Wladyslaw Szymanski

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Władysław Szymanski (born April 5, 1901 in Klein Dommatau (today: Domatówko ) near Putzig ( Puck ); † January 11, 1940 in Stutthof concentration camp near Danzig ) was a priest, religious teacher and martyr of the Catholic Church .

Life

Szymanski studied at the seminary in Pelplin and was ordained a priest on June 27, 1926 . He became vicar in Gdansk (now Gdańsk ) at St. Joseph's Church and pastor of the Christ the King Congregation. As early as April 13, 1934, the Danzig Senate, which is dominated by the NSDAP , issued a ban on the exercise of pastoral activities. A law from 1873, which originated from the time of the Kulturkampf , served as the legal basis . After protests, the priest was assigned to the remote community Groß Lesewitz (Polish: Lasowice Wielkie ) near Marienburg . He also worked for Polish youth organizations. In 1935 he became pastor in Sopot , but had to be removed from office again under pressure in 1937. Until the end he was still a religion teacher there.

Early in the morning on the first day of World War II , September 1, 1939, Szymanski, along with pastors Bronisław Komorowski , Franciszek Rogaczewski , Bernhard von Wiecki and the clergyman Marian Górecki, were arrested by SS men and imprisoned in the Gdańsk Victoria School . Like Górecki, he was probably transferred to the Stutthof concentration camp the next day, where they worked in a group of 40 priests and teachers to set up the camp.

On January 11, 1940, Szymanski was shot there with Pastor Bernhard von Wiecki and other members of the Polish intelligentsia. The corpses were exhumed and buried in the honorary cemetery in Zaspa ( Gdańsk-Zaspa ; formerly: Saspe ).

Commemoration

In Sopot since 1985 a memorial to him, four Catholic chaplains who died in a similar way and 69 other citizens. Commemorative plaques in the Maria Meeresstern church in Sopot and another one at the Marienkapelle in Söder near Hildesheim also give his name.

The Catholic Church included Wladislaus Szymanski as a witness of faith in the German martyrology of the 20th century .

Nothing is known about a process of beatification as a martyr.

literature

  • Lech Kaczmarek (Ed.): Studia Gdańskie, Tom 1 (Polish). Gdańsk-Oliwa 1973. p. 58 f, p. 98 ff. (PDF 12.2 MB [1] ; PDF; 12.8 MB)
  • NN: Victoria School - Gdańsk - 1 wrzesnia 1939 . (Polish) 2008 ( online )
  • NN: Ksiadz Władysław Szymanski . (Polish, short biography with photos) ( online )
  • Helmut Moll (publisher on behalf of the German Bishops' Conference), witnesses for Christ. The German Martyrology of the 20th Century , 6th, expanded and restructured edition Paderborn u. a. 2015, ISBN 978-3-506-78080-5 , Volume I, pp. 769-770.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Klaus Martin Reichenbach: Florilegium Martyrologii Romani. 2001, o. O. ( online )
  2. ↑ Zmarli pochowani na Cmentarzu Na Zaspie. (Polish) ( online )
  3. ^ Monument of Citizens of Sopot . ( Online  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. )@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / old.sopot.net  
personal data
SURNAME Szymanski, Wladyslaw
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Szymanski, Vladislaus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Roman Catholic clergyman and Nazi victim
DATE OF BIRTH April 5, 1901
PLACE OF BIRTH Klein Dommatau , German Empire
DATE OF DEATH January 11, 1940
Place of death Stutthof concentration camp , German Empire