First to Fight

by Roger Moorhouse

  89 Account of Bruno Hlebowicz, in Ryszard Szawłowski (ed.), Wojna polsko-sowiecka 1939, Tom 2: Dokumenty (Warsaw, 1997), p. 57.

  90 Account by Lieutenant Władysław Tomaszewski, PISM, B I 70/H.

  91 Gołębiowski testimony, op. cit.

  92 Account of Grażyna Lipińska, in Ryszard Szawłowski (ed.), Wojna polsko-sowiecka 1939, Tom 2: Dokumenty (Warsaw, 1997), p. 70.

  93 Testimony of Janusz Puchciński, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0652.

  94 Lipińska account, op. cit., pp. 73–4. See also testimony of Władysław Wasilewski, PISM, B I 70/H.

  95 Kundzicz testimony, op. cit.

  96 Hill, op. cit., p. 409; Ryszard Szawłowski (ed.), Wojna polsko-sowiecka 1939, Tom 2: Dokumenty (Warsaw, 1997), p. 36.

  97 Mel’tyukhov, op. cit., pp. 478–9.

  98 Tomasz Piesakowski, The Fate of Poles in the USSR 1939–1989 (London, 1990), p. 36.

  99 Czesław Grzelak (ed.), Wrzesień 1939 na Kresach: w relacjach, (Warsaw, 1999), p. 384.

  100 Testimony of Henryk Jaroszyński, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0292.

  101 Mel’tyukhov, op. cit., p. 482.

  102 Gross, op. cit., p. 43.

  103 Testimony of Father Józef Anczarski, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/II/1224/2K.

  104 Testimony of Jerzy Piwoński, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/624.

  105 Gross, op. cit., p. 44.

  106 Testimony of Dariusz Dąbrowski, Imperial War Museum Sound Archive, London, 10450.

  107 Testimony of Henryk Meszczyński, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0508.

  108 Testimony of Józef Bartoszewicz, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0026.

  109 Vladimir Abarinov, The Murderers of Katyń (New York, 1993), p. 101 et. seq.

  110 Anczarski testimony, op. cit.

  111 Account of Major-General Andrei Yeremenko, quoted in Grzelak, op. cit., p. 50.

  112 Anczarski testimony, op. cit.

  113 Testimony of Kazimierz Rodziewicz, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0672.

  114 Zofia Chomętowska, Na wozie i pod wozem: wspomnienia z lat 1939–1940 (Warsaw, 2008), p. 94.

  115 Olesiński testimony, op. cit.

  116 Quoted in Gross, op. cit., p. 36.

  117 Testimony of Andrzej Ramułt, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0663.

  118 Chomętowska, op. cit., p. 30 n.

  119 Quoted in Gross, op. cit., p. 37.

  120 Kupczykowska testimony, op. cit.

  121 Ibid., p. 34.

  122 Testimony of Stanisław Ossowski, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/II/3301.

  123 Karski, op. cit., pp. 16–17.

  124 Daniel Gerould (ed.), The Witkiewicz Reader (Evanston, IL, 1992), p. 275.

  125 Winston Churchill, The Second World War, Vol. 1: The Gathering Storm (London, 1985), p. 400; John Colville, The Fringes of Power: Downing Street Diaries 1939–1955, Vol. 1: September 1939–September 1941 (London 1985), p. 24.

  126 Nicolson (ed.), op. cit., p. 34.

  127 Norman Mackenzie and Jeanne Mackenzie (eds), The Diary of Beatrice Webb, Vol. 4: The Wheel of Life (London, 1985), pp. 438–40.

  128 Dorothy Sheridan (ed.), Among You Taking Notes … : The Wartime Diary of Naomi Mitchison 1939–1945 (London, 1985), p. 40.

  129 Harry Pollitt, How to Win the War (London, 1939), passim.

  130 See Moorhouse, op. cit., pp. 109–14.

  131 ‘Stalin Shows His Hand’, The Times, 18 September 1939.

  132 Raczyński to Halifax, 17 September 1939, The National Archives, London (hereafter TNA), FO 371/23103 C14996.

  133 Quoted in Keith Sword, ‘British Reactions to the Soviet Occupation of Eastern Poland in September 1939’, Slavonic and East European Review, 69 (1991), p. 89.

  134 Broadcast message to Warsaw, reproduced in Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Polish White Book, Vol. 1 (London, 1941), Doc. 143, p. 140.

  135 Churchill, op. cit., p. 403.

  136 Sword, op. cit., p. 98.

  137 David Dilks (ed.), The Diaries of Sir Alexander Cadogan, OM, 1938–1945 (London, 1971), p. 218.

  138 Supreme War Council Minutes, 25 September 1939, TNA, CAB 66/1/399.

  139 Dilks (ed.), op. cit., p. 219.

  140 Supreme War Council Minutes, op. cit.

  141 Polonius, op. cit., pp. 164–5.

  7 Into the Arms of Death

  1 Heinz Linge, With Hitler to the End: The Memoirs of Adolf Hitler’s Valet (London, 2009), p. 122.

  2 Max Domarus, Hitler: Speeches and Proclamations 1932–1945 – The Chronicle of a Dictatorship, Vol. 3: The Years 1939 to 1940 (Würzburg and London, 1997), pp. 1802–4.

  3 Ibid., p. 1807.

  4 Ibid., p. 1808.

  5 Linge, op. cit., p. 123.

  6 Wacław Tym and Andrzej Rzepniewski (eds), Kępa Oksywska 1939: relacje uczestników walk lądowych (Gdańsk, 1985), pp. 257–8.

  7 Ibid., p. 36.

  8 An image of the grave can be seen on Dąbek’s Wikipedia page at https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanisław_Dąbek.

  9 Charles W. Sydnor Jr, Soldiers of Destruction: The SS Death’s Head Division 1933–1945 (Princeton, 1977), p. 41.

  10 Tym and Rzepniewski (eds), op. cit., p. 189.

  11 Richard Hargreaves, Blitzkrieg Unleashed: The German Invasion of Poland 1939 (Barnsley, 2008), p. 175.

  12 Quoted in Marius Emmerling, Luftwaffe nad Polską 1939, Czesc 3: Stukaflieger (Gdynia, 2006), p. 10.

  13 Testimony of Eugeniusz Maciejewski, ‘Wspomnienia z obrony Helu w 1939’ (Gdynia, 1960), typescript, p. 18, Polish Navy Museum Archive, Gdynia.

  14 Tym and Rzepniewski (eds), op. cit., p. 371.

  15 Krzysztof Komorowski (ed.), Boje Polskie 1939–1945: przewodnik encyklopedyczny (Warsaw, 2009), p. 114.

  16 Tym and Rzepniewski (eds), op. cit., p. 377.

  17 Maciejewski testimony, op. cit., p. 20.

  18 Max Domarus, Hitler: Reden und Proklamationen 1932–1945 (Wiesbaden, 1973), vol. 2, p. 1316.

  19 Linge, op. cit., p. 123.

  20 Walter Warlimont, Inside Hitler’s Headquarters 1939–1945 (London, 1964), p. 38.

  21 Roman Bąkowski and Waldemar Nadolny, Baterie Artylerii Przeciwlotniczej (Hel, 2005), pp. 8–12.

  22 Mariusz Borowiak, Admiral Unrug 1884–1973 (Warsaw, 2009), p. 253.

  23 Paul Schmidt, Hitler’s Interpreter (London, 1951), p. 163.

  24 Maciejewski testimony, op. cit., pp. 20–21.

  25 Ibid., p. 23.

  26 Wiesław Arlet, quoted in Janina Grabowska-Chałka, Stutthof: informator historyczny – przewodnik (Gdańsk, 2011), pp. 18–19.

  27 Danziger Vorposten, 13 September 1939, p. 10.

  28 Quoted in Hermann Kuhn (ed.), Stutthof: ein Konzentrationslager vor dem Toren Danzigs (Bremen, 2016), p. 99.

  29 Ibid., p. 97.

  30 Quoted ibid., p. 39.

  31 Wanda Ruczkal, quoted in Grabowska-Chałka, op. cit., p. 52.

  32 Testimony of Wacław Lewandowski, displayed at Muzeum Stutthof w Sztutowie, Poland. Also in Archiwum Muzeum Stutthof, Wspomnienia i relacje, manuscript, Vol. 1, p. 208.

  33 Mieczysław Filipowicz, quoted in Westerplatte w 7 odsłonach (Gdańsk, 2017), p. 97.

  34 Bolesław Kowalczyk, quoted in Grabowska-Chałka, op. cit., p. 50.

  35 Kuhn (ed.), op. cit., p. 96.

  36 Quoted ibid., p. 96.

  37 Lewandowski testimony, op. cit.

  38 Paul Malmassari, Armoured Trains: An Illustrated Encyclopaedia 1825–2016 (Barnsley, 2016), p. 360.

  39 Hans Baur, I Was Hitler’s Pilot (Barnsley, [1958] 2013), p. 102.

  40 Nikolaus von Vormann, Der Feldzug 1939 in Polen: die Operationen des Heeres (Weissenburg, 1958), p. 176.

  41 Wiktor Thommée, ‘Ze wspomnień dowódcy obrony Modlina’, Wojskowy Przegłąd Historyczny, 4:3 (1959), p. 179n.

  42 Tadeusz Krawczak and Janusz Odziemkowski, Polskie pociągi pancerne w wojnie 1939 r. (Warsaw, 1987), p. 102.

  43 Erhard Jähnert, Mal oben – mal unten: einer, der immer dabei war (Bad Kissingen, 1992), pp. 32–3.


  44 Thommée, op. cit., p. 191.

  45 Ludwik Czyżewski, Wspomnienia dowódcy obrony Zakroczymia w 1939 r. (Warsaw, 1973), p. 26.

  46 Ibid., p. 56.

  47 Rochus Misch, Hitler’s Last Witness (Barnsley, 2014), pp. 30–31.

  48 Czyżewski, op. cit., p. 38.

  49 Klemens Rudnicki, The Last of the War Horses (London, 1974), p. 41.

  50 Mario Appelius, Una guerra di 30 giorni: la tragedia della Polonia (Milan, 1940), p. 185.

  51 Rudnicki, op. cit., p. 42.

  52 Quoted in Herbert Drescher, Warschau und Modlin im Polenfeldzug 1939: Berichte und Dokumente (Pforzheim, 1991), pp. 530–31.

  53 Johann Adolf Graf von Kielmansegg, Panzer zwischen Warschau und Atlantik (Berlin, 1941), p. 73.

  54 Quoted in Drescher, op. cit., p. 548.

  55 Ibid., p. 550.

  56 Testimony of Fritsch’s adjutant, Lieutenant Rosenhagen, Der Spiegel, 34/1948, p. 18.

  57 Baur, op. cit., p. 102.

  58 See, for instance, Johnny von Herwarth, Against Two Evils (London, 1981), p. 171.

  59 Victor Klemperer, I Shall Bear Witness: The Diaries of Victor Klemperer 1933–1941 (London, 1998), pp. 300–301.

  60 Julien Bryan, Warsaw (New York, 1959), p. 36.

  61 John Ker Davis, ‘Farewell to a Beleaguered City’, Foreign Service Journal, July 1966, p. 47.

  62 Bryan, op. cit., pp. 37, 39.

  63 Quoted in Lucjan Dobroszycki, Marian Drozdowski, Marek Getter and Adam Słomczyński (eds), Cywilna obrona Warszawy we wrześniu 1939 r.: dokumenty, materiały prasowe, wspomnienia i relacje (Warsaw, 1964), p. 143.

  64 Michalina Mazińska, quoted in Leszek Zaborowski (ed.), Chronicles of Terror, Vol. 1: German Executions in Occupied Warsaw (Warsaw, 2018), p. 36.

  65 Marta Korwin-Rhodes, The Mask of Warriors: The Siege of Warsaw, September 1939 (New York, 1964), p. 132.

  66 Alexander Polonius, I Saw the Siege of Warsaw (Glasgow, 1941), p. 137.

  67 Quoted in Emmerling, op. cit., p. 202.

  68 Bryan, op. cit., p. 34.

  69 Władysław Szpilman, The Pianist: The Extraordinary Story of One Man’s Survival in Warsaw 1939–45 (London, 1999), p. 39.

  70 Testimony of Maria Komornicka, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/II/3611.

  71 Anonymous diarist, quoted in Marta Markowska (ed.), The Ringelblum Archive: Annihilation – Day by Day (Warsaw, 2008), p. 18.

  72 Polonius, op. cit., p. 154.

  73 Testimony of Stanisław Dmuchowski, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0126.

  74 Jadwiga Zdanowa, quoted in Zbigniew Gluza (ed.), Rok 1939: rozbiór polski (Warsaw, 2009), p. 159.

  75 Paweł Rokicki et al., ‘A więc wojna’: Ludność cywilna we wrześniu 1939 r. (Warsaw, 2009), pp. 189, 191.

  76 Polonius, op. cit., pp. 151–2.

  77 Korwin-Rhodes, op. cit., p. 128.

  78 Stanisław Lorentz, quoted in Rokicki et al., op. cit., p. 195.

  79 Korwin-Rhodes, op. cit., p. 137; Polonius, op. cit., p. 162.

  80 Marian Marek Drozdowski (ed.), Archiwum Prezydenta Warszawy Stefana Starzyńskiego (Warsaw, 2004), p. 292.

  81 Korwin-Rhodes, op. cit., p. 146.

  82 Polonius, op. cit., p. 163.

  83 Quoted in Marian Marek Drozdowski, Starzyński: legionista, polityk gospodarczy, prezydent Warszawy (Warsaw, 2006), p. 397.

  84 Szpilman, op. cit., p. 39.

  8 Impenitent Thieves

  1 On Lauterpacht and Lemkin, see Philippe Sands, East–West Street: On the Origins of Genocide and Crimes against Humanity (London, 2016).

  2 Stanisław Maczek, Od podwody do czołga: wspomnienia wojenne 1918–1945 (Edinburgh, 1961), pp. 84–5.

  3 Diary of General Władysław Langner, commander of Lwów garrison, Polish Institute and Sikorski Museum, London (hereafter PISM), KOL 166, p. 14.

  4 Report by Colonel Stanisław Maczek, PISM, B I/58A, p. 21.

  5 Max Domarus, Hitler: Reden und Proklamationen 1932–1945 (Wiesbaden, 1973), vol. 2, p. 1350.

  6 See Ronald Smelser and Enrico Syring (eds), Die Militärelite des Dritten Reiches (Frankfurt am Main, 1995), p. 502.

  7 Quoted in Richard Hargreaves, Blitzkrieg Unleashed: The German Invasion of Poland 1939 (Barnsley, 2008), p. 191.

  8 Ibid., p. 191.

  9 Wojciech Włodarkiewicz, Lwów 1939 (Warsaw, 2003), p. 80.

  10 Ibid., p. 91.

  11 Langner diary, op. cit., p. 19.

  12 Bruno Shatyn, A Private War: Surviving in Poland on False Papers 1941–1945 (Detroit, 1985), p. 122.

  13 Jochen Böhler, Auftakt zum Vernichtungskrieg: die Wehrmacht in Polen 1939 (Frankfurt am Main, 2006), p. 213.

  14 Shatyn, op. cit., p. 122.

  15 Langner diary, op. cit., p. 20.

  16 Langner to Commander-in-Chief, 14 September 1939, PISM, AII 24/17/1.

  17 Hermann Frank Meyer, Blutiges Edelweiß: die 1. Gebirgs-Division im Zweiten Weltkrieg (Berlin, 2008), p. 29.

  18 Tadeusz Rawski, Piechota w II wojnie światowej (Warsaw, 1984), p. 45.

  19 Rosamund Rolle, Kazimierz Sosnkowski: Servant of the White Eagle (London, 1944), p. 29.

  20 Der Polenfeldzug im Tagebuch eines Gebirgsartilleristen (Innsbruck, 1940), quoted in Hargreaves, op. cit., p. 195.

  21 Bronisław Prugar-Ketling, Aby dochować wierności: wspomnienia z działań 11. Karpackiej Dywizji Piechoty. wrzesień 1939 (Warsaw, 1990), p. 77.

  22 Hargreaves, op. cit., p. 197.

  23 Prugar-Ketling, op. cit., p. 71.

  24 Ibid., p. 71.

  25 Kazimierz Sosnkowski, Cieniom września (Warsaw, 1989), p. 135.

  26 Prugar-Ketling, op. cit., p. 79.

  27 Ibid., p. 90.

  28 Generalkommando VII AK, Wir zogen gegen Polen: Kriegserinnerungswerk des VII Armeekorps (Munich, 1940), pp. 90–91.

  29 Sosnkowski, op. cit., p. 178.

  30 Langner diary, op. cit., p. 26.

  31 Sosnkowski, op. cit., pp. 171–2.

  32 Włodarkiewicz, op. cit., p. 175.

  33 Copy of a Soviet leaflet, ‘Do wojsk Polskich!’, in the possession of the author.

  34 Copy of a leaflet in the possession of the author.

  35 Langner diary, op. cit., p. 27.

  36 Maczek report, op. cit., p. 33.

  37 Langner diary, op. cit., p. 29.

  38 Testimony of Michał Gawroński, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0183.

  39 Diary of Alma Heczko, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/II/1297/2K.

  40 Władysław Langner, ‘Ostatnie dni obrony Lwowa 1939’, Niepodległość, 11 (1978).

  41 Testimony of Janina Król, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0407.

  42 Langner diary, op. cit., p. 34.

  43 Account of Lieutenant-Colonel Kazimierz Ryziński, in Kazimierz Ryś, Obrona Lwowa w 1939 roku (Palestine, 1943), pp. 171–2.

  44 Włodarkiewicz, op. cit., p. 176.

  45 Heczko diary, op. cit.

  46 Stanisław Ostrowski, W obronie polskości Ziemi Lwowskiej: Dnie pohanbienia 1939–1941 – wspomnienia (Warsaw, 1986), p. 44.

  47 Langner, ‘Ostatnie dni obrony Lwowa 1939’.

  48 Langner diary, op. cit., p. 37.

  49 Ostrowski, op. cit., p. 45.

  50 Antoni Szymański, Zły sąsiad: Niemcy 1932–1939 w oświetleniu polskiego attaché wojskowego w Berlinie (London, 1959), p. 188.

  51 Langner diary, op. cit., p. 39.

  52 Ibid., p. 40.

  53 Ibid., p. 41.

  54 Ibid., p.48.

  55 Langner, ‘Ostatnie dni obrony Lwowa 1939’.

  56 Langner diary, op. cit., p. 52.

  57 Stanisław Czuruk, quoted in Paweł Rokicki et al., ‘A więc wojna’: ludność cywilna we wrześniu 1939 r. (Warsaw, 2009), p. 129.

  58 Account of Adam Huk, in Ryś, op. cit., p. 177.

  59 Testimony of Janina Przyszlak, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0649.

  60 Adam Epler, The Last Soldier of the Battle of Poland, September 1939 (Edinburgh, 1944), pp. 39, 52.

  61 Jan T. Gross, ‘Sovietisation of P
oland’s Eastern Territories’, in Bernd Wegner (ed.), From Peace to War: Germany, Soviet Russia and the World 1939–1941 (Oxford, 1997), p. 63.

  62 Roger Moorhouse, The Devils’ Alliance: Hitler’s Pact with Stalin 1939–1941 (London, 2014), p. 49.

  63 Protocol, signed in Mińsk Mazowiecki, on German–Soviet cooperation, PISM, AII 27/57.

  64 Natalia Lebedeva, ‘The Red Army Invasion and the Fourth Partition of Poland’, in Adam Daniel Rotfeld and Anatoly V. Torkunov (eds), White Spots – Black Spots: Difficult Matters in Polish–Russian Relations 1918–2008 (Pittsburgh, 2015), pp. 194–5.

  65 Nikita Khrushchev, Khrushchev Remembers (London, 1971), p. 112.

  66 Major-General Andrei Yeremenko, quoted in Czesław Grzelak, Sowiecki najazd 1939 r.: Sojusznik Hitlera napada polskie Kresy – relacje świadków i uczestników (Warsaw, 2017), p. 48.

  67 Testimony of Nela Boratyn, Karta Archive, Warsaw, AW/I/0063.

  68 Kriegstagebuch des Generalkommandos XIX AK (hereafter ‘KTB XIX AK’), reports from 14 September, US National Archives T-314, roll 611, pp. 124–5.

  69 Heinz Guderian, Panzer Leader (London, 1952), p. 81.

  70 KTB XIX AK, p. 130; Dr Frahm, quoted in Alan Bance (trans.), Blitzkrieg in Their Own Words: First-Hand Accounts from German Soldiers 1939–1940 (St Paul, MN, 2005), p. 51.

  71 KTB XIX AK, p. 153.

  72 Vasily Laskovich, quoted in Yury Rubashevsky, ‘Radost’ byla vseobshchaya i triumfal’naya’, Vechernii Brest, 16 September 2011, http://www.vb.by/article.php?topic=36&article=14200 (accessed 1 May 2019).

  73 KTB XIX AK, p. 173.

  74 Ibid., pp. 164, 168.

  75 Guderian, op. cit., pp. 82–3.

  76 KTB XIX AK, p. 179.

  77 Guderian, op. cit., p. 82.

  78 Janusz Magnuski and Maksym Kołomijec, Czerwony Blitzkrieg: wrzesień 1939 – sowieckie wojska pancerne w Polsce (Warsaw, 1994), p. 72.

  79 Raisa Shirnyuk, quoted in Vasily Sarychev, ‘V poiskach utrachennogo vremeni’, Vechernii Brest, archived at http://www.vb.by/sarychev/content/75/main.php

  80 German eye-witness account from a 1939 postcard, reproduced at http://riowang.blogspot.com/2009/09/brest-nazi-soviet-military-parade-23_25.html (accessed 1 May 2019).

  81 Shirnyuk quoted in Sarychev, op. cit.

  82 Ibid.

  83 Stanislav Miretski, quoted ibid.

  84 Boris Akimov, quoted ibid.

  85 Semyon Krivoshein, Mezhdubur’ye: Vospominaniya (Voronezh, 1964), p. 261.