Tarnów

Tarnów Cathedral preserved one of the most extraordinary examples of renaissance and mannerist tomb monuments in the country.[6]

After the death of Jan Tarnowski (16 May 1561), Italian sculptor Jan Maria Padovano began creating one of the most beautiful examples of Renaissance headstones in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The monument of hetman Tarnowski is almost 14 meters tall, and stands in St. Anne Chapel, which is located in northern nave of the Tarnów Cathedral. Padovano completed his work in 1573; furthermore, he designed the Renaissance town hall, and oversaw its remodelling in the 1560s. At that time, in 28 niches of the town hall were portraits of members of the Tarnowski family – from Spicymir Leliwita to Jan Krzysztof Tarnowski, who died in 1567. In 1570 Tarnów became property of the Ostrogski family, after Zofia Tarnowska, the daughter of the hetman, married prince Konstanty Wasyl Ostrogski. In 1588, after Konstanty's death, the town changed hands several times, belonging to different families, which slowed its development. Until the Partitions of Poland, Tarnów belonged to the County of Pilzno, Sandomierz Voivodeship. The town, like almost all locations of Lesser Poland, was devastated in October 1655, during the Swedish invasion of Poland, and as a result, its population declined from 2,000 to 768. In 1723, the town became the property of the Sanguszko family, which purchased it from the Lubomirski family.

Market Square in Tarnów in 1800, painting by Zygmunt Vogel

After the first partition of Poland (1772), Tarnów was annexed by the Habsburg Empire, and remained in Austrian Galicia until late 1918. Austrian rule initially brought positive changes, as the town ceased to be private property, became the seat of a county (German: kreis), and of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tarnów (1783). On 14 March 1794, Józef Bem was born in Tarnów. In the 1830s, under the influence of events in Congress Poland (see November Uprising), Tarnów emerged as a center of Polish conspiratorial organizations. Plans for a national uprising in Galicia failed in early 1846, when local peasants began murdering the nobility in the Galician slaughter. The massacre, led by Jakub Szela (born in Smarżowa), began on 18 February 1846. Szela's peasant units surrounded and attacked manor houses and settlements located in three counties – Sanok, Jasło, and Tarnów. The revolt got out of hand and the Austrians had to put it down.

Tomb of General Józef Bem, national hero of Poland, Hungary and the former Ottoman Empire

Tarnów went through the period of quick development in the second half of the 19th century, due to the program of construction of the railway system. In 1852, the town received rail connection with Kraków, due to the Galician Railway of Archduke Charles Louis, and in 1870, its population was 21,779. In 1878, gas lighting was introduced, and three years later, the first daily newspaper appeared. In 1888, the Diocese Museum was founded by Rev. Jozef Baba, and in 1910, Tarnów received modern waterworks, a power plant and a new complex of the main rail station. The city remained a hotspot of Polish conspirational activities, with up to 20% of all members of the Polish Legions in World War I coming from Tarnów and its area. On 10 November 1914, units of the Russian Imperial Army captured Tarnów, and remained in the city until 6 May 1915 (see Gorlice–Tarnów Offensive). In the early stages of the offensive, Tarnów was shelled by German-Austrian heavy artillery, which brought destruction to some of its districts.

Tarnów was one of the first Polish cities to be freed during the rebirth of Poland following World War I. The Polish Legions liberated the city on the night of 30–31 October 1918. In the Second Polish Republic, Tarnów belonged to Kraków Voivodeship, and gave the newly established country many outstanding figures, such as Franciszek Latinik and Wincenty Witos. In early 1927, construction of a large chemical plant was initiated in the suburban village of Świerczków, which is now a part of the industrial borough of Mościce, a district of the city. Before the outbreak of World War II, the population of Tarnów was 40,000, of which almost half were Jewish.

First transport of Polish captives deported from Tarnów to Auschwitz concentration camp during German AB-Aktion in Poland, June 1940

On 28 August 1939, a Nazi saboteur conducted the Tarnów rail station bomb attack killing 20 civilians, two days before the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany. The city was overrun by the German forces on 7 September 1939. Tarnów was incorporated into the General Government territory as the seat of the Kreishauptmanschaft Tarnow district on 26 October 1939.

In September 1939, the Einsatzgruppe I entered the city to commit atrocities against Poles, and the Einsatzgruppe zbV entered to take over the Polish industry.[7] Poles expelled in December 1939 from various places in German-annexed western Poland were deported in freight trains to Tarnów.[8] On 14 June 1940, the first mass transport left the Tarnów station to Auschwitz concentration camp, with 728 Polish political prisoners,[9] including at least 67 underage boys.[10] All throughout the German occupation of Poland Tarnów was an important center of the Armia Krajowa (AK) and other resistance organizations. In the mid-1944, AK's 16th Infantry Regiment "Barbara" took part in Operation Tempest. The Wehrmacht retreated from Tarnów on 18 January 1945, and the city was captured by the Red Army, and then restored to Poland.

Ludwik Solski Theatre

A few months later, the Museum of Tarnów Land was opened, and Tarnów began a postwar recovery. In 1957, State Theatre of Ludwik Solski was opened, and in 1975 Tarnów became the capital of a voivodeship.

Before World War II, about 25,000 Jews lived in Tarnów.[11] Jews, whose recorded presence in the town went back to the mid-15th century, comprised about half of the town's total population. A large portion of Jewish business in Tarnów was devoted to garment and hat manufacturing. The Jewish community was ideologically diverse and included religious Hasidim, secular Zionists, and many more.[12]

Jewish men humiliated and tortured by German policemen

Immediately following the German occupation of the city on 8 September 1939, the persecution of the Jews began. German units burned down most of the city's synagogues on 9 September and drafted Jews for forced-labor projects.[11] Tarnów was incorporated into the Generalgouvernement. Many Tarnów Jews fled to the east, while a large influx of refugees from elsewhere in occupied Poland continued to increase the town's Jewish population. In early November, the Germans ordered the establishment of a Jewish council (Judenrat) to transmit orders and regulations to the Jewish community. Among the duties of the Jewish council were enforcement of special taxation on the community and providing workers for forced labor.[12]

During 1941, life for the Jews of Tarnów became increasingly precarious.[11] The Germans imposed a large collective fine on the community. Jews were required to hand in their valuables. Roundups for labor became more frequent and killings became more commonplace and arbitrary. Deportations from Tarnów began in June 1942, when about 13,500 Jews were sent to the Belzec extermination camp. The first major act in the extermination of the Jews of Tarnów was the so-called "first operation" from 11–19 June 1942. The Germans gathered thousands of Jews in the Rynek (market place), and then they were tortured and killed. During this time period, on the streets of the town and in the Jewish cemetery, about 3,000 Jews were shot; in the woods of Zbylitowska Góra a few kilometers away from Tarnów a further 7,000 were murdered.[13] According to a document from Michal Borawski born in 1926, featured at the entry of the Bimah as part of the panel offered by the Batorego Foundation, the street stairs ("małe schody" or little stairs) from the town-center to the Bernardynski street (where the Bernardine Monastery is located), had to be cleaned of the blood by the local fire brigade for three days.[14] Poles gave shelter to several Jewish escapees from the ghetto, however, several Poles were eventually captured and murdered by the Germans for rescuing Jews.[15][16] Many Poles were imprisoned by the Germans in the local prison for rescuing and helping Jews and then often deported to Auschwitz and other concentration camps, in which some died, while some fortunately survived until the end of the war.[17]

Existing remains of the old synagogue

After the June deportations, the Germans forced the surviving Jews of Tarnów, along with thousands of Jews from neighboring towns, into the new Tarnów Ghetto. The ghetto was surrounded by a high wooden fence. Living conditions in the ghetto were deplorable, marked by severe food shortages, a lack of sanitary facilities, and a forced-labor regimen in factories and workshops producing goods for the German war industry. In September 1942, the Germans ordered all ghetto residents to report to Targowica Square, where they were subjected to a 'selection' in which those deemed 'non-essential' were singled out for deportation to Belzec. About 8,000 people were deported. Thereafter, deportations from Tarnów to extermination camps continued sporadically; the Germans deported a group of 2,500 in November 1942.[11]

In the midst of the 1942 deportations, some Jews in Tarnów organized a Jewish resistance movement. Many of the resistance leaders were young Zionists involved in the Hashomer Hatzair youth movement. Many of those who left the ghetto to join the partisans fighting in the forests later fell in battle with SS units. Other resisters sought to establish escape routes to Hungary, but with limited success. The Germans decided to destroy the Tarnów ghetto in September 1943. The surviving 10,000 Jews were deported, 7,000 of them to Auschwitz and 3,000 to the Plaszow concentration camp in Kraków. In late 1943, Tarnów was declared "free of Jews" (Judenrein). By the end of the war, the overwhelming majority of Tarnów Jews had been murdered by the Germans. Although 700 Jews returned in 1945, some of them soon left the city. Many moved to Israel.[11]

The church of Our Lady of the Scapular in Tarnów was built on a plot that was illegally obtained by the parish from the descendants of Jewish Holocaust survivors. The plot, which belonged to the Goldman family, remained in the care of family friend Jerzy Poetschkes after Blanka Drillich (née Goldman), the last remnant of the family, left Poland after the war. In 1987 Poetchkes, with the advice of parish lawyers, claimed that the plot has been abandoned (i.e. the last owner is unknown, or had perished), despite being in contact with the Drillichs; he then sold half the plot and transferred the other half to the Church. In 2016, following a lengthy legal battle, a three judge panel found the Church had acted in bad faith and had no legal rights to the property. A year later the case was re-opened after the Church appealed to the local district attorney, with the personal involvement of Minister of Justice Zbigniew Ziobro.[18][19]

Tarnów is one of the warmest cities in Poland. The average temperature in January is −0.4 °C (31 °F) and 19.8 °C (68 °F) in July.[20] It is claimed that Tarnów has the longest summer in Poland spreading from mid May to mid September (above 118 days).

Tarnów is twinned with:[22]