Description
Volume V of the Great Atlas of the September Campaign of 1939 covers the activities of the Polish Army in the area of western Mazovia.
In Polish military historiography, these actions are called the Battle of the Bzura. From September 9, 1939, the tactical unions of the two Polish armies, “Poznań” and “Pomerania”, made successive attacks on the German 8th Army. The first phase of the battle was the attack of the Operational Group of General Knoll-Kownacki on the stretched German 30th Infantry Division. Despite the three-fold advantage in people and equipment, achieving complete surprise and the advantage of the maneuver, the Polish Army was not able to destroy the enemy in a 50-kilometer belt. The German 30th Infantry Division, despite significant losses and the necessity of a constant retreat, was soon strengthened by the next unions of the 8th Army and with them moved to counter strikes.
The next stage of the fighting on the Bzura river was the Polish attack in the direction of Łowicz-Skierniewice. Here the Polish Army suffered a defeat practically at the loss of the entire operation. From that moment on, it was the Germans who took the initiative in battle. They carried out successive strikes and locked Polish units in an ever tighter cauldron. The German 3rd Infantry Division, crossing the Vistula near Płock, went to the deep rear of General Kutrzeb’s troops. All that was left was to laboriously break through the lower Bzura river towards the salutary Kampinos Forest. But also there the Germans put in their forces and did everything to stop the Poles before they came to Warsaw. At the end of the fighting on the Bzura river, almost all quick unions of the Army Group South and the vast majority of infantry units were active on the German side. Eleven days of fighting on the Bzura River, although it did not bring the expected effect of defeating the German troops going to Warsaw, allowed other units, including the “Lublin” Army, to prepare their positions. The intended actions of the Germans across the middle Vistula were temporarily stopped. It should be said, however, that the defeat over Bzura was the beginning of the end of the fighting, and although numerous unions of the Polish army were still fighting, it was no longer possible to count on a reversal of the fate of the campaign.
Atlas size – A3 format (29.7 x 42 cm)
