page_title: Tczew
section_title: World War II
hierarchical_section_title: Tczew / History / World War II
caption_attribution_description: English: A bridge over Wisła River destroyed by Polish sappers in September 1939 in order to slow down German Army. Better photo:http://img.audiovis.nac.gov.pl/PIC/PIC_2-7554.jpg Polski: Most na Wiśle pod Tczewem, wysadzony przez polskich saperów, we wrześniu 1939 roku, w celu utrudnienia komunikacji niemieckiej miedzy Rzeszą a Prusami Wschodnimi.
context_page_description: Tczew is a town on the Vistula River in Eastern Pomerania, Kociewie, northern Poland with 60,279 inhabitants. The city is known for its Old Town and the Vistula Bridge, or Bridge of Tczew, which played a key role in the Invasion of Poland during World War II.
  It is the capital of Tczew County in Pomeranian Voivodeship since 1999, and was previously a town in Gdańsk Voivodeship. It is also the largest town of the ethnocultural region of Kociewie.
  The town is the location for the annual English Language Camp arranged by the American-Polish Partnership for Tczew.
context_section_description: According to the city's website, Tczew was the location of the start of World War II when German bombers attacked Polish sapper installations to prevent the bridge from being blown up at 04:34 on 1 September 1939 (the shelling of Westerplatte commenced at 04:45).
  During the German occupation of Poland (1939–45) Tczew, as Dirschau, was annexed into Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia of the administrative district of Regierungsbezirk Danzig of Germany's Third Reich. The Polish population was subjected to mass arrests, repressions, expulsions and murder. The SS-Heimwehr-Sturmbann Götze entered the town in September 1939 to carry out actions against Poles, including mass arrests with the help of local Germans organized in the Selbstschutz, who denounced local Polish activists. The Germans imprisoned hundreds of Poles in camps established in a former factory (present-day museum), in a craft school and in military barracks. In November 1939, Germans carried out executions of numerous Poles from Tczew, including local teachers, officials (including pre-war mayor Karol Hempel,) craftsmen, a policeman, and even a seventeen-year-old student. Catholic priests from Pelplin, who were not murdered in Pelplin, were imprisoned in the Tczew barracks and then murdered in the Szpęgawski Forest. In January 1940, the SS and Selbstschutz carried out two public executions of 33 Polish residents, including railway employees, officials, craftsmen and merchants, at the market square. Also Poles from Starogard and Tuchola counties, who refused to sign the Volksliste, were imprisoned in Tczew and then murdered in a nearby forest.
  In 1941, the Germans created a transition camp for Poles expelled from the region in a local factory (present-day museum). People were held there for several weeks, and then expelled to the General Government. Hundreds of Polish inhabitants of Tczew were expelled in 1940 and 1941. Some inhabitants were also deported to forced labour to Germany.
  After World War II the town, was one of the most damaged cities of Gdańsk Pomerania. Virtually none of its remaining factories were capable of production. There had been considerable loss of population down to around 18-20 thousand people. Shortly before the end of World War II it was occupied by the Soviet Army. After the end of war the town became part of People's Republic of Poland and renamed Tczew again. German residents were dispossessed and expelled; Polish residents took the first effort of reconstruction, and revitalization.
caption: The Vistula bridge demolished by sappers of the Polish Army in September 1939 after the Wehrmacht invasion
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