News

The 4^th edition of the Nationwide Academic Conference Sites after German prisoners-of-war camps in Poland. Forgotten or Discovered? has taken place.

The conference, whose aim is to present the state of knowledge about the history and current condition of the sites of former German prisoner-of-war camps in our country, took place, once again, on Friday 17 November at the Museum building in Łambinowice and online (https://bit.ly/3sIdfwQ). Academics and local researchers presented in this regard the sites of: Stalag Luft IV Gross Tychow for Allied airmen (Associate Professor Michał Polak from the Koszalin University of Technology, Paweł Urbaniak from the Museum of Polish Arms in Kołobrzeg), Stalag III C Alt Drewitz ( Associate Professor Przemysław Słowiński from the Jakub Paradyż Academy), Stalag XXI C Wollstein (Jarosław Rostkowski from the Regional Museum in Wolsztyn), Stalag II D Stargard ( Associate Professor D. Andrzej Ossowski from the Pomeranian Medical University in Szczecin), Stalag 344 Lamsdorf (Dr. Dawid Kobiałka from the University of Łódź and Dr. Violetta Rezler-Wasielewska representing the Museum), and oflags: II B Arnswalde, II C Woldenberg, II D Gros Born (Professor Anna Matuchniak-Mystkowska from the University of Łódź).

For the event, we partnered with the ‘League of POW Remembrance’ Network which was represented by the president of its Board Adam Szpaderski, Professor of SWPS University of Social Sciences and Humanities, who presented the idea behind the Network as a strategy of management and cooperation of groups of people interested in the remembrance of the fate of POWs and, in a discussion with the founding members (https://www.cmjw.pl/en/siec-liga-pamieci-jenieckiej-en/), analysed the successes and failures in the management of POW memorials in the context of the search for solutions and good practices.

Another important item on the agenda was the presentation of activities and possibilities of cooperation with the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. These were presented by Magdalena Erdman, Head of the Division of Sites of National Remembrance in the Department of Cultural Heritage Abroad and Memorial Sites. She also - representing the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage - awarded the medal Guardian of National Remembrance to Kinga Hartmann-Wóycicka, who is the chair of the Council of the Memory, Education, Culture Foundation and the European Centre Memory, Education, Culture, which takes care of the site of former Stalag VIII A Görlitz (Zgorzelec). The proposer of the motion to award the medal was our Museum.

We would like to thank everyone for their participation. Congratulations to Mrs. Kinga Hartmann-Wóycicka!