September 1, 1939, 4.40 am... Wielun, a first Luftwaffe target in Poland...
"We went through the whole city that was on fire, people were running in all directions, they were running away, some without clothes, I saw the dead, the wounded ... Smoke, noise, explosions ... Everything was burning ..."
Wielun (
Poland) (AFP)
Little known abroad, the tragedy of the small town of Wielun, Polish-Jewish Guernica bombed massively by the Luftwaffe on September 1, 1939, returns to the light of day 81 years later.
Witnesses are still there and their memories remain alive.
"At dawn, it was still gray outside, I was woken up by a strange sound, a powerful howling never heard before, suddenly the ceiling cracked and the windows shattered. on the street where the first bombs fell, a little further, on the hospital ".
Zofia Burchacinska is 91 years old today, but remembers perfectly the day when her city became the first target of Hitler's war.
The exact number of victims has never been established, with estimates ranging from several hundred to over a thousand deaths.
- "Symbol of Total War" -
"Wielun, where children, women, old people perished, is a symbol of total war," says historian Jan Ksiazek, director of the Wielun Earth Museum.
The strident sound that frightened the 11-year-old girl was the sirens, known as "Jericho trumpets", mounted on the landing gear of the "dive bombers" Junkers Ju 87.
The order to bomb Wielun, a town of about 16,000 inhabitants of central Poland, was given by General Wolfram von Richthofen, the former head of the Legion Condor, whose planes had razed the Basque city of Guernica in 1937. The drama had inspired a famous painting by Picasso.
In both cases it was about slaughtering the defenseless civilian population, to spread panic.
"We fled with my mother crossing the market square, already full of rubble, part of the square was on fire, the flames were strong, it was a perfumery that burned, with lots of flammable products," she says. scene Mrs. Burchacinska.
"I only returned to Wielun after the so-called liberation, with the arrival of the Bolshevik army," she said. "I did not recognize the city, my father had to lead me by the hand to go to school, there was no more market place, no more streets".
Twenty witnesses of the bombing still live in Wielun. One of them is Tadeusz Sierandt, who was eight years old in 1939.
"We went through the whole city that was on fire, people were running in all directions, they were running away, some without clothes, I saw the dead, the wounded ... Smoke, noise, explosions ... Everything was burning ... "he says.
After the war, Wielun rebuilt itself. Today it is a beautiful, prosperous city of 25,000 inhabitants, with well-kept streets and parks, proud of its identity as a former royal city founded in the 13th century.
"Only the ruins of the parish church in the center now bear the traces of the bomb explosions, which show the extent of destruction," said Deputy Mayor Joanna Skotnicka-Fiuk.
The city maintains relations with Germany through partner cities, but this year, on 1 September, they reach an unprecedented level, with the visit, alongside President Andrzej Duda, of his German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier.
- Why Wielun? -
Why did the German army target a city of no military significance?
"It is likely that the Germans realized that Wielun was a bi-cultural city.The Polish population dominated, followed by the Jewish population.There was no German minority here, unlike other central cities. of Poland ", analyzes the historian Tadeusz Olejnik.
"On the other hand, when the bombs fell on the sleeping city, people fled this hell, blocking the roads and complicating the movements of the Polish army," said the university professor who lives in Wielun.
In addition, "in the first German relations, the attack on Wielun is explained by the fact that the city was home to a large Jewish population.In 1939, out of almost 16,000 inhabitants, 33.39% exactly were Jewish," adds the professor. Olejnik.
The surviving Jews were first locked up in a ghetto, then, as part of the "final solution", sent either to the Lodz ghetto or the Chelmno nad Nerem extermination camp, to be murdered in "trucks". gas".
"We went through the whole city that was on fire, people were running in all directions, they were running away, some without clothes, I saw the dead, the wounded ... Smoke, noise, explosions ... Everything was burning ..."
Wielun (
Poland) (AFP)Little known abroad, the tragedy of the small town of Wielun, Polish-Jewish Guernica bombed massively by the Luftwaffe on September 1, 1939, returns to the light of day 81 years later.
Witnesses are still there and their memories remain alive.
"At dawn, it was still gray outside, I was woken up by a strange sound, a powerful howling never heard before, suddenly the ceiling cracked and the windows shattered. on the street where the first bombs fell, a little further, on the hospital ".
Zofia Burchacinska is 91 years old today, but remembers perfectly the day when her city became the first target of Hitler's war.
The exact number of victims has never been established, with estimates ranging from several hundred to over a thousand deaths.
- "Symbol of Total War" -
"Wielun, where children, women, old people perished, is a symbol of total war," says historian Jan Ksiazek, director of the Wielun Earth Museum.
The strident sound that frightened the 11-year-old girl was the sirens, known as "Jericho trumpets", mounted on the landing gear of the "dive bombers" Junkers Ju 87.
The order to bomb Wielun, a town of about 16,000 inhabitants of central Poland, was given by General Wolfram von Richthofen, the former head of the Legion Condor, whose planes had razed the Basque city of Guernica in 1937. The drama had inspired a famous painting by Picasso.
In both cases it was about slaughtering the defenseless civilian population, to spread panic.
"We fled with my mother crossing the market square, already full of rubble, part of the square was on fire, the flames were strong, it was a perfumery that burned, with lots of flammable products," she says. scene Mrs. Burchacinska.
"I only returned to Wielun after the so-called liberation, with the arrival of the Bolshevik army," she said. "I did not recognize the city, my father had to lead me by the hand to go to school, there was no more market place, no more streets".
Twenty witnesses of the bombing still live in Wielun. One of them is Tadeusz Sierandt, who was eight years old in 1939.
"We went through the whole city that was on fire, people were running in all directions, they were running away, some without clothes, I saw the dead, the wounded ... Smoke, noise, explosions ... Everything was burning ... "he says.
After the war, Wielun rebuilt itself. Today it is a beautiful, prosperous city of 25,000 inhabitants, with well-kept streets and parks, proud of its identity as a former royal city founded in the 13th century.
"Only the ruins of the parish church in the center now bear the traces of the bomb explosions, which show the extent of destruction," said Deputy Mayor Joanna Skotnicka-Fiuk.
The city maintains relations with Germany through partner cities, but this year, on 1 September, they reach an unprecedented level, with the visit, alongside President Andrzej Duda, of his German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier.
- Why Wielun? -
Why did the German army target a city of no military significance?
"It is likely that the Germans realized that Wielun was a bi-cultural city.The Polish population dominated, followed by the Jewish population.There was no German minority here, unlike other central cities. of Poland ", analyzes the historian Tadeusz Olejnik.
"On the other hand, when the bombs fell on the sleeping city, people fled this hell, blocking the roads and complicating the movements of the Polish army," said the university professor who lives in Wielun.
In addition, "in the first German relations, the attack on Wielun is explained by the fact that the city was home to a large Jewish population.In 1939, out of almost 16,000 inhabitants, 33.39% exactly were Jewish," adds the professor. Olejnik.
The surviving Jews were first locked up in a ghetto, then, as part of the "final solution", sent either to the Lodz ghetto or the Chelmno nad Nerem extermination camp, to be murdered in "trucks". gas".
