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Amber altar piece, St Bridget's Church, Gdansk, Poland

Poland: Gdansk at Christmas - Old Town & Museums
December 2023

Old Town Second World War Museum European Solidarity Centre
Gdansk shipyard cranes

 

Gdansk is a beautiful city, with many buildings restored to their historical state. It has two very impressive museums on the Second World War and Solidarity struggle.

Gdansk at Christmas - Main Town

Old Town

St Bridget's
St. Bridget's Church

The Old Town is in the northern part of Gdansk, though it is not really the site of the origins of the city. According to archaeologists, that accolade belongs to the Main Town, though there was a settlement in the Old Town in the 10th century which developed alongside the Main Town. The Old Town never had its own defensive system and was always poorer. It also suffered badly during the Second World War but few of its buildings were reconstructed. St Bridget's Church was one of these. Only the outer walls remained after the bombing and very few of the interior furnishings.

It is worth a visit for the amazing amber altar piece representing the Tree of Life. It is massive, 174 cm high and spanning the width of the apse behind the altar.

St Bridget's
St Bridget's
The Tree of Life, St Bridget's.
St Bridget's
Wheat and grapes.

St Bridget's Nativity

Their Nativity was also on display while we were there and the priest switched it on for us. It is truly wonderful, many moving figures in a village scene around the Holy Family.

 

 


Video: Nativity, St Bridget's.

Video: Nativity, St Bridget's: the shoemaker.

Video: Nativity, St Bridget's: the bakery.

 

 

 

The church has another, rather macabre, surprise in store - the Skull Crypt.

Only discovered in 2016, the chamber was most probably an ossuary, a place where bones from damaged graves were placed to preserve them. In the niche of the chapel are around 500 skulls of the sisters of St Bridget.

St Bridget's, the Skull Crypt
The Skull Crypt.
St Bridget's, the Skull Crypt
The Skull Crypt.
The cross on the right is a Reliquary, said to contain relics of the Holy Cross, St Peter, St Paul and others.
Gdansk
Remains of the medieval city wall.

 

There are odd bits of old wall and buildings in this area as one heads up to the Great Mill. The mill was created around 1350 in a time when Teutonic Knights ruled the city. A murderous bunch, they'd massacred the citizens in 1308 during their takeover.

 

Gdansk Great Mill
The Great Mill.
Gdansk Great Mill
A statue of Jan Heweliusz in front of the Old Town Hall.

 

The mill was the largest in Europe at the time, over 40m long and 26m high. It produced over 200 tonnes of flour a day up until 1945.

Gdansk

 

 

 

Very close by is the Old Town Hall, dating from the end of the 16th century.

Gdansk
One of the small bronze lions scattered around the city. They derive from the lions on the city's coat of arms.

In front of the Old Town Hall is a statue of Jan Heweliusz, a 17th century astronomer. His name influences the name of the small bronze lion sculptures around town, called Hewelions.

We had a very good meal in the Old Town at PG4, a brewery and restaurant close to the train station. It doesn't open until 2pm so we went up on the tram for dinner one evening.

Gdansk PG4 brewery and restaurant
PG4 brewery and restaurant.
Gdansk PG4 brewery and restaurant

 

I had very good potato pancakes with Baltic herring and sour cream, Andrew a very good burger

 

Second World War Museum

Gdansk Second World War Museum

 

On the banks of the Motlawa River in the north of the city, a striking striking building holds a permanent exhibition following the fate of Poland and its people through the Second World War. We spent a good two hours here but to really study the whole of it would take far longer.

Eighteen sections trace events from the causes of the war right through to the days of the Cold War. Exhibits include propaganda posters - from Nazi to Communist, artefacts of war and domesticity as the people tried to carry on some semblance of a normal life, and massive mock-ups of a Warsaw street and a bombed Warsaw street with a Russian tank. The section on the Holocaust is particularly moving.

I would have liked to see more devoted to Gdansk itself but it is a really interesting place to learn about the war in Poland as a whole.

 


Gdansk Second World War Museum


Gdansk Second World War Museum
Gdansk Second World War Museum
In 1917 the Bolsheviks staged a coup in Russia to establish Communist rule. They aimed to foment revolution across the whole of Europe.
Gdansk Second World War Museum
Elzbieta Zahorska was a telegraphist and assistant heavy machine gun operator in the Women's Military Service in Warsaw at the beginning of September 1939. In November she was sentenced to death by the German occupation authorities for tearing down an anti-British propaganda poster. She was the first person to be officially executed in occupied Warsaw.
Gdansk Second World War Museum
M4 Sherman "Firefly" Tank
M4 General Sherman tanks were used by the Allies 1943-45. The Firefly version was manufactured in Great Britain and equipped with a 76.2 mm, 17-pounder gun, capable of destroying the heavily armoured German vehicles. This particular tank has the colours and markings of the 24 Uhlan Regiment of the Polish First Armoured Division.
Gdansk Second World War Museum
Wedding dress made from a Japanese military silk parachute, wedding photograph of James and Betty Brass.
James Brass served for several months in Japan and he returned home to the USA in February 1946 brought the silk parachute back for his fiancee Betty.

 

Gdansk Second World War Museum
Mock-up of a bombed Warsaw street with a Russian tank.
Gdansk Second World War Museum
Six million Jews were murdered during the Second World War, simply for being Jewish. The section on the victims of the Holocaust in the museum is particularly moving

 

European Solidarity Centre

Gdansk shipyard cranes
Gdansk European Solidarity Centre
European Solidarity Centre
Gdansk European Solidarity Centre

 

North of the Old Town this centre has a compelling exhibition of the Gdansk shipyard strikes, and the fight for freedom from Communism.

Gdansk shipyard cranes

The tall cranes of the shipyards are very close to the Centre in what was once the Lenin Shipyard.

Gdansk European Solidarity Centre
Gdansk European Solidarity Centre Jacket with bullet holes of 20-year-old shipbuilder Ludwig Piernicki
Jacket with bullet holes of 20-year-old shipbuilder Ludwig Piernicki. Piernicki was killed on 17 December 1970 in Gdynia.

 

Gdansk European Solidarity Centre A fragment of Adam Gotner's jacket
A fragment of Adam Gotner's jacket.
Courtesy of Grazyna Gotner.
"In the morning of 17 December 1970 Adam Gotner, a worker of the 'Paris Commune' Shipyard in Gdynia, was on his way to work. On the flyover nearby the local railway station in Gdynia Stocznia, he was shot with a series of six machine gun bullets. Doctors saw no chance for him to recover. Gotner puller through, though, and later engaged in the activities of Solidarnosc."

We spent hours studying the exhibits here which trace the history of the struggle against the Communist authorities, from the shipyard strikes of the 1970s to the post-war, first ever partially free parliamentary elections in Poland in 1989 which were won by the opposition; a Solidarnosc nominee, Tadeus Mazowiecki, became prime minister.

The information here comes from the many information boards and videos in the Centre.

In December 1970 strikes over a sudden rise in food prices and other commodities spread to more than 100 workplaces in the coastal region. The strikers had a list of 21 demands including establishment of independent trade unions, a reduction of prices to pre-13 December levels, and wage increases. Strikers were increasingly intimidated by the Citizens' Militia and the army and ended the strikes on 22 December with the authorities promising to consider the demands. Many who had taken part in the protests were dismissed from their jobs and it wasn't until March 1971 that the price increases were revoked.

Again in 1976 the authorities announced large price increases for food which was met by a wave of protests in workplaces throughout the country. The authorities backed off from implementing the increases but, nevertheless, hundreds of people were arrested and brutally beaten and two people were killed in clashes. Demonstrators were imprisoned. In response to the crackdown against the strikers the Workers Defence Committee (KOR) was established.

Gdansk European Solidarity Centre members of the Old Folk
Some members of the "Old Folk".
Top left to right: Ludwik Cohn - a defence council in numerous political trials, Stefan Kaczorowski, Professor Edward Lipinski - a doyen of Polish economists;
Bottom left to right: Antoni Pajdak - victimized in a Moscow showpiece trial of the leaders of the Polish Underground State, Jozef Rybicki - a Home Army soldier and political prisoner, Aniela Steinsbergowa - an attorney in political trials.

The "Old Folk" were pre-war Polish intelligentsia who were all, in one way or another, war heroes. They supported KOR with their authority, offered advice, protected KOR members from repression, composed statements and letters.

On the morning of May 7th 1977 student Stanislaw Pyjas, who was involved in opposition activities, was found dead in the doorway of a building in Cracow. The Cracow academic community were outraged. Mass demonstrations were organised and a Student Solidarity Committee was formed on May 15th, followed a few months later by similar committees in other Polish cities including Gdansk. They fought for restoration of the independence of universities and for students right to freedom of expression. In the 1980s members of these committees co-founded the Independent Association of Students as well as the Solidarnosc Trade Union.

Gdansk Monument to the Fallen Shipyard Workers of 1970
Monument to the Fallen Shipyard Workers of 1970 outside the Centre, unveiled on the 16th December 1980, the 10th anniversary of the brutal response to the strike.
Gdansk Monument to the Fallen Shipyard Workers of 1970
"A token of everlasting remembrance of the slaughter victims.
A warning to rulers that no social conflict in our country can be resolved by force.
A sign of hope for fellow-citizens that evil need not prevail."
Gdansk Monument to the Fallen Shipyard Workers of 1970
Gdansk Anna Walentynowicz
Anna Walentynowicz
Anna Walentynowicz took part in the shipyard strikes of 1980 and 1981. She was interned from 18 December to 23 July 1982, arrested on August 30 1982 for starting the December 1981 strike, sentenced to a one year thee months prison term, conditionally suspended for three years. She continued to be active in the sphere of anti-Communist rule and was decorated with the Medal of Freedom in 2005, awarded by the American Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, among other awards. She died in a plane crash near Smolensk, Russia, in 2010.

Gdansk European Solidarity Centre Lech Walesa
Lech Walesa, Chairman of the Inter-Factory Strike Committee.

Gdansk European Solidarity Centre gate no 2 Gdansk shipyard
Gate No 2 Gdansk Shipyard

Anna Walentynowicz (1929-2010) had worked in the Lenin Shipyard since 1950, first as a welder then as a crane operator. She was active in Free Trade Unions of the Coast. Three months before her retirement she was dismissed on disciplinary grounds for "gross misconduct". In fact, she was sacked for her involvement in opposition activity. It was in her defence that the August 1980 strike at the Lenin Shipyard was started.

Gdansk European Solidarity Centre shipyard workers helmets
Each shipyard worker's helmet had a number and departmental symbol. Colours denoted the worker's job. In the 1970 strikes the numbers were used to identify workers and persecute them. In 1980 the workers erased the numbers with razor blades or sandpaper.

Lech Walesa was an electrician at the Lenin Shipyard and a trade union activist. He was one of the leaders of the shipyard workers during the 1970 strike and was fired in 1976 as a result of his activities.

In August 1980 he was nevertheless elected head of the strike committee at the shipyard after joining the strikers in the shipyard.

On 17 August 1980, after heated discussions among the various strike leaders, a list of 21 demands was ready, the most important of which was that the authorities accept that the trade unions be independent. Panels bearing the demands were hung on Gate No 2 of the Gdansk (Lenin) Shipyard.

Strikes spread throughout the Polish Coast and an Inter-Factory Strike Committee (MKS) was formed. Some 800 enterprises expressed support and protests became nationwide. In Gdansk the authorities backed down and agreed to the demands.

Their demands met, the strike at the Gdansk shipyard was close to being called off when Alinka Pienkowska appealed for the workers to remain in support of the other strikes around the country. Joined by Anna Walentynowicz and others they persuaded the strikers to continue. Through August and September agreements were reached between authorities and the strike committees of other shipyards, mines and workplaces providing guarantees that the trade unions would be independent and their economic and social demands would be met.

Gdansk European Solidarity Centre poster for Man of Iron

In 1980 the Solidarnosc Independent Trade Union was formed and almost 10 million people joined.

In May 1981 Anrzej Wajda's film "Man of Iron" was awarded the Palme D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, its highest honour. It tells the story of the Lenin Shipyard strike in August 1980 but had been banned in Poland up to this time. However, the publicity the award attracted meant he film could no longer be banned.

On 2 October 1981 the first leadership election of Solidarnosc Independent Trade Union was held in which Lech Walesa was victorious.

The Solidarnosc Executive Committee held a meeting on 11-12 December 1981 to discuss calling a general strike in the event that the authorities announced a state of emergency.

Gdansk European Solidarity Centre Lech Walesa
Lech Walesa during the final Solidarnosc National Executive meeting prior to the imposition of martial law, Gdansk 12 December, 1981.

In response to the growing popularity and strength of Solidarnosc, and fearing armed intervention by the Soviets, General Jaruzelski imposed martial law on 13 December 1981, outlawing Solidarnosc. All of the Executive's members were scheduled for internment, only a few managed to avoid arrest, Walesa was not one of them. "Man of Iron" was again banned.

Gdansk European Solidarity Centre memorial to the Wujek massacre
Memorial to those killed in the Wujek Mine massacre. European Solidarity Centre.

When martial law was imposed the shipyard workers again went on strike. On the 16th December nine miners were shot dead and many wounded during the so-called "pacification" of the strikers at Wujek Coal Mine.

Gdansk European Solidarity Centre screen-printing fabric wedding dress
Replica of screen-printing fabric dress made by Maria Duffek-Bartoszewska.

The introduction of martial law was condemned worldwide and numerous countries organised humanitarian aid and fundraising. The church was actively involved in distribution of goods such as medicines, clothing, food and hygiene articles. Many items were prohibited and had to be smuggled into the country, including printing equipment and publications printed in exile.

Screen-printing fabric, for instance, was one of the prohibited items. Maria Duffek and Leszek Bartoszewski pretended to be an engaged couple to smuggle a wedding dress made from such material across the border from East Germany. Maria had supplied a wedding dress pattern to friends in East Germany who bought the fabric and made the dress. Thousands of "Release Political Prisoners" flyers were printed as a result. Maria and Leszek married in 1985 and Maria recreated the dress displayed here.

Walesa was released in November 1982 but continued to be kept under surveillance. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1983 "for non-violent struggle for free trade unions and human rights in Poland".2

As economic conditions worsened the Jaruzelski regime was forced to negotiate with Walesa and his Solidarnosc colleagues. This resulted in limited parliamentary elections in 1989 which led to the establishment of a non-communist government.1 A Solidarnosc nominee, Tadeus Mazowiecki, became prime minister.

In December 1990 Walesa was elected President of the Republic of Poland and served until defeated in the election of November 1995.1

As well as the Nobel Peace Prize he has also been awarded many others honours including many honourary degrees, the Medal of Freedom (Philadelphia, U.S.A.); the Award of Free World (Norway); and the European Award of Human Rights.1

References

  1. Lech Walesa – Biographical. NobelPrize.org. Nobel Prize Outreach AB 2024. Wed. 1 May 2024.
  2. The Nobel Peace Prize 1983. NobelPrize.org. Nobel Prize Outreach AB 2024. Wed. 1 May 2024.