Polish Forced Labour (Zwangsarbeiter/Fremdarbeiter) collection

[StefanM]

Another small group of photos added to my archive:



The beautiful Polish woman above, features in several of the other group photos.

[StefanM]

Recent additions to the "letter P" photo archive.

Dressed in their "Sunday best" conscripted Polish workers outside of their barrack quarters - 8 June 1941. The caption is a ryhme of two lines translated as :

‘Your life is quite screwed up
When behind a wire you’re just stuck’



Below: undated

[StefanM]

Using pieces of the ruins of Heilbronn, in northern Baden-Württemberg, Germany Polish forced workers erected this cross memorial in 1945/46, after their liberation.



Civilian forced labourers in the city of Heilbronn 1940-1945

A total of 5048 civilian forced labourers are recorded in the archives for the city of Heilbronn. However this is considered to be a conservative estimate because about 70-80 percent of the total workforce deployed in Heilbronn during WWII were in fat civilian forced laborers. The countries of origin of these workers were: Poland, the Soviet Union, Ukraine, Belgium, France, Italy, the Netherlands, the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, Slovenia, Serbia, Croatia and Greece.



Above: Polish forced workers employed in Heilbronn, dated on reverse 1941--2.



Above: Reverse with photographer PHOTO KUSS studio mark in Heilbronn on the center photo*


In order for employers to get "foreign workers (Fremdarbeiter or Zwangsarbeiter)" assigned to a company, it had to be recognised as a manufacturer of products important to the military war effort. Researchers have determined that for the urban district of Heilbronn there were some 272 different employers where civilian forced laborers were employed. The number of forced workers deployed within a company ranged from a single labourer to over 800 such employees. The treatment of foreign workers within the Heilbronn companies ranged between extreme ill-treatment to almost friendly relations with them depending on if the foreign workers were from western Europe or those from the "East" who generally received the harshest treatment by their employers.


* The FOTO KUSS studio is still in existence: FOTO KUSS GmbH, Sülmerstraße 49, 74072 Heilbronn. www.foto-kuss.de

[StefanM]

Just purchased a collection of 530 Polish work cards completed at the Arbeitsamt (Labour/Employment Exchange) Częstochowa, Poland dated during 1942. Those marked "VD" are Volksdeutsch and "RD" are Reichsdeutsch with employment entries across a wide range of companies and organisations. Not seen such a large group of Arbeitsamt cards before so had to snap them up

[CARL]

Nice haul Stefan, plenty to study there!

[StefanM]

By coincidence I just picked up another new photo of two Polish forced workers posing at FOTO KUSS photographic studio in Heilbronn, dated 1941. The three other Foto Kuss photos I have are circa 1942.

[StefanM]

A group of Polish PoWs one of whom is seen wearing two loose letter "P" patches hanging from his right breast pocket. The photo is dated July 1940 so just a few months after the Polenerlasse was enacted in March 1940 requiring all Poles working in the German Reich territories to wear the "P" patch for Poles.

[StefanM]

Here a group of Polish men and women pose together wearing the regulation "P" patch.

[kindzjal]

That's a very interesting picture.
The guy seems to be mocking the Germans

[StefanM]

To begin with many Poles felt humiliated in being so marked with a badge that signified their inferiority in the German racial hierarchy and often they would not wear their "P" badge on Sunday's if they were given the day off work and went into town.

But later many Poles wore the Polish "P" badge with almost a sense of pride in being marked out as Polish and as a symbol of solidarity with their fellow countrymen and women...so I am sure there was also a hint of mockery towards the German master race by those wearing the patch with pride rather than it being a symbol of inferiority as was intended.