OFFIZIERLAGER (OFLAG) II D
The Wehrmacht established Oflag II D (map 4b) on June 1, 1940, in Defense District (Wehrkreis) II from Stalag II E Gross Born.1 The camp deployed to near Gross Born (today Borne Sulinowo, West Pomeranian Voivodeship, Poland). The camp was subordinate to the Commander of Prisoners of War in Operations Area II (Kommandeur der Kriegsgefangenen im Operationsgebiet II).
Until May 1942, the camp held French officers and orderlies as prisoners. In February 1941, there were 3,166 officers and 565 orderlies in the camp. In April 1942, there were 2,408 officers and 418 orderlies. From May 1942 onward, the camp held only Polish officers and orderlies. The following table shows the number of Polish prisoners in the camp from 1942 to 1945:2
| Date | Officers | Orderlies | Total |
| June 1, 1942 | 2544 | 274 | 2818 |
| July 1, 1944 | 4670 | 376 | 5046 |
| January 1, 1945 | 5014 | 377 | 5391 |
The conditions in Oflag II D were generally satisfactory and in keeping with the 1929 Geneva Convention on the Treatment of Prisoners of War (POWs). The POWs lived in wooden barracks. Officers in the camp were divided into [End Page 232] battalions and companies. The Polish officers selected an elder (starosta), or leader, from their midst who represented the prisoners’ interests with the German camp administration. Colonels Witold Morawski (until 1944) and Izydor Izdebski (from 1944 to 1945) took on the role of the starosta.
The Polish prisoners organized cultural and educational activities in the camp. A large stone building served as the prison chapel, theater, concert hall, and library, which was supplied with books by the YMCA and Red Cross. Religious services were conducted by Catholic priests and an Evangelical minister every Sunday. Other religious activities, including funerals, were also conducted by these clergymen.3 The prisoners organized plays, symphonies, choir performances and other such productions. In addition, courses and lectures were offered on a variety of topics, including economics, geography, and mathematics.4 A resistance movement organized escapes.
As the Red Army approached at the end of January 1945, the camp was evacuated to the west. This did not mark the end of the camp administration, which moved with the prisoners and remained in operation until the beginning of March.
SOURCES
Primary source material about the Oflag II D is located in BA-MA (RW 6: 450–453) and WASt Berlin (Stammtafel Oflag II D).
Information about Oflag II D may be found in the following publications: Gracjan Bojar-Fijałkowski, “Obozy jenieckie na Ziemi Koszalinskiej (1939–1945),” Zbrodnie hitlerowskie na Ziemi Koszalińskiej w latach 1933–1945, ed. Andrzeja Czechowicza (Koszalin: Okre gowa Komisja badania zbrodni hitlerowskich, 1968); Szymon Datner, Zbrodnie Wehrmachtu na jencach wojennych w II wojnie światowej (Warsaw: MON, 1964), pp. 370–371; Rajmond Galon, “O życiu kulturalno-oświatowym w niektórych oficerskich obozach jenieckich w Niemczech w latach 1939–1945,” Koszalińskie zeszyty muzealne 9 (1979): 113–122; Tadeusz Gasztold, “Obozy jenieckie na Pomorzu Zachodnim w łatach 1939–1945,” Zapiski Koszalińskie 2, no. 26 (1966); Tadeusz Gasztold, Życie kulturalne w obozach polskich jeńców wojennych na Pomorzu Zachodnim w latach 1939–1945 (Koszalin: Koszaliński Ośrodek Naukowo-Badawczy, 1977); Norbert Honka, Życie religijne żołnierzy polskich w niewoli niemieckiej i radzieckiej podczas II Wojny Światowej (Opole: Centralne Muzeum Jeńców Wojennych w Łambinowicach-Opolu, 1998); Jozef Machowski, Poczta Polska Obozu IID Gross Born (Kraków: PZF, 1963); G. Mattiello and W. Vogt, Deutsche Kriegsgefangenenund Internierten-Einrichtungen 1939–1945. Handbuch und Katalog: Lagergeschichte und Lagerzensurstempel, vol. 2 (Koblenz, self-published, 1987); Czesław Pilichowski, Obozy hitlerowskie na ziemiach polskich 1939–1945. Informator encyklopedyczny (Warsaw: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, 1979), p. 114; Juliusz Pollack, Jeńcy polscy w hitlerowskiej niewoli (Warsaw: MON, 1986); Violetta Rezler-Wasielewska, Działalność naukowo-oświatowa polskich jeńców wojennych w niemieckich i radzieckich obozach podczas II wojny światowej (Opole: Centralne Muzeum Jeńców wojennych w Łambinowicach-Opolu, 2001); Marek Sadzewicz, Oflag II D Gross-Born (Warsaw: Książka i Wiedza, 1977); and Georg Tessin, Verbände und Truppen der deutschen Wehrmacht und Waffen-SS im Zweiten Weltkrieg 1939–1945, Vol. 2: Die Landstreitkräfte 1-5 (Osnabrück: Biblio, 1966), p. 127.
