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Early history[edit]
Medieval fortified Old Saint Bartholomew church, one of the oldest structures of Gliwice
Gliwice was first mentioned as a town in 1276, however, it was granted town rights earlier by Duke Władysław Opolski of the Piast dynasty. It was located on a trade route connecting Kraków and Wrocław and was part of various Piast-ruled duchies of fragmented Poland: Opole until 1281, Bytom until 1322, from 1322 to 1342 Gliwice was a capital of the Duchy of Gliwice [pl], afterwards again part of the Duchy of Bytom until 1354, later it was also ruled by other regional Polish Piast dukes until 1532, although in 1335 it fell under the suzerainty of the Bohemian Crown, which itself was part of the Holy Roman Empire, and passed with that crown under suzerainty of the Austrian Habsburgs in 1526.
According to 14th-century writers, the town seemed defensive in character, when under rule of Siemowit of Bytom. In the Middle Ages the city prospered mainly due to trade and crafts, especially brewing.
On 17 April 1433, Gliwice was captured by the Duke Bolko V, who joined the Hussites after they captured Prudnik.
Early Modern Age[edit]
An 1863 Polish plaque at the Town Hall commemorating Polish King John III Sobieski to 200th anniversary of the Battle of Vienna
After the dissolution of the Duchy of Opole and Racibórz in 1532, it was incorporated as Gleiwitz into the Habsburg monarchy. Because of the vast expenses incurred by the Habsburg monarchy during their 16th century wars against the Ottoman Empire, Gleiwitz was leased to Friedrich Zettritz for the amount of 14,000 thalers. Although the original lease was for a duration of 18 years, it was renewed in 1580 for 10 years and in 1589 for an additional 18 years. Around 1612, the Reformed Franciscans came from Kraków, and then their monastery [pl] and Church of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross [pl] were built. The city was besieged or captured by various armies during the Thirty Years' War. In 1645 along with the Duchy of Opole and Racibórz it returned to Poland under the House of Vasa, and in 1666 it fell to Austria again. In 1683, Polish King John III Sobieski stopped in the city before the Battle of Vienna. In the 17th and 18th century, the city's economy switched from trading and brewing beer to clothmaking, which collapsed after the 18th-century Silesian Wars.
During the mid 18th century Silesian Wars, Gleiwitz was taken from the Habsburg monarchy by the Kingdom of Prussia along with the majority of Silesia. After the end of the Napoleonic Wars, Gleiwitz was administered in the Prussian district of Tost-Gleiwitz within the Province of Silesia in 1816.[citation needed] In the 19th century, the city was visited by writers Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz, Wincenty Pol, Honoré de Balzac and Józef Ignacy Kraszewski. The city was incorporated with Prussia into the German Empire in 1871 during the unification of Germany. In 1897, Gleiwitz became its own Stadtkreis, or urban district.[citation needed]
Industrialization[edit]
Iron foundry in c. 1900
The first coke-fired blast furnace on the European continent was constructed in Gleiwitz in 1796 under the direction of John Baildon. Gleiwitz began to develop into a major city through industrialization during the 19th century.[citation needed] The town's ironworks fostered the growth of other industrial fields in the area. The city's population in 1875 was 14,156. However, during the late 19th century Gleiwitz had: 14 distilleries, 2 breweries, 5 mills, 7 brick factories, 3 sawmills, a shingle factory, 8 chalk factories and 2 glassworks.
Other features of the 19th-century era industrialized Gleiwitz were a gasworks, a furnace factory, a beer bottling company, and a plant for asphalt and paste. Economically, Gleiwitz opened several banks, savings and loan associations, and bond centers. Its tram system was completed in 1892, while its theater was opened in 1899; until World War II, Gleiwitz's theatre featured actors from throughout Europe and was one of the most famous theatres in the whole of Germany. Despite Germanisation policies, the Poles established various Polish organizations, including the "Sokół" Polish Gymnastic Society, and published local Polish newspapers.
20th century[edit]
Main railway station in c. 1908
According to the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica, Gleiwitz's population in 1905 was 61,324. By 1911, it had two Protestant and four Roman Catholic churches, a synagogue, a mining school, a convent, a hospital, two orphanages, and a barracks. Gleiwitz was the center of the mining industry of Upper Silesia.[citation needed] It possessed a royal foundry, with which were connected machine factories and boiler works.[citation needed]
After the end of World War I, clashes between Poles and Germans occurred during the Polish insurrections in Silesia. Some ethnically Polish inhabitants of Upper Silesia wanted to incorporate the city into the Second Polish Republic, which had just regained independence. On 1 May 1919, a Polish rally was held in Gliwice. Seeking a peaceful solution to the conflict, the League of Nations held a plebiscite on 20 March 1921 to determine which country the city should belong to. In Gleiwitz, 32,029 votes (78.7% of given votes) were for remaining in Germany, Poland received 8,558 (21.0%) votes, and 113 (0.3%) votes were declared invalid. The total voter turnout was listed as 97.0%. The majority in the present-day districts (then surrounding villages) of Brzezinka, Czechowice, Łabędy, Ostropa, Sośnica, Stare Gliwice, Wójtowa Wieś and Żerniki opted to reintegrate with Poland, with the result ranging from 55.7% voting for Poland in Łabędy to 80.2% in Czechowice, while in the present-day districts of Ligota Zabrska and Bojków 56.5% and 98.3%, respectively, voted to remain in Germany. The results prompted another insurrection by Poles. The League of Nations determined that three Silesian cities: Gleiwitz (Gliwice), Hindenburg (Zabrze) and Beuthen (Bytom) would remain in Germany, and the eastern part of Upper Silesia with its main city of Katowice (Kattowitz) would join restored Poland. After delimiting the border in Upper Silesia in 1921, Gliwice found itself in Germany, but near the border with Poland – nearby Knurów was already in Poland.[citation needed]
The present Administrative Court building in the 1920s
During the interbellum the city witnessed not only anti-Polish, but also anti-French incidents and violence by the Germans. In 1920, local Polish doctor and city councillor Wincenty Styczyński [pl], protested against the German refusal to treat French soldiers stationed in the city. In January 1922, he himself treated French soldiers shot in the city. On 9 April 1922, 17 Frenchmen died in an explosion during the liquidation of a German militia weapons warehouse in the present-day Sośnica district. Styczyński, who defended the rights of local Poles and protested against German acts of violence against Poles, was himself murdered by a German radical/militant on 18 April 1922. Nevertheless, various Polish organizations and enterprises still operated in the city in the interbellum, including a local branch of the Union of Poles in Germany, Polish banks and a scout troop.
On 9 June 1933, Gliwice was the site of the first conference of the Nazi anti-Polish organization Bund Deutscher Osten in Upper Silesia. In a secret Sicherheitsdienst report from 1934, Gliwice was named one of the main centers of the Polish movement in western Upper Silesia. Polish activists were increasingly persecuted starting in 1937.
Gliwice Radio Tower
The Gleiwitz incident was a false-flag attack on a radio station in Gleiwitz on 31 August 1939, staged by the German secret police, which served as a pretext, devised by Reinhard Heydrich under orders from Hitler, for Nazi Germany to invade Poland, and which marked the start of the Second World War. Shortly after the outbreak of the war, on 4 September 1939, the Einsatzgruppe I entered the city to commit atrocities against Poles. After the invasion of Poland, the assets of local Polish banks were confiscated by Germany. The Germans formed a Kampfgruppe unit in the city. It was also the cremation site of many of around 750 Poles murdered in Katowice in September 1939.
In early 1940, the advanced shaped charge explosive developed for the attack on Fort Ében-Émael as part of the Blitzkrieg attack on the Maginot Line on 10 May 1940 were tested at places in Gleiwitz to ensure secrecy.
During the war, the Germans operated a Dulag transit camp for Polish prisoners of war, and a Nazi prison in the city, and established numerous forced labour camps, including a Polenlager camp solely for Poles, a camp solely for Jews, a penal "education" camp, a subcamp of the prison in Strzelce Opolskie, and six subcamps of the Stalag VIII-B/344 prisoner of war camp. In October 1943, the Germans brought a large transport of Italian POWs to a forced labour camp in today's Łabędy district. From July 1944 to January 1945, Gliwice was the location of four subcamps of the Auschwitz concentration camp. In the largest subcamp, whose prisoners were mainly Poles, Jews and Russians, nearly 100 either died of hunger, mistreatment and exhaustion or were murdered. During the evacuation of another subcamp, the Germans burned alive or shot 55 prisoners who were unable to walk. There are two mass graves of the victims of the early 1945 death march from Auschwitz in the city, both commemorated with monuments.
During the final stages of the war, 124 inhabitants committed suicide fearing the advancing Red Army. On 24 January 1945, Gliwice was occupied by the Red Army. Soviet troops then murdered over 1,000 civilians, mostly women, children and elders. In February 1945, the Soviets carried out deportations of local men to Soviet mines. Under borders changes dictated by the Soviet Union at the Potsdam Conference, Gliwice fell inside Poland's new borders after Germany's defeat in the war. It was incorporated into Poland's Silesian Voivodeship on 18 March 1945, after almost 300 years of being outside of Polish rule.
Parade of the Polish Border Protection Forces in 1978
In 1956, Gliwice was the site of a manifestation of solidarity with the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, and local Poles raised funds and donated blood for the Hungarian insurgents (see also Hungary–Poland relations).
