Published: 2020-08-211

The influence of two totalitarian regimens on the fate of the Archives of the Archdiocese of Warmia

Andrzej Kopiczko
Echa Przeszłości
Section: ARTICLES
https://doi.org/10.31648/ep.5760

Abstract

The Archives of the Archdiocese of Warmia in Olsztyn have a long and complicated history. The Bishop’s Archives were established in 1243, and the Archives of the Warmia Cathedral Chapter were founded in 1260. In 1933, both archives were merged and renamed as the Frombork Diocesan Archives. The archives’ safety was compromised during Teutonic-Polish Wars, and the entire collection was relocated to Gdansk, Olsztyn and other cities. The archives suffered further damage during the Polish-Swedish war and the Northern War. However, World War II dealt the greatest blow when the Ferber Palace in Frombork and the vast collection of historical documents dating back to the mid-19th century were burned by the Red Army. A considerable portion of the archives was transported by the Russians to Moscow, and it was returned only in the mid-1950s.

The German occupation and the communist regime were the particularly difficult periods in the history of the Archives. During World War II, the collection was treated instrumentally, and it was used by the German authorities to identify people of Aryan origin and to pursue the master race policy. Birth registers from the parishes of the Warmia Diocese were transferred the Diocesan Archives in Frombork, and they were transported to Western Germany in 1943. The collection remained in the care of Anneliese Birch-Hirschfeld, the first woman in the history of the institution. After the war, the diocese moved its seat from Frombork to Olsztyn. The search for a suitable building to house the archives presented a challenge. Transport was also difficult because the Frombork Hill was occupied by Soviet troops until mid 1946. By 1947, nearly the entire collection had been successfully relocated to Olsztyn and stored in the building on Mariańska Street which housed the Bishop’s Curia, the Lower Seminary and the Higher Seminary (after 1949). The building was requisitioned by the local authorities in 1961, and the seminary was moved to a much smaller facility on Bema Square. Once again, the archives had to be distributed across three
locations. After years of petitioning, the Diocese of Warmia finally obtained permission to erect the new Library and Archives on Kopernika Street in the early 1970s. The Archives of the Diocese of Warmia (renamed to the Archdiocese of Warmia in 1992) have been stored under proper conditions and accessible to the public since 1977.`

Keywords:

Archives of the Archdiocese of Warmia in Olsztyn, Diocese of Warmia,, Diocese of Warmia, Warmia Cathedral Chapter, Frombork, Olsztyn

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Kopiczko, A. (2020). The influence of two totalitarian regimens on the fate of the Archives of the Archdiocese of Warmia. Echa Przeszłości, (XX/2). https://doi.org/10.31648/ep.5760

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