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Command cadre of the SZP-ZWZ-AK in Auschwitz by Jerzy Dębski
Kadra dowódcza SZP-ZWZ-AK w Konzentrationslager Auschwitz 1940-1945 [Command cadre of the SZP-ZWZ-AK in Auschwitz Concentration Camp, 1940-1945], by Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum historian Dr. Jerzy Dębski, has been published jointly by the Institute of National Remembrance in Katowice and the Museum. It is available in the online bookshop at the Museum website.
In over 500 pages, the book presents the structure of the SZP-ZWZ-AK (Polish Victory Service/Union of Armed Struggle/Home Army) and the most important causes of the arrests that resulted in the imprisonment of Polish underground soldiers in the Auschwitz concentration camp and extermination center. There were a total of 192 such prisoners; 104 of them lost their lives in the camp.
The author uses an extensive base of sources to determine the fate of many SZ-ZWZ-AK officers in the camp and supplies a large, meticulous biographical dictionary. Each biographical note features a detailed bibliography. “These biographical profiles testify to the resistance and uneven combat of the Polish underground against German Nazism, while also making up a tragic picture of the connections between the Auschwitz camp and the Polish Underground State,” says Museum historian Dr. Adam Cyra.
This year marks the 68th anniversary of the moment on February 14, 1942, when the Union of Armed Struggle transformed itself intothe Home Army.
Jerzy Dębski: Kadra dowódcza SZP-ZWZ-AK w Konzentrationslager Auschwitz 1940-1945 [Command cadre of the SZP-ZWZ-AK in Auschwitz Concentration Camp, 1940-1945]
Katowice-Oświęcim, 2009
Published by: IPN Katowice, Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum
558 pp., 17 x 24 cm, hard cover
ISBN: 978-83-7629-101-7
The Headquarters of the SZP/ZWZ/AK (Polish Victory Service/Union of Armed Struggle/Home Army) grew during the war from a core group of a handful of people on September 27, 1939 to 1,195 officers, cadet officers, and NCOs in February 1944. To this number should be added an unknown number of rank-and-file soldiers, which certainly fluctuated in the region of 2 to 3 thousand. Therefore the total personnel of the SZP-ZWZ-AK HQ amounted to some 3 to 4 thousand people.
Clandestine activity and combat caused losses in the ranks of underground soldiers. This was an accepted risk in the resistance movement and part of everyday life in the underground. The arrests resulted, on the one hand, from the efficiency of the enemy’s police apparatus, which disregarded the laws of war, and on the other hand from recklessness, the lack of imagination, or failure to observe the basic rules of underground work.
There were also losses caused by the extermination policy of the occupier towards the Polish nation. There were also many random arrests and detentions during roundups, followed by execution or the imprisonment in concentration camps of underground members who were never identified by the enemy.
From March 1941 to February 1944, SZP-ZWZ-AK HQ had 457 people killed and 1,001 arrested. It seems likely that the total losses of SZP-ZWZ-AK HQ were above 1,500 soldiers, although it is impossible to determine a precise figure. 41 prominent persons were imprisoned in Auschwitz; 12 of them died (2 after transfer to other camps and 3 in the course of the war) while 22 survived (4 escaped, 4 were released from the camp, and 2 were murdered after the war by the communists).
From the Regional and District commands, the second level, 51 people ended up in Auschwitz and 26 of them (more than 50%) died there. 5 died in other camps and 2 died during the war in other circumstances (a total of 33 persons, or almost 65%). 18 (over 35%) died.
Numerically, the greatest losses came from Lwów District (Lwów, Stanisławów, and Tarnopol commands) and Cracow District (Cracow and Silesia). 20 people from the latter area were imprisoned in Auschwitz and 16, or 80%, died. 100 people were incarcerated in Auschwitz from the two lowest organizational levels in the SZP-ZWZ-AK, the Regional Inspectorates and Sub-Districts. 73 (73%) died, meaning only 27% survived.
A total of 192 members of the command cadre of the SZP-ZWZ-AK, at various levels of command, were incarcerated in Auschwitz. Of this number, 143 were active duty or reserve officers of the Polish Army, while 49 had no military background.
Their educational status was as follows: 60 persons had higher education (including 8 graduates of officer school), 117 had secondary education (38 of whom also graduated from cadet school), 4 had elementary education, and there is no information available about the educational attainments of 11 of them. The oldest of them was born in 1884 and the youngest in 1925, but the greatest number—78, or more than 41%—were born in the time period between 1901 and 1910.
104 members (57%) of this command cadre died in Auschwitz, 12 in other camps, and 7 during the war, for a total of 123 people—that is, over 54%. Establishing the full losses among members of the headquarters of the SZP-ZWZ-AK was not possible during wartime, and it still not fully possible today. The lists of losses in the semi-annual reports to the Supreme Commander and the Polish government-in-exile in London were always hedged with reservations about the incompleteness of the data. This was mostly true of the outlying territory, but it surely applied to some degree to SZP-ZWZ-AK HQ, as well.
