All events · The World Wars

Expulsions from Annexed Poland and the 'Heim ins Reich' Resettlement

1939–1944 · Europe & Northern Eurasia

Displacement Abduction (Children)

Displaced

1.4 million

Roughly 900,000 to 1,000,000 Poles and Jews were expelled from the annexed provinces into the General Government or moved within them between 1939 and 1944, according to German resettlement office records; in the Zamosc region of the General Government a further 100,000 Polish villagers, including about 30,000 children, were cleared from their homes in 1942-43. About 500,000 ethnic Germans were settled in the annexed territories, drawn from roughly one million resettled under the 'Heim ins Reich' agreements from the Baltic states, Volhynia, Galicia, Bessarabia, northern Bukovina and Romania. At least 20,000 Polish children judged racially suitable were taken from their families for Germanization. Figures come from SS resettlement statistics and the postwar Polish and German reconstructions summarised by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Share of the population affected

14%

of the population of the Polish territories annexed to the German Reich in 1939, 1939

Killed

30,000–100,000

deaths in transit or in camps

Open on the interactive map →

What happened

Hitler appointed Himmler Reich Commissioner for the Strengthening of Germandom on 7 October 1939 with the task of making the annexed Polish provinces German. Poles and Jews were removed from their farms, shops and houses at short notice, usually with a suitcase each, and moved by train to the General Government; their property was handed to ethnic German settlers brought in under agreements with the Soviet Union, Italy, Romania and the Baltic states that repatriated about a million Volksdeutsche from eastern and southeastern Europe. Racial screening offices sorted both the expelled and the incoming, and at least 20,000 Polish children assessed as Germanizable were taken from their parents and placed with German families. The most systematic clearance in the General Government took place around Zamosc in 1942-43 as a first instalment of Generalplan Ost, the SS scheme for the settlement of eastern Europe by Germans and the removal, over decades, of tens of millions of Slavs. Generalplan Ost was never implemented as drafted, but the expulsions, the Germanization of children and the plunder of property were carried out and were charged at Nuremberg.

Parties

Himmler's Reich Commission for the Strengthening of Germandom expelled Poles and Jews from the annexed Polish provinces and settled ethnic Germans brought in from eastern Europe in their place

Disputed

Totals vary between roughly 900,000 and 1.7 million expelled depending on whether internal displacement inside the annexed provinces, the flight of 1939 and the later evacuation of ethnic Germans are counted.

The denominator

The annexed provinces — the Reichsgau Wartheland, Danzig-West Prussia, Upper Silesia and Zichenau — held roughly ten million people, of whom about 8.9 million were Poles, around 600,000-700,000 Jews and some 600,000 ethnic Germans. Himmler's Reich Commission expelled several hundred thousand Poles and Jews eastward into the General Government and settled some 500,000-900,000 ethnic Germans brought 'home to the Reich' from the Baltic, Volhynia, Bessarabia and elsewhere.

The affected figure combines Poles and Jews expelled from the annexed provinces with ethnic Germans resettled into them from outside, two movements in opposite directions, so it should not be read as a share of the annexed territories' population that was driven out.

Where the baseline comes from

Heim ins Reich — Wikipediaopen-edited
Expulsion of Poles by Germany — Wikipediaopen-edited

On the death toll

Deaths arose from the conditions of the transports in winter, from the killing of those who resisted and from the shooting of villagers during the Zamosc clearances and the reprisals that followed; several thousand of the deported children died. No systematic count exists, and the range reflects Polish postwar estimates that include deaths in transit camps such as Lodz and Potulice alongside those killed during the operations.

Documented forms of violence

Destruction of PropertyAbduction of ChildrenForced LabourArbitrary DetentionDenationalization

The seizure of Polish farms and houses, the racial screening and removal of children, the use of expelled Poles as forced labour and the transit camps are documented in SS resettlement records introduced in evidence at Nuremberg and summarised by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Formal findings

International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg (1946) — Found that the deportation of populations from occupied territories and the Germanization programme, including the removal of children, constituted war crimes and crimes against humanity — source

Movements mapped

Wartheland -> General Government (expelled Poles and Jews)700,000
Baltic Germans from Latvia and Estonia -> Wartheland120,000
Germans of Bessarabia and Bukovina -> annexed Polish provinces190,000

Countries touched, on present-day borders

Poland, Latvia, Moldova

Related entries

Overlaps with: The German-Soviet Partition of Poland
The expulsion of Poles and Jews from the annexed western provinces into the General Government in 1939-41 is counted both in the partition entry and in the Heim ins Reich expulsions entry. 500,000 people are counted in both entries.