Free City of Danzig
The Free City of Danzig (German: Freie Stadt Danzig; Polish: Wolne Miasto Gdańsk) was a city-state under the protection and oversight of the League of Nations between 1920 and 1939, consisting of the Baltic Sea port of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland) and nearly 200 other small localities in the surrounding areas. The polity was created on 15 November 1920 in accordance with the terms of Article 100 (Section XI of Part III) of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles after the end of World War I.
Free City of Danzig | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1920–1939 | |||||||||
| Motto: "Nec Temere, Nec Timide" "Neither rashly nor timidly" | |||||||||
| Anthem: Für Danzig | |||||||||
The Free City of Danzig in 1930 | |||||||||
| Status | Free City under League of Nations protection | ||||||||
| Capital | Danzig | ||||||||
| Common languages | |||||||||
| Religion | |||||||||
| Demonym(s) | Danziger, Gdańszczanie | ||||||||
| Government | Republic | ||||||||
| LoN High Commissioner | |||||||||
• 1919–1920 (first) | Reginald Tower | ||||||||
• 1937–1939 (last) | Carl J. Burckhardt | ||||||||
| Senate President | |||||||||
• 1920–1931 (first) | Heinrich Sahm | ||||||||
• 1939 (last) | Albert Forster | ||||||||
| Legislature | Volkstag | ||||||||
| Historical era | Interwar period | ||||||||
| 15 November 1920 | |||||||||
| 1 September 1939 | |||||||||
| 1 August 1945 | |||||||||
| Area | |||||||||
| 1928 | 1,952 km2 (754 sq mi) | ||||||||
| Population | |||||||||
• 1923: 11 | 366,730 | ||||||||
| Currency | Papiermark (1920–1923) Gulden (1923–1939) | ||||||||
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| Today part of | Poland | ||||||||
Although predominantly German-populated, the territory was bound by the imposed union with Poland covering foreign policy, defence, customs, railways and post, but remained distinct from both the post-war German Republic and the newly independent Polish Republic. In addition, Poland was given certain rights pertaining to port facilities in the city.
In the 1920 Constituent Assembly election, the Polish Party received over 6% of the vote, but its percentage of votes later declined to about 3%. A large number of Danzig Poles voted for the Catholic Centre Party instead. In 1921, Poland began to develop the city of Gdynia, then a midsized fishing town. This completely new port north of Danzig was established on territory awarded in 1919, the so-called Polish Corridor. By 1933, the commerce passing through Gdynia exceeded that of Danzig. By 1936, the city's senate had a majority of local Nazis, and agitation to rejoin Germany was stepped up. Many Jews fled from German antisemitism, persecution, and oppression.
After the German invasion of Poland in 1939, the Nazis abolished the Free City and incorporated the area into the newly formed Reichsgau of Danzig-West Prussia. The Nazis classified the Poles and Jews living in the city as subhumans, subjecting them to discrimination, forced labor, and extermination at Nazi concentration camps, including nearby Stutthof (now Sztutowo, Poland). Upon the city's capture in the early months of 1945 by the Soviet and Polish troops, a significant number of German inhabitants perished in ill-prepared and over-delayed attempts to evacuate by sea, while the remainder fled or were expelled.
The city was fully integrated into Poland as a result of the Potsdam Agreement, while members of the pre-war Polish ethnic minority started returning and new Polish settlers began to come. Gdańsk suffered severe underpopulation from these events and did not recover until the late 1950s.