The Palmiry massacre was a series of mass executions carried out by Nazi German forces, during World War II, near the village of Palmiry in the Kampinos Forest northwest of Warsaw.
Massacres Between December 1939 and July 1941 more than 1700 Poles and Jews – mostly inmates of Warsaw's Pawiak prison – were executed by the SS (Schutzstaffel) and Ordnungspolizei in a forest glade near Palmiry. The most well documented of these massacres took place on 20–21 June 1940, when 358 members of the Polish political, cultural, and social elite (Polish intelligentsia) were murdered in a single operation.
Palmiry is one of the most infamous sites of the Nazi crimes in Poland, and "one of the most notorious places of mass executions" in Poland. Along with the Katyn massacre, it has become emblematic of the martyrdom of Polish intelligentsia during World War II.
Prelude
Warsaw was perceived by Nazi leaders as one of the biggest obstacles to their plan to subjugate the Polish nation. After the Nazi invasion of Poland, Warsaw was reduced to a provincial city in the newly created General Government. However, it remained a center of Polish cultural life. Warsaw also headquartered the high command of the Polish Underground State and soon became a stronghold of armed and political resistance against the German occupation.Dunin-Wąsowicz (1984), p. 5. On 14 December 1943 Governor-General Hans Frank noted in his diary:
The Polish capital surrendered to the Wehrmacht armies on 28 September 1939. Three days later members of Einsatzgruppe IV led by SS-Brigadeführer Lothar Beutel entered the city. They immediately conducted a search in public and private buildings, as well as mass arrests.Bartoszewski (1970), pp. 39–40. On 8 October 1939 about 354 Polish teachers and catholic priests were detained because occupational authorities assumed that they are “full of Polish chauvinism” and “created an enormous danger” for public order.Wardzyńska (2009), p. 240. Soon Warsaw's prisons and detention centers Pawiak, Mokotów Prison, the Central Detention Center at Daniłowiczowska Street, the cellars of the Gestapo headquarter on 25 Szucha Avenue were full of inmates.Bartoszewski (1976), p. 15. Many of the prisoners were deported to Nazi concentration camps. Many others were murdered.
In the first months of German occupation political prisoners from Warsaw were secretly executed in the back of the Polish parliament (Sejm) building complex at Wiejska Street (in the so-called Sejm gardens, ogrody sejmowe). Between October 1939 and April 1940 several hundred people were murdered in this place. However Nazi German police authorities soon realized that they would not be able to keep executions secret if they were conducted in the very center of a large city.Wardzyńska (2009), pp. 241–242. It was decided that henceforth mass executions would be carried out in the small forest glade in Kampinos Forest, located near the villages of Palmiry and Pociecha,Bartoszewski (1970), p. 64. about northwest of Warsaw.
Modus operandi
Executions in Palmiry were carried out by the members of the Ordnungspolizei or by the soldiers of the regimental staff and the first squadron of the 1st SS Death's Head Cavalry Regiment (1. SS-Totenkopf-Reiterstandarte) which was quartered in Warsaw.Böhler, Mallmann, Matthäus (2009), p. 89.Pieper (2015), p. 38. They were overseen by Gestapo officers led by the SD and Sicherheitspolizei Commander in Warsaw, SS-Standartenführer Josef Meisinger.
In every case mass executions in Palmiry were prepared in a careful manner. Mass graves were always dug a few days before the planned execution. Usually it was done by the Arbeitsdienst unit which was quartered in Łomna or by Hitlerjugend members who camped near Palmiry. In most cases the graves were shaped like a ditch and were more than long and deep. Sometimes, for smaller groups of convicts or for individual victims, irregularly shaped graves were prepared, similar to natural terrain landslides or to explosion craters. The glade where executions took place was soon enlarged by tree-cutting.Bartoszewski (1970), pp. 64–65. On the day of planned execution Polish forestry workers always received a day off. In the meantime German police undertook intensive patrolling near the glade and in the surrounding forest.Bartoszewski (1970), p. 66.
Victims were transported to the place of execution by trucks. Usually they were brought from Pawiak prison, rarely from Mokotów Prison. SS soldiers tried to convince their victims that they are going to transfer them to another prison or to a concentration camp. For this reason, death transports were usually formed at dusk and prisoners were allowed to take their belongings with them. Sometimes before departure convicts received an additional food ration and they were given back their documents from the prison's depository.Bartoszewski (1970), p. 65. Initially, these methods were so effective that the prisoners were not aware of the fate awaiting them.Domańska (1978), p. 27. Later, when the truth about what was happening in Palmiry spread through Warsaw, some victims tried to throw short letters or small belongings from the trucks, in hopes that in this way they would be able to inform their families about their fate. During postwar exhumation some bodies were found with a card reading "Executed in Palmiry", written by the victims shortly before their death.Bartoszewski (1970), p. 112.
At the glade the prisoners' bags were taken but they were permitted to keep their documents and small belongings. Jews left on the yellow Star of David they were forced to wear as a badge under Nazi occupation; and people who worked in Pawiak's infirmary were found still wearing their badges with the Red Cross symbol. Sometimes prisoners' hands were tied and their eyes blindfolded. The victims were then taken to the edge of the grave and executed by machine gun fire. Sometimes victims were forced to hold a long pole or ladder behind their back. Such supports were later lowered so that the bodies fell into the grave in an even layer. Postwar exhumation proved that the wounded victims were sometimes buried alive.Bartoszewski (1976), p. 22. SS and OrPo members photographed the executions until it was forbidden by the SS-Standartenführer Meisinger, as happened on 3 May 1940.Domańska (1978), p. 58. After the execution was finished, the graves were filled in, covered with moss and needles, and then planted over with young pine trees. Families of the victims were later informed by the Nazi authorities that their relatives had "died from natural causes".Wardzyńska (2009), p. 242.
Despite all efforts, the Nazis were not able to keep the massacres secret. Local Polish inhabitants, especially forestry workers and inhabitants of Palmiry and Pociecha, had many opportunities to observe the death transports and to hear the gunshots. Several times they also saw groups of prisoners being led to the place of execution. Forester Adam Herbański and his subordinates from the Polish Forest Service helped reveal the truth about the Palmiry massacre. At risk of their lives, they visited the forest glade after the executions (usually at night) in order to secretly mark out the mass graves. Also, a few photos taken by the executioners in Palmiry were stolen by members of the Union of Armed Struggle.
Timeline of the Palmiry massacre
First executions Probably the first executions in the forest glade near Palmiry were carried out on 7 and 8 December 1939, when 70 and 80 people were murdered, respectively. According to the Wehrmacht soldiers who guarded a nearby ammunition warehouse, all the victims were Jewish. Bartoszewski (1970), pp. 67–68.
The next execution was conducted on 14 December 1939 when 46 people were shot dead. At least some of the victims came from Pruszków. Among them were Stanisław Kalbarczyk, a Polish teacher from Pruszków, and two unidentified women.Bartoszewski (1970), p. 68.
The circumstances of the last mass execution conducted in Palmiry in 1939 are at least partially known. However, according to Maria Wardzyńska (a Polish historian employed in the Institute of National Remembrance), at least 70 other people were secretly executed in Palmiry before the end of 1939.Wardzyńska (2009), p. 244.
In January and February 1940 the Gestapo infiltrated and crushed the underground organization Polska Ludowa Akcja Niepodległościowa (PLAN) ("Polish People's Independence Action"). On 14 January, the PLAN commander, Kazimierz Andrzej Kott, escaped from the Gestapo headquarters at 25 Szucha Avenue. Soon after, several hundred people were arrested in Warsaw, among them 255 leading Jewish intellectuals. On 21 January about 80 hostages, including two women, were executed in Palmiry. Among the victims were Fr. Marceli Nowakowski (rector of the Church of the Holiest Saviour in Warsaw, and former member of parliament) and 36 Jews (including attorney Ludwik Dyzenhaus, dentist Franciszek Sturm and chess master Dawid Przepiórka). Another 118 people arrested after Kott's escape, mostly Jews, were probably murdered in Palmiry in the first months of 1940.Bartoszewski (1970), p. 73.
According to Maria Wardzyńska, about 40 inhabitants of Zakroczym were also executed in Palmiry in January 1940. Among them was the mayor of Zakroczym, Tadeusz Henzlich.
The next mass execution in Palmiry was carried out on 26 February 1940. In retaliation for the death of the German mayor of Legionowo, who had been assassinated two days earlier by unknown perpetrators, about 190 people were murdered at the "glade of death". Among the victims were six women. In most cases the victims of this execution came from Legionowo or from surrounding localities.Bartoszewski (1970), p. 74.Domańska (1978), p. 44.
On the night of 28 March 1940, German police officers entered the house at Sosnowa Street in Warsaw where Józef Bruckner, commander of the underground organization Wilki ("The Wolves"), had his conspiratorial flat. Bruckner and his aide opened fire on the policemen, and after a brief fight, they escaped from the building. In retaliation, the Germans arrested 34 Polish men who lived in this building (aged 17 to 60). All of them were murdered in Palmiry on 23 April 1940.Bartoszewski (1970), pp. 78–79.
On 2 April 1940, about 100 inmates of Pawiak and Mokotów prisons were murdered in Palmiry. The execution was conducted in retaliation for the assassination of two German soldiers in Warsaw. Among the victims were Fr. Jan Krawczyk (theologian, parson of Catholic parish in Wilanów), Bogumił Marzec (attorney), Stefan Napierski (literary critic, editor of monthly magazine of literature Ateneum), Bohdan Offenberg (deputy director of the Labour Fund), Zbigniew Rawicz-Twaróg (captain of the Polish Army), Jacek Szwemin (architect), and 27 women.Bartoszewski (1970), pp. 76–77.
According to Polish historians, between 700Bartoszewski (1970), p. 445. and 900Wardzyńska (2009), p. 243. people were executed in Palmiry from December 1939 until April 1940.
AB-Aktion
In the spring of 1940, the highest NSDAP and SS authorities in the General Government decided to conduct a wide-ranging police operation aimed at the extermination of the Polish political, cultural, and social elite. The mass murder of Polish politicians, intellectuals, artists, social activists, as well as people suspected of potential anti-Nazi activity, was seen as a preemptive measure to keep the Polish resistance scattered and to prevent the Poles from revolting during the planned German invasion of France. This operation was given the code name AB-Aktion (shortcut from Außerordentliche Befriedungsaktion).Bartoszewski (1970), pp. 60–62.Mańkowski (1992), pp. 10–12. It officially lasted from May to July 1940 and claimed at least 6500 lives.Mańkowski (1992), p. 13.Rozett & Spector (2013), p. 101.