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The history of Germans in Poland dates back almost a millennium. Poland was at one point Europe's most multiethnic state during the medieval period. Its territory covered an immense plain with no natural boundaries, with a thinly scattered population of many ethnic groups, including the Poles themselves, Germans in the cities of West Prussia ...
The Polish historian Bernadetta Nitschke has provided a summary of the research in Poland on the calculation of German losses due to the flight and resettlement of the Germans from Poland only, not including other Central and Eastern European countries. Nitschke contrasted the estimate of 1.6 million deaths in Poland reported in 1958 by the ...
The Austrians wanted to incorporate Congress Poland into their territory of Galicia, so even before the war they allowed nationalist organisations to form there (for example, Związek Strzelecki). The Russians recognized the Polish right to autonomy and allowed formation of the Polish National Committee , which supported the Russian side.
Until today, the "rugi pruskie" or the Prussian mass deportations, serve as Polish national symbol of gross injustice experienced by the Poles at the hands of the anti-Polish forces of Prussia, the German Empire, and Otto von Bismarck personally, during the time when Poland remained occupied.
During World War II, expulsions were initiated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland. The Germans deported 2.478 million Polish citizens from the Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany, [30] murdered 1.8 to 2.77 million ethnic Poles, [31] another 2.7 to 3 million Polish Jews and resettled 1.3 million ethnic Germans in their place. [32]
The fighting continued until June 28, 1919, when the Treaty of Versailles was signed, which recreated the nation of Poland. From the defeated German Empire, Poland received the following: Most of the Prussian province of Posen was granted to Poland. This territory had already been taken over by local Polish insurgents during the Great Poland ...
The idea of reconstituting Congress Poland for the Poles after the war, was a cynical ploy which stemmed from a desire to push Russia's frontiers further East with the least amount of German effort. [8] In reality, Germany planned to annex about 30,000 km 2 from former Congress Poland for German colonisation. [4]
German historians have portrayed this resistance as a national conflict in which the large cities of Danzig, Elbing and Thorn in the struggle against the suppression of their German nationality. [34] In the 16th century, Danzig was the largest and one of the most influential cities of Poland and had a preponderantly German-speaking population. [35]