| Original caption: “Hordes of prisoners were all that remained of Poland’s Army after three weeks of war. The Poles, trying to defend their entire frontier, were cut off in pockets. The Germans took some seven hundred thousand captives; the Russian Army, some two hundred thousand more.” This photo is a still frame from newsreel Ufaton-Woche (“Ufa Sound Week”) Nummer 471 released in 1939. Universum-Film Aktiengesellschaft (“Public Company”) was a propaganda arm of the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP -“National Socialist German Workers’ Party”) run by Alfred Hugenberg (June 19, 1865 – March 12, 1951). This film, which depicts the Polenfeldzug (“Polish Campaign”) from the Bromberger Blutsonntag (“Bloody Sunday in Bromberg”) clash between Völksdeutsche and Poles that was exploited by the Nazi German Press, Polish Prisoner of War camps, and the occupation of Poland. The newsreel was incorporated into the 1940 film Der Feldzug in Polen (“The Campaign in Poland”) and the antisemitic propaganda film Der Ewige Jude (1940). It was repurposed by the Allies in the anti-Nazi film Calling Mister Smith (1943). In the Ufaton-Woche newsreel, a kriegsberichter interviews Polish Prisoners of War. The narrator intones, “Everywhere the advancing German soldiers encounter endless trains of Polish prisoners. They are the victims of the Polish government scoundrels, incited by England, who have already fled to the border with the gold of the Polish State Bank. The Polish prisoners are being gathered in large camps. They are satisfied that they can no longer be abused in a hopeless fight for England’s interests. They laugh.” “Kriegsberichter: Tell me, what were they saying about us?” “Polish Prisoner of War: They were saying that there was terrible poverty in Germany, that there was nothing to eat, but there were a lot of people there and no jobs.” “Kriegsberichter: And what else can you say?” “Polish Prisoner of War: Well, it’s not, it’s very bad, but as I see it, it’s not that bad, only in Poland it’s bad.” “Kriegsberichter: You guys didn’t want go to war?” “Polish Prisoners of War (in unison): No!” “The Poles were forced into the war for England’s interests. The German soldiers know what they are fighting for. That is why their advance is so impetuous.” Despite the joy apparent in the Ufaton-Woche newsreel, conditions in the camps were far from the ideal portrayed on film. Death was becoming all too common for captured Polish soldiers. Poland’s losses in the September campaign were high: 66,000, 300 soldiers and airmen were killed and a 133,000, 700 were wounded; 694,000 soldiers were captured by the Germans and 240,000 by the Soviets. Unlike the Soviet Union, Germany was a signatory to the Geneva Convention governing the treatment of prisoners of war, but there were numerous instances of Polish Prisoners of War being shot by the Wehrmacht during the campaign, the worst atrocity being the execution of 300 men near Radom. Crimes against Polish prisoners were especially common in the wake of the Battle of the Bzura River, when large columns of Prisoners of War were marched to internment camps behind German lines. 1 such camp was established in a park in Rawa Mazowiecka next to the Catholic Church. A simple fenced-in area with no barracks or other shelter, this camp held nearly 4,000 Polish Prisoners of War for several weeks after the end of the war. The soldiers kept there were poorly fed once every 2 to 3 days, and medical attention was practically nonexistent. The German guards also enforced discipline very harshly. During his march to the camp at the end of September, Stanislaw Smialkowski (October 26, 1913 – November 27, 1995) witnessed how German guards immediately killed any prisoner who could not keep up with the column or who broke ranks to urinate or forage in cabbage fields for food. Another Prisoner of War, Franciszek Michalski (January 29, 1881 – August 8, 1961), similarly witnessed German guards shooting Prisoners of War on the march. He even saw Poles who fell out of the ranks beaten to death by guards using the butts of their rifles. While in the Rawa Mazowiecka camp, Michalski also saw German guards deliberately murder 3 Polish officers (a Captain, a Lieutenant, and a Sergeant). The random shooting of small numbers of Prisoners of War occurred nearly every day, he reported, forcing the prisoners to live in daily fear for their lives. On September 10, a German army unit appeared in Rawa Mazowiecka leading a large column of Polish prisoners of war to a temporary internment camp that had been established there. As the column passed through, a German soldier ordered a Jewish boy who was standing beside the road to get him some water. The boy became frightened and turned to run away. When the boy fled, the man fired his rifle at the child. The shot missed the boy, but it hit and killed another soldier. Chaos broke out next as other German soldiers who heard the shot and saw a comrade lying on the ground scattered and began to pull civilians from the houses flanking the road. Among these people were the Jewish boy and his entire family, all of whom the Germans shot on the spot. Civilians who the soldiers had collected and the Prisoners of War they brought with them were then forced to the marketplace and ordered to lay face down on the pavement. Rawa Mazowiecka resident Ewa Sadzik (September 17, 1904 – October 10, 1982) recalled that as the large mixed group of Jews and Poles filled the marketplace, German soldiers fired randomly into the crowd, killing and wounding many. A Jewish baker named [????] Fluma (???? – September 10, 1939), whom Sadzik knew, tried to run into his house, but a German who spotted him shot Fluma in the back. Wehrmacht personnel forced the remaining prisoners to lie down on the marketplace. The Germans screamed that whoever raised his head or tried to rise would be shot immediately. Troops then fanned out through the neighborhoods to chase people from their homes to the marketplace. As the group grew larger, women and children were separated from men, and Jews were separated from Poles. The situation rapidly deteriorated into an orgy of killing as German soldiers moved among the assembled Jews shooting at them. After a while, Sadzik lost count of those killed, but she estimated that the Germans shot to death at least 300 Jews. Other witnesses recalled shootings being simultaneously carried out elsewhere in the vicinity, including 2 groups of Poles, 9 in the 1st and 3 in the 2nd, whom German soldiers executed against a wall. The Poles were constables from the local office of the forest service and were probably mistaken for militia because of their uniforms. Jan Pawlewski (???? – ????) also witnessed the murder of a mother and child whom German troops shot on the street. Last, German soldiers took 50 Jews from the market square and locked them in a shack on the edge of Rawa Mazowiecka’s Jewish cemetery. They set fire to the building and killed everyone inside.”7 Polish investigators never firmly established the number of people who lost their lives that day, either Polish or Jewish, opting instead to place the number at “scores of civilians.” Eyewitness statements indicate though that on this occasion German soldiers vented their anger about the murder of a comrade on the Jews of Rawa Mazowieckalto a far greater degree than on the non-Jewish population. Conditions were no better for Polish prisoners held in the Sojki Prisoners of War camp that was located outside of Kutno. At 1 point, Sojki contained as many as 10,000 captured Polish military personnel. Like the camp in Rawa Mazowiecka, the vast majority of these prisoners slept in the open air and received poor quality food, including moldy bread and soup made from rancid horsemeat. Former Polish soldiers who had been held in Sojki also recalled the brutality of their guards. Already hungry after several weeks of fighting, Józef Maj (???? – ????) remembered that food was distributed unevenly to the prisoners, and as a result many soon grew too weak to lift themselves off of the ground. Several times he saw German guards select weakened prisoners for forced labor and then kill these men when they could not respond to the summons. Maj estimated that during his 6 weeks in Sojki he saw at least 60 prisoners killed for no reason by the German soldiers guarding the camp. Killings took place outside of the wire too, as happened on 1 occasion when guards gunned down 16 Prisoners of War in the field next to the camp when 1 of the men refused to work. Maj’s fellow prisoner, Stanistawa Kepinski (???? – ????), makes clear, however, that the German guards at Sojki did not necessarily need a specific reason to fire their weapons into the crowded compound and kill Polish Prisoners of War. According to Kepinski, groups of prisoners were regularly executed as collective punishment for the escape of others. Standing up to walk also invited a German bullet, he recalled, forcing the prisoners to remain sitting or lying on the ground for days on end. The Wehrmacht attempted to shift blame for the atrocities on to the Schutzstaffel SS and Gestapo. For example, the surrendering Polish officers at Modlin had been promised parole after their surrender but found themselves in captivity. When General Wiktor Thommée (1881-1962) protested to a German general he received a disingenuous reply: “Herr General is wrong: the German Generals gave you their word as soldiers and have kept it; you and the entire gallant garrison of Modlin were released, and if you were then arrested by the police and detained by the police as prisoners, you must understand that the police and politics are above the army.” This conversation took place in Colditz, a camp run by the Wehrmacht. Only around 85,000 Polish soldiers and airmen managed to escape to neighboring countries. Equipment losses were almost total. The notable exception was the 10th Armored Cavalry Brigade, mobilized too late to take much part in the campaign, which crossed into Hungary with its tanks. 100 aircraft were flown to Romania, where the pilots were interned. The German losses were far lower: 10,572 men killed, 30,322 wounded and 3,409 missing. 30,000 Polish officers were sent to Oflags in Germany: the generals and staff 1st to Hohnstein and then Königstein, and the majority of officers to Murnau or Gross Born (Borne Sulinowo). Conditions were poor in these camps until the spring of 1940, when Red Cross parcels began to arrive. The 664,000 rank and file, however, were scattered through numerous camps in occupied Poland and in Germany, surviving the bitterly cold winter of 1939-40 in tents, while engaged in the construction of the rows of huts, which would soon be used to house French and British Prisoners of War. In direct contravention of the Geneva Convention governing the treatment of Prisoners of War in November 1939, the German Foreign Ministry informed the Swedish legation in Berlin that because the Polish state no longer existed, it considered Sweden’s mandate as the protecting power of Polish Prisoners of War to have lapsed. In the spring of 1940, these men were compulsorily released from their Prisoners of War status and became slave workers – principally in German agriculture but also in road building and other hard-labor projects. The Polish Prisoners of War were subject to the same draconian restrictions as the Polish civilians. There is evidence, however, that some Germans were reluctant to treat Polish soldiers as badly as the authorities wanted. A report by the German Social Democratic Party in exile noted: “The behavior of the population in its contacts with Polish Prisoners of War is is a matter of serious concern to the regime…The Nazis are doing all they can to prevent contact between the German population and the Polish prisoners. Nonetheless, relations between the local residents and the Polish prisoners are becoming closer.” The Polish Prisoners of War were, however, inadequately housed, ill-fed and overworked. Those who became sick were sent back to Poland where the Polish welfare agencies cared for them. Countess Karolina Lanckorońska (August 11, 1898 — August 25, 2002) in Krakow was caring for the returning and when she asked an officer for permission for the Poles to pray together on Christmas Eve, they had the following exchange: ‘“But they’ll start praying for Poland’s freedom.” “I promise that they won’t do it out loud.” “At that point, the man I was talking to – a former Austrian army captain – burst out laughing,” and permission was granted. The fate of the 60,000 Jewish Polish Prisoners of War was far worse. They were segregated on arrival at the Prisoners of War camps and given the hardest work to do. They also received such low rations that by the spring of 1940, 25,000 of them were dead. The remainder were then, like the Christian Poles, deprived of their Prisoners of War status but, unlike the Christian Poles, they were sent back to Poland. Christian Prisoner of War Zbigniew Styputkowski (March 26, 1904 – March 30, 1979) watched: “Their hopes rose when the Germans started to send loads of Jewish Prisoners of War to Poland. For public works – it was claimed, to the ghetto – as it turned out later on. Apparently the German Armed Forces did not want to assume responsibility for the mass murder of Prisoners of War and discharged them as prisoners. They were to be dealt with by the German civilian authorities. Many did not even make it back home but were murdered on the way, notably 350 near Parczew. The remainder were crammed into the ghettos that the Germans had already established in Poland. The Soviet authorities had responsibility for around 240,000 Polish Prisoners of War These vastly exceeded the number the Narodnyy komissariat vnutrennikh del (NKVD – “People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs”) administrative machinery could deal with. From the moment of their surrender, the officers had been separated from their men and many shot out of hand. Those who survived this culling suffered a different fate from that of the soldiers, who were confined in impromptu camps established throughout Kresy and Soviet Ukraine. Conditions were appalling: in the camp at Podliszki Mate near Lwów, around 2,000 Polish Prisoners of War were housed in cowsheds; in Jaryczow Stary, they lived in pigsties; at the Zytnia camp, there were no washing facilities for the 1st 6 months. At the beginning of October 1939, around 42,000, 400 ethnic Ukrainian and Belorussian Polish soldiers were released and permitted to return to their homes. After the conclusion of the German-Soviet agreement on population exchanges, the Soviets despatched nearly 42,942 Polish soldiers to German-occupied Poland and received 13,757 in return. Polish Jews made unsuccessful petitions to the Soviets not to be returned to their homes in the German zone. The Soviets forced 25,000 Prisoners of War to work on the Nowogród-Wolynski-Lwow road, others were sent to Pechora to build a railway, and labor camps were established in the Soviet Union at Rovensk, Krivoi Rog (Kryvyi Rih), Yeleno-Karakub and Zaporozh’e, where the Prisoners of War worked in the mines and in the metallurgical industry. In October 1939, the Polish officers, government officials, and police and prison guards were despatched to 3 camps in the Soviet Union: Starobel’sk, about a 130 miles (210 kilometers) south of Kharkov; Ostashkov, about a 105 miles (a 170 kilometers) west of Kalinin (Tver); and Kozel’sk, about a 155 miles (250 kilometers) southeast of Smolensk. The highest-ranking officers were sent to Starobel’sk to live in an old monastery where there was a lack of sleeping space and little food and water: on April 1, 1940, the camp population was 3,893 Prisoners of War. Conditions were similar at Kozel’sk where on April 1, 1940, the headcount was 4,599 officers, of whom about half were reserve officers; the camp at Ostashkov contained a mixture of 6,300 officers and police-men, housed in the former Nil Hermitage. The NKVD interrogated all the officers, seeking out those who had a positive opinion of the Soviet Union, but noting that the majority were strongly anti-Soviet. Those who responded favorably to Soviet overtures, such as Colonel Zygmunt Berling (April 27, 1896 – July 11, 1980) and 60 others, were separated from their fellows and ultimately sent to live in luxurious conditions in Moscow until Stalin came to a decision on what to do with them. The general anti-Soviet sentiments of the majority sealed their fate: on March 5, 1940, the head of the NKVD, Lavrenty Beria (March 29, 1899 – December 23, 1953), sent a memorandum to Stalin outlining the extent of the “counter-revolutionary” opinions of the Polish officers in the camps and highlighting reports of “counter-revolutionary” activity in Kresy led by former officers, policemen and gendarmes. He recommended that these “hardened, irremediable enemies of Soviet Power” should be subjected to a new interrogation by a troika of 3 NKVD officers, Vsevolod Merkulov (November 27, 1895 – December 23, 1953), Bogdan Kobulov (March 1, 1904 – December 23, 1953) and Leonid Bashtakov (1900 – 1970). The memorandum supplied the figures of 14,000, 700 Polish officers, officials, landowners, police, intelligence agents, gendarmes, settlers and prison guards in the Prisoners of War camps, and 11,000 Poles currently in prisons in Kresy. It made clear that the fate of those hostile to the Soviet Union would be execution: Stalin clearly indicated his assent to Beria’s proposals. | |
| Image Filename | wwii0770.jpg |
| Image Size | 332.67 KB |
| Image Dimensions | 1874 x 1458 |
| Photographer | |
| Photographer Title | Ufa |
| Caption Author | Written or Adapted by Jason McDonald |
| Date Photographed | September 15, 1939 |
| Location | |
| City | Sójki |
| State or Province | Łódź |
| Country | Poland |
| Archive | Bundesarchiv |
| Record Number | 24883 |
| Status | Caption ©2026 MFA Productions LLC Please Do Not Duplicate or Distribute Without Permission; Image in the Public Domain |
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