Outbreak of the Second Silesian Uprising

On 19 August 1920 the command of the Polish military underground in Upper Silesia issued the order to fight, and on the night of 19–20 August the Second Silesian Uprising began. This time it was not, as a year earlier, a chaotic rising against the will of the Polish leaders. The decision was taken by Wojciech Korfanty, who headed the Polish plebiscite campaign, and its aim was limited and precisely defined: to remove from the plebiscite area the German security police, which instead of keeping order protected German armed squads.

Silesia under Allied rule

Since February 1920 Upper Silesia had no longer been governed from Berlin. Power had passed to the Inter-Allied Governing and Plebiscite Commission (PL), which began its work in Opole on 11 February. It was chaired by the French general Henri Le Rond (PL), well disposed towards the Polish cause, and order was kept by French, Italian and British troops, with the French clearly predominant. The German army had been withdrawn, but the German local administration and police remained. Their most important part was the Sicherheitspolizei, known as the Sipo, which according to Polish accounts numbered about 5,000 armed men.

The campaign before the vote was run by two plebiscite commissariats. The Polish one (PL), based in the Lomnitz hotel in Bytom, was led by Korfanty. In spring and summer the campaign grew ever more brutal. German squads broke up Polish meetings and marches, on the night of 27–28 May they attacked the seat of the Polish commissariat in Bytom, and the Sipo usually looked on and did nothing. The Poles demanded that it be disbanded.

A rumour of Warsaw’s fall

The spark came from the war in the east. In mid-August the Red Army stood before Warsaw, and on 17 August the German press in Silesia reported that the Polish capital had fallen. In fact, since the previous day the Polish counter-attack from the Wieprz had been deciding the Battle of Warsaw in Poland’s favour, but that news had not yet reached Silesia. In Katowice (PL) a German crowd celebrating “the end of Poland” and demanding the cancellation of the plebiscite attacked the office of the Allied district controller, the French colonel Blanchard. French soldiers opened fire and killed about ten of the attackers. In revenge the crowd lynched a Polish doctor, Andrzej Mielęcki (PL), who had been dressing the wounded, and wrecked the office of the Polish Plebiscite Committee in Katowice.

During the night of 17–18 August a Polish company went into action at Szopienice (PL). On 18 August Walenty Fojkis (PL), commander of the Katowice–Pszczyna district, having taken several settlements around Katowice, demanded that headquarters proclaim an uprising throughout the plebiscite area. This time the Polish Military Organisation of Upper Silesia was far better prepared than in 1919. In April 1920, according to Przystanek Historia, it had 7,815 sworn members and about 20,000 initiated sympathisers, and it was trained by instructors from the Polish Army.

The order of 19 August

Korfanty decided to fight. The order was issued on 19 August, and operations were again commanded by Alfons Zgrzebniok (PL), who set up his headquarters in Dąbrówka Mała (PL). After Korfanty’s appeal a general strike began in Upper Silesia. In five districts the insurgent units first destroyed communications, which paralysed German countermeasures. The Polish government could not help: the whole army was engaged in the battle for Warsaw.

Within a few days the insurgents had taken most of the industrial district, almost the whole Pszczyna district and part of the Rybnik district. They did not attack the larger towns, where Allied troops were stationed, but blockaded them, and they left Bytom, which they had occupied, at the Allies’ demand. On 24 August the Inter-Allied Commission ordered the Sipo disbanded and the creation of a plebiscite police made up half of Poles and half of Germans. The fighting ended on 25 or 26 August, depending on the account. For the first time the Silesian insurgents had achieved their aim, and from then on the Polish plebiscite campaign could work without fear of the Sipo.