Extermination and Expulsion of Poles and Jews By Nazi Germany
Nazi German policy aimed at extermination of Jewish and Polish population. Mass murder sites in the region include:
- Stutthof concentration camp, where over 85,000 died(mostly Poles).
- Piaśnica, site of mass murder of around 12,000 local Polish-Kashub intelligentsia and other people.
The Polish Roman Catholic Church was severely persecuted and most Catholic priests were deported to concentration camps.
An organisation called Selbstschutz was formed out of local Germans who hunted down prominent members of Polish and Jewish community and mass murdered them. In West Prussia, Selbstschutz under the command of Ludolf von Alvensleben were 17,667 men strong, and had already executed 4,247 Poles by October. Soon a series of Selbstschutz camps were established in the region.
The total number of victims of Selbstschutz mass murder campaign is difficult to determine in precise way. In autumn 1939 Oebsger-Roder lamented that that despite all the measures only a fraction of Poles were destroyed and gave the number of 20,000.
Jews did not figure prominently among the victims in West Prussia, as the area was not densely populated by them and most had fled before Germans arrived. However in places where they stayed they were removed by expulsion and what was classified as "other measures"-in effect meaning murder. In areas where Jewish families or individuals remained a "shameful situation" was proclaimed, and authorities expected the Selbstschutz to remedy it through direct action.
One Selbstschutz commander, Wilhelm Richardt, said in Karolewo (Karlhof) camp that he did not want to build big camps for Poles and feed them, and that it was an honour for Poles to fertilize the German soil with their corpses. There was little opposition or lack of enthusiasm for activities of Selbstschutz among those involved in the action. There was even a case where a Selbstschutz commander was relieved after he failed to account for all the Poles that were required, and it was found that he executed "only" 300 Poles.
Additionally Germans expelled a number of Poles and Jews-the overall number of the German ethnic cleansing is estimated by the Stutthof Museum at 120-170,000 and located German colonists in their place.
Read more about this topic: Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia
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