AustreibungExpulsions4

AustreibungExpulsions - 4

   Flight and Expulsions of Germans
                  from Poland
     during and after World War II



Expulsion of Germans
after World War II
(demographic estimates)
Background
Nazi-Soviet population transfers
Potsdam Agreement
Flight and evacuation
German evacuation
East Prussia
Flight and expulsion
Czechoslovakia
Poland (incl. former German territories)
Netherlands
Romania
Exodus and emigration
Exodus from Eastern Europe
Emigration from Poland

The flight and expulsion of Germans from Poland was the
largest of a series of flights and expulsions of Germans in
Europe during and after World War II. The German population
fled or was expelled from all regions which are currently within
the territorial boundaries of Poland, including the former
eastern territories of Germany and parts of pre-war Poland.

The first mass movement of German civilians followed the Red
Army's advance and was composed of both spontaneous flight
driven by rumours of Soviet atrocities, and organised
evacuation starting in the summer of 1944 and continuing
through to the spring of 1945.[1] About 3.5 million people were
involved, mainly driven by fear of the advancing Soviet Army.
[1] In 1945, the eastern territories of Germany (most of Silesia
and Pomerania, East Brandenburg, and East-Prussia) as well as
Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany (especially Warthegau
and Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia) were occupied by the
Soviet Red Army and Polish military forces. Early expulsions in
Poland were undertaken by the Polish Communist military
authorities[2] even before the Potsdam Conference ("wild
expulsions"),[3] to ensure the later integration into an
ethnically homogeneous Poland[4] as envisioned by the Polish
Communists.[5][6] Between seven hundred and eight hundred
thousand Germans were affected.[1] Germans were defined as
either Reichsdeutsche, people enlisted in 1st or 2nd Volksliste
groups, and those of the 3rd group, who held German
citizenship. About 1.1 million[7] German citizens of Slavic
descent were "verified" as "autochtone" Poles,[8] 900,000 of
whom natives of Upper Silesia and Masuria.[7] Of those, most
were not expelled, yet hundreds of thousands emigrated to
Germany after 1950, including most Masurians.[9]

The Soviet Union transferred territories to the east of the Oder-
Neisse Line to Poland in July 1945.[8] All Germans were
expropriated and placed under restrictive jurisdiction.[8][10]
Subsequent to this, under the authority of Potsdam Agreement,
most remaining Germans were expelled from pre-war Poland
and the so-called "Recovered Territories" to the territories
west of the Oder-Neisse line. From the spring of 1946 the
expulsions gradually became better organised, and less lethal,
affecting another three million people.[1] Some German
civilians, prior to their expulsion, were used as forced labour in
Communist administered camps.[11] Besides large camps, some
of which were re-used Nazi concentration camps, numerous
other forced labour, punitive and internment camps, urban
ghettos, and detention centres sometimes consisting only of a
small cellar were set up.[10] An estimated million[1] of
Germans considered "indispensable" for the Polish economy
were retained until the early 1950s,[10] and had virtually left by
1960.[9] Close to 165,000 Germans were transported to the
Soviet Union for forced labour where most of them perished.[10]

The attitude of Polish civilians, many of whom had experienced
brutalities only surpassed by the treatment of the Jews during
the preceding Nazi occupation, was ambiguous.[12] Many
engaged in looting, robberies, beatings and even murders and
rapes.[12] On the other hand, there were incidents when Poles,
even freed slave labourers, protected Germans by e.g.
disguising them as Poles.[12] The attitude of the Soviet soldiers
was also ambiguous. Many of them committed numerous
atrocities, most prominently rapes and murders,[13] and did not
always distinguish between Poles and Germans, often
mistreated them alike.[14] Other Soviets were taken aback by
the brutal treatment of the Germans and engaged in their
protection.[12]

Thomasz Kamusella is citing estimates of 7 million expelled
during both "wild" and "legal" expulsions from the "Recovered
Territories" until 1948, joined by an additional 700,000 from
areas of pre-war Poland.[10] Overy cites approximate totals of
those evacuated, migrated, or expelled between 1944–1950
from East Prussia: 1.4 million to Western Germany, 609,000 to
Eastern Germany; from West Prussia: 230,000 to Western
Germany, 61,000 to Eastern Germany; from the former
German area East of the Oder-Neisse: 3.2 million to Western
Germany, 2 million to Eastern Germany.[15]

Contents [hide]
1 Background
1.1 Historical background
1.2 Allied decisions: Tehran, Yalta and Potsdam conferences
1.3 Polish attitudes
2 Flight and evacuation following the Red Army's advance
3 After the Soviet and Polish take-over
3.1 Deportation to the Soviet Union
3.2 Internment and forced labor in Poland
3.3 Pre-Potsdam "wild" expulsions (May - July 1945)
4 Expulsions following the Potsdam Conference
5 "Autochthones"
6 "Rehabilitation"
7 "Indispensable Germans"
8 Repopulation
9 Formal end of the expulsions
10 Demographic estimates
11 Legacy
11.1 Post-war
11.2 Post-communist (1989-present)
12 See also
13 Notes
14 Sources

Historical background:

History of German settlement in Eastern Europe, Nazi
Germany, and World War II
German settlement in the former eastern territories of
Germany and pre-war Poland dates back to the medieval
Ostsiedlung. Nazi Germany used the presence and the alleged
persecution of Volksdeutsche as propaganda tools in
preparation for the invasion of Poland in 1939. With the
invasion, Poland was partitioned between Nazi Germany and
the Soviet Union according to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.
This was followed by population exchanges, mostly Baltic
Germans were resettled to occupied Poland.

Nazi Germany's Generalplan Ost strategy for Central and
Eastern Europe envisioned the creation of a Greater Germany,
which was to be built by means of removing a variety of non-
Germans from Poland and other areas in Eastern Europe,
mainly Slavs and Jews believed by Nazis to be subhuman. These
non-Germans were targeted for slave labor and eventual
extermination. While Generalplan Ost's settlement ambitions
did not come into full effect due to the war's turn, some
Germans mostly from Eastern Europe were settled by the
Nazis to replace Poles removed or killed during the occupation.
Nazi Germany deported millions of Poles either to other
territories, to concentration camps or as slave workers. Many
others were deported to the Soviet Union under their direction.

It is important to note that most affluent German-Jews were
able to leave Germany in 1939. Most of them were capable of
taking their wealth and personal property with them.

German-Jews who did not leave Germany voluntarily, and who
did not oppose Hitler's Germany, were not sent to
extermination camps, but worked for the German Reich in
many important capacities.

Allied decisions: Tehran Conference, Yalta Conference,
Potsdam Conference, and Oder Neisse line

Though initially hesitant to support widespread post-war
population transfers, the British government began signaling
approval already in late 1940, after German bombing attacks on
British cities had radicalised British public opinion. But, British
officials were sharply divided on the extent and speed of the
transfers. In 1943, the War Office opposed the Foreign Office’s
intentions to move Polish borders as far as the Oder-Neisse line
and deport the millions of Germans who would be left inside the
new borders of Poland. Such a move, the Director of Military
Intelligence wrote, would yield an overpopulated and revisionist
Germany bordering an underpopulated and weak Poland, and
would "sow the seeds of another war".[16] The Foreign Office
countered with the argument that German salients in the East
were even more dangerous and rendered Poland strategically
vulnerable. Just as important, argued the Foreign Office,
Britain had a moral obligation to Poland, which would have to be
compensated for its losses to the Soviet Union.

Representatives of the Polish Government were not present at
any of those conference and felt betrayed by their western
Allies who have decided about future Polish borders behind
their backs.

Retreating Wehrmacht, eastern Germany, March 1945:
Following the Tehran Conference (November-December 1943)
Joseph Stalin and Winston Churchill made it clear that the
Soviets would keep the Polish territories east of the Curzon line
and offered Poland territorial compensation in the West.[17]
The final decision to move Poland's boundary westward,
preconditioning the expulsion of Germans, was made by Britain,
the Soviet Union, and the United States at the Yalta
Conference in February 1945, when the Curzon line was
irrevocably fixed as the future Polish-Soviet border.[12][18]
The precise location of the Polish western border was left open
and, though basically the Allies had agreed on population
transfers, the extent remained questioned[19]. Concerning the
post-war western frontier of Poland, the agreement simply
read: "If a specific problem such as the frontiers of liberated
Poland and the complexion of its government allowed no easy
solution, hopes were held out for the future discussion of all
outstanding problems in an amicable manner."[20] Upon gaining
control of these lands, the Soviet and Polish-Communist
authorities started to expel the German population.[21]

President Harry S. Truman complained that there were now
five occupation zones because the Soviets had turned over the
area extending along the Oder and western Neisse to Poland
and was concerned about Germany's economic control and war
reparations.[22] Churchill spoke against giving Poland control
over an area in which some eight million Germans lived. Stalin
insisted that the Germans had all fled and that the Poles were
needed to fill the vacuum.[23] On July 24, the Polish communist
delegation arrived in Berlin, insisting on the Oder and western
Neisse rivers as the frontier, and they vehemently argued their
case before the foreign ministers, Churchill, and Truman, in
turn.[23] The next day Churchill warned Stalin: "The Poles are
driving the Germans out of the Russian zone. That should not
be done without considering its effect on the food supply and
reparations. We are getting into a position where the Poles
have food and coal, and we have the mass of (the) population
thrown at us."[24] To the Soviets, reparations were more
important than boundaries, and Stalin might have sold out the
Poles if they had not so vociferously protested when, in spite of
his 'illness', he consulted with them during the evening of July
29.[25]

Polish attitudes:

Władysław Gomułka, Polish Communist leader, organized
expulsions in his "Ministry for the Recovered Territories"As
early as in 1941, Władysław Sikorski of the Polish government
in exile insisted on driving "the German horde (...) back far
[westward]"[26], while in 1942 memoranda he expressed
concern about Poland acquiring Lower Silesia, populated with
"fanatically anti-Polish Germans".[27][28] Yet as the war went
on, Lower Silesia also became a Polish war aim, as well as
occupation of the Baltic coast west of Szczecin as far as
Rostock and occupation of the Kiel Canal.[28] Expulsions of
Germans from East Prussia and pre-war Poland had become a
war aim as early as in February 1940, expressed by Polish
Foreign Minister August Zaleski[28].

Stanisław Mikołajczyk, Polish prime minister of the Polish
Government in Exile, supported the expulsions. After Sikorski's
death, the next Polish Prime Minister Stanisław Mikołajczyk in
a letter to Roosevelt expressed his concerns about the idea of
compensating Poland in the west.[29] However, pressed by
Churchill, he was forced to accept the Tehran decision, which
was the direct cause of his resignation from his post.[30] The
next Polish Prime Minister, Tomasz Arciszewski made a
statement that Poland did not "want neither Breslau nor
Stettin".[31]

Although the Polish government in Exile was recognised by the
Allies at that time, the Soviet Union broke off all diplomatic
relations with it in April 1943 after Polish government
demanded the investigation of the Katyn massacre. Shortly,
thereafter the Russians admitted that they had killed the Polish
Officers in the Katyn Forest Massacre, but instead of the
10,000 officers killed, it was determined long after the war had
ended and after the fall of the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics and the creation of the new Russian Federation, that
the Red Army had actually executed more than 40,000 Polish
Officers.

On April 20, 1944, in Moscow, the Soviet sponsored Polish
Communist cell founded the Polish Committee of National
Liberation (PKWN) on Stalin’s initiative. Just one week later
the representatives of the PKWN and the Soviet Union signed a
treaty regulating the new Polish-Soviet border. A year later,
before the Potsdam Conference, the western Allies followed
Stalin, recognized the Soviet-sponsored government, which
accepted the shift of the borders westwards, and withdrew their
recognition for the Polish government in Exile.

When Stanisław Mikołajczyk joined the "Government of
National Unity" as a deputy prime minister in 1945, he justified
the expulsions of Germans by national terms following
communist Wladyslaw Gomulka, but also as a revolutionary act,
freeing the Poles of exploitation by a German middle and upper
class.[32]

Dead Germans in Nemmersdorf, East Prussia: Soviet atrocities,
exaggerated and spread by Nazi propaganda, fueled the
spontaneous flight of the German population. But the
propaganda later turned out to be a fact. Also, it was said by
the Soviets and the Allies that Germany had attacked Russian
Troops by surprise. Actually, through the efforts of a German
double agent, it was found that the Red Army was at
Germany's eastern borders, unbeknown to the Germans.
Determining that this was so, the Germans mobilized several
crack divisions and attacked the Russian Army in a surprise
attack, driving them back at breakneck speed toward Russia. It
was also learned that it was the Red Russians that had a burnt
land policy. The very disciplined German Wehrmacht did not
murder and/rape innocent Polish citizens, as the Russians
claimed. The Germans would only retaliate if they were also
attacked. But the Red Army's advance guard which included
Tartars and Mongolians were not disciplined, and therefore
were responsible for the murder and rape of innocent Polish and
German civilians. It was also told to Stalin that he would
receive all the eastern countries as a gift if they broke their
alliance with the Third Reich and attack them first.   However,
by utilizing the ingenuity of a double agent, the Germans beat
the Russians at their own game.

After the Red Army had advanced into the eastern parts of
post-war Poland in the Lublin–Brest Offensive, launched on 18
July 1944, Soviet spearheads first reached eastern German
territory on 4 August 1944 at northeastern East Prussia and
Memelland, causing a first wave of refugees.[33] These
refugees temporarily returned when the German army,
Wehrmacht, was able to regain territory in Operation
Doppelkopf.[34] On October 5, the Red Army launched the
Memel Offensive,[34] and eleven days later the Gumbinnen
Offensive into East Prussia.[35] In the same month, Volkssturm
units were formed out of the not yet drafted male population
deemed fit for military service.[35] While Nazi Gauleiter Erich
Koch refused to evacuate the civilian population, Wehrmacht
and the East Prussian president (Regierungspräsident)
evacuated more than 600,000 people from a 30 kilometer wide
strip behind the frontline, a measure which the Gauleitung
finally approved in late October.[34] When the Wehrmacht
repelled the Soviet Gumbinnen Offensive throughout the fall of
1944, news were spread by the Nazi propaganda machine[36]
about a Soviet massacre in Nemmersdorf[37] and other
atrocities.[38] People were now aware of the Soviet reprisals
on German civilians[12] and apprehensive regarding the
pending Soviet takeover[12] - "Die Russen kommen!"
("Russians approaching!") became the desperate slogan of the
time.[38]

Refugees cross the frozen Frisches Haff, 1945With the Soviet
Vistula–Oder Offensive, launched on 12 January 1945, and the
parallel East Prussian Offensive launched on 13 January 1945,
Soviet gains of pre-war German and annexed Polish territory
became permanent. With the subsequent East Pomeranian,
Lower Silesian and Upper Silesian Offensives in February and
March, the Red Army seized control of virtually all territories
east of the Oder river. Wehrmacht counter-offensives like
Operation Solstice and Operation Gemse were repelled, and
only shrinking pockets like Breslau, Danzig,[39] Heiligenbeil,
Hela, Kolberg, Königsberg, and Pillau[39] remained German
controlled. Soviet soldiers committed reprisal rapes and other
crimes [12][13] In most cases, implementation of the evacuation
plans was delayed until Soviet and Allied forces had defeated
the Nazi forces and advanced into the areas to be evacuated.
The responsibility for leaving millions of Germans in these
vulnerable areas until combat conditions overwhelmed them can
be attributed directly to the draconian measures taken by the
Nazis against anyone even suspected of 'defeatist' attitudes [as
evacuation was considered] and the fanaticism of many Nazi
functionaries in their execution of Hitler's 'no retreat' orders.
[13][40][41][42] Hitler and his staff refused to accept Soviet
military superiority.[41] Hitler called the Red Army "gleaned
punks" and "booty divisions", who were not able to win decisive
battles.[43] Himmler called the preparation of the early 1945
Soviet offensive "the biggest bluff since Dshingis Khan".[44]

Refugee trek in East Prussia, March 1945The first mass
movement of German civilians in the eastern territories was
composed of both spontaneous flight and organized evacuation,
starting in the summer of 1944 and continuing through the early
spring of 1945.[45] Conditions turned chaotic in the winter,
when miles-long queues of refugees pushed their carts through
the snow trying to stay ahead of the Red Army.[12] From the
Baltic coast, thousands were evacuated by ship in Operation
Hannibal.[12] Since February 11, refugees were shipped not
only to German ports, but also to Nazi occupied Denmark,
based on an order issued by Hitler on 4 February.[46] Of 1,180
ships participating in the evacuation, 135 were lost due to
bombs, mines, and torpedoes, an estimated 20,000 died.[47]
Between 23 January 1945 and the end of the war, 2,022,702
people were transported via the Baltic Sea,[48] between
200,000[49] and 250,000[50] of them to occupied Denmark.

When the land evacuation routes were already intercepted by
the Red Army, tens of thousands remaining Germans were
evacuated by ship in Operation Hannibal. Depicted liner MV
Wilhelm Gustloff was sunk by a Soviet submarine, 9,000
drowned.Most of the evacuation efforts commenced in January
1945, when Soviet forces were already at the eastern border of
Germany. About six million Germans had fled or were
evacuated from the areas east of the Oder-Neisse line before
Soviet and the attached Polish Army took control of the region.
[51] Refugee treks and ships which came into reach of the
advancing Soviets suffered high casualties when targeted by
low-flying aircrafts, torpedoes, or were rolled over by tanks.
[12] The most infamous incidents during the flight and expulsion
from the territory of later Poland include the sinking of the
refugee liner MV Wilhelm Gustloff by a Soviet submarine with
a death toll of some 9,000 people;[12] the USAF bombing of
refugee-crowded[52] Swinemünde on 12 March 1945 killing an
estimated 23,000[53][54] to 25,000;[55] the desperate
conditions under which refugees crossed the frozen Frisches
Haff, where thousands broke in, froze to death, or were killed
by Soviet aircrafts;[56] and the poorly organized evacuation
and ultimative sacrifice of refugee crowded Breslau by the local
Nazi authorities headed by Karl Hanke.

The Nazi German Ministry for Inner Affairs passed a decree on
14 March 1945 allowing abortion to women raped by Soviet
soldiers.[57]

[edit] After the Soviet and Polish take-over

Volkssturm to defend the Oder, February 1945
Soviet forces enter Danzig (Gdansk), March 1945Many
refugees tried to return home when the fighting in their
homelands ended. Before June 1, 1945, some 400,000 crossed
back over the Oder and Neisse rivers eastward, before Soviet
and Polish communist authorities closed the river crossings;
another 800,000 entered Silesia from Czechoslovakia.[58]

Soviet troops,[13][14] as well as Polish civilians[12] and militias
[59] exacted revenge on ethnic Germans and German nationals.
While many Germans had already fled ahead of the advancing
Soviet Army, millions of Reichs- and Volksdeutsche remained in
East and West Prussia, Silesia, Pomerania, the Sudetenland,
and in pockets throughout Central and Eastern Europe.[11] The
Polish courier Jan Karski warned US President Franklin Delano
Roosevelt of the possibility of Polish reprisals, describing them
as "unavoidable" and "an encouragement for all the Germans
in Poland to go west, to Germany proper, where they belong".
[60]

[edit] Deportation to the Soviet Union
Main article: Forced labor of Germans in the Soviet Union
On February 6, 1945, Soviet NKVD ordered mobilisation of all
German men (17 to 50 years old) in the Soviet-controlled
territories. Many of them were then transported to the Soviet
Union for forced labour. In the former German territories the
Soviet authorities did not always distinguish between the Poles
and Germans and often treated them alike.[14] Some 165,000
Germans were rounded up randomly and deported in 1945, they
were not allowed to "return" (that is, not to their former homes
but to either East or West Germany) until 1955; most of them
perished[61].

[edit] Internment and forced labor in Poland
In territories that belonged to Poland before the war, Germans
were treated even more harshly than in the former German
territories[62]. Deprived of any citizen rights, many were used
as forced labor prior to their expulsion, sometimes for years, in
labor battalions or in labour camps[63][64] such as Glaz,
Milecin, Gronowo, Sikawa, Central Labour Camp Jaworzno,
Central Labour Camp Potulice, Łambinowice (run by Czesław
Gęborski), Zgoda labour camp and others. The death toll was
between twenty and fifty percent[65], and as the guards were
not paid regular salary they forcefully extracted their wage
from the inmates[66]. When Geborski was tried by the Polish
authorities in 1959 for his wanton brutality, he stated his only
goal was to exact revenge for his own treatment during the war
[67].

Zayas states that "in many internment camps no relief from
outside was permitted. In some camps relatives would bring
packages and deliver them to the Polish guards, who regularly
plundered the contents and delivered only the remains, if any.
Frequently, these relatives were so ill-treated that they never
returned. Internees who came to claim their packages were also
mistreated by the guards, who insisted the internees should
speak Polish, even if they were Germans born in German-
speaking Silesia or Pomerania."[68]

Among the interned were also German POWs. Up to 10% of
the 700,000 to 800,000 POWs of the respective battlegrounds
were handed over to the Poles by the Soviet military for the use
of their work force[69]. Their number in 1946 was 40,000
according to the Polish administration, of whom 30,000 were
used as miners in the Upper Silesian coal industries[70]. 7,500
Germans alleged of crimes against Poles were handed over to
Poland by the Western Allies in 1946 and 1947[71]. A number of
German Nazi war criminals were imprisoned in Polish jails, at
least 8,000 remained in jail in 1949, many of them also being
POWs[72]. (see also Supreme National Tribunal)

[edit] Pre-Potsdam "wild" expulsions (May - July 1945)

Refugee's trail, eastern Germany 1945.In 1945, the former
eastern territories of Germany (Silesia, most of Pomerania,
East Brandenburg and East-Prussia) were occupied by Soviet
and Soviet controlled Polish military forces. Polish militia and
military started expulsions[73] already before the Potsdam
Conference, referred to as "wild expulsions" (German: Wilde
Vertreibungen), affecting between 700,000 and 800,000
Germans.[1] The Polish communists ordered the expulsion of
Germans: "We must expel all the Germans because countries
are built on national lines and not on multi-national ones" was
demanded by participants of a Plenum of the Central
Committee of the Polish Workers Party in May 20-21, 1945.
[74] On the same Plenum, the head of the Central Committee,
Wladyslaw Gomulka, ordered: "There has to be a border patrol
at the border [Oder-Neisse line] and the Germans have to be
driven out. The main objective has to be the cleansing of the
terrain of Germans, the building of a nation state".[75] To
ensure the Oder Neisse line would be accepted as the new
Polish border at a future Allied Conference (Potsdam
Conference), up to 300,000 Germans living close to the rivers'
eastern bank were expelled subsequently[76]. On May 26,
1945, the Central Committee ordered all Germans to be
expelled within one year and the area settled with some 3.5
million ethnic Poles; 2.5 million of them were already re-settled
by summer[77].

Germans were defined as either Reichsdeutsche or
Volksdeutsche resembling the 1st or 2nd category in the Nazis'
Volksliste, people who had signed a lower category were
allowed to apply for "verification", that was to determine
whether they would be granted Polish citizenship as
"autochtones"[78]. Polish military drove 400,000 Germans
across Poland's new western border in June and July[79].

Many Germans evacuated during the war were not allowed to
return to their homes. Before June 1, 1945, some 400,000
managed to cross the Oder and Neisse rivers eastward before
Polish authorities closed the river crossings, another 800,000
entered Silesia from Czechoslovakia, bringing up Silesia's
population to 50% of the pre-war level.[80]. This led to the odd
situation of treks of Germans moving about in all directions, to
the east as well as to the west, each warning the others of what
would await them at their destination[32]

[edit] Expulsions following the Potsdam Conference

Oder-Neisse line at UsedomAfter the Potsdam Conference,
Poland was officially in charge of the territories east of the
Oder Neisse line. Despite the fact that article 8 of Potsdam
agreement from August 2, 1945 stated that "population
transfer" should be performed in ordered and humane manner,
and should not commence until after the creation of an
expulsion plan approved by the Allied Control Council, the
expulsions continued without rules and were associated with
many criminal acts.[81] While the Polish administration had set
up a State Repatriation Office (Państwowy Urząd
Repatriacyjny, PUR), the bureau and its administrative subunits
proved ineffective due to quarrels between Communists and
opposition and a far too low equipment for the giant task of
expelling Germans as well as resettling Poles in an area
devastated by war[82]. Furthermore, rivalry occurred between
the Soviet occupation forces and the new installed Polish
administration, a phenomenon dubbed dwuwladza (double
administration)[83]. The Soviets kept trains and German
workmen regardless of the Polish ambitions and plans[82].

Expellees from Pomerania, West and East Prussia arrive in
Berlin, 1945.The waves of expulsions after the Potsdam
conference must also be seen in the context of the
contemporary, likewise unorganized, resettling of displaced or
homeless Poles. Polish settlers, who themselves had been
expelled from areas east of the Curzon line, arrived with about
nothing, putting an even higher pressure on the remaining
Germans to leave[84]. For the Germans, the Potsdam
Agreement eased conditions only in one way - because now the
Poles were more confident in keeping the former eastern
territories of Germany, the expulsions were performed with
less haste, which meant the Germans were duly informed about
their expulsions earlier and were allowed to carry some luggage
[85].

Another problem the Germans and, to a lesser extent, even the
newly arrived Poles were facing was an enormous crime wave,
most notably theft and rape, committed by gangs not only
consisting of regular criminals but also Soviet soldiers, deserters
or former forced laborers (Ostarbeiter), coming back from the
west[86]. In Upper Silesia, a party official complained about
some Polish security forces and militia raping and pillaging the
German population and a general loss of sense for right and
wrong[84]. Much abuse also came from large Soviet contingents
stationed in Poland after the war. A high number of crimes
committed by regular Soviet soldiers - on both German and
Polish populace - had been reported, as well as a high death toll
of the few Polish officials who dared to investigate these cases
[87]. Yet, Soviet troops played an ambiguous role, as there are
also cases where Soviets freed local Germans imprisoned by
Poles, or delayed expulsions to keep German workforce, for
example on farms providing Soviet troops (for instance in
Słupsk).[88]

Refugees from East Prussia, 1945The damaged infrastructure
and quarrels between the Allied authorities in the occupation
zones of Germany and the Polish administration caused long
delays in the transport of expellees, who were first ordered to
gather at one of the various PUR transportation centers or
internment camps and then often forced to wait in ill-equipped
barracks, exposed both to criminals, aggressive guards and the
cold and not supplied sufficiently with food due to the overall
shortages[82].

The "organized transfer" as agreed on at the Potsdam
Conference only began in early 1946 and subsequently evolved
in a process coordinated with British and Soviet authorities in
occupied Germany in 1946 and 1947. Yet due to the lack of
heating facilities, the cold winters of both 1945/46 and 1946/47
continued to claim many lives.[84].

[edit] "Autochthones"
Another problem that Polish authorities were faced with was
the disposition of the so-called "Germanized Poles" or
"autochthons". Of close to three million residents of Masuria
(Masurs), Pomerania (Kashubians) and Upper Silesia (Silesians)
of Slavic descent, many did not identify with Polish nationality,
were either bilingual or spoke German or Germanized dialects
only[89]. Large numbers of these had registered with the
German Deutsche Volksliste during the war. While those who
had signed Volksliste category "I" were expelled, the Polish
government aimed to retain as many as "autochthons" as
possible, as they were needed both for economic reasons and
also for propaganda purposes, as their presence on former
German soil was used to indicate an intrinsic "Polishness"
character of the area and justify its incorporation into the
Polish state as "recovered territories"[90]. "Verification" and
"national rehabilitation" processes were set up to reveal a
"dormant Polishness" and to determine which were redeemable
as Polish citizens, few were actually expelled[91].
"Autochthons" not only disliked the subjective and often
arbitrary verification process, but they also faced discrimination
even once verified. Polish settlers coveted autochthon property,
and they resented and distrusted the verified autochthons.
Many autochthons fled to occupied Germany in despair at their
treatment, although the situation in Germany was little better.
As one Silesian wrote, "In Poland, I'm a German. In Germany,
a Pole. Perhaps they should create a state for us on the moon.
There we might finally feel at home".[92]

The verification procedure varied in different territories and
was changed several times. Initially, the applicants had to prove
their past membership in a Polish minority organization of the
German Reich, and in addition needed a warrant where three
Polish locals testified their Polishness.[93] In April 1945, the
Upper Silesian voivode declared the fullfillment of only one of
these requirements to be sufficient.[93] In the areas like Lower
Silesia and Pomerania, where the Polish authorities suspected
only Germans, verification was handled much more strictly than
in the former German-Polish borderlands.[7] Of the 1,104,134
"verified autochtones" in the census of 1950, close to 900,000
were natives of Upper Silesia and Masuria.[7]

[edit] "Rehabilitation"
While most of the ethnic German population of pre-war Poland
fled or was expelled, some were "rehabilitated" and offered
their pre-war Polish citizenship back.[94] "Rehabilitation" was
offered to people who had been subject to forced labour before,
spoke Polish and were rated as not constituting a threat.[94]
Once granted Polish citizenship, they were encouraged to
Polonize their names, or to re-Polonize them if they had been
Germanized during the war.[94] Numbers of how many were
offered to stay in Poland as Poles and eventually did are not
available,[94] but it is assumed that the vast majority had
rather opted and left for Germany by 1960.[94] Those of mixed
descent from within or without the borders of pre-war Poland
were also allowed to stay on the premise of Polonization, yet
likewise no comprehensive data exists.[94]

[edit] "Indispensable Germans"
Some Germans were exempted from expulsion and retained
because of their professional skills, if no Pole was at hand to
replace them. These Germans were treated second class
regarding salary and food supply. So-called "abandoned wives",
whose husbands found themselves in post-war Germany and
were not able to return, were compelled to "seek divorce" and
were not allowed to leave for Germany before 1950-1952[95].
The other ones retained were not allowed to leave before 1956,
these measures also included the families of the retainees or the
parts thereof remaining with them[96]. About 250,000 had been
issued East German passports in the 1950s, ending their former
statelessness.[97] Many were concentrated in the areas of
Wroclaw (former Breslau),[97] Walbrzych (former
Waldenburg),[97][98] and Legnica (former Liegnitz),[97] all in
Lower Silesia, and in Koszalin (former Köslin)[97] in
Pomerania. How many actually left is uncertain, though it is
generally assumed that the majority emigrated.[97] The
German society of Walbrzych has maintained a continuous
existence since 1957.[97]

[edit] Repopulation
People from all over Poland moved in to replace the former
German population in a process parallel to the expulsions. While
the Germans were interned and expelled, up to 5 million[99]
settlers were either attracted or forced to settle the area. The
settlers can be grouped according to their background:

settlers from Central Poland moving in on a voluntary basis
(majority)[100]
Poles that had been freed from forced labor in Nazi Germany
(up to two millions)[101][102]
Repatriants- Poles expelled from the Kresy areas east of the
Curzon line annexed by the Soviet Union, who made up for less
than 10% of the overall Polish population, were preferably
settled in the new western territories where they made up for
26% of the population (up to two millions)[103][104]
non-Poles forcefully resettled during Operation Wisla in 1947.
Large numbers of Ukrainians were forced to move from south
eastern Poland under a 1947 Polish government operation,
termed Operation Wisla, which aimed at dispersing, and
therefore assimilating, the Ukrainian population, which had not
been expelled eastward already, throughout the newly acquired
territories. Belarusians living around the area around Białystok
were also pressured into relocating to the areas vacated by
fleeing German population for the same reasons. This
scattering of members of non-Polish ethnic groups throughout
the country was an attempt by the Polish authorities[105] to
dissolve the unique ethnic identity of groups like the Ukrainians,
Belarusians and Lemkos, and broke the proximity and
communication necessary for strong communities to form.
Tens of thousands of Jewish Holocaust-survivors, most of them
being "repatriates" from the East, settled mostly in Lower
Silesia creating Jewish cooperatives and institutions - the
largest communities were founded in Wroclaw (Breslau, Lower
Silesia), Szczecin (Stettin, Pomerania), Dzierżoniów (formerly
Reichenbach)) and Walbrzych (Waldenburg, Lower Silesia)
[106]. However most of them later left Poland.
Polish and Soviet newspapers and officials encouraged Poles to
relocate to the west - "the land of opportunity"[107]. These
new territories - known in Poland as the Recovered or
Regained Territories - were described as a place where opulent
villas abandoned by fleeing Germans waited for the brave; fully
furnished houses and businesses were available for the taking.
[108]. These were the just rewards for the hardships and bitter
losses of the war. The papers urged, "Go! Tomorrow might be
too late".[109]

[edit] Formal end of the expulsions
After 1 January 1948, Germans were primarily shipped to the
Soviet occupation zone (after 3 October 1949, the German
Democratic Republic), based on a Polish-Soviet agreement.
[110] Most Germans had been expelled by the end of 1947. In
entire 1948, a relatively small number of 42,700 were expelled,
and another 34,100 in 1949.[110] In 1950, 59,433 Germans were
expelled following a bi-lateral agreement between the People's
Republic of Poland and the German Democratic Republic
(GDR), 26,196 of whom however headed for West Germany.
[110] Between October 1948 and December 1950 all 35,000
German prisoners of war detained in Poland were shipped to
Germany.[110]

On 10 March 1951, the Polish "Bureau for Repatriation" (PUR)
was disbanded; all further resettlement from Poland to
Germany was carried out in a non-forcible and peaceful manner
by the Polish state travel agency Orbis.[110]

[edit] Demographic estimates
According Polish census in 1946, there were still 2,036,400
Germans in the "Recovered Territories", 251,900 in the pre-
war Polish territories (primarily eastern Upper Silesia,
Pomerelia and Wielkopolska) and the former Free City of
Danzig, and 417,000 in the process of "verification" as "new"
Poles.[111] The census data did not include former German
citizens already "verified" as ethnic Poles, Germans in forced
labor or detention camps and otherwise detained Germans, and
Germans employed by the Soviet administration.[111]

According to S. Banasiak, 3,109,900 Germans were expelled to
the Soviet and British occupation zones and thereby registrated
by Polish officials between 1945 and 1950.[112] Registration by
Polish officials was not exhaustive, especially in 1945.[112] An
unknown number left without formal registration or was
expelled by Soviet military authorities without notifying Polish
officials responsible for statistics.[112] Also, especially in 1945,
many Germans returned to their former homes and some were
expelled more than once.[112]

Thomasz Kamusella is citing estimates of 7 million expelled
during both "wild" and "legal" expulsions from the "Recovered
Territories" until 1948, joined by an additional 700,000 from
areas of pre-war Poland.[10] Kamusella states that about 5
million had fled from the former eastern territories of
Germany, and 500,000 from pre-war Poland in 1944 and 1945,
that another 3.325 millions were expelled from the former
German territories in 1946-1948, emphasizing these numbers
are not exhaustive.[113]

Overy cites approximate totals of those evacuated, migrated, or
expelled between 1944–1950 from East Prussia: 1.4 million to
Western Germany, 609,000 to Eastern Germany; from West
Prussia: 230,000 to Western Germany, 61,000 to Eastern
Germany; from the former German area East of the Oder-
Neisse: 3.2 million to Western Germany, 2 million to Eastern
Germany.[114]

According to Nitschke, of around 12.4 million Germans residing
within the lands of post-war Poland in 1944, 3.6 million were
expelled, one million were certified as Poles, 300,000 remained
in Poland as a German minority, and up to 1.1 million are
unaccounted for and presumed to be dead (killed).[115]

According to Kacowicz, about 3.5 million people had fled before
the organized expulsions began, mainly driven by fear of the
advancing Soviet Army, between seven hundred and eight
hundred thousand Germans were affected by the "wild"
expulsions, and another three millions were expelled in 1946 and
1947.[1]

[edit] Legacy
[edit] Post-war
In Communist Poland, the expulsions were not to be questioned,
and ideologically defended by propaganda.[116] The anti-
German argument was an important element for the
communists to gain acceptance with Polish population, large
parts of which were anti-communist. The expulsions were
perceived by many Poles as just with respect to the former Nazi
policies, injustices were balanced off with the injustices during
the contemporary "repatriation" of Poles.[116] Except for the
use in official anti-German propaganda, the expulsions became
a taboo in Polish politics, public, and education for decades.
[116] German expellee organizations who did not accept the
post-war territorial and population changes fueled Communist
propaganda dismissing them as far-right revanchists.[117]

In the first years after the war, the bishop of Katowice
Stanisław Adamski criticized the expulsion of Germans as
inhumane. In 1965, a group of Polish bishops made a particularly
important overture by sending a letter to their German
counterparts in which they asked forgiveness for the wrongs
perpetrated during the expulsion and at the same time offered
forgiveness for German war crimes. Attempts were made by
Znak, a group of Catholic members of parliament, and the
oppositional Clubs of Catholic Intelligentsia (Kluby Inteligencji
Katolickiej, KIK) to attain a somewhat less ideologized picture
of the Germans. This new perspective also meant dealing
critically with the question of how the expulsion of Germans
was to be incorporated into the self-image of Polish society.
[118]

According to Philipp Ther, pre-1989 Polish historiography has in
general either under-estimated or concealed the role of force
during the expulsions.[119] Ther says that this was caused on
the one hand by censorship, and on the other hand by the
interpretation of the registration forms the expellees had signed
as acquiescence to "voluntary emigration".[119]

[edit] Post-communist (1989-present)
Since the beginning of the 1990s, there has been a lively debate
in Poland regarding the post-war expulsion of the Germans. The
Polish role in the expulsions could not be contemplated in
Poland until the end of the Cold War.[64] After the signing of
the German-Polish treaty on borders and neighbourly relations
as well as the visible congruence of Germany's and Poland's
interests in a Europe which was reuniting in the first half of the
1990s, it was not only Poland's political and intellectual elites
who dealt with the Polish role in the expulsions, but also larger
parts of the general public. In regions from which the Germans
had been expelled, Polish citizens began looking for traces of
German cultural heritage and German traditions (as, for
instance, a German-Polish network set up in the border regions).
[120]

In the Polish-German border and neighborhood treaties of 1990
and 1991, the term "expulsion" for the first time replaced the
old and euphemistic Communist term "resettlement" or the
Potsdam term "population transfer", which were used by Polish
officials before.[117] Though "Wypędzenie", the Polish term
for "expulsion", is since widely used officially, in regular
linguistic practice it is still an emotionally loaded term, not as it
were, something that is being acknowledged, and closely
attached to the question of "right" or "wrong".[121] Polish and
joint German-Polish scholary research and public debates in
Poland were now concerned with issues like moral examination
of the expulsions, responsibility for the inflicted suffering,
terminology, numbers, and whether the expellee's status was
that of a political subject or object.[117]

In 1995, Polish foreign minister Władysław Bartoszewski
expressed regret about the suffering of innocent Germans
during the expulsions in a speech held before German
parliament and federative council.[121] In 1996, Polish public
opinion research institute CBOS polled public opinion about a
phrase in the letter of reconciliation the Polish bishops wrote in
1965: "We forgive and ask for forgiveness": 28% agreed; 45%
agreed with the offering of forgiveness, but rejected that the
part that asked for forgiveness; 22% disagreed altogether.[121]

However the desire for reconciliation was tempered when shifts
in German remembrance culture became evident at the turn of
the millennium.[122] When members of organizations like
Preussische Treuhand prepared law suits aiming at
compensation to the expelled and their descendants,[123] many
Poles feared that the importance attached to Nazi war crimes in
Poland and the related Polish suffering might decrease,[124]
[125] and that Poland would be liable for reclaimed property
worth billions of euros.[125]

In addition, anxiety is growing in Poland about the legal and
moral claim to Poland's post-war territorial gains.[125] The
legal aspects have been investigated by various international
law experts coming to different conclusions,[125] prompting
both Germany and Poland to employ a joint expert team that
gave an overall negative answer to chances for such legal
challenges.[126] Polish government made some efforts to sue
Germany for damages inflicted on Poland during World War II
in return.[123] The advancing German project of erecting a
Centre against expulsions depicting the fate of German
expellees is controversially discussed in Poland, and was
described by former Polish Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński
as "equating the victims with the persecutors".[127] The Polish
reaction was severely criticized in Germany.[118]

Nevertheless the personal relations between the former and the
modern inhabitants of these areas are often exceptional good, e.
g. active members of refugee organisations are honorary
citizens of their birthtowns[128].

[edit] See also
Expulsion of Poles by Germany
Repatriation of Poles (1944–1946)
Polish-German relations
World War II evacuation and expulsion
Territorial changes of Germany
Territorial changes of Poland
[edit] Notes
^ a b c d e f g Arie Marcelo Kacowicz, Pawel Lutomski,
Population resettlement in international conflicts: a
comparative study, Lexington Books, 2007, pp.100,101 ISBN
073911607 [1]
^ Philipp Ther, Deutsche Und Polnische Vertriebene:
Gesellschaft und Vertriebenenpolitik in SBZ/ddr und in Polen
1945-1956, 1998, p.56, ISBN 3525357907: From June until mid
July, Polish military and militia expelled nearly all people from
the districts immediately east of the rivers [Oder-Neisse line]
^ The Expulsion of 'German' Communities from Eastern
Europe at the end of the Second World War, Steffen Prauser
and Arfon Rees, European University Institute, Florense. HEC
No. 2004/1. p.27
^ Matthew J. Gibney, Randall Hansen, Immigration and
Asylum: From 1900 to the Present, 2005, p.197, ISBN
1576077969, 9781576077962
^ Naimark, Russian in Germany. p. 75 reference 31:" a citation
from the Plenum of the Central Committee of the Polish
Workers Party, May 20-21, 1945."
^ The Expulsion of 'German' Communities from Eastern
Europe at the end of the Second World War, Steffen Prauser
and Arfon Rees, European University Institute, Florense. HEC
No. 2004/1. p.26: confirms motivation to create an ethnically
homogeneous Poland
^ a b c d Philipp Ther, Deutsche und polnische Vertriebene:
Gesellschaft und Vertriebenenpolitik in SBZ/DDR und in Polen
1945-1956, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1998, p.306, ISBN
3525357907
^ a b c The Expulsion of 'German' Communities from Eastern
Europe at the end of the Second World War, Steffen Prauser
and Arfon Rees, European University Institute, Florense. HEC
No. 2004/1. p.28
^ a b The Expulsion of 'German' Communities from Eastern
Europe at the end of the Second World War, Steffen Prauser
and Arfon Rees, European University Institute, Florense. HEC
No. 2004/1. p.30
^ a b c d e f The Expulsion of 'German' Communities from
Eastern Europe at the end of the Second World War, Steffen
Prauser and Arfon Rees, European University Institute,
Florense. HEC No. 2004/1. p.29
^ a b Bernard Wasserstein, European Refugee Movements
After World War Two, BBC history, [2]
^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Matthew J. Gibney, Randall Hansen,
Immigration and Asylum: From 1900 to the Present, 2005, p.
198, ISBN 1576077969, 9781576077962
^ a b c d Earl R. Beck, Under the Bombs: The German Home
Front, 1942-1945, University Press of Kentucky, 1999, p.176,
ISBN 0813109779
^ a b c p. 35 - Jankowiak, Stanisław (2005). "Wysiedlenie i
emigracja ludności niemieckiej w polityce władz polskich w
latach 1945-1970" (Expulsion and emigration of German
population in the policies of Polish authorities in 1945-1970).
Warszawa: Instytut Pamięci Narodowej. ISBN 83-89078-80-5.
^ Overy, ibid.
^ Detlef Brandes. "Der Weg zur Vertreibung 1938-1945. Pläne
und Entscheidungen zum Transfer", p.233
^ Klaus Rehbein, Die westdeutsche Oder/Neisse-Debatte:
Hintergründe, Prozess und Ende des Bonner Tabus, LIT Verlag
Berlin-Hamburg-Münster, 2005, p.11, ISBN 3825893405
^ Klaus Rehbein, Die westdeutsche Oder/Neisse-Debatte:
Hintergründe, Prozess und Ende des Bonner Tabus, LIT Verlag
Berlin-Hamburg-Münster, 2005, p.17, ISBN 3825893405
^ Alfred M. De Zayas, Nemesis at Potsdam, p.85
^ Klaus Rehbein, Die westdeutsche Oder/Neisse-Debatte:
Hintergründe, Prozess und Ende des Bonner Tabus, LIT Verlag
Berlin-Hamburg-Münster, 2005, p.18, ISBN 3825893405
^ Philipp Ther, Deutsche Und Polnische Vertriebene:
Gesellschaft und Vertriebenenpolitik in SBZ/ddr und in Polen
1945-1956, 1998, p.56, ISBN 3525357907, 9783525357903:
From June until mid July, Polish military and militia expelled
nearly all people from the districts immediately east of the
rivers [Oder-Neisse line]
^ Gormly, p. 49
^ a b Gormly, p. 50
^ Gormly, p.51
^ Gormly: p.55f
^ Norman M. Naimark, Fires of Hatred: Ethnic Cleansing in
Twentieth-Century Europe, Harvard University Press, 2002,
ISBN 0674009940, p.123
^ Viktoria Vierheller, "Polen und die Deutschland Frage 1939-
1945", Köln 1970, p. 65
^ a b c Norman M. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p.123
^ Stanisław Mikołajczyk, "The pattern of Soviet Domination",
London 1948, p. 301
^ Thomas Urban, "Der Verlust ...", p. 114
^ Sunday Times, December 17, 1944
^ a b Norman M. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p.124
^ Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach Dänemark,
BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.13, ISBN 3833441151
^ a b c Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach
Dänemark, BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.14, ISBN
3833441151
^ a b Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach
Dänemark, BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.21, ISBN
3833441151
^ Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach Dänemark,
BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.16, ISBN 3833441151
^ Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach Dänemark,
BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.15, ISBN 3833441151
^ a b Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach
Dänemark, BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.17, ISBN
3833441151
^ a b Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach
Dänemark, BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.28, ISBN
3833441151
^ Werner Buchholz, Pommern, Siedler, 1999, p.516, ISBN
3886802728: reference confirming this for Pomerania
^ a b Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach
Dänemark, BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.22, ISBN
3833441151: confirming this for East Prussia
^ Annette Neulist, Wolfgang Moll, Die Jugend Alter Menschen:
Gesprächsanregungen für die Altenpflege, Elsevier,
Urban&FischerVerlag, 2005, p.124, ISBN 3437273809:
eyewitness account of February radio broadcasts in East
Prussia: "Ostpreußen darf nicht verloren gehen. Es besteht
keine Veranlassung, die Bevölkerung zu evakuieren.".
^ Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach Dänemark,
BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.17, ISBN 3833441151: Hitler:
"Zusammengelesenes Pack" und "Beutedivisionen", die zu
keiner Entscheidungsschlacht mehr fähig seien.
^ Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach Dänemark,
BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.17, ISBN 3833441151:
Himmler: Der größte Bluff seit Dschingis Khan.
^ Matthew J. Gibney, Randall Hansen, Immigration and
Asylum: From 1900 to the Present, 2005, pp.197,198, ISBN
1576077969
^ Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach Dänemark,
BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.27, ISBN 3833441151
^ Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach Dänemark,
BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.27, ISBN 3833441151, citing
Günter Böddeker: Die Flüchtlinge, p.93
^ Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach Dänemark,
BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.31, ISBN 3833441151, citing
Martin Holz: Evakuierte, Flüchtlinge, Vertriebene, pp.86,87
^ Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach Dänemark,
BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.59, ISBN 3833441151
^ Manfred Ertel. "A Legacy of Dead German Children",
Spiegel Online, May 16, 2005
^ Ulf Brunnbauer, Michael G. Esch, Holm Sundhaussen,
Definitionsmacht, Utopie, Vergeltung, p.84
^ Torsten Mehlhase, Flüchtlinge und Vertriebene nach dem
Zweiten Weltkrieg in Sachsen-Anhalt: ihre Aufnahme und
Bestrebungen zur Eingliederung in die Gesellschaft, LIT Verlag
Berlin-Hamburg-Münster, 1999, p.256, ISBN 3825842789:
70,000 refugees in Swinemünde on 12 March 1945
^ Petra Dubilski, Ostseeküste- Mecklenburg-Vorpommern,
DuMont Reiseverlag, 2003, p.200, ISBN 3770159268
^ Daniela Schetar-Köthe, ADAC Reiseführer Polen, ADAC
Verlag DE, 2007, p.98, ISBN 3899054911
^ Werner Buchholz, Pommern, Siedler, 1999, p.514, ISBN
3886802728
^ Erwin Ay, Rettende Ufer: Von Ostpreußen nach Dänemark,
BoD – Books on Demand, 2005, p.23, ISBN 3833441151: 12km
route, land route blocked when Soviets took Elbing, thousands
died due to cold and air raids
^ Silke Satjukow, Besatzer: »die Russen« in Deutschland 1945-
1994, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008, p.338, ISBN 352536380
^ Ulf Brunnbauer, Michael G. Esch, Holm Sundhaussen,
Definitionsmacht, Utopie, Vergeltung, p.85
^ Adam Zadworny, They Were Killing Germans in Revenge,
Wyborza, 2008-01-18 [3]
^ R. J. Rummel, Irving Louis Horowitz (1997). Death by
Government. Transaction Publishers. p. 302. http://books.
google.com/books?
id=N1j1QdPMockC&pg=PA302&dq=karski+roosevelt+revenge
. "I would rather be frank with you, Mr. President. Nothing on
earth will stop the Poles from taking some kind of revenge on
the Germans after the Nazi collapse. There will be some
terrorism, probably short-lived, but it will be unavoidable. And I
think this will be a sort of encouragement for all the Germans in
Poland to go west, to Germany proper, where they belong."
^ Tomasz Kamusella in Prauser and Reeds (eds), The Expulsion
of the German communities from Eastern Europe, p.29, EUI
HEC 2004/1 [4]
^ Norman M. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p.131
^ Norman M. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p.130, p.131
^ a b Arie Marcelo Kacowicz, Pawel Lutomski, Population
resettlement in international conflicts: a comparative study,
Lexington Books, 2007, p.101, ISBN 073911607 [5]
^ Norman M. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p.130
^ Norman M. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p.130
^ Norman M. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p.130
^ Alfred M. de Zayas, Nemesis at Potsdam, Routledge & Kegan
Paul, London 1977 ISBN 0710084684 pp. 124ff.
^ Manfred Gebhardt, Joachim Küttner, Dieter Bingen,
Deutsche in Polen nach 1945: Gefangene und Fremde, 1997, p.
23, ISBN 3486562363, 9783486562361
^ Manfred Gebhardt, Joachim Küttner, Dieter Bingen,
Deutsche in Polen nach 1945: Gefangene und Fremde, 1997, p.
24, ISBN 3486562363, 9783486562361
^ Manfred Gebhardt, Joachim Küttner, Dieter Bingen,
Deutsche in Polen nach 1945: Gefangene und Fremde, 1997, p.
24, ISBN 3486562363, 9783486562361
^ Manfred Gebhardt, Joachim Küttner, Dieter Bingen,
Deutsche in Polen nach 1945: Gefangene und Fremde, 1997, p.
24, ISBN 3486562363, 9783486562361
^ Philipp Ther, Deutsche Und Polnische Vertriebene:
Gesellschaft und Vertriebenenpolitik in SBZ/ddr und in Polen
1945-1956, 1998, p.56, ISBN 3525357907, 9783525357903:
From June until mid July, Polish military and militia expelled
nearly all people from the districts immediately east of the
rivers [Oder-Neisse line]
^ Naimark, The Russians ..., p. 75 reference 31
^ Philipp Ther, Deutsche Und Polnische Vertriebene:
Gesellschaft und Vertriebenenpolitik in SBZ/ddr und in Polen
1945-1956, 1998, p. 56, ISBN 3525357907, 9783525357903
^ Philipp Ther, Deutsche Und Polnische Vertriebene:
Gesellschaft und Vertriebenenpolitik in SBZ/ddr und in Polen
1945-1956, 1998, p. 57, ISBN 3525357907, 9783525357903
^ Ulf Brunnbauer, Michael G. Esch, Holm Sundhaussen,
Definitionsmacht, Utopie, Vergeltung: "ethnische
Säuberungen" im östlichen Europa des 20. Jahrhunderts, 2006,
p.85, ISBN 3825880338, 9783825880330
^ Norman M. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p.130
^ Ulf Brunnbauer, Michael G. Esch, Holm Sundhaussen,
Definitionsmacht, Utopie, Vergeltung: "ethnische
Säuberungen" im östlichen Europa des 20. Jahrhunderts, 2006,
p.86, ISBN 3825880338, 9783825880330
^ Ulf Brunnbauer, Michael G. Esch, Holm Sundhaussen,
Definitionsmacht, Utopie, Vergeltung, p.85, 2006, ISBN
3825880338, 9783825880330
^ Meyers Lexicon Online. Vertreibung.
^ a b c Philipp Ther, Deutsche Und Polnische Vertriebene, p.60
^ Philipp Ther, Deutsche Und Polnische Vertriebene, p.59
^ a b c Norman M. Naimark, Fires of Hatred, p.128
^ Philipp Ther, Deutsche Und Polnische Vertriebene, p.58
^ Philipp Ther, Deutsche Und Polnische Vertriebene, p.61
^ Philipp Ther, Deutsche Und Polnische Vertriebene, p.59/60
^ Ulf Brunnbauer, Michael G. Esch, Holm Sundhaussen,
Definitionsmacht, Utopie, Vergeltung: "ethnische
Säuberungen" im östlichen Europa des 20. Jahrhunderts, LIT
Verlag Berlin-Hamburg-Münster, 2006, p.85, ISBN 3825880338
^ Tomasz Kamusella in Prauser and Reeds (eds), The Expulsion
of the German communities from Eastern Europe, p.28, EUI
HEC 2004/1 [6]
^ Tomasz Kamusella in Prauser and Reeds (eds), The Expulsion
of the German communities from Eastern Europe, p.28, EUI
HEC 2004/1 [7]
^ Tomasz Kamusella in Prauser and Reeds (eds), The Expulsion
of the German communities from Eastern Europe, p.28, EUI
HEC 2004/1 [8]
^ Nitschke, Vertreibung und Aussiedlung .., p. 165
^ a b Philipp Ther, Deutsche und polnische Vertriebene:
Gesellschaft und Vertriebenenpolitik in SBZ/DDR und in Polen
1945-1956, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1998, p.305, ISBN
3525357907
^ a b c d e f K. Cordell in Stefan Wolff, German Minorities in
Europe: Ethnic Identity and Cultural Belonging, Berghahn
Books, 2000, pp.79,80, ISBN 157181504
^ Tomasz Kamusella in Prauser and Reeds (eds), The Expulsion
of the German communities from Eastern Europe, p.29, EUI
HEC 2004/1 [9]
^ Tomasz Kamusella in Prauser and Reeds (eds), The Expulsion
of the German communities from Eastern Europe, p.29, EUI
HEC 2004/1 [10]
^ a b c d e f g Stefan Wolff, German Minorities in Europe:
Ethnic Identity and Cultural Belonging, Berghahn Books, 2000,
p.79, ISBN 157181504
^ Werner Besch, Dialektologie: Ein Handbuch zur Deutschen
und allgemeinen Dialektforschung, Walter de Gruyter, 1982, p.
178, ISBN 3110059770
^ Karl Cordell, Andrzej Antoszewski, Poland and the European
Union, 2000, p.168, ISBN 0415238854, 9780415238854: gives
4,55 million within the first years
^ Karl Cordell, Andrzej Antoszewski, Poland and the European
Union, 2000, p.168, ISBN 0415238854, 9780415238854: 2,8
million of 4,55 million within the first years
^ Dierk Hoffmann, Michael Schwartz, Geglückte Integration?,
p142
^ Karl Cordell, Andrzej Antoszewski, Poland and the European
Union, 2000, p.168, ISBN 0415238854, 9780415238854: 1,5
million of 4,55 million within the first years
^ Dierk Hoffmann, Michael Schwartz, Geglückte Integration?,
p142
^ Karl Cordell, Andrzej Antoszewski, Poland and the European
Union, 2000, p.168, ISBN 0415238854, 9780415238854: 1,55
million of 4,55 million within the first years
^ Thum, p.129
^ Selwyn Ilan Troen, Benjamin Pinkus, Merkaz le-moreshet
Ben-Guryon, Organizing Rescue: National Jewish Solidarity in
the Modern Period, pp.283-284, 1992, ISBN 0714634131,
9780714634135
^ Karl Cordell, Andrzej Antoszewski, Poland and the European
Union, 2000, p.168, ISBN 0415238854, 9780415238854: created
the image in public mind that the area was Poland's promised
land
^ Gregor Thum, Die fremde Stadt. Breslau 1945, p.120
^ Gregor Thum, Die fremde Stadt. Breslau 1945, p.120-121
^ a b c d e Grzegorz Janusz in Manfred Kittel,
Deutschsprachige Minderheiten 1945: ein europäischer
Vergleich, Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, 2007, pp.143,144,
ISBN 3486580027
^ a b Manfred Kittel, Deutschsprachige Minderheiten 1945: ein
europäischer Vergleich, Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, 2007,
p.142, ISBN 3486580027
^ a b c d Manfred Kittel, Deutschsprachige Minderheiten 1945:
ein europäischer Vergleich, Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag,
2007, p.144, ISBN 3486580027
^ The Expulsion of 'German' Communities from Eastern
Europe at the end of the Second World War, Steffen Prauser
and Arfon Rees, European University Institute, Florense. HEC
No. 2004/1. p.22
^ Overy, ibid.
^ Nitschke, Vertreibung und Aussiedlung .., p. 280
^ a b c Arie Marcelo Kacowicz, Pawel Lutomski, Population
resettlement in international conflicts: a comparative study,
Lexington Books, 2007, p.100, ISBN 073911607 [11]
^ a b c Arie Marcelo Kacowicz, Pawel Lutomski, Population
resettlement in international conflicts: a comparative study,
Lexington Books, 2007, p.103, ISBN 073911607
^ a b Kraft, Claudia, Debates on the Expulsion of Germans in
Poland since 1945
^ a b Philipp Ther, Deutsche und polnische Vertriebene:
Gesellschaft und Vertriebenenpolitik in SBZ/DDR und in Polen
1945-1956, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1998, p.82, ISBN
3525357907
^ Krzysztof Ruchniewicz, Jürgen Zinnecker, Zwischen
Zwangsarbeit, Holocaust und Vertreibung: Polnische, jüdische
und deutsche Kindheiten im besetzten Polen, 2007, pp.27ff
ISBN 3779917335, 9783779917335 [12]
^ a b c Arie Marcelo Kacowicz, Pawel Lutomski, Population
resettlement in international conflicts: a comparative study,
Lexington Books, 2007, p.104, ISBN 073911607
^ Polish Leaders Criticize Latest German Compensation
Claims, Deutsche Welle, 6.12.2006
^ a b Arie Marcelo Kacowicz, Pawel Lutomski, Population
resettlement in international conflicts: a comparative study,
Lexington Books, 2007, p.109 ISBN 073911607
^ Poles Angered by German WWII Compensation Claims,
Spiegel Online, 12/18/2006
^ a b c d Arie Marcelo Kacowicz, Pawel Lutomski, Population
resettlement in international conflicts: a comparative study,
Lexington Books, 2007, p.107, ISBN 073911607
^ Arie Marcelo Kacowicz, Pawel Lutomski, Population
resettlement in international conflicts: a comparative study,
Lexington Books, 2007, pp.107,108 ISBN 073911607
^ War Compensation Claims Still Plague Polish-German Ties,
Deutsche Welle, 30.10.2006
^ openpr.de e.g. the chairman of the refugees of the Lötzen
district
[edit] Sources
Ther, Philipp (1998) (in German). "Deutsche und polnische
Vertriebene: Gesellschaft und Vertriebenenpolitik in SBZ/DDR
und in Polen 1945-1956". Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. ISBN
3525357907.
Podlasek, Maria (1995) (in Polish). "Wypędzenie Niemców z
terenów na wschód od Odry i Nysy Łużyckiej". Warszawa:
Wydawnictwo Polsko - Niemieckie. ISBN 8386653000.
Nitschke, Bernadetta (2003). Vertreibung und Aussiedlung der
deutschen Bevölkerung aus Polen 1945 bis 1949. Munich:
Oldenbourg.
Jankowiak, Stanisław (2005). "Wysiedlenie i emigracja ludności
niemieckiej w polityce władz polskich w latach 1945-1970"
(Expulsion and emigration of German population in the policies
of Polish authorities in 1945-1970). Warszawa: Instytut Pamięci
Narodowej. ISBN 83-89078-80-5.
Zybura, Marek (2004). "Niemcy w Polsce" (Germans in
Poland). Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Dolnośląskie. ISBN 83-7384-
171-7.
Baziur, Grzegorz (2003). "Armia Czerwona na Pomorzu
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1947). Warszawa: Instytut Pamięci Narodowej. ISBN 83-89078-
19-8.
Norman M. Naimark. The Russians in Germany: A History of
the Soviet Zone of Occupation, 1945-1949. Harvard University
Press, 1995. ISBN 0-674-78405-7
James L. Gormly: From Potsdam to the Cold War. Big Three
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(ISBN 0-8420-2334-8)
Urban, Thomas (2004) (in German). Der Verlust. Die
Vertreibung der Deutschen und Polen im 20. Jahrhundert.
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Thum, Gregor (2003). Die fremde Stadt. Breslau 1945. Berlin:
Siedler. ISBN 3-88680-795-9.
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