Łomża () is a city in north-eastern Poland, approximately to the north-east of Warsaw and west of Białystok. It is situated alongside the Narew River as part of the Podlaskie Voivodeship. It is the capital of Łomża County and has been the seat of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Łomża since 1925.
Łomża is one of the principal economic, educational, and cultural centres of north-eastern Masovia as well as one of the three main cities of Podlaskie Voivodeship (beside Białystok and Suwałki). It lends its name to the protected area of Łomża Landscape Park. The town is also the location of the Łomża Brewery.
History Early history
Łomża was founded in the 10th century, on the site of the present day village called Stara Łomża (Old Łomża). It was first mentioned in official records in the 14th century. Łomża received its municipal rights in 1416, and became an important political and economic center in the mid-16th century.Qiryat Tiv'on, "Łomża from its beginnings," translated from Hebrew by Stan Goodman, original published by Pinkas haKehilot branch of Yad Vashem Łomża was a royal city of Poland and the capital of the Łomża Land, an administrative unit (ziemia) of the Masovian Voivodeship in the Greater Poland Province until Poland lost its independence in 1795.
Polish Duke Bolesław IV the Curly built a palace there in the 12th century. In 1444 the town was granted an exemption from the transit tax on Narew River contributing to its further development. In the 16th century King Sigismund II Augustus gave Łomża the right to hold great fairs three times a year, similar to Warsaw and Płock. In 1614 the Jesuits founded a Jesuit College, which as today's I Liceum Ogólnokształcące is among the oldest high schools in Poland. In 1618 a great fire destroyed most of the city, and six years later, an epidemic killed 5,021 persons decimating its population. A series of disasters (including the Swedish invasion and the Cossack raids) resulted in its rapid decline. The 3rd Polish National Cavalry Brigade was stationed in Łomża before the Third Partition of Poland.
Late modern period
As a result of the Partitions of Poland Łomża was annexed by Prussia in 1795. In 1807 it was included in the short-lived Polish Duchy of Warsaw, within which it was the seat of the Łomża Department. In 1815 Łomża became part of Congress Poland, which was forcibly integrated into the Russian Empire over the course of the 19th century.
After the Russian massacres of Polish protesters in Warsaw in 1861, Polish demonstrations took place in Łomża, at which even romantic poet Władysław Syrokomla gave a public speech, however, they ended in October 1861 when the Russians imposed martial law. Afterwards the Polish resistance began preparations for an uprising. In 1863 the January Uprising broke out and many local Poles joined it. In July 1863, the Russians carried out a massacre of 50 unarmed young Poles in the nearby forest in Wygoda, mainly students of local schools, who joined the uprising.Katalog miejsc pamięci powstania styczniowego w województwie podlaskim, p. 55Lipiński, p. 33 The victims were tortured and murdered in gruesome ways: some had their eyes gouged out, bones broken, or insides torn out before they died. On 15 October a Russian imperial decree declared that it had annexed the Districts of Łomża and Augustów and that they would henceforth be incorporated provinces of the Russian Empire."Poland". The Preston Chronicle and Lancashire Advertiser. October 17, 1863. p. 2. From November 1863, the Russians carried out mass arrests and confiscations of Polish property, and many insurgents escaped from the country.Lipiński, p. 34 Russians deported hundreds of Poles from the county to Katorga to Siberia, and Łomża was one of the sites of Russian executions of Polish insurgents.Katalog miejsc pamięci powstania styczniowego w województwie podlaskim, p. 15 At the place of the executions, Poles put up crosses several times, and the Russians removed them.Katalog miejsc pamięci powstania styczniowego w województwie podlaskim, p. 54
During World War I, the Russian administration was evacuated in June 1915, and the city was occupied by Germany from August 1915 until 1918. Łomża had a local branch of the secret Polish Military Organization, which was also joined by local scouts who carried out intelligence and sabotage operations against the German occupiers. In 1916 the Poles finally erected a still preserved monument at the site of the Russian executions of Polish insurgents. In 1916–1917, the Polish Legions were stationed in the city. In 1917–1918, Łomża was the location of a German internment camp for soldiers of the Polish Legions. The Polish resistance movement organized food aid and assisted in the escape of interned Polish legionnaires from the camp. In 1917, the commander of the local unit of the Polish Military Organization, was arrested. In November 1918, Poland regained independence, and the occupying German forces opened fire on Poles who tried to liberate the city, but it was still reintegrated with the reborn Polish state.
During the Polish-Soviet War of 1919–1921, the city was attacked by the Russians on 29 July 1920. On 4 August the Russian military took Łomża."Lomza Captured by Bolsheviki Forces". Associated Press. The Boston Globe. August 5, 1920. p. 10. Polish forces defended the city until 15 August, when Polish Fourth Army of General Leonard Skierski attacked the 15th Army, led by Soviet General August Kork. The Polish army successfully took back control of Łomża from Russian forces. The Russian army retreated eastward under pressure from the Polish forces.
World War II
In September 1939, during the joint Soviet and German invasion of Poland, Łomża was largely destroyed by the Wehrmacht during the Battle of Łomża, and then was briefly occupied by Germany. The Einsatzgruppe V entered Łomża in mid-September to commit various crimes against Poles. Germans carried out searches of Polish offices, organizations, and Catholic institutions, including the bishop's seat and the Capuchin monastery, and banned preaching and the organization of meetings.Wardzyńska, p. 112
On 26 September 1939 a Soviet aircraft dropped anti-Polish propaganda leaflets, which stated that "Poles are not capable of self-governing their country," so "the Soviets come to take care of them out of mercy." Soon afterwards the city was turned over by the Germans to the Red Army,Shapiro, Chaim. "Go, My Son: A Young Jewish Refugee's Story of Survival". New York: Feldheim, 1989. which entered on 29 September and was incorporated into the Byelorussian SSR. The Soviets established a local station of the NKVD,Boćkowski, p. 91 and the Polish population was subjected to various repressions. In January 1940, the Soviets changed several street names, even calling one 17 September Street, after the day of the Soviet invasion of Poland.Agresja sowiecka na Polskę i okupacja wschodnich terenów Rzeczypospolitej 1939–1941, p. 105 At least 32 Poles from Łomża were murdered by the Russians in the Katyn massacre in 1940. The Soviets carried out arrests of the Capuchin monks and expelled Benedictine nuns in mid-1940.Agresja sowiecka na Polskę i okupacja wschodnich terenów Rzeczypospolitej 1939–1941, p. 174-175 According to Soviet data from September 1940, over 330 Polish families were deported from the district to the USSR.Boćkowski, p. 146 The Soviets held 2,128 people in the local prison as of 21 June 1941, the day before Germany invaded the Soviet Union,Boćkowski, p. 207 and on 20–21 June they carried out mass deportations of Poles to Russia.Agresja sowiecka na Polskę i okupacja wschodnich terenów Rzeczypospolitej 1939–1941, p. 201 Łomża remained under Soviet control until Operation Barbarossa.
In June 1941, at the onset of the Russian campaign Łomża was captured by the Wehrmacht and used as a communications hub by the German forces."The Russo-German War Today". The Baltimore Sun. June 25, 1941. p. 3. Hundreds of Poles, including those initially held in the local prison and local Polish intelligentsia, were murdered in large massacres in nearby villages of Sławiec, Jeziorko and Pniewo in 1942–1943. The Jewish population of Łomża, which numbered 9,000 at the beginning of the war, was almost entirely wiped out, murdered at a nearby forest or sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp to be murdered there. Only a few dozen survived. Since 1943, the Sicherheitspolizei carried out deportations of Poles including teenage boys from the local prison to the Stutthof concentration camp.
The Polish underground resistance movement organized secret education, military training, medical courses, published Polish underground press, organized aid for Polish prisoners of war, and conducted guerrilla warfare. Even teenagers participated in the resistance. Several resistance members were arrested by the Soviets. In 1941 the local resistance was weakened when the Soviets arrested its commander.Boćkowski, p. 204
The Red Army fought back and successfully captured Łomża on 13 September 1944."Narew River Line in Poland Cracks: Reds Also Advance To Within 50 Miles Of Yugoslavia". Associated Press. The Baltimore Sun. September 6, 1944. p. 1. Afterwards the city was restored to Poland, although with a Soviet-installed communist regime, which remained in power until the Fall of Communism in the 1980s.
Recent period On 21 May 1945, the Polish anti-communist resistance broke into the communist prison in Łomża. In the following years, the resistance remained active in Łomża, including the local organizations Bracia Atomów, Polska Armia Powstańcza (Polish Insurgent Army) and Młodzi Patrioci Polscy (Young Polish Patriots), which engaged in educational and sabotage activities.
Between 1946 and 1975, the oldest part of the city was rebuilt. New housing estates came into existence along with several industrial plants, among them Łomża cotton and furniture factories and starch manufacturer PEPEES, as well as municipal thermal power station. The city transit system was also established during this time. By the beginning of the 1970s, the population had reached almost 30,000 inhabitants. It was the capital of the Łomża Voivodeship from 1975 to 1998.
Jewish community
References to Jewish residents in Łomża () date to 1494. The population numbers date back only to 1808, when 157 Jews were officially counted. They settled in the village of Rybaki along the Narew River, which would become the Łomża shtetl. Jeffrey Epstein's great-grandfather Morris Epstein was born here in 1862.
A magnificent stone synagogue was built there in 1881 on the initiative of Rabbi Eliezer-Simcha Rabinowicz. The Great Synagogue designed by Enrico Marconi became a centre of the Zionist movement. The Lomza Yeshiva attracted hundreds of Orthodox Jewish students, founded in 1883.
World War I was especially hard on the Jewish community of Łomża, which was a major battle area against German military forces."Million Men Battle: Over a Front of Eighty Miles Russians and Germans Meet". The Washington Post. March 12, 1915. p. 2."Russians Rolled Back: Defeated Again in East Prussia, Declare Berlin Reports". The Washington Post. April 1, 1915. p. 11."Berlin Reports Gains". The Baltimore Sun. May 5, 1915. p. 2."Great Battle Begun for Warsaw: Forts of City Now Under Fire: Teutons Attack Fortresses of Lomza, Ostrolenka and Ivangorod". The Washington Post. August 5, 1915. p. 1."Lomza Offensive Menaces: May Threaten Bialystok and Brest-Litovsk, Says Correspondent". The New York Times. August 7, 1915. p. 2. In 1915, the Jewish Aid Society estimated that 22,000 Jewish residents of Łomża were made homeless from the war."Jews' Sufferings Grow: Aid Society Estimates the Number of Homeless at 100,000". The New York Times. June 5, 1915. p. 18. In 1931, there were 8,912 Jews who lived in the city.