The Land of Oświęcim Residents’ Memory Museum cordially invites you to attend the conference entitled “Tireless in the Fight for their Homeland – Land of Oświęcim Inhabitants on WWII frontlines.” The event will take place at 10am on 16th September in the Centre for Dialogue and Prayer located at 1, Kolbego street. Member of the European Parliament Beata Szydło and District Head Marcin Niedziela are honorary patrons of the event.
The conference is part of this year’s commemorations of the 80th anniversary of the outbreak of WWII and will focus on land of Oświęcim inhabitants’ involvement in the battles on the frontlines of WWII within the context of Polish and local history.
There will be two parts to the meeting – firstly, lectures and secondly testimonies of descendants of soldiers who fought at Monte Cassino. The presentations will be enriched by a display of photographs and documents from that time.
In the first section, Dr Wanda Łuczak from the Jagellonian University in Krakow gives a lecture entitled “Poles on WWII frontlines – the southern front.” Dr hab. Andrzej Synowiec also from the Jagellonian University presents “Poles on WWII frontlines – the western front.” Dr Jacek Lachendro of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum Research Centre speaks on “Civilian escape from the Oświęcim area in September 1939.”
In the second section, descendants of soldiers who fought at Monte Cassino will share their memories of our local heroes. There will also be an exhibition of documents, awards and photographs from the period of WWII which belonged to the soldiers.
An exhibition on loan from the Cracow Saltworks Museum in Wieliczka about the participation of Poles in WWII battles will be available for viewing. The gathering will be a unique history lessons about the soldiers who shed their blood for their homeland on many fronts, and in the majority of cases, never returned.
The exhibition shows the most important battles in which Polish units took part: The Battles of Narvik, defensive battles in France from the beginning of WWII, participation of Poles in the Battle of Britain, the Seige of Tobruk, Monte Cassino, the Battle of Normandy in 1944, where the Polish units, after USA, GB and Canada were the greatest in number on the side of the Allies. The exhibition also mentions the creation of the army of Polish people freed from Soviet prisons in the USSR which made it all the way to Berlin.
You are warmly invited to participate!
The photograph belongs to Mr Piotr Czyż – Monte Cassino hero and resident of Oświęcim.
