function

diocesan priest

creed

Latin (Roman Catholic) Church RCmore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2014.09.21]

diocese / province

Culm (Chełmno) diocesemore on
pl.wikipedia.org
[access: 2012.11.23]
Military Ordinariate of Polandmore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2014.12.20]

honorary titles

Spiritual Counselor
Gold „Cross of Merit”more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2019.04.16]

date and place
of death

20.10.1939

Wolatoday: Pelplin gm., Tczew pov., Pomerania voiv., Poland
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.12.18]

alt. dates and places
of death

13.10.1939

Szpęgawski foresttoday: Starogard Gdański gm., Starogard Gdański pov., Pomerania voiv., Poland
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2018.09.23]

details of death

alt. details of death

cause of death

mass murder

perpetrators

Germans

date and place
of birth

25.10.1893

Przyrowatoday: Gostycyn gm., Tuchola pov., Kuyavia–Pomerania voiv., Poland
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.12.18]

presbyter (holy orders)
ordination

17.06.1923 (St Barbara Theological Seminary chapel in Pelplin)

positions held

others related
in death

BOGDAŃSKIClick to display biography John Thomas, BOROWSKIClick to display biography Theodore, BIAŁCZYKClick to display biography Vladislav

murder sites
camp 
(+ prisoner no)

Wola n. Pelpin: On 20.10.1939 Germans murdered in Wola n. Pelplin three priests who were arrested earlier the same day. In all probability Germans were late with their transport and did not manage to catch up with a group of catholic priests arrested in or nearby Pelplin the same day, transported next and murdered in Tczew in military barracks. (more on: informator.pelplin.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.08.31])

Szpęgawski forest: In Szpęgawsk forest Germans, as part of their «Intelligenzaktion» — extermination of Polish intelligentsia in Pomerania — between 09.1939 and 01.1940 in mass executions murdered 5,000‑7,000 Poles. Among them were c. 49 Catholic priests — all bar one from Starogard Gdański county, 30 from Culm diocese Curia and 5 from Pelplin. 1,692 psychiatric hospital patients in Kocborowo — in 15 mass executions starting from 22.09.1939 — part of «Aktion T4», i.e. Germ. „Vernichtung von lebensunwertem Leben” (Eng. „elimination of live not worth living”) extermination program, were also murdered there. The victims were brought from Starogard Gdański jail in trucks or buses with windows blackened at sunset or during the night. Transports avoided main roads. At murder site prisoners were forced to kneel at banks of the ditches and murdered by a shot to the back of the head. Wounded were finished off with rifle butts or buried alive. After World War II 39 mass graves were found. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2018.09.23])

ZL Mewe: Zivilgefangenenlager (Eng. POW camp for civilians) Mewe — known also as Germ. Umsiedlungslager (Eng. resettlement camp). Operated in Gniew from 02.11.1939 to 02.1940 — though even before, i.e. in 10.1939, arrested Polish Catholic priests were held in Gniew prison, among others. It was located in the basement and halls of the partially destroyed Gniew Castle, in the barracks courtyard and in the prison. Members of the genocidal German organization Volksdeutscher Selbstschutz (Eng. Self‑Defense) guarded the camp. C. 2,000 Poles (women, children and men) arrested in Gniew, Tczew (in the „Arkona”), factory), Pelplin and Gdańsk passed through the camp. Some of the prisoners were taken from the camp to the Szpęgawski Forests and murdered there, others were murdered within the castle itself — as part of the «Intelligenzaktion», i.e. an action to exterminate the Polish intelligentsia and leadership classes. (more on: ph.muzeum1939.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2023.12.09])

«Intelligenzaktion»: (Eng. „Action Intelligentsia”) — extermination program of Polish elites, mainly intelligentsia, executed by the Germans right from the start of the occupation in 09.1939 till around 05.1940, mainly on the lands directly incorporated into Germany but also in the so‑called General Governorate where it was called «AB‑aktion». During the first phase right after start of German occupation of Poland implemented as Germ. Unternehmen „Tannenberg” (Eng. „Tannenberg operation”) — plan based on proscription lists of Poles worked out by (Germ. Sonderfahndungsbuch Polen), regarded by Germans as specially dangerous to the German Reich. List contained names of c. 61,000 Poles. Altogether during this genocide Germans methodically murdered c. 50,000 teachers, priests, landowners, social and political activists and retired military. Further 50,000 were sent to concentration camps where most of them perished. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.10.04])

Ribbentrop‑Molotov: Genocidal Russian‑German alliance pact between Russian leader Joseph Stalin and German leader Adolf Hitler signed on 23.08.1939 in Moscow by respective foreign ministers, Mr. Vyacheslav Molotov for Russia and Joachim von Ribbentrop for Germany. The pact sanctioned and was the direct cause of joint Russian and German invasion of Poland and the outbreak of the World War II in 09.1939. In a political sense, the pact was an attempt to restore the status quo ante before 1914, with one exception, namely the „commercial” exchange of the so‑called „Kingdom of Poland”, which in 1914 was part of the Russian Empire, fore Eastern Galicia (today's western Ukraine), in 1914 belonging to the Austro‑Hungarian Empire. Galicia, including Lviv, was to be taken over by the Russians, the „Kingdom of Poland” — under the name of the General Governorate — Germany. The resultant „war was one of the greatest calamities and dramas of humanity in history, for two atheistic and anti‑Christian ideologies — national and international socialism — rejected God and His fifth Decalogue commandment: Thou shall not kill!” (Abp Stanislav Gądecki, 01.09.2019). The decisions taken — backed up by the betrayal of the formal allies of Poland, France and Germany, which on 12.09.1939, at a joint conference in Abbeville, decided not to provide aid to attacked Poland and not to take military action against Germany (a clear breach of treaty obligations with Poland) — were on 28.09.1939 slightly altered and made more precise when a treaty on „German‑Russian boundaries and friendship” was agreed by the same murderous signatories. One of its findings was establishment of spheres of influence in Central and Eastern Europe and in consequence IV partition of Poland. In one of its secret annexes agreed, that: „the Signatories will not tolerate on its respective territories any Polish propaganda that affects the territory of the other Side. On their respective territories they will suppress all such propaganda and inform each other of the measures taken to accomplish it”. The agreements resulted in a series of meeting between two genocidal organization representing both sides — German Gestapo and Russian NKVD when coordination of efforts to exterminate Polish intelligentsia and Polish leading classes (in Germany called «Intelligenzaktion», in Russia took the form of Katyń massacres) where discussed. Resulted in deaths of hundreds of thousands of Polish intelligentsia, including thousands of priests presented here, and tens of millions of ordinary people,. The results of this Russian‑German pact lasted till 1989 and are still in evidence even today. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2015.09.30])

Pius XI's encyclicals: Facing the creation of two totalitarian systems in Europe, which seemed to compete with each other, though there were more similarities than contradictions between them, Pope Pius XI issued in 03.1937 (within 5 days) two encyclicals. In the „Mit brennender Sorge” (Eng. „With Burning Concern”) published on 14.03.1938, condemned the national socialism prevailing in Germany. The Pope wrote: „Whoever, following the old Germanic‑pre‑Christian beliefs, puts various impersonal fate in the place of a personal God, denies the wisdom of God and Providence […], whoever exalts earthly values: race or nation, or state, or state system, representatives of state power or other fundamental values of human society, […] and makes them the highest standard of all values, including religious ones, and idolizes them, this one […] is far from true faith in God and from a worldview corresponding to such faith”. On 19.03.1937, published „Divini Redemptoris” (Eng. „Divine Redeemer”), in which criticized Russian communism, dialectical materialism and the class struggle theory. The Pope wrote: „Communism deprives man of freedom, and therefore the spiritual basis of all life norms. It deprives the human person of all his dignity and any moral support with which he could resist the onslaught of blind passions […] This is the new gospel that Bolshevik and godless communism preaches as a message of salvation and redemption of humanity”… Pius XI demanded that the established human law be subjected to the natural law of God , recommended the implementation of the ideal of a Christian state and society, and called on Catholics to resist. Two years later, National Socialist Germany and Communist Russia came together and started World War II. (more on: www.vatican.vaClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2023.05.28], www.vatican.vaClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2023.05.28])

Thomas Zan Societies: Secret societies of Polish youth, aiming at self‑education, patriotic in form and content, functioning 1830‑1920, in mutiny against enforced Germanisation and censure of Polish culture, mainly in secondary schools — gymnasia — mainly in Greater Poland (Wielkopolska) and later in Silesia. The first groups were formed in 1817. In 1897 a congress in Bydgoszcz was held when rules of clandestine activities were formulated. At other congress in Bydgoszcz in Poznań a „Red Rose” society was formed, heading all others groups in various gymnasiums and coordinating their activities. In 1900 „Red Rose” consolidated Philomaths organizations from Pomerania as well. After Toruń trial of Pomeranian Philomaths in Toruń Germans arrested 24 members of Thomas Zan Society from Gniezno. 21 of them were sentenced up to 6 weeks in prison and reprimands. All were relegated from schools without the right to continue education in secondary and higher schools in Prussia. Despite repression the Societies existed till 1918 and rebirth of Poland. (more on: pl.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2021.12.19])

Pomeranian Philomaths: Secret societies of Polish youth, aiming at self‑education, patriotic in form and content, functioning 1830‑1920, mainly in secondary schools — gymnasia — in Pomerania around Vistula river (Gdańsk Pomerania and Chełmno county), in Prussian‑occupied Polish territories (one of the partitions of Poland). On 08.01.1901 Germans conducted a series of interrogations of students at Chełmno, Brodnica and Toruń gymnasiums. On 09‑12.09.1901 the first of court trials of Polish students from those gymnasiums and students of Theological Seminary in Pelplin was held in Toruń. 1 person was sentenced to 3 months in prison, 1 to 2 months, 3 to 6 weeks, 7 to 3 weeks, 2 to 2 weeks, 19 to a week, 2 to 1 day, 10 were reprimanded. 15 were cleared. More definitive penalties were relegations from the schools with so‑called wolf’s ticket, forbidding sentenced students to continue secondary and higher studies in Prussia (Germany). Among those penalized were a few future Catholic priests — those were able to continue their education for the Chełmno diocese bishop, Bp August Rosentreter, refused to relegate students from Theological Seminary. (more on: pl.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2018.11.18])

sources

personal:
www.lpr-pomorze.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.05.19], www.niedziela.diecezja.torun.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.05.19], straty.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2021.09.02], www.kpbc.ukw.edu.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.10.04], informator.pelplin.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.08.31]
bibliographical:
„Biographical dictionary of priests ordained in the years 1921‑1945 working in the Chełmno diocese”, Fr Anastasius Nadolny, prof., Bernardinum publishing house 2021
original images:
informator.pelplin.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.08.31], nowa.morzeszczyn.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2018.02.15]