stillunusual:Wiesław Chrzanowski (code name “Wiesław”) - Polish resistance fighter and photographer,
stillunusual:Wiesław Chrzanowski (code name “Wiesław”) - Polish resistance fighter and photographer, pictured in a townhouse on Wilcza Street in Warsaw, September 1944.Chrzanowski was born in Sosnowiec on 4th December 1920. He graduated from secondary school in Warsaw and was a student at the military engineering school in Modlin when the Second World War broke out. He took part in the defence of Modlin Fortress against invading German forces in September 1939, before returning to Warsaw. He began military training in an underground cadet school in 1940 and also continued his engineering studies at Warsaw Polytechnic (although the Germans banned higher education for the Polish population, underground universities operated in secret - and at great risk - throughout occupied Poland for the duration of the war).During the Warsaw Uprising, Chrzanowski was commander of the 2nd platoon of Anna company (part of the AK Gustaw battalion). He fought against the Germans and their Russian and Ukrainian collaborators in the Stare Miasto (Old Town) district throughout August, and then in the northern city centre until the end of hostilities. He also took about 150 photographs of the uprising.He left Warsaw as a prisoner of war in October 1944 and was initially interned by the Germans in Stalag XI-B Fallingbostel, and subsequently spent time in Bergen-Belsen, Grossborn, Sandbostel and Lübeck. After the war Chrzanowski initially remained in Germany to complete his studies, but decided to return to communist Poland in November 1947 after graduating from the Technical University in Munich. He settled in Śląsk and got a job in the steel industry in Chorzów, near Katowice. Later he moved back to Warsaw to work in the Ursus tractor factory and also taught at Warsaw Polytechnic. He was 90 years old when he died on Easter Sunday, 24th April 2011.Five of Wiesław Chrzanowski’s Warsaw Uprising photos….Polish partisans defending Ślepa Street in the Old Town….Taking a break from the fighting….Krasińskich Square at the end of August 1944….Two Polish partisans in the city centre rubble….Polish partisans carrying sacks of grain across Aleje Jerozolimskie…. -- source link
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