During the occupation of Poland (World War II), in 1939, Germans carried out mass arrests of local Poles, who were later murdered in the area or deported to Nazi concentration camps. Some of these Poles were murdered in Skrwilno between 15 October and 15 November 1939 and in Brzezinki in October 1939. The interwar principal of the local high school, Klemens Malicki, was among the Polish principals and teachers murdered in the Oranienburg concentration camp as part of the "Intelligenzaktion Pommern". In 1940–1941, the Germans carried out expulsions of Poles, whose homes, shops and workshops were then handed over to German colonists as part of the "Lebensraum" policy. An Einsatzgruppen penal camp was operated in the town during the occupation, and in 1944, the Germans also established a subcamp of the Stutthof concentration camp, intended for female prisoners. The German occupation ended in January 1945.