An Untold Story of Heroism: Helena Jablonowska

February 13, 2021February 16, 2021 / donnagawell / 3 Comments

Helena could have fled Poland well before the Germans invaded her homeland in September 1939. As a wealthy Polish landowner in Debica, Helena Jablonowska quickly learned the Germans had targeted the elite as they ravaged the entire country. The Germans considered the aristocracy and the intelligentsia as most likely to lead any uprising against the Reich. Within six months, tens of thousands of Poland’s wealthiest and best-educated citizens were imprisoned and executed. How easy it would have been for Helena to pack her valuables and spend the war years in a neutral country! She instead chose to remain in her beloved homeland. As Helena stood and fought against German facism and Russian totalitarianism, she lost her family’s property, wealth, and status but never her compassion or integrity.

Helena Jablonowska was one of the most extraordinary women to rise up against the Germans during the Second World War. She was born on January 4, 1895, in Andrychow, Poland, and was, as one might say, “born to the service of others.” As the eldest daughter of Mikołaj Rey, a political activist associated with the peasant movement, Helena would follow in her father’s footsteps.

From 1906-1913, Jablonowska received an excellent education at a school for girls at the Convent of the Niepokalanki sisters in Jaroslaw. The sisters instilled a strong sense of moral duty for those in need and were themselves well-known rescuers of Jews and partisans during the wars.

The Convent in Jaroslaw

Helena married Jozef Jablonowski, a man whose family shared her zeal for political activism. After their marriage at the church her father funded in Chotowa, the young couple settled in the family’s manor in Przyborów, near Debica. Three sons and one daughter soon followed. As Helena raised her family during the interwar period, she was the president of the Catholic Action and Marian Sodality. She initiated efforts to organize orphanages where children from rural areas safely received care and food while their mother participated in agricultural work.

Helena’s greatest trials came with Germany’s invasion of Poland in 1939. The wilderness areas of Debica and the surrounding villages proved to be the perfect place for Hitler to build the largest SS training camp outside of Germany. Within the first few months of occupation, the Germans turned many of the local population into refugees as their homes were raised for building the camp. Those who chose to stay worked as forced laborers, felling trees and building the massive camp reaching from Debica to Kolbuszowa.

Helena’s love of Poland and her sacrificial nature were challenged by the atrocities all around her. Recognizing her family’s status and wealth, she exerted influence on behalf of those less fortunate. At significant risk to her family, the Jablonowski home became a shelter for the families of Polish soldiers and Polish Army officers, and displaced villagers.

Helena’s work with the Polish Home Army (AK) is perhaps her most remarkable achievement where she was known by the AK codename, “Rzepechia.” The Jablonowski home became a center of partisan activity, and her sons also were Home Army soldiers. One son, Andrzej, was shot by Germans while carrying a wounded partisan on his back during Operation Tempest.

Estonian and Ukranian Troops training at Camp Heidelager

As Camp Heidelager was expanded, separate prisons for Poles, Jews, and captured Russian soldiers were built in nearby Pustkow. Helena boldly requested a meeting with the camp commander, asking to help feed the starving prisoners. As her German was fluent, she was able to employ sizeable influence. To everyone’s surprise, the commandant allowed Helena and her daughter Marysia to organize a weekly food collection for the prisoners. Helena also acted as an intermediary in collecting letters and secret messages from prisoners to their families and the outside world. She even assisted in the escape of some prisoners at Pustkow.

Through her various activities at the camp, Helena gathered information about the number and condition of the prisoners and Pustkow Prison Camp’s functioning. She also collected information about Hitler’s top-secret V-1 and V-2 missile research in nearby Blizna, inside Camp Heidelager. Helena passed the details on to the command of the Polish Home Army.

Eventually, Debica became too dangerous for the AK officials, so they move their headquarters (known as Deser) to Gumniska, a hilly area south of town. Resistance fighters engaged in acts of sabotage and often attacked the trains carrying German troops on the Krakow-Lwow rail lines.

In early 1944, the AK attempted to blow up a train carrying Hans Frank as it passed through a station near Debica. The Germans arrested innocent villagers from nearby Gumniska to send to prison camps as retribution, known as “collective punishment.” While the prisoners waited in German trucks in front of an administrative building, Helena Jablonowska opened the building gate and truck doors holding the prisoners. Taking advantage of the confusion, the prisoners scattered around the city. The Germans managed to catch only eleven people and were furious. Helena was dismissed from her position as chairman of the Central Welfare Council of Debica, but the decision was never enforced.

As the Russian “rescuers” moved into the area in July 1944, the locals fled from the towns and villages to avoid the ensuing battles. Together with three hundred locals, the Duchess remained in hiding for several weeks in cellars and outbuildings. The Germans destroyed the Jablonowski manor house and farm buildings as they fled from the Russians in the late summer of 1944.

The new communist government that occupied Poland from 1944-1989 extended no mercy to the Countess. As was typical of the Russians, they burned complete libraries at manor homes and any item that might work against their totalitatian ideology. Helena was stripped of all her property by the puppet government even though the community attested to her good works during the German occupation. Helena moved to Krakow and never complained about her unfair treatment or sacrifice. This amazing woman understood the importance of living in contentment despite her circumstances.

On June 11, 1977, Helena died at the age of eighty-three and was buried in the family chapel in Straszecin. Her husband, Jozef, died in Krakow in 1966.

The Ruins of the Jablonowski Manor House

In 2007, the European Union announced it would completely rebuild the Jablonowski’s manor in Przyborów. Helena’s father, Mikołaj Rey, a member of Parliament and descendant of the “Father of Polish literature” built the manor house in 1894. Its architect was Stanislaw Witkiewicz, founder of the “Zakopane Style.” It is the only existing manor house of this type that remains. Currently, the manor house remains in ruins.

Helena’s story is a testimony is an inspiration to those of us who might despair in the current world around us. She acted boldly, not for her own interests, but for the welfare of others.

Blizna Historical Park and Museum

May 16, 2019 / donnagawell / 2 Comments

Hidden in the bucolic forests in southeastern Poland sits an important part of WWII history: Blizna Historical Park. When it was built in 1943, Blizna was already part of SS Camp Heidelager, the largest SS training camp outside of Germany. Visitors can now tour a small museum and remnants of the launching platforms and bunkers in the nearby woods.

After the bombing raid on Peenemunde on August 17, 1943, the German Strategic Command decided to decentralize and divided the research and building of its V-2 missiles among three different geographical centers. The assembly plants were transferred to underground factories in the massive hollowed out cave complex in the Harz Mountains. Development and design were moved to offices in Ebensee, Austria. The main missile testing and training were transferred to Blizna which was perfectly situated outside the range of Allied bombers. Bliza became the main test launching site for the V-1 and V-2 missiles.

Construction at Blizna was accomplished through the work of slave laborers from the Pustkow Concentration Camp and local forced labors. The local Poles had been removed from their homes and farms and had no other options.

During WWII, 15,000 people died in the Pustkow Concentration Camp: 7,500 Jews, 2,500 Poles, and 5,000 Soviet captives. The next article will detail Pustkow.

Bunker at nearby Pustkow Concentration Camp

Polish forced laborers working for the Reich

New infrastructure, starting with concrete roads and a narrow gauge railway, was needed for the transfer of these massive weapons. The workers also built barracks, bunkers, and the specialized equipment necessary for the operation and firing of the missiles.

Blizna, within Camp Heidelager, was the perfect covert wilderness setting, but it was supplemented by a mysterious fake village. The Germans built uninhabited wooden houses and barns, hung laundry on clotheslines, and placed statues of farm animals to create the impression of a peaceful village. This village was likely built because the Allies were taking aerial photos, and a village would give the impression innocent people would be killed if they dropped bombs near Blizna. The Polish Home Army (also known as the AK or Armia Krawoja) was the first to notice this setting.

The Germans started to remove the Polish population living in the area immediately after the September 1939 invasion. The residents of Blizna were moved on December 17, 1940, and most of the surrounding villagers were evacuated shortly after that. The Poles were forced to abandon their homes, leaving behind most of the moveable property for the perpetrators to loot. Most homes were torched, but a few were moved to be used for workers homes in an adjoining camp area. The brick buildings, like manor houses, schools, and churches were left untouched to serve the needs of the invaders.

On the outskirts of Camp Heidelager, the Reich created huge German farms managed by the SS using the local forced laborers. Everyone over the age of fourteen was required to work to serve the needs of the occupiers. The Nazi’s long-term goal was to colonize Poland with German citizens and to totally eliminate Poles from existence. (see reference at end.)

The site at Blizna was considered to be of such high strategic importance that it attracted personal visits from many of the Nazi régime’s most elite officers. Heinrich Himmler, Hans Kammler, and Gottlob Berger visited Blizna in September 1943. The commander of the site was Major General Dr. Walter Dornberger, leader of Nazi Germany’s V-2 rocket program. Adolf Hitler visited in the spring of 1944. Wernher von Braun, the creator of the V-2 and the central figure in Germany’s pre-war rocket development program, visited the test missile impact areas to troubleshoot any problems discovered during trials. After the war, he became director of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.

Himmler (in middle) during his 1943 visit

von Braun visiting Blizna

The first test firings began in November 1943 using both V-1 and V-2 missiles. 40% of all the missiles shot from Blizna did not reach their destination, and sometimes created huge craters in the local area.

The V-1 or “flying bomb” was an automatically controlled unmanned aerial vehicle with a jet-propelled engine. The V-1 could be taken down by fighter and anti-aircraft fire before it even reached its destination. The launching was from a stationary ramp.

Because of the limitations of the V-1, the V-2 was created. It was the first long-range ballistic missile powered by liquid fuel. The speed and altitude of the V-2 meant there was no possibility of destroying them before they could reach their destination, but they were also known for their poor accuracy. The V-2 was launched from an upright position on mobile platforms. The first test runs showed poor reliability with only 20% of the missiles reaching their target destinations. Both the V-1 and V-2 were mostly used to terrorize the civilian populations in England and never created the damage Hitler envisioned.

The partisans of the Home Army immediately began sending reports to the Allied Command about this previously unknown weapon. With the assistance of the foresters, railway workers, and local farmers, the Polish soldiers risked their lives to gain information. They performed extensive surveillance of the Nazi’s activities and sabotaged the equipment and railroads.

Germans watching a V-2 launch from the trenches

A group from the Polish underground infiltrated the crew and often sabotaged the construction of the missiles. Once the flawed rockets were placed on their launching pads, they did not follow the programs and commands of the microcomputers. The rockets would lift off but then fall back either directly on the spot or would fly off course. The saboteurs had either cut the wires or slackened the fuel conduits. Exploded missile fragments found near Blizna were routinely collected and smuggled to the Allies for decoding. Sometimes, local farmers repurposed the high-grade metal into shovels and tools. These heroic acts of sabotage came at a high price: an average of 300 workers working on the missile production at the three sites were killed every day.

Crashed V-2 near Blizna

Learning of this sabotage, Von Braun intervened and decided that the rockets should be dismantled before transport and later reassembled in Blizna. This was done in the assembly hall close to the barracks near the road to Blizna.

In the summer of 1944, local partisans discovered a fully intact and unexploded V-2 rocket, analyzed the components, and then smuggled the parts to London as part of Operation Wildhorn III. A full explanation of this operation can be found in this article:

https://donnagawell.com/poland-in-wwii-niwiska-and-anna-grabiec/world-war-ii-in-poland/operation-wildhorn-iii/

Part of the V-2 rocket being recovered from the Bug River near Sarnaki

In late July 1944, the advance of the Red Army forced the Germans to evacuate their work at Blizna. The Red Army reached Blizna on August 6, 1944, about ten days after the Germans had moved out. Before they left, the Germans blew up remaining missiles and removed anything of military or material value, including valuables stolen from the locals. The remaining structures built as SS Camp Heidelager were torched and destroyed.

Many remnants of V-2 missiles were recovered by the Russians. British intelligence agents were eventually granted access to the launch site in September 1944. By this time, the Red Army had already cleared out most of what the Germans had left. The British managed to fill several crates with some useful V-2 rocket parts, which were then transported to England with the full co-operation of the Soviets. When the crates were opened in London, they did not have the expected contents. Instead, they contained old rusty truck and tank parts. Likely, the Soviet agents had switched the boxes.

The soldiers of the Home Army fought bravely to prevent the Russians from gaining access to the information about the top-secret missile program. A great number of people were killed during the numerous attempts to overtake Hitler’s retaliatory weapons making it the bloodiest operation in the history of the Polish Home Army. Polish officers, cadets, and the Home Army soldiers were arrested by the Red Army after it took control over Poland.

Unfortunately, the Western Allies did not remember the Polish Home Army’s contribution to this great effort. As a result, these brave men and women were sent to a communist prison in Poland and Gulag prison camps situated in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic. Many of these prisoners, known as “the doomed or cursed soldiers,” lost their lives, and only a few were able to emigrate west.

Today, an attractive historical park is surrounded by the remnants of the war years in the exact location where the missiles were tested and launched. The people in the area and the community wanted to save the historical truth of the place from oblivion. Blizna played an important role in the history of World War II and the subsequent shaping of military technology, including the space programs in the USA and USSR.

The museum emphasizes the important role of the Home Army that once operated in this area and its contribution to the unmasking of one of Hitler’s most guarded secret projects. Thanks to these Home Army soldiers and local informants, their efforts helped change the direction of many V-2 missiles, preventing them from reaching their targets.

If the Germans and the V-2 had been successful, these large-scale weapons and the adaption of missiles carrying nuclear charges could have produced an entirely different outcome in the war and the history of the modern world.

More photos from Blizna Historical Park (taken by Donna Gawell during her two visits in 2016 and 2018:

Portable Radio Station used during WWII

Power Generator at Blizna

Portable WWII Mess Kitchen

Outline of V-1 launching platform

A telescope used to view launches from the trenches

Allied Survellience map of Blizna

Two of the many displays of V-1 and V-2 material fragments recovered

by Home Army partisans near Blizna

Bunkers near Blizna

Be sure to visit the beautiful wild horses that live in the woods near Blizna

Hitler’s plans for extermination of Poles were first stated in his 1927 book Mein Kampf. He called for Germans to give up their attempt to regain their former colonies (lost after WWI) and to revert instead to their ancient “Drang nach Osten” (Push Eastwards) so as to conquer new territories for German expansion (“Lebensraum”) in Poland. Twelve years later, in a speech to the leaders of German armed forces on August 22, 1939 Hitler ordered: “Kill without pity or mercy all men, women or children of Polish descent or language. Only in this way can we obtain the living space (Lebensraum) we need. The destruction of Poland is our primary task. The aim is… annihilation of living forces.”

SS Camp Heidelager

March 26, 2019May 16, 2019 / donnagawell / 2 Comments

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Troops at Camp Heidelager

Nazi Germany’s Lesser Known SS Military Complex and Death Camp

Part One: History

Hidden in a wilderness region of southwest Poland is the Blizna Historical Park, a memorial museum dedicated to the preservation of one of Hitler’s top-secret projects. It is difficult to imagine that in this lovely and heavily forested area was once the largest SS training camp outside of Germany. Few foreign visitors even know about its existence, but a visit provides a unique step back into history to learn of the horrors suffered by the prisoners and the local Polish population at the hands of the Nazis.

On my first visit in 2016 to my grandfather’s village in Niwiska, I was astounded that any major atrocities could have happened so close to my grandfather’s birth home. A massive model of a V-2 missile rests ominously in the center of the park. A rocket such as this had been launched and sometimes crashed hundreds of times over my Polish family’s home, just a fifteen-minute walk through the woods!

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At the outset of WWII, the Germans had been well acquainted with every square mile of Poland as the Austria-Hungarian Empire encompassed this territory for over 150 years during the era of the Great Partitions from 1772 to 1918 when Poland ceased to be a nation. Set in this wilderness area of southeastern Poland, Blizna and the surrounding villages provided a secluded area for the very worst of the Nazi’s military forces: the SS or Schutzstaffel.

Oath ceremony of the Ukranian branch

The SS was founded in 1925 to serve as bodyguards for Adolf Hitler. By WWII, it had evolved into the most powerful and feared organizations in all of Nazi Germany. Recruits had to prove none of their ancestors were Jewish and received elite military training. The SS had more than a quarter million members engaged in activities ranging from intelligence operations to controlling the Nazi concentration camps.

Setting up military training centers began almost immediately after Germany’s takeover of Poland in September 1939. The Supreme Command of the Armed Forces of the Reich (OKW) issued an order on December 21, 1939, to build the SS training base on the area of the former counties of Debica, Mielec, and Kolbuszowa. Important transportation routes (railways and roads) and industrial facilities such as chemical and tire plants, the aerospace plant in Mielec, and numerous sawmills made an ideal location for Camp Debica, later renamed as SS Heidelager.

Entrance to plant in Pustkow

Entrance to the plant near Pustkow

The main task of Camp Heidelager was the training of collaborationist military units and for the reorganization of branches that supplemented the units’ losses. The Estonian SS legion and the Ukrainian Division “Galizien” were created in Pustków.

A concentration camp was created by prison and forced labor in Pustkow. It is estimated that about 15,000 prisoners were killed or murdered at these camps: 7,500 Jews, 5,000 Soviet prisoners of war, and 2,500 Poles. The camp originally opened on June 2, 1940, with the arrival of the first forced laborers, mostly Jews and Belgian prisoners. The conditions were so terrible that most prisoners did not survive the first few months.

The second major group was Soviet prisoners who arrived in October 1941. In the beginning, the POW camp was no more than an enclosed area, and prisoners received minimal or no food and were reduced to eating grass and roots. There were no barracks, so prisoners had to sleep out in the open. A third camp for Polish forced prisoners was established in September 1942, and the conditions were no better than those at the first two camps.

In order to build this massive camp, most of the Polish villagers were displaced from their homes by mid-1940 and often had no more than two days to evacuate. The Germans took no responsibility for finding any housing resources for these people. It was the sad destiny for many to wander to a family member’s village outside the camp area in the hope a relative would take pity on them. Many of their houses were torched for new building projects, or some salvageable parts might be moved to build barracks for worker’s settlements. Displaced families were paid a meager compensation and porridge and black coffee was provided once a week.

Everyone above the age of sixteen was required to register and be accountable for their work serving the Reich. Without their land to farm or a trade to pursue, these Poles were forced to accept work at the camp for building projects. Many of their younger people were captured in group roundups and taken to Germany to work on farms or factories.

These local villagers were employed in the construction of the training ground to build railroads, concrete roads, sewage and water systems, and barracks. A large number of prisoners and workers from the Baudienst (the agency that registered and assigned the local villagers) were assigned for agricultural and horticultural work, and in workshops, warehouse, and in cleaning and food services. Large farms were established to ensure the proper amount of food for the crew and the troops staying at the training ground.

SS Hauptsturmfuhrer Albrecht

Captain Albrecht, a man of incredible evil and one of the characters in my novel.

The Germans used pre-war factory buildings and manor and housing estates consisting of thirteen large, two-family villas and several blocks of flats. The more stately homes were taken over as housing for the officers, and the more impressive buildings were used as SS headquarters. For example, the city hall in Kolbuszowa became the Gestapo Headquarters, and the Hupka manor house in Niwiska was taken over as housing for Colonel Ludwik Heiss.

Barrack on Ring 3

A Villa at Heidelager

The camp included most of the features of a typical German town with entertainment, cultural, and recreational facilities for their soldiers. There was a cinema-theater that could accommodate over 2,500 people, a newspaper (“Der Rufer”), sports fields, large dining halls, and barracks. For officers, there were impressive villas and ranges for hunting parties.

Entrance to polygon command

Entrance to Camp Heidelager

Camp Heidelager was open every Sunday for civilians who visited soldiers staying at the training camp. The guests and soldiers enjoyed facilities such as sports fields for recreation. Visitors often brought food and alcohol. They also brought news from the front that had a negative effect on the morale of the soldiers, and there were often desertions.

There was also a brothel that was located in the forest far from the rings and barracks called “Waldkaffe” (Forest Cafe). The entire area of this place was fenced and included a guard who kept order and a cook from the camp.

One bizarre feature of Camp Heidelager was a small fake village. The empty houses were painted, clothes were hung permanently on a clothesline, and statues of farm animals graced the farm. The purpose of this small village is not known, but the locals and foresters found it puzzling.

In the summer of 1943, Hitler moved his top-secret V-1 and V-2 missile research program to Blizna located near the center of the camp. The project had been centered in Peenemunde, Germany but Allied bombing almost destroyed the program. With that devastation, the Germans thought it was more prudent to divide the program between three different regions. The first launch of V-2 rockets took place in Blizna on November 5, 1943, and the V-1 missiles launches began in the spring of 1944. Hundreds of missiles were launched, but many failed, leaving huge craters along their paths.

The Polish Home Army (Armia Krajowa or AK) had the entire area under surveillance and performed heroic acts of sabotage and numerous raids on the missile program. The local foresters, railway workers, and farmers risked their lives on missions to covertly obtain exploded missile fragments that were then smuggled to the Allies.

Once the Germans saw the war was turning in the Allies’ favor, they began to move equipment, prisoners, and anything of value to Germany and torched the wooden structures to erase proof of their actions and atrocities.

The activity at Camp Heidelager came to an abrupt end when the Russians moved into the area in early August 1944. plac-768x615

Map of the rings and barracks in Camp Heidelager near Pustkow

Heinrich Himmler visits

Himmler on a visit to Camp Heidelager in 1943.

*(Part One of Three Articles)

Next: My 2016 and 2018 Visit to Blizna Historical Park

I have just completed “War in the Wilderness,” a historical novel set in WWII in Camp Heidelager. The story is based on the true events and real people who lived under Nazi Germany’s Rule of Terror. I will notify you when the actual publication date is assigned!