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The Free City of Danzig refers to either of two short-lived city-states which were centered on the Baltic port Danzig (Polish Gdańsk).

Napoleonic-era Danzig (1807-1815)

The Free City of Danzig, sometimes referred to as the Republic of Danzig, was a semi-independent state established by Napoleon on September 9, 1807, during the time of the Napoleonic Wars. This territory was carved out from lands that made up part of the Kingdom of Prussia, consisting of the city of Danzig along with its rural possessions on the mouth of Vistula, together with the Hel Peninsula and the southern half of the Vistula Spit. The state came to an end on January 22, 1813.

After the Congress of Vienna of 1815, Danzig was reincorporated into Prussia. Although made the capital of a district and the province of West Prussia, the traditional autonomy of the city was significantly reduced.

Danzig between the World Wars (1920-1939)

The Free City of Danzig (German: Freie Stadt Danzig; Polish: Wolne Miasto Gdańsk) was an autonomous city-state established on January 10, 1920. It was established in accordance with the terms of Section XI of the Treaty of Versailles of 1919, which placed the city under League of Nations protection, with special economic-related rights reserved for Poland.

Territory

The Free City of Danzig included the major city of Danzig (Gdańsk) as well as Zoppot (Sopot), Tiegenhof (Nowy Dwór Gdański), Neuteich (Nowy Staw) and some 252 villages and 63 hamlets. Covering a total area of 1,966 square kilometers (754 sq mi), the territory was roughly twice the size of the Napoleonic statelet.

Population

The Free City had a population of 357,000 (1919), most of whom (about 90%) were German-speakers, with the rest mainly speaking either Kashubian or Polish.

The Treaty of Versailles, which had severed Danzig and surrounding villages from Germany, now required that the newly formed state had its own citizenship, based on residency. German inhabitants lost their German nationality with the creation of the Free City, but were given the right within the first two years of the state's existence to re-obtain it; however, if they did so they were required to make their residence outside of Danzig in the remaining part of Germany.

Total population by language, November 1, 1923
Nationality	Total	German	German and Polish	Polish, Kashub, Masurian	Russian, Ukrainian	Hebrew, Yiddish	Unclassified
Danzig	335,921	327,827	1,108	6,788	99	22	77
Non-Danzig	30,809	20,666	521	5,239	2,529	580	1,274
Total	366,730	348,493	1,629	12,027	2,628	602	1,351
Percent	100.00%	95.03%	0.44%	3.28%	0.72%	0.16%	0.37%

Polish rights

The Free City was represented abroad by Poland and was in a customs union with it. The railway line that connected the Free City with Poland was administered by Poland. Similarly, the separated military post within the city's harbour, the Westerplatte (formerly a city beach), was also given to Poland. There were also two post-offices, one municipal, the other Polish-run.

Politics

File:SynagogeDanzig04.jpg

"Come, lovely May, and free us from the Jews"

In May 1933, the Nazi Party won the local election in the city. However, they received 57 percent of the vote, less than the two thirds required by the League of Nations to change the Constitution of Free City of Danzig. The government introduced anti-Semitic and anti-Catholic laws, the latter primarily being directed against the Poles and Kashubian inhabitants. The city also served as a training point for members of the German minority within Poland that, recruited by organisations such as the Jungdeutsche Partei ("Young German Party") and the Deutsche Vereinigung ("German Union") that would form the leading cadres of Selbstschutz, an organisation involved with murder and atrocities during the German invasion of Poland in 1939.^{[citation needed]} As throughout Germany, Jews were increasingly persecuted, the Danzig Great Synagogue was taken over and demolished by the local authorities in 1939.

In 1939, as tensions peaked between Poland and Germany, the Free City's Nazi government engaged in persecutions of Polish Danzigers (Gdańszczanie), including the expulsion to Poland of all Polish students from the Danzig Technical University.

Second World War and aftermath

The Nazi government voted for re-unification with Germany on September 2, 1939, the day after the German invasion of Poland began. Although illegal under the terms of the city's constitution, the state was nevertheless formally incorporated by Germany into the newly-formed Reichsgau of Danzig-West Prussia. Polish civilian Post Office employees had been trained and had a cache of weapons, mostly pistols, three light machine guns and some hand grenades, when they defended the Polish Post Office for 15 hours. They were executed upon their surrender, against the international law. The Polish military forces in the city held out until the 7th at the fortified Westerplatte. About 10 thousand members of Polish intellgentsia were executed within the first week of German invasion.

Around 90% of the city was reduced to ruins towards the end of the Second World War. On March 30, 1945 the city was taken by the Red Army. It is estimated that more than 90% of the pre-war population were either dead or had fled by 1945. A number of inhabitants of the city perished in the sinking of a ship assisting evacuation, the Wilhelm Gustloff. It had up to 10,000 refugees on board at the time, including about 1,000 soldiers and sailors.

The Allied Powers agreed at the Yalta and Potsdam conferences that the city should become part of Poland.

By 1950, around 285,000 former inhabitants of the Free City were living in an Allied-occupied Germany. ^{[citation needed]} 13,424 former citizens of Free City have been positively verified and granted Polish citizenship {http://www.ipn.gov.pl/portal/pl/24/1363/ Biuletyn Instytutu Pamięci Narodowej nr 9-10 2005 page 43}. By 1947 126,472 Germans were expelled to Germany from Gdańsk. Their place took 101,873 Poles from Central Poland and 26,629 Poles from Eastern Poland (the same source page 44).

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 [[Image:Gdansk flag.svg|thumb|right|Flag of Danzig]]
-The '''Free City of Danzig''' refers to either of two short-lived city-states which were centered on the [[Baltic Sea|Baltic]] port [[Gdańsk]] (''Danzig'')
+The '''Free City of Danzig''' refers to either of two short-lived city-states which were centered on the [[Baltic Sea|Baltic]] port [[Danzig]] (Polish ''Gdańsk'').
 == Napoleonic-era Danzig (1807-1815)==