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its German name, and by several other names, is the sixth-largest city in Poland and is Poland's principal seaport and the capital of the Pomeranian Voivodeship. The city lies on the southern coast of Gdańsk Bay (of the Baltic Sea), in a conurbation with the spa town of Sopot, the city of Gdynia and suburban communities, which together form a metropolitan area called the greater Gdańsk or the Tricity (Trójmiasto) with a population of over a million people. Gdańsk is, with a population of 458,053 (2006), the largest city in the province of Eastern Pomerania, and present region of Gdańsk Pomerania. To the West lies the Kashubian Tricity (Rumia, Reda, and Wejherowo), while Pruszcz Gdański is to the south. Gdańsk is situated at the mouth of the Motława River, connected to the Leniwka, a branch in the delta of the Vistula, whose waterway system connects 60% of the area of Poland. This gives the city a unique advantage as the center of Poland's sea trade. Historically an important seaport since medieval times and subsequently a principal ship-building centre, Gdańsk was a member of the Hanseatic League. The city is famous worldwide as the birthplace of the Solidarity movement which, under the leadership of Lech Wałęsa, played a major role in bringing an end to Communist rule in the Eastern Bloc. Today Gdańsk remains an important industrial centre, together with the nearby port of Gdynia.
History
Main article: History of Gdańsk, see also: History of Pomerania
Foundation and the Middle AgesAccording to archaeologists, the Gdańsk stronghold was built in the 980s by Mieszko I of Poland, after a series of local wars against the inhabiting pagans. In 1997, the year 997 was celebrated by Poland as the date of the foundation of the city, this being the year when Saint Adalbert of Prague (sent by the Polish king Boleslaus the Brave) baptized the inhabitants of Gdańsk (urbs Gyddanyzc). Gdańsk soon became the main centre of a Polish splinter duchy known as Pomerelia ruled by the Dukes of Pomerania. The most famous of them, Świętopełk II, granted the local autonomy charter to the city in ca. 1235, which at the time had about 2,000 inhabitants. Eleven years prior, in 1224, the town had already developed a city charter similar to that of Lübeck which obtained its municipal constitution (Lübisches Stadtrecht) in 1226. Polish governors of Pomerelia gradually gained more and more power and evolved into semi-independent dukes, who ruled the duchy until 1294. The official language of Gdańsk was the language of its ruling family and their own administrative body. By 1308 the city had became a flourishing trading city with some 10,000 inhabitants, but on November 13 1308, it was occupied and demolished by the Teutonic Knights. This led to a series of wars between the Knights and Poland, ending with the Peace of Kalisz in 1343 when the Knights acknowledged that they would hold Pomerania as an alm from the Polish king. Although it left the legal basis of their possession of the province in some doubt, the agreement permitted the foundation of the municipality in 1343 and the development of increased export of grain from Poland via the Vistula river trading routes.
A new war broke out in 1409, ending with the Battle of Grunwald (1410), and the city briefly came under the direct overlordship of the Polish king. A year later, with the Peace of Toruń (Thorn) in 1411, it returned to the Teutonic Knights' administration. In 1440 Danzig participated in the foundation of the Prussian Union which eventually led to the Thirteen Years War (1454-1466) and the incorporation of Royal Prussia by the crown of Poland, with the prerequisite of autonomy for western Prussia.
The city suffered a slow economic decline due to the wars in the 18th century, when it was taken by the Russians after the Siege of Danzig in 1734. Danzig was annexed to Prussia in 1793 and remained a part of Prussia - later within Germany - until 1919. The exception was for several years, from 1807-1815, when it was the Free City of Danzig, as arranged by France amidst the Napoleonic Wars. As part of Prussia, its longest serving Regierungspräsident was Robert von Blumenthal, who held office from 1841, before the troubles of 1848, until 1863. Danzig became part of the German Empire in 1871.
World Wars and inter-war yearsAs a result of the Versailles treaty after World War I, Danzig became a free city under the protection of the League of Nations. Its predominantly German population had no right of self-determination in a referendum as in other disputed parts of the former German Empire. When Poland regained its independence after World War I, the Poles hoped to regain the city to provide the free access to the sea which they had been promised by the Allies on the basis of Woodrow Wilson's "Fourteen Points". However, since the population of the city was predominantly German, it was not placed under Polish sovereignty, but became the Free City of Danzig, an independent quasi-state under the auspices of the League of Nations, governed by its predominantly German residents but with its external affairs largely under Polish control. The Free City had its own constitution, national anthem, parliament (Volkstag), and government (Senat). It issued its own stamps and currency, bearing the legend "Freie Stadt Danzig" and symbols of the city's maritime orientation and history. The vast majority of the city's population favoured eventual return to Germany. In the early 1930s the Nazi Party capitalized on these pro-German sentiments, and in 1933 garnered 38 percent of vote for the Danzig Volkstag. Thereafter, the Nazis under the Bavarian Gauleiter Albert Förster achieved dominance in the city government - which, nominally, was still overseen by the League of Nations' High Commissioner. Nazi demands, at their minimum, would have seen the return of Danzig to Germany and a one kilometer, state-controlled route for easier access across the Polish Corridor, from Pomerania to Danzig (and from there to East Prussia). Originally, the Poles had rejected this proposal, but later appeared willing to negotiate (as did the British) by August. By this time, however, Hitler had Soviet backing and had decided to attack Poland. Germany feigned an interest in diplomacy (delaying the Case White deadline twice), to try to drive a wedge between Britain and Poland. On September 1, 1939, Germany attacked Poland, triggering the outbreak of World War II. The military assault at Danzig began with an artillery bombardment of Polish positions at the Westerplatte peninsula by the old German pre-Dreadnought battleship Schleswig-Holstein and a subsequent landing of German infantry on the peninsula. Polish defenders at the Westerplatte resisted for nearly a week, before running out of ammunition. Many members of Danzig's Polish and Kashub population were deported to Stutthof concentration camp near Danzig or were executed at Piaśnica forest.
The city was annexed by Nazi Germany and incorporated into the Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia. The Wehrmacht designated Danzig as Hauptsitze, Wehrkreis XX, under the command of General de Infanterie Bodewin Keitel. It's primary operational unit was the XX Infanterie Korps, and the XXXXVII Panzer Korps. Danzig was the Home Station of the 60th Panzer Grenadier Division, and the 21st Infanterie Division. Danzig was responsible for Sub-Area Headquarters at Neustadt in Westpreussen, Preussisch Stargard, Marienwerder, Graudenz, Bromberg, and Thorn. Most of the Jewish community in Danzig was able to escape from the Nazis shortly before the outbreak of hostilities. However, German secret police had been observing Polish circles since 1936, compiling information which in 1939 served to prepare conscription lists of Poles to be arrested or executed in Operation Tannenberg. On the first day of the war, approximately 1,500 people were arrested, mainly Poles active in social and economic life, activists, and members of Polish organizations. On 2 September 1939, 150 of them were deported to Stutthof concentration camp, where most were eventually killed. As the war turned against Germany, German populations in Eastern Europe took flight from the advancing Red Army, resulting in a great population shift. After the final Soviet offensive began in January, 1945, hundreds of thousands of German refugees, many of whom had fled to Danzig by foot from East Prussia (see evacuation of East Prussia), tried to escape through the city's port in a large-scale evacuation that employed hundreds of German cargo and passenger ships. Some of the ships were sunk by the Soviets, including the Wilhelm Gustloff, after an evacuation was attempted at neighboring Gdynia. In the process, tens of thousands of refugees were killed. The city also endured heavy Allied and Soviet bombardment. Those who survived and could not escape encountered the Red Army. On 30 March 1945, the Soviets captured the city and left it in ruins.[1] After the Yalta and Potsdam conferences, Gdańsk was assigned to Poland, along with all other territories east of the Oder-Neisse line. The remaining German residents of the city who survived the war were expelled to the western zones of remaining Germany, and henceforth the city became wholly Polish populated. Modern agePoles came to the city from throughout Poland, especially from the regions of eastern Poland annexed by the Soviet Union. The Old City was rebuilt during the 1950s and 1960s. Because of the development of its port and three major shipyards, Gdańsk was a major shipping and industrial center of the Communist People's Republic of Poland. In the course of German-Polish reconciliation policies driven by West German Chancellor Willy Brandt's Ostpolitik, German territorial claims on Gdańsk (and all other formerly German territories now under Polish administration) were renounced, and its full incorporation into Poland was recognized in the Treaty of Warsaw in 1970. In 1970 Gdańsk was the scene of anti-government demonstrations which led to the downfall of Poland's communist leader Władysław Gomułka. Ten years later the Gdańsk Shipyard was the birthplace of the Solidarity trade union movement, whose opposition to the government led to the end of communist party rule (1989). Solidarity's leader Lech Wałęsa became President of Poland in 1990. Today Gdańsk is a major industrial city and shipping port.
Throughout its history Gdańsk/Danzig was ruled by various states before 1945:
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