Free State of Danzig

The Free City of Danzig (german: Freie Stadt Danzig; pl, Wolne Miasto Gdańsk; csb, Wòlny Gard Gduńsk) was a city-state under the protection of the League of Nations between 1920 and 1939, consisting of the Baltic Sea port of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland) and nearly 200 other small localities in the surrounding areas.

Overview

The polity was created on 15 November 1920 in accordance with the terms of Article 100 (Section XI of Part III) of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles after the end of World War I. In line with the treaty provisions, the entity was established under the oversight of the League of Nations. Although predominantly German-populated, the territory was bound by the imposed union with Poland covering foreign policy, defence, customs, railways and post, while remaining distinct from both the post-war German Republic and the newly independent Polish Republic. In addition, Poland was given certain rights pertaining to port facilities in the city.

In the 1920 Constituent Assembly election, the Polish Party received over 6% of the vote, but its percentage of votes later declined to about 3%. In 1921, Poland began to develop the city of Gdynia, then a midsized fishing town. This completely new port north of Danzig was established on territory awarded in 1919, the so-called Polish Corridor. By 1933, the commerce passing through Gdynia exceeded that of Danzig. Notwithstanding this, Poland refused to relinquish trading and other rights awarded to it, further alienating the Danzigers. By 1936, the city's senate had a majority of local Nazis, and agitation to rejoin Germany was stepped up. Many Jews fled from German antisemitism, persecution, and oppression. In 1938, the Free City's population of 410,000 was 98% German, 1% Polish and 1% other."Encyclopaedia Britannica Year Book for 1938", pp. 193–194.Zapiski historyczne: Volume 60, p. 256, ''Towarzystwo Naukowe w Toruniu.'' Wydział Nauk Historycznych – 1995

After the German invasion of Poland in 1939, the Nazis abolished the Free City and incorporated the area into the newly formed of Danzig-West Prussia. The Nazis classified the Poles and Jews living in the city as subhumans, subjecting them to discrimination, forced labor, and extermination. Many were murdered at Nazi concentration camps, including nearby Stutthof (now Sztutowo, Poland). Upon the city's capture in the early months of 1945 by the Soviet and Polish troops, a significant number of German inhabitants perished during the ill-prepared and much over-delayed attempts of evacuation over the sea, while the remainder fled or were expelled.

The city was fully reintegrated into Poland as a result of the Potsdam Agreement, while members of the pre-war Polish ethnic minority started returning and new Polish settlers began to come. Gdańsk suffered severe underpopulation from these events and did not recover until the late 1950s.

Establishment

Periods of independence and autonomy

Danzig had an early history of independence. It was a leading player in the Prussian Confederation directed against the Teutonic Monastic State of Prussia. The Confederation stipulated with the Polish king, Casimir IV Jagiellon, that the Polish Crown would be invested with the role of head of state of western parts of Prussia (Royal Prussia). In contrast, Ducal Prussia remained a Polish fief. Danzig and other cities such as Elbing and Thorn financed most of the warfare and enjoyed a high level of city autonomy. Danzig used the title ''Royal Polish City of Danzig''.

In 1569, when Royal Prussia's estates agreed to incorporate the region into the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, the city insisted on preserving its special status. It defended itself through the costly Siege of Danzig in 1577 in order to preserve special privileges, and subsequently insisted on negotiating by sending emissaries directly to the Polish king. Danzig's location as a deep-water port where the Vistula river met the Baltic Sea had made it into one of the wealthiest cities in Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries as grain from Poland and Ukraine was shipped down the Vistula on barges to be loaded onto ships in Danzig, where it was shipped on to western Europe.Macmillan, Margaret ''Paris 1919'', New York: Random House p. 211 As many of the merchants shipping the grain from Danzig were Dutch, who built Dutch-style houses for themselves, leading to other Danzigers imitating them, the city was thus given a distinctively Dutch appearance. Danzig become known as "the Amsterdam of the East", a wealthy seaport and trading crossroads that linked together the economics of western and eastern Europe, and whose location at where the Vistula flowed into the Baltic led to various powers competing to rule the city.

Although Danzig became part of the Kingdom of Prussia in the Second Partition of Poland in 1793, Prussia was conquered by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1806, and in September 1807 Napoleon declared Danzig a semi-independent client state of the French Empire, known as the Free City of Danzig. It lasted seven years, until it was re-incorporated into the Kingdom of Prussia in 1814, after Napoleon's defeat at the Battle of Leipzig (Battle of Nations) by a coalition that included Russia, Austria, and Prussia. The city remained part of Prussia until 1920, becoming part of the ''Reich'' in 1871.

Point 13 of U.S. president Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points called for Polish independence to be restored and for Poland to have "secure access to the sea", a promise that implied that Danzig, which occupied a strategic location where the Vistula river flowed into the Baltic sea, should become part of Poland. At the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, the Polish delegation led by Roman Dmowski asked for Wilson to honor point 13 of the Fourteen Points by transferring Danzig to Poland, arguing that Poland would not be economically viable without Danzig and that since the city had been part of Poland until 1793, it was rightfully part of Poland anyway.Macmillan, Margaret ''Paris 1919'', New York: Random House p. 211. However, Wilson had promised that national self-determination would be the basis of the Treaty of Versailles. As 90% of the people in Danzig in this period were German, the Allied leaders at the Paris Peace Conference compromised by creating the Free City of Danzig, a city-state in which Poland had certain special rights.Macmillan, Margaret ''Paris 1919'', New York: Random House p. 218. It was felt that including a city that was 90% German into Poland would be a violation of the principle of national self-determination, but at the same time the promise in the Fourteen Points of allowing Poland "secure access to the sea" gave Poland a claim on Danzig, hence the compromise of the Free City of Danzig.

The Free City of Danzig was largely the work of British diplomacy as both the French Premier Georges Clemenceau and U.S. President Woodrow Wilson supported the Polish claim to Danzig (Gdańsk), and it was only objections from the British Prime Minister David Lloyd George that prevented Danzig from going to Poland.Rothwell, Victor ''The Origins of the Second World War'', Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001 pp. 106–07. Despite creating the Free City, the British did not really believe in the viability of the Free City of Danzig with Lloyd George writing at the time: "France would tomorrow fight for Alsace if her right to it were contested. But would we make war for Danzig?" The Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour wrote in the summer of 1918 that the Germans had such a ferocious contempt for Poles that it was unwise for Germany to lose any territory to Poland even if morally justified as the Germans would never accept losing land to the despised Poles and such a situation was bound to cause a war.Rothwell, Victor ''The Origins of the Second World War'', Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001 p. 11. During the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, the British consistently sought to minimize German territorial losses to Poland under the grounds that the Germans had such an utter contempt for the Poles together with the rest of the Slavic peoples that such losses were bound to deeply wound their feelings and cause a war. For all the bitterness of the French–German enmity, the Germans had a certain grudging respect for the French that did not extend to the Poles at all. During the Paris Peace Conference, a commission of inquiry chaired by a British historian, James Headlam-Morley, investigating where the borders between Germany and Poland should be, started to research Danzig's history.Overy, Richard & Wheatcroft, Andrew ''The Road to War'', Random House: London 2009 p. 2. Upon discovering that Danzig had been a Free City in the past, Headlam-Morley came up with what he regarded as a brilliant compromise solution under which Danzig would become a Free City again that would belong to neither Germany nor Poland. As the British were opposed to Danzig becoming part of Poland and the French and the Americans to Danzig remaining part of Germany, Headlam-Morley's compromise of the Free City of Danzig was embraced.

The rural areas around Danzig were overwhelmingly Polish and the representatives of the Polish farmers around Danzig complained about being included in the Free City of Danzig, stating they wanted to join Poland. For their part, the representatives of the German population of Danzig complained about being severed from Germany, and constantly demanded that the Free City of Danzig be reincorporated into the ''Reich''.Macmillan, Margaret ''Paris 1919'', New York: Random House p. 219. The Canadian historian Margaret MacMillan wrote that a sense of Danzig national identity never emerged during the Free City's existence, and the German population of Danzig always regarded themselves as Germans who had been unjustly taken out of Germany. The loss of Danzig did indeed deeply hurt German national pride and in the interwar period, German nationalists spoke of the "open wound in the east" that was the Free City of Danzig.Overy, Richard & Wheatcroft, Andrew ''The Road to War'', Random House: London 2009 p. 16. However, until the building of Gdynia, almost all of Poland's exports went through Danzig, and Polish public opinion was opposed to Germany having a "choke-hold" on the Polish economy.

Territory

The Free City of Danzig (1920–39) included the city of Danzig (Gdańsk), the towns of Zoppot (Sopot), Oliva (Oliwa), Tiegenhof (Nowy Dwór Gdański), Neuteich (Nowy Staw) and some 252 villages and 63 hamlets, covering a total area of 1,966 square kilometers (). The cities of Danzig (since 1818) and Zoppot (since 1920) formed independent cities (Stadtkreise), whereas all other towns and municipalities were part of one of the three rural districts (Landkreise), Danziger Höhe, (both seated in Danzig city) and , seated in Tiegenhof.

In 1928, its territory covered 1,952 km² including 58 square kilometers of freshwater surface. The border had a length of 290.5 km, of which the coastline accounted for 66.35 km.

Polish rights declared by Treaty of Versailles

The Free City was to be represented abroad by Poland and was to be in a customs union with it. The German railway line that connected the Free City with newly created Poland was to be administered by Poland, as were all rail lines in the territory of the Free City. On November 9, 1920, a convention that provided for the Presence of a Polish diplomatic representative in Danzig was signed between the Polish government and the Danzig authorities. In article 6, the Polish government undertook not to conclude any international agreements regarding Danzig without previous consultation with the Free City's government.

A separate Polish post office was established, besides the existing municipal one.

League of Nations High Commissioners

Unlike Mandatory territories, which were entrusted to member countries, the Free City of Danzig (like the Territory of the Saar Basin) remained directly under the authority of the League of Nations. Representatives of various countries took on the role of High Commissioner:

The League of Nations refused to let the city-state use the term of ''Hanseatic City'' as part of its official name; this referred to Danzig's long-lasting membership in the Hanseatic League.

State Constabulary

With the creation of the Free City in the aftermath of World War I a security police force was created on 19 August 1919. On 9 April 1920, a military style marching band, the ''Musikkorps'', was formed. Led by composer Ernst Stieberitz, the police band became well known in the city and abroad. In 1921, Danzig's government reformed the entire institution and established the ''Schutzpolizei'', or protection police. Helmut Froböss became President of the Police (i. e. Chief) on 1 April 1921. He served in this capacity until the German annexation of the city.

The police initially operated from 12 precincts and 7 registration points. In 1926 the number of precincts was reduced to 7.

After the Nazi takeover of the Senate, the police were increasingly used to suppress free speech and political dissent. In 1933, Froböss ordered the left-wing newspapers ''Danziger Volksstimme'' and ''Danziger Landeszeitung'' to suspend publications for 2 months and 8 days respectively.HeinOnlin
15 League of Nations (1934)
(translated from German)

By 1939, Polish-German relations had worsened and war seemed a likely possibility. The police began making plans to seize Polish installations within the city, in the event of conflict.
(in German) Ultimately the Danzig police participated in the September Campaign, fighting alongside the local SS and the German Army at the city's Polish post office and at Westerplatte.Williamson, D. G
Poland Betrayed: The Nazi-Soviet Invasions of 1939
p. 66

Even though the Free City was formally annexed by Nazi Germany in October 1939, the police force more or less continued to operate as a law enforcement agency. The Stutthof concentration camp, 35 km east of the city, was run by the President of the police as an internment camp from 1939 until November 1941. Administration was finally dissolved when the city was occupied by the Soviets in 1945.

Population

The Free City's population rose from 357,000 (1919) to 408,000 in 1929; according to the official census, 95% were Germans, with the rest mainly either Kashubians or Poles. According to E. Cieślak, the population registers of the Free City show that in 1929 the Polish population numbered 35,000, or 9.5% of the population.

Henryk Stępniak estimates the 1929 Polish population as around 22,000, or around 6% of the population, increasing to around 13% in the 1930s. Based on the estimated voting patterns (according to Stępniak many Poles voted for the Catholic Zentrumspartei instead of Polish parties), Stępniak estimates the number of Poles in the city to be 25–30% of Catholics living within it or about 30–36 thousand people. Including around 4,000 Polish nationals who were registered in the city, Stępniak estimated the Polish population as 9.4–11% of population.Ludność polska w Wolnym Mieście Gdańsku, 1920–1939, page 37, Henryk Stępniak, Wydawnictwo "Stella Maris", 1991, "Przyjmując, że Polacy gdańscy stanowili 25–30% ogólnej liczby ludności katolickiej Wolnego Miasta Gdańska, liczącej w 1920 r. około 110 000 osób, można ustalić, że w liczbach bezwzględnych stanowiło można ustalić, że w liczbach bezwzględnych stanowiło to 30- – 36 tyś. osób. Jeśli do liczby tej dodamy ok. 4 tyś. ludności obywatelstwa polskiego, otrzymamy łącznie ok. 9,4–11% ogółu ludności." In contrast Stefan Samerski estimates about 10 percent of the 130,000 Catholics were Polish. Andrzej Drzycimski estimates that Polish population at the end of 30s reached 20% (including Poles who arrived after the war).

The Treaty of Versailles required that the newly formed state have its own citizenship, based on residency. German inhabitants lost their German citizenship with the creation of the Free City, but were given the right to re-obtain it within the first two years of the state's existence. Anyone desiring German citizenship had to leave their property and make their residence outside the Free State of Danzig area in the remaining parts of Germany.

Notable people born in the Free City of Danzig

* Eddi Arent (1925 in Danzig – 2013 in Munich) was a German actor, cabaret artist and comedian. He appeared in 104 films between 1956 and 2002.
* Ike Aronowicz (1923 in Danzig – 2009 Israel) captain of the immigrant ship SS ''Exodus'', which unsuccessfully tried to dock in Mandatory Palestine with Holocaust survivors on July 11, 1947
* Elisabeth Becker (1923 in Danzig – executed 1946 in Biskupia Górka) was a concentration camp guardStutthof Trial. Female guards in Nazi concentration camps Archived 2008
retrieved 21 October 2017 in World War II.
* Ingrid van Bergen (born 1931 in Danzig) is a German film actress. She has appeared in 100 films since 1954. Convicted of manslaughter in 1977
* Miltiades Caridis (1923 in Danzig – 1998 in Athens) was a German-Greek conductor, his family moved to Greece in 1938.
* Zygmunt Chychła (1926 in Gdańsk – 2009 in Hamburg) was a Polish boxer. He won the Olympic gold medal for Poland at the 1952 Summer Olympics
* Anna M. Cienciala (1929 in Danzig – 2014 in Florida) was a Polish-American historian and author
* Holger Czukay (1938 in Danzig – 2017 in Weilerswist) was a German musician, co-founder of the krautrock group Can
* Horst Ehmke (1927 in Danzig – 2017 in Bonn) was a German lawyer, law professor and SPD politician, served as Federal Minister of Justice (1969)
* Jörg-Peter Ewert (born 1938 in Danzig) is a German neurophysiologist and researcher into Neuroethology
* Günter Grass (1927 in Danzig – 2015 in Lübeck) was a German novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, sculptor, and recipient of the 1999 Nobel Prize in Literature.
* Ursula Happe (1926 in Danzig – 2021 in Dortmund) was a German swimmer and Olympic champion. She competed at the 1956 Summer Olympics and won the gold medal in 200 m breaststroke
* Hans Albert Hohnfeldt (1897 in Neufahrwasser – 1948) Nazi Party ''Gauleiter'' in Danzig.
* Klaus Kinski (1926 in Zopot – 1991 in Lagunitas, California) was a controversial German actor.
* Wanda Klaff (1922 in Danzig – executed 1946 in Biskupia Górka) was a Nazi camp overseer
* Heinz-Hermann Koelle (1925 in Danzig – 2011 in Berlin) was an aeronautical engineer, made the preliminary designs for Saturn I
* Erhard Krack (1931 in Danzig – 2000 in Berlin) was an East German politician and mayor of East Berlin from 1974 to 1990.
* Zdzisław Kuźniar (born 1931 in Gdańsk) is a Polish actor.
* Hanna-Renate Laurien

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