Battle of Annaberg

Early in the afternoon of 21 May 1921 battalions of the Bavarian Freikorps Oberland (PL) stormed Góra Świętej Anny (PL), known in German as Annaberg, driving the Silesian insurgents from it. On the tower of the Franciscan monastery they hoisted the black-white-red flag of imperial Germany rather than the colours of the republic. So began the largest battle of the Third Silesian Uprising, in which for the next few days the villages around the hill changed hands again and again.

A hill above the Oder

Góra Świętej Anny, an extinct volcano in the Chełm massif, is only about 400 metres high, but it dominates the country east of the Oder. With its Franciscan monastery it was an important religious centre of the region. For soldiers something else counted: whoever held the hill commanded the surrounding area with artillery fire, and for the Germans it was a convenient base for an advance deep into the industrial district, towards Gliwice.

The insurgents had taken the hill in the first days of the uprising, and by 10 May they had driven the Germans back across the Oder. Then the front came to a halt. Korfanty, true to the idea of an “armed demonstration”, did not want to go further and waited for the Allies’ decision. Meanwhile volunteers from Freikorps units poured in from the interior of the Reich, led by officers with experience of the Great War, and reinforced the Upper Silesian Selbstschutz (PL). On 21 May command of the German forces passed to General Karl Hoefer (PL) of Pszczyna, the same man who from the end of 1918 had commanded the 117th Infantry Division there, later turned into the Grenzschutz.

The assault

The German offensive began on the night of 20–21 May. The Oberland battalions, supported by Selbstschutz units, attacked from the north. According to later accounts the hill fell at about 12.40 p.m. The Germans pressed on against the insurgent 8th Infantry Regiment of Captain Franciszek Rataj (PL), taking one village after another: Kamień, Kamionek, Dąbrówka, Zakrzów, Oleszka. According to Professor Ryszard Kaczmarek, quoted by Polish Radio, the insurgents lost control of 28 localities that day, and with no reserves a gap opened north of Koźle through which the Germans could reach the industrial district or retake Kędzierzyn. The Germans had a numerical superiority of roughly two to one and better weapons.

The burden of the defence passed to Walenty Fojkis (PL)’s 1st Katowice Regiment and to the Strzelce–Toszek battalions of Captain Teodor Kulik’s “Bogdan” group. In the afternoon of 21 May the insurgents drove the Germans out of Kalinów, Poznowice and Sprzęcice and from Kamień station. The front bent but did not break.

The following days

On 23 May the insurgents counter-attacked, and the commander of the insurgent forces, Maciej Mielżyński (PL), came to the scene. In Leśnica (PL), Lichynia, Klucz and Zalesie they fought for individual houses, often hand to hand, supported by armoured cars and improvised armoured trains. The same day the Germans also attacked in the south, but at the Olza (PL) they were beaten back. The counter-attack did not retake the hill, and on 26 May the insurgent command, in view of the talks on a ceasefire that had begun, forbade further offensive actions. According to Hoefer’s report, some German battalions were left with only 10–15 per cent of their strength. According to dzieje.pl the German counter-offensive cost about 2,000 killed and wounded.

Tactically the Germans won the battle, but they did not break the front or reach the industrial district, and their show of force led the Allies to press Berlin to stop supporting the volunteers. After the partition of Silesia the hill remained in Germany and became a place of remembrance for both sides. In 1938 the Nazis built an amphitheatre in a former quarry and, on the summit, a mausoleum holding the ashes of 50 Freikorps soldiers. In 1945 the mausoleum was blown up, and in its place rose the Monument to the Insurgent Deed by Xawery Dunikowski (PL).