski Square, known
previously as Victory Square and Saxon Square, was located in front of the now
destroyed Saski Palace. It was named for
Jozef Pitsudski, the first chief of state (1918-1922) of the newly independent
Poland State in November 1918.
TheTtomb of the Unknown Soldier sits under the surviving arches of the Saski Palace
(Saxon Palace). The unknown soldier is
from the Defense of Lwow (1918-1919) but since then earth from the battlefields
where Polish soldiers died has been added to the urns that surround the
tomb. An eternal flame lights the tomb,
and it is constantly guarded by an Honor Guard from the Polish Army. Most military ceremonies are held here. The changing of the guard takes place every
hour of every day.
There is a lot of excavation/reconstruction going on around Pilsudski Square. The government is in the process of reconstructing three buildings – Saski Palace, Bruhl Palace, and three tenement homes – to their original form before they were destroyed during WWII. These buildings played an important role in the Second Polish Republic and housed several government agencies including the General Staff of the Polish Army and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. They are still in the early years of excavating the ruins of these buildings, and unfortunately it is not open to the public. There is a covered fence around the area, but there were a few openings in the cloth covering where you could take a picture or two.
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| Tomb of the Unknown Soldier |
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| Saxon Gardens |
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| Saxon Gardens |
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| Saxon Gardens |
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| Saxon Gardens -- Bridal Couple |
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| Excavation Around Pilsudski Square |
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| Statue of Jozef Pitsudski |
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| Found Bill's New Cars! |
Walking to the Staszic Palace, we passed the Basilica of the Holy Cross, a Roman Catholic church considered to one of the most beautiful churches in Warsaw. Built in the Baroque style, it has sculpture of Christ carrying the cross with his hand raised toward the sky in front of the church.
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| Holy Cross Church |
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| Holy Cross Church |
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| Staszic Palace and Nicolaus Copernicus Monument |
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| Nicolaus Copernicus Monument |
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