World War II Poland: NAZI Forced Labor: Ethnic Poles


Figure 1.--This forced labor detail was photograohed some where in German occupied Poland. We do not know just when, but we suspect some time during 1941-43. It looks like a localy concripted setail rather than a detail from a labor camp. It had to be taken before September 1943 because it was then it appeared in American newspapers. The press caption read, "It's a hard, bitter road for the Poles: Polish youth, boys and girls, at work on a road building job somewhere in Poland while Nazi guard sternly eye their progress. Some day these sane youths may be suddenly rounded upand shipped into Germany to do forced labor. The Nazi labor chiefs in Poland under nstruction from Berlin to deliver a certain quota of laborers into Germany order the arrest and dportation of all men and women caught in a 'Lapanka' (mass round ups of human beings) regardless of age or phsical condition." Th photograph was carried in American nesppers September 9, 1943. Tge editorsere not fully aware that children were being caught up in the Lapankas as well. Click the image for an enlarged detail.

The policy toward ethnic (non-Jewish) Poles was more varied than that administered to the Jews. Many Poles would die in NAZI labor camps, but there were no death camps with the sole purpose of killing. And there wre no ghettoes where who families wee intened. Poles were expected to support the war effort. If they did not have jobs supporting the German war effort, they could be concripted for force labor. Poles were affected by forced labor in a number of ways. Some but not all were confined to camps as well as deported to the Reich. It is believed that German occupation authorities deported about 1.5 million Poles to the Reich for forced or slave labor. Somes estimates are even higher. The vast proportion were deforted against their will. Most were teenage boys and girls or youths who did not have jobs supporting the war effort. The NAZIs obtained forced abnd slave labor from other occupied countries as well. The treatment of these people was affected by their national origins and race. Poles were among the non-Jewish people that were most harsly treated. The Poles were Slavs and part of the NAZI war effort was to substantially reduce the Slavic population of Eastern Europe to make room for German colonists. This and the general view that Eastern Europeans were inferior resulted in especially harsh treatment. Poles were required to wear an identifying purple "P" badge on their clothes. They were subjected to a curfew and not permittedv to use public transportation or bomb shelters. The treatment afforded Poles varied widely depending on their work assignments. Here the variation depended largely on the humanity of the supervisor in charge. Poles were employed in both factories and on farms. They were often forced to work especially long hours. The Poles not employed as slave labor received lower wages than Western workers. Poles employed in larger groups in major cities were commonly housed in segregated barracks behind barbed wire.

Roundups: Lapanka

The NAZI occupation łapankas began soon after the German World War II invasion (September 1939). It was a German tactic used throughout NAZI occupied Europe. Other foreign terms included: rafle, razzia, and rezzou. The Polish term łapanka comes from the Polish verb łapać meaning 'to catch'. It had a black humor context, it was the name of children's game played around the world--tag. The łapankas were an especially common tactic in Warsaw and other Polish cities. The SS, Wehrmacht, and RSHA were involved in the roundups. The Germans detained unsuspecting civilians at random on the streets of occupied cities. The round ups became an all-to-common feture of Polish life in NAZZI-occupied Warsaw and other Polish cities. German security police and soldiers sealed off whole streetsnd even city quarters. One ibserver writes, "Round ups, or lapankas, the Polish name they were known under, became an essential feature of life in Warsaw and precipitated much wider ferocity on both sides. .... Whole streets were sealed off by police and soldiers and most trapped men and women were carted off to concentration camps or sent as slave labour to the Reich. Tram and trainloads of people, regardless of work documents, were herded like cattle into trucks, many never to see home or family again." [Jeffrey] The civilians detained depending on the scale and objective of the Germans were passers-by or inhabitants of selected city quarters that had been surrounded by German forces. [Jeffery] It was used at first against Jews, but once the Jews were ghetoized, the tactic became mostly used against non-Jews. One popular tactgic was to detain the movie goers after a film showing. The purposes of the roundups varied. The Germans were always on the look out for fugitive Jews. In the early days of the occupation, hostages were taken to be shot in reprisal actions. These at first were mostly Jews. As the occupation went on, the detainees were sent to concentration camps being built throughout Poland for slave labor. And as workers were conceipted in the Reich, more and more Poles were deported to the Reich for war work. Sauckel's system often packed virtually every one they picked up rgardless of phyical condition and age abord cattle cars and shipped to the Reich. Authorities there complained that many of the individuals were not fit for work. In the country side duting the laterphase of the War, roundups were used to collect people for execurion in ethnic cleansing operations. [Bartoszewski, pp. 303-04.] Children were not exemptedfrom the round up. Blond, blue eyed children wre especially valued catches and turrned over to the SS for Himler's Lebensborn Program. Older Polish girls not chosen for Lebensborn might be deported to work as unpaid servants in German homes. The people found without proper documents or carrying contraband were transported to concentration and by 1942 sonetimes to the death camps. Jews in hiding and Poles aiding them might be shot on the spot.

NAZI Labor and Concentration Camps in Poland System

With the advent if the War and the occupation of Poland, the NAZIS began building a sprawling forced and slave labor system that encompassed most of Europe and consisted of hundreds of camps, the largest with sub-camps, created for various purposes and periods of time. The forced labor was used for a wide range of projects:road-building, military instalations (such as the Atlantic Wall), industry (chemical, construction, metal, mining, and munitions industries), agriculture, repairing city bomb damage and damage to the railroads. The NAZI slave and forced labor system included concentration camps and their subcamps, farms, ghettos, labor battalions, religious institutions, prisoner-of-war camps, and industries (in Germany and other Axis countries). This system began in Germany. And then extended into Czechoslovalia and Poland. With more NAZI military victories was eventually extended throughout much of Europe.

Deportations for Labor Service in the Reich

The Germans deported some 1.5 million Polish citizens, including teenagers and chilren, to the Reich for war work. This does not include some 0.3 million POWS. Some estimates are even higher as many as 2.3 million Poles. [Piotrowski] The vast proportion were deforted against their will. Most were were teenaged boys and girls or youths who did not have jobs supporting the war effort. The NAZIs obtained forced abnd slave labor from other occupied countries as well. In percentage terms, more Poles were deported than any other nationalities. The treatment of these people was affected by their national origins and race. Poles were among the non-Jewish people that were most harsly treated. The Poles were Slavs and part of the NAZI war effort was to substantially reduce the Slavic population of Eastern Europe to make room for German colonists. This and the general view that Eastern Europeans were inferior resulted in especially harsh treatment. Poles were required to wear an identifying purple "P" badge on their clothes. They were subjected to a curfew and not permittedv to use public transportation or bomb shelters. The treatment afforded Poles varied widely depending on their work assignments. Here the variation depended largely on the humanity of the supervisor in charge. Poles were employed in both factories and on farms. They were often forced to work especially long hours. The Poles not employed as slave labor received lower wages than Western workers. Poles employed in larger groups in major cities were commonly housed in segregated barracks behind barbed wire. Work in the concentrations camps in Poland was slave labor. The Polish workers in the Reich were often paid small sums, much less than German workers. They also worked longr hours and under harsher conditions. Poles and other foreign workers were employed in SS-owned enterprises (German Armament Works, Deutsche Ausrustungswerke, DAW). They were also employed by many private German manufacturers such as Messerschmitt, Junkers, Siemens, and IG Farben.

Local Labor Details

We believe that there were also temporary labor details. These may have included work projects such as oad cinstruction at some distance from labor camps. These details seem to have included people, including many youths not removed from homes. Here we have not yet found much information.

Sources

Bartoszewski, Władysław. 1859 dni Warszawy (1859 Days in Warsaw).

Herbert, Ulrich and William Templer. Hitler's Foreign Workers: Enforced Foreign Labor in Germany under the Third Reich (Cambridge University Press, 1997).

Jeffery, Ron. Red Runs the Vistula (Nevron Associates: Manurewa, Auckland, New Zealand, 1985).

Piotrowski, Tadeusz. Poland's Holocaust: Ethnic Strife, Collaboration with Occupying Forces and Genocide in the Second Republic, 1918-1947 (1998).







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Created: 1:33 AM 11/30/2014
Last updated: 1:33 AM 11/30/2014