Jędrzej Giertych (1903-1992) was surely the most prolific author of the National Camp1 in its full history. specified a message can produce different reactions, as the quantity does not always go hand in hand with quality. However, in the case of Giertych we are dealing with the most affirmative translation of quantities into the quality of writing.
In his case, I usage the concept of writing the meaning of the largo, as Giertych was realized in both the current publications, in longer historical and historical forms, beletristy, memories and even poetry. For his publications and historical writing he could and was severely attacked and various directions, besides by people of his own camp. Although this negative evidence clearly indicates that it was crucial writing, since so many reactions and polemics were experienced.
The subject of this survey raises the problem of defining its content. Jędrzej Gierty was until 1939 an active political activist of the National Party, from 1936 a associate of the strict, formal and informal, management of the SN, and from October 1937 to June 1939 was an advisor and associate of the president of the SN's General Board Kazimierz Kowalski, author of speeches, speeches and political concepts he tried to push in the bias. It is apparent that as a leading national activist, in the political situation of the sanctioning Poland, not agreeing fundamentally with the policy of the post-May regime, Gierty not only fought for the implementation of his imagination of SN policy, but acted in defence of Poland's interests in the form that SN and himself saw him. As a soldier, Navy officer, he defended Poland in 1939 against the German invasion. After the war, not being able to play the function of an active politician, he focused on writing, which in the basic frame is just filled with defence of the good name of Poland and Poles. virtually no crucial historical issue and its times
The author did not leave unresponsive, unanswered. In this sense, the full post-war activity of Jędrzej Giertych filled in the content of this study. Thus, just as well, the title utilized above could be the title of the extended biography of Giertych, possibly not only concerning the years 1945-92. This, of course, exceeds the framework of an article intended only to approximate in a condensed form the fundamental core of the activities of this prominent national author. The following is so simply an introduction to the broad subject outlined in the title. It besides encourages further investigation for scientists, and for those with no technological ambition, to further research the extraordinary character of Jędrzej Giertych and the rich writing heritage he left behind. The author of the following survey focuses on post-war years with only a fewer essential references to the interwar period.
By making a hard choice for the purposes of this text among the vast legacy of Jędrzej Giertych, I believe that the first place should be to put his book ‘In defence of my country” (In defence of My Country), published in 1981 as part of the Roman Dmowski Society Publishing Series as Volume 19. This work is an extended discussion of the issues of the Polish-German dispute in the 20th century against a historical background, with emphasis on issues of the Polish-German border after the Versailles Treaty and after the Potsdam Conference, with the presentation of the historical rights of Poland to both the lands of pre-trial Poland in its 18th century shape, as well as to the lands recovered after 1945, and most lost to various entities, but yet to Germany in the centuries-old historical process. The author describes in item the problem of the alleged Polish Corridor, which existed in 1918-39, and which divides Germany from East Prussia, the problem of Gdańsk, advanced Silesia, besides the question of the alleged Curzon Line, the case of Vilnius and the consequences of planet War II, The Potsdam Conference and its decisions regarding Poland, the issue of the displaced German population, the compensation of losses suffered by the 3rd Reich by Poland, yet lectures Polish rights to post-German territories called after-war Poland Recovered Lands or Northwest Lands.
An crucial impulse for the creation of “In defence of my country” was the speech of the American prof. of English medieval literature Austin J. Appa, Honorary president of the Federation of Americans of German Descent (Federation of Americans of German Origin), a Catholic who in November 1978, in the Lutheran periodical "Christian News" made an anti-Polish pamphlet in the form of an open letter to Pope John Paul II, in which, citing ethics, he called for justice for German "exiles", calling on the pope to say that "the remorse and reparation [of the Polish side] for this terrible crime must be accomplished". At the same time, the App felt that the Pope, erstwhile announcing a akin declaration, would exposure himself to “the wrath of his chauvinist compatriots.” The article-list Appa besides appeared as a separate brochure in December 1978.
A very crucial chapter of the book deals with judaic issues, hard Polish-Jewish relations in the first half of the 20th century and the defence of Poland and Poles against accusations of complicity in German genocide carried out on Jews during planet War II, as well as before the communicative of Western media utilizing the phrase "Polish concentration camps" in common and frequently in bad faith. It is in the chapter devoted to the Polish-Jewish problemology that the author draws the attention of the English-speaking reader – in condensed form – to the thought of creating a quasi-Jewish state in the form of a "reservation" in the lands of Lublin, as an unrealized German concept. It should be noted that the chapter "The Jews of Poland" was besides published separately in English and in Polish translation. It is not hard to announcement that the mentioned issue was alive not only in 1981, the year of the book's release, but remains mostly current to this day. Jędrzej Giertych was not the only 1 who opposed this kind of anti-Polish propaganda, but there is no uncertainty that he did so in those years and on emigration, most, by addressing the problem in a comprehensive way. In the introduction and introduction to his book Gierty, he gives reasons for writing it:
"I started writing this book in December 1979. It was led to me by the fact of the constant anti-Polish propaganda undertaken by the Western world, in the form of countless books, articles, television, radio and another forms of manifestation. The ratio of Western circles to Poland [...] best illustrate the words Hugh Seton-Watson, which I utilized as the motto of this book: the very fact that Poland exists is for these circles a origin of continuous irritation. They would be happy if Poland ceased to exist. [...] It is an undeniable fact that the mass media of the Western planet are conducting systematic propaganda to slander Poland. And it's not just in the media. besides in the circles of intellectual elites conducting sophisticated discussions and, on the another hand, formulating primitive accusations leading to prejudices and simplifications among the little educated public."
Another release, to be mentioned, is financed by a national activist from the USA ZBigniewa Poray-Łukaczyński "Poland and Germany" – Jędrzej Giertych's consequence to the extremist pro-German emergence of American Republican Congressman B. [Brazilla] Carroll Reece (1889-1961), On 16 May 1957, in his speech in the home of Representatives, he expressed his opposition to Poland's possession of the Recovered Lands and stated that "Jędrzej Gierty, a Polish publicist, may have understood the danger of Poland being pushed in erstwhile in its book The Lands Recovered in the light of ethics refuses to adopt a policy of alleged compensation suggested to Poles". Therefore, Reece not only attacked the fact that Poland had recovered lands, but besides took advantage of the expected position on this issue of Giertych. Therefore, the author of the consequence to the congressman defended not only the Polish position on Earth Recovered, but besides his own, pointing to the manipulation and infidelity of Reece. Gierty, considering the congressman's speech as an expression of extraordinary dishonesty, summed them up with words:
"What Reece implies as my opinion is precisely the other of what I actually said and what I truly think and always thought. It is simply a real bastard to support the name of an unsuspecting man on the another side of the Atlantic and to effort to make the impression that he said precisely the other of what he actually said. Reece is not ignorant of my opinion on Earth Recovered. It is truly hard to believe that he has read only a fewer passages from the full brochure [...]. And if he has read the full brochure, he knows that the intent of the position taken in it was to say that Poland has the right to hold these territories and that the current border on Oder and Nysa Lusatia must stay forever".
Giertych's book-answer was sent to the most celebrated American library – the Library of Congress, and she refused to accept it. The author addressed all Catholic Senators in the U.S. legislature to request intervention. Only the future president of the United States, the then Massachusetts Senator, reacted – John F. KennedyAfter which the book was accepted into state and is inactive there today.
It is crucial that the book Giertych in its first English version played an crucial propaganda function despite the modesty of forces and means. any reactions to it collect and present a tiny publication in the form of a 4-page folder, published by the author by Veritas Foundation Press in 1959 – Catalogue of books by Jędrzej Giertych. "The Catholic Herald" wrote that it was "no uncertainty the best presentation of this issue from the Polish side available in English". "The Tablet": "[...] The book is far from pleasurable or propaganda, it is simply a defence of the case at the best level, which present is scarce. This is due to the fact that it is written by a man who knows what he is writing about and presents his views by holding back his temperament for the benefit of an educated audience. Anyone who is inclined to presume that justice will come erstwhile the German borders of 1939 are restored should first read what Mr. Gierty has to say on this issue." "The Times Literary Supplement": "[...] The book is competently written and contains actual wealth of historical and statistical facts. An autobiographical note printed on the cover shows the author as an unconventional man. A political non-conformist, a nationalist in constant dispute with his own party, and a right-wing politician who fights for independency and freedom with courage and selflessness."
"Detroit News": "Understanding this component of the German issue which concerns Poland becomes necessary. This is what he tried to convey in his book Jędrzej Giertych.” “Kombatant” from Cleveland, Andrzej Budreewicz wrote: “I have already given respective books to my friends Americans, even of German origin, who previously agreed with Reee’s statements. I will not exaggerate unless I say that they not only admired the author's erudition, but were virtually kidnapped and fascinated by this book.” Fr Kamil Kantak in London’s “News” added: “He deserved well by Mr Gierty writing, and by Mr Łukaczyński financing the book Poland and Germany. We want her to scope as many readers of goodwill as possible."
In the aspect of Jędrzej Giertych's fight for Poland's rights to the Recovered Land, besides in the context of the deliberately misleading reader of the mention to this position of Congressman Reece, it is essential to mention here the brochure The Case of Earth Recovered in the light of ethics, published in Stuttgart in 1948. An crucial conclusion of Giertych's reflections on the ethical side of Poland's takeover of the German lands east of the border on Oder and Nysa Lusatia is that:
"The taking by the Polish people, as compensation, for the harm and harm caused to them now or in the past – the ethnographic territories of German people and the displacement of German people from them, combined with the confiscation of immovable and partially movable property that these people in these territories had, is not punishment for others' guilt within the meaning of criminal law. It is the intent of the German people to make material damages. This compensation was based on the position of the Polish people on those tangible assets which were attainable to the Polish people. But, of course, the intention of the Polish side was not to harm the individuals straight affected, but to take distant what belongs to the Polish side from the German people as a whole. No 1 in the Polish nation has any objection to the fact that the losses suffered by the Wrocław Germans, or the losses incurred by the Szczeciński Germans, are distributed evenly across the full German nation, i.e. that they are not displaced from Poland to the Germans paid fair compensation – in cash, peculiar bonds, in land allocations, or in any another way – from the pockets of the German population from the remaining areas of the erstwhile 3rd German Reich."
It is worth noting that Giertych uses the word ‘Recovered Land’ in the title of a brochure issued in 1948. The word was utilized in the authoritative naming of the Ministry of Earth Recovered in People's Poland (ministery under the direction of Władysław Gomulka It existed from 13 November 1945 to 11 January 1949) and widely in propaganda. Despite this, the word was besides utilized on emigration, the most unambiguous example of which is the brochure Giertych, although it should be mentioned that the word was besides utilized by authors like Władysław Pałucki, Marian Seyda, Zbigniew Poray-Łukaczyński, Jerzy Zdzechowski, and even – mainly in discussions and press speeches – people associated with the government in exile, functioning after it was recognized in 1945. It is simply a sad reflection that attacking this word from a position of ridicule by opposition to the power of the Polish People's Republic of Poland during the times of the Polish People's Republic, has turned into a completely incomprehensible abandonment of it, the usage of the form of "so-called" Recovered Lands, which is in fact a distance from the content of the perfect concept.
Since another author participating in the conference on the centenary of the birth of Jędrzej Giertych deals in item with this subject, I would just like to draw attention to another works by Jędrzej Giertych on Recovered Lands, as devoted to Warmia and Mazury spiritual and National Faces of Warmia and Mazury, ethnically Polish lands on Prussian grounds, published twice first as part of the serial publication "Sacrum Poloniae Millennium. Discourses – Sketches – Historical materials". T. 4, " Pontificiae Universitatis Gregorianae", Rome 1957, pp. 289–459, and as a separate copy book the same year. In addition to the subject of Warmian-Mazury, the fresh “is awarded by the Association of Polish Writers in the Obiec region.On Holy Warmia” (London 1983). Interest in Warmia and Mazury after the war was in Gierty's case a continuation of the investigation undertaken before the war as well as the assessments formulated in his works at the time. The fruit of the journey to Warmia and Mazury, as well as the work in the position of consular attache in Olsztyn (1931-32), was the edition of the book "Behind the Northern cordon" (Ossolineum, Warsaw 1934). The importance of this book is evidenced by the fact that it was published in 1935 in the form of a typo for the power circles of the 3rd Reich, entitled "Hinter dem nördlichen Grenzgürtel (Ostpreussen)" by Bund Deutscher Osten9, translated by Friedrich Ross and the introduction of Theodore Oberländer10. Even earlier, being an authoritative in the Ministry of abroad Affairs from 1927, Gierty prepared and published in 3 languages a brochure dedicated to the alleged Polish corridor, opposing German propaganda. Written in Polish, it was published in English, French and German. The author starred under the pseudonym Adam Tomas.
On emigration alongside many articles published by Giertych on this subject German, mainly in “Horizonaries”, “The Rock” and “News”, in 1962 the brochure “Deutschland und die Polen von 1795 bis heute’ ("Germany and Poland from 1795 to today"), published by "Horizones" as part of the series "Adam Macielinski Fund Publishing" No 112. In 1978, Lens's "Nationalist" published the brochure "Against German Orientation", which was a collection of articles published by Jędrzej Giertych, Michał Kwiatkowski (the publishers of the Nationalist) and Tadeusz Borowicz. Finally, in the country, in 1986, in the second circulation, Wydawnictwo Polska and Polityka published as a separate brochure the reprint of the article from “Opaka” No. 18 dated October 1984, entitled “Dangerous Pro-German Steps”.
Adam Laughter
This is simply a fragment of a paper published at the convention dedicated to Jędrzej Giertych on 14 January 2023, published entirely in the book entitled “Jędrzej Giertych – a faithful follower of Dmowski's thoughts, an ideologist of Catholic nationalism”, Warsaw 2023.
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In the photo: Jędrzej Giertych (the second right) carries a coffin with the body of Roman Dmowski (7 January 1939).
Think Poland, No. 39-40 (25.09-110.2023)
