Events with tag - Prisoners

October 16, 1325

Wedding of Casimir the Great and Aldona Anna

On October 16, 1325, the wedding of King Casimir the Great and Lithuanian Princess Aldona Anna, daughter of Grand Duke Gediminas, took place in the Wawel Cathedral. This marriage sealed the Polish-Lithuanian alliance and led to the release of 24,000 Polish prisoners.

March 5, 1940

The Katyn Massacre

The Katyn massacre was a mass execution of approximately 22,000 Polish prisoners of war, mainly officers and members of intelligentsia, carried out by the Soviet NKVD in spring 1940. The decision to conduct the executions was made on March 5, 1940, by order of the Political Bureau of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks), signed by Stalin. The executions were carried out in Katyn, Kharkiv, and Kalinin between April and May 1940.

April 13, 1943

Discovery of Katyn graves

On April 13, 1943, German radio announced the discovery of mass graves of Polish officers in the Katyn Forest. This event revealed the NKVD crimes against Polish prisoners of war and state officials who were murdered by decision of the highest Soviet authorities in 1940. The discovery led to the severance of diplomatic relations between the Polish government-in-exile and the USSR.

January 27, 1945

Liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau

On January 27, 1945, soldiers of the 60th Army of the First Ukrainian Front of the Red Army liberated the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp. At the time of liberation, there were about 7,000 prisoners in the camp, left behind by fleeing Nazis. This event revealed to the world the scale of Nazi crimes and became a symbol of the end of the Holocaust.