"The people of the East are not allowed to have any higher education beyond a four-year primary school. The purpose of such a school is to teach simple counting, up to five hundred at most, writing one's name, and teaching that the highest commandment is to obey the Germans. I do not consider reading necessary," Heinrich Himmler, May 15, 1940.
The Poles were ready. Over a century of prior occupation prepared the Nation to resist efforts to exterminate its culture and language, to erase its history. Underground Education began while the September campaign was still raging. Schools were suspended. Teachers were hunted down. So education went Underground. Children gathered together in secret, in private apartments, in barns, under various guises -- namedays, birthdays, etc., and were taught by courageous educators who risked concentration camps and death. Education comprised all levels, from elementary, through high school, to university, to cadets in the forming Underground Army.
In an effort to erase Polish culture Germans banned books about the country's history and geography, destroyed (or stole or appropriated) its art... Here Germans are destroying the iconic Chopin monument (its reconstructed version stands today in the Łazienki Park in Warsaw):
During German occupation of Poland the real income dropped by 90% (to 10% of pre-war value). An average salary could buy little-to-nothing, meaning hardly anything was available through official channels, and black-market rates were out-of-reach to most. To survive one had to eat. To eat one had to obtain food on the black market. Food could be purchased or bartered on the black market but punishment was execution or concentration camp. Read about it in detail in WITHOUT PITY.
For context: in 1942/43 the average monthly salary was 130-360 złoty (maximum hourly wages were imposed by the German occupation administration).
For comparison: in Paris, France, the average cost of feeding a family of four went up 6-fold vs pre-war; In Warsaw it went up 70-fold...
A 20$ US Gold Double Eagle sold on the street for 8,000 złoty...
The price of wheat flour shot up by 3000%, pork 4000%, sugar 7000% compared to pre-war prices...
Butter, 1KG costs 170 złoty...
Pork fat, 1KG costs 160 złoty...
Cooking oil, 1L costs 130 złoty...
A lighbulb costs 20 złoty...
A pair of women's shoes cost 2,000 złoty...
A man's suit costs 6,000 złoty, by the end of 1943: 15,000...
A fake kennkarte (official ID, the lack of which could get one executed or sent to a concentration camp) is 500-600 złoty...
A bribe to escape from the Jewish ghetto costs 500 złoty [1]...
[1] Read: Pięć Lat na Muszce by Wiesław Dobrowolski.
Resistance to German occupation began immediately and would eventually reach levels unseen anywhere else in Europe. It is impossible to list all of its various forms. Staying alive when faced with biological extermination was resistance... Learning when education was banned was resistance... Eating enough when food rations and its caloric value were intended to starve was resistance... As was destroying or disrupting the distribution of entire batches of German printed presses... taking down Nazi flags and banners... shaming and stygmatizing those who attended cinemas with German movies... who willingly did business with Germans (in certain cases the Underground would permit work for Germans as unavoidable or beneficial to the cause of Poland's liberation)... disarming German soldiers or gendarmes... derailing military transport trains... etc., etc. Secret military organizations formed across the country within weeks of German occupation (in time these would consolidate and form the largest secret / underground army in Europe)...
When press was banned (or operated under German control) secret printing presses counteracted German-controlled printed media and informed the population. Hundreds of publications circulated the streets. The largest and longest-running BIULETYN INFORMACYJNY issued its first edition November 5, 1939, the last January 19, 1945 ("liberation" of Warsaw). Above is an example, its lead story is the rescue of prisoners being transported between the Gestapo headquarters and Pawiak Prison.
The symbol of Resistance was the stylized P with and anchor (as in PW: Polska Walcząca / Fighting Poland). Here is the first, or one of its first recorded appearances:
Following the bombing and destruction campain of Warsaw German propaganda machine issued a series of articles and posters, including the above: "England! Your Doing!" After the fall of France a similar poster in the same vein was plastered around Paris:
Then came time to demonise the Soviets by painting them as the Antichrist incarnate. Poles never needed to be reminded how bad the Russians were, alas the propaganda campaign came after Germans targetted churches and the clergy -- one of the first victims of the mass roundups and arrests (Operation Tannenberg) and some of the first prisoners to be sent to Auschwitz were Catholic priests...
...and then there was the perennial attack on the British and Jews. Here's one: "Great Britain is Israel", "Rabbi Hertz: The British Isles are the royal base of Israel's rule over the world":
"Starving people have to devote a significant part of their energy to satisfying their hunger, and when it stops bothering them, their free energy looks for an outlet in another direction," Hans Frank, the governor of General Government (occupied Poland), May 15, 1940 - pictured here after being hanged by the neck - the fate of present and future war criminals.
If it rings a bell it is because starvation had been used as a weapon by occupants throughout history. Frank was referring to use of starvation of the occupied Polish people in order to eliminate the Resistance. The plan failed. Because the occupied will always seek freedom...
On November 2, 1939, the NAZI Department of Public Enlightement and Propaganda ordered Polish booksellers and libraries to submit complete lists of books, documents and other prints in their stock. All books falling under the purview of the official proscription list were confiscated and destroyed. In the course of the occupation the list (Liste des deutschfeindlichen, schadlichen und unerwunschten polnischen Schrifttums) was updated and expanded at least 4 times. It included subjects, languages (ie: from countries in opposition to Nazis) and authors whose works the occupant considered harmful to the existence of the Third Reich. Millions of volumes were destroyed.
But the Poles fought back. Citizens stocked and hid the proscribed books; the Underground and private individuals financed a program that supported authors who were forced into hiding; publishers (no longer able to publish) issued advances to authors for books no yet written or conceived (many of these were never published, and advances were not repaid). Gestapo and German police raided bookstores, arrested their proprietors if proscribed books were found, and carted them into concentration camps...
Today's authors continue to be censored (shadowbanned), or they censor themselves in order to stand a chance to be published...
Shortly* after he waged an unprovoked war the people tried to assassinate their possessed dictator. They failed. He went on to murder tens of millions...
Later, to clear their collective conscience the people came up with a slogan: Never Again!
Today only its echo remains: ...Again! ...Again! ...Again!
* Munich, November 8, 1939. Hitler escaped by leaving the event early...
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Various posts related to Without Pity, its background and context. Historical events described here might not appear in chronological order
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