One of the goals of Women’s History Month is to make visible the women who have been forgotten or largely ignored over the centuries. It’s about acknowledging the unrecognized trailblazers who changed the world. It’s about digging into archives to reclaim lost stories. It’s about bringing to light the impact of local, national and international events on the lives of everyday women.​  One such event was the occupation of Poland by Germany during World War II and the policy of forcing the civil population (often at gunpoint) to leave their home country and work for the Germans in order to keep their war economy operating at full speed.

Polish women forced laborers digging peat in the area of Großmoor, Celle District,  Lower Saxony  Photo: AFPNP( Fundacja „Polsko-Niemieckie Pojednanie”) Visible on the woman in the back left of the photo is the required "P" patch on the left side of her apron which marked her as a Pole.

​Polish women had to leave their families, their children and husbands and sent to Germany to work in industry, agriculture and in various private sectors against their will and often throughout the entire war period. Many died there from tuberculosis, maltreatment and as "collateral damage" during the last days of the war. 

Graves of Polish forced laborers at the cemetery in Waltersdorf in the district of Saale-Holzland, in Thuringia, Germany that died in air raids in 1944.  Photo: AFPNP(Fundacja "Polsko-Niemieckie Pojednanie.”). The young woman on the left is wearing the required "P" patch.

​The end of the war brought liberation and freedom but many would never be the same again. May their story never be forgotten.

 Wearing the Letter "P" Polish Women as Forced Laborers in Nazi Germany 1939-1945.  www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9pOnS399Vw

The cross is the most recognizable symbol of Christianity. It is believed to have been used as a symbol of the faith as early as the 2nd century but it wasn’t until the 4th century that the suffering of Jesus Christ and His ultimate sacrifice became the predominant symbol of Christianity. 

Photo: Polish village between the world wars. Undetermined location. Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe.

In Poland, the cross came to be called Boże Męki, or God’s Suffering. It was believed that only after erecting a cross did a village truly become Christian as embodied by the Polish proverb: A cross in the village, God in the village. The cross and the immediate area around it was seen as sacred and as such became a place of prayer. This was especially vital to small hamlets and villages that did not yet have a church of its own. The cross was a sign of God's presence and protection.  Throughout the Catholic liturgical year, the inhabitants gathered to hold devotions to the Blessed Virgin Mary in May or to the Sacred Heart of Jesus in June. It was also the place of importance on Holy Saturday, the last day of Holy Week.

One of the most cherished of Polish Easter traditions, the blessing of foods on Holy Saturday, called święnconka, has been practiced in Poland since the Middle Ages. In the small hamlets and villages that did not have a church of its own, the people brought their food to the most sacred place in their community – the cross. There they waited for the priest to make his rounds through all of the rural communities and arrive to bless their food. They sometimes erected a table in front of the cross to place their baskets or bowls or simply sat or kneeled around the cross. After the blessing, they carried their food home in anticipation of its enjoyment the very next morning. 




 19th c. illustration by Jan Feliks Piwarski. Public domain.

   As can be seen by the photographs, the tall crosses were most often made of wood which  gradually rotted at the base or deteriorated from the elements and had to be replaced. The cross was sacred, no matter that it was old and in disrepair. It was the tradition in Poland that if an old cross was removed, it would be burnt at a sacred  time - on Holy Saturday night,  the eve of keeping vigil for the Resurrection of the Lord.

Blessing of fire in front of St. Mary's Church in Warsaw. Eugeniusz Małyszczycki. 1894. Wikimedia.

    In Roman Catholic practices, fire and water are blessed on this night. In the cities or towns that had one, this took place in front of the church. In rural communities that didn’t have a church it took place on cemetery grounds. The wood for the fire consisted of an old cross together with the dense and thorny branches of blackthorn (Prunus spinosa) because of legendary beliefs that its branches were used to make the crown of thorns worn by Jesus Christ at His crucifixion on Good Friday.
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​It was also believed that the ashes from this Holy Saturday pyre would protect the fields from hail and lightning and ensure a good harvest so it was collected and scattered on the land during the first plowing of the fields.

Blackthorn (Prunus spinosa). Photo by Dawid Bagiński. RadioMaryja.pl

It was only after this late-in-the day blessing of fire and water that the attending priest could sing  “Alleluja” for the first time since the beginning of Lent.  Christ’s suffering is over and the faithful exalt in joy at His resurrection.

Sources: Gawełek, Franciszek. Wielkanoc. Drukarnia Literackiej w Krakowie 1911

                Spirit of Place: The Roadside Shrines of Poland. Hippocrene Books. 2023

​On March 8, 1940, during World War II, German Field Marshall Herman Göring released a series of laws, that required all the Polish people working in Germany as forced laborers to wear a visible patch with the letter P.  The laws, known as the infamous March Decrees, dictated how the Poles were to be treated while in Germany. 

Enlargement of photo(see below) obtained by U.S. Army Signal Corps photographer T/4 J.A. Ryan. Photo from National Archives in College Park, Maryland.

Those laws, translated and used by U.S Chief of Counsel at Nuremberg Trials, gave evidence of the  discrimination against Poles. Here are some excerpts:

“….it is also necessary to provide all Polish workers who enter the Reich with an outward mark of identification.  From the very first day of his employment, there must be a guarantee that a Polish worker can be recognized as such by anybody and at any time.
…. Poles must be made to understand, by restricting their liberty, that they have come to Germany for the sole purpose of working
….  Appropriate measures, such as absolute compulsion to stay at the place of employment, more severe compulsory registration, introduction of a curfew, restrictions on the consumption of alcohol etc., must be taken at once
… free use of public conveyances, such as railroads, omnibuses etc., is an inducement to Poles to leave their places of work without permission and to roam about uncontrolled in the Reich and it urgently needs to be stopped.”

Five years later, in March 1945 U.S. Army Signal Corps photographer T/4  J. A. Ryan captured this photograph:

Photo from the National Archives in College Park, Maryland. U.S. Army Signal Corps photographer T/4  J. A. Ryan.

​​The caption reads: "Liberated Polish workers, former prisoners of the Germans, were liberated when troops of the Infantry Division, 3rd U.S. Army entered the town of Kelberg, Germany. Using debris from bombed out houses to fill in holes in a road which was used constantly by American troops as they advanced to the front. "

No other details were given but many thanks to the National Archives in College Park, Maryland which holds documents, both written and photographic, to support the facts about the experiences of Polish forced laborers in Germany during World War II.

For more reading on the subject: Wearing the Latter P: Polish Women as Forced Laborers in Nazi Germany 1939-1945. Hippocrene Books, Inc.