The region formed part of Poland since the establishment of the country in the 10th century. The town was founded on the site of a previous Slavic settlement, dating back to the 10th century.[1] Its name was Germanised to Lewin and then Lewinburg by the Teutonic Knights,[2][3] after annexation from Poland in 1310.[1] In 1341 Dietrich von Altenburg, Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights, granted 100 Hufen (similar to hides) to Rutcher von Emmerich for the foundation of a town named Lewinburg (Lauenburg) with Kulm rights,[4] presumably to secure the territory around Stolp (Słupsk).[5] East of the original city the Teutonic Order completed the Ordensburg castle in 1363. The castle was partly razed after the 1410 Battle of Grunwald and remained under Polish control until 1411. In 1440 the town joined the Prussian Confederation, which opposed the Teutonic Knights, and at the request of which King Casimir IV Jagiellon signed the act of re-incorporation of the town and region to the Kingdom of Poland in 1454. The population of Lauenburg was composed in large part of Kashubians, later Slovincians.
In 1454 after the outbreak of the Thirteen Years' War, troops from Danzig (Gdańsk) occupied Lauenburg and Bütow (Bytów); the following year they were turned over to Eric II, Duke of Pomerania, to form an alliance.[4] Because Lauenburg remained loyal to the Prussian Confederation and not the Teutonic Order, King Casimir IV Jagiellon of Poland granted the town three nearby villages.[4] Troops from the Polish-allied city of Gdańsk (Danzig) reoccupied Lauenburg in 1459 when the mayor, Lorenz Senftopf, entered into negotiations with the Teutonic Knights. Eric replaced the Danzigers with Teutonic Knights the following year, however, when he switched sides during the war. After the Teutonic Knights were ultimately defeated in the Thirteen Years' War, Lębork passed to Poland, according to the 1466 Second Peace of Thorn,[6] and was granted by Casimir IV Jagiellon to Eric and his Pomeranian successors as part of the Lauenburg and Bütow Land, a Polish fief.
In 1701, Lauenburg/Lębork became a Prussian-administered territory under the sovereignty of the Polish Crown. The 1773 Treaty of Warsaw granted full sovereignty over the territory to Prussia after the First Partition of Poland. The Lauenburg and Bütow Land, transformed into a district (Lauenburg-Bütowscher Kreis), was first included in the newly established province of West Prussia, but was transferred to the province of Pomerania in 1777.
When the district was divided in 1846, Lauenburg became the capital of a new district (Landkreis Lauenburg i. Pom.). Lauenburg began to develop as an industrial center after its 1852 connection to the Prussian Eastern Railway to Danzig and Stettin (Szczecin).[4] In 1866, the Masonic Lodge was formed, whose membership was in the main made up of the elite entrepreneurial class. The building survives to this day. The town became part of the German Empire in 1871 during the unification of Germany. Chancellor Otto Fürst von Bismarck (1815–1898) was made an honorary citizen in 1874. (He was also created Duke of Lauenburg in 1890 after his resignation as Chancellor of the German Empire, but this title refers to the city of Lauenburg/Elbe in present-day Germany, and should not be confused with Lębork/Lauenburg in Pomerania.) New German settlers came to the town, but Poles also still settled there.[9] Despite Germanisation policies, the Polish-Kashubian movement developed.[10] Helpful in preserving Polish culture and identity was the local Catholic church, in which Polish language lessons were still organized.[11]
Poland regained independence after World War I in 1918, and local Poles organized a pro-Polish rally, which was shut down by the local German police. Polish activists were sentenced to several months in prison, and then to exile.[12] Despite Polish attempts at regaining control of the region, the Treaty of Versailles did not restore the pre-partition borders and the town remained within interwar Germany. In the subsequent years many German migrants resettled in and around Lauenburg,[13] while many Poles, including Kashubians, left for the nearby Polish Pomeranian Voivodeship.[14] The town's economy has declined and the nationalists, communists and Nazis gained popularity among the German population.[15] The Poles were active in the Union of Poles in Germany.[1] After the Nazis took power, Poles, as well as Jews, were persecuted.[16] Under the leadership of Willy Fruggel a Hochschule for teacher education was established in the city in 1933.[13] The football club SV Sturm Lauenburg played within Gauliga Pommern.
After the outbreak of World War II, the persecution of indigenous Poles, including Kashubians, intensified, and the patients of the local psychiatric hospital were murdered in Piaśnica, however, the Polish resistance movement remained present in the district.[17] In 1942, the Germans founded a subcamp of the Stutthof concentration camp and sent prisoners from the Buchenwald concentration camp there.[18] Further prisoners were sent from the main Stutthof camp, and the subcamp was dissolved only in February 1945, during the German-organized evacuation of the Stutthof main camp.[18] The Germans also operated a forced labour subcamp of the Stalag II-Bprisoner-of-war camp for Allied POWs in the town.[19] The town was occupied without resistance by the SovietRed Army on 10 March 1945. Most of the Old Town burned in the subsequent Soviet rampage, although the Gothic Church of St. James and the Teutonic castle survived.[13] During this time about 600 people committed suicide.[20]
As Lębork, the town became again part of Poland in accordance with the post-war Potsdam Agreement. Germans remaining in the town were either immediately expelled in accordance with the Potsdam Agreement or were allowed to voluntarily leave in the 1950s. The remaining Polish inhabitants were joined by other Poles, incl. those displaced from Poland's eastern lands annexed after the war by the Soviet Union. The town was administratively part of the Gdańsk Voivodeship in 1945–1975, and then the Słupsk Voivodeship in 1975–1998.
Geography
Climate
The climate in this area has mild differences between highs and lows, and there is adequate rainfall year-round. The Köppen Climate Classification subtype for this climate is "Cfb". (Marine West Coast Climate/Oceanic climate).[21]
Climate data for Lębork (1991–2020 normals, extremes 1951–present)
In terms of confession, the population was predominantly Catholic since the Christianization of Poland, then it was mostly composed of Protestants after the Reformation, and since the end of World War II it is once again predominantly Catholic.
^ abcSłownik geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego i innych krajów słowiańskich, Tom V (in Polish). Warszawa. 1884. p. 199.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
^ ab"1637-1658". Historia Bytowa w pigułce (in Polish). Retrieved 11 February 2020.
^ abGliński, Mirosław. "Podobozy i większe komanda zewnętrzne obozu Stutthof (1939–1945)". Stutthof. Zeszyty Muzeum (in Polish). 3: 169. ISSN0137-5377.
^"Les Kommandos". Stalag IIB Hammerstein, Czarne en Pologne (in French). Retrieved 29 May 2022.
^"Miesięczna suma opadu". Normy klimatyczne 1991-2020 (in Polish). Institute of Meteorology and Water Management. Archived from the original on 9 January 2022. Retrieved 12 February 2022.
^"Liczba dni z opadem >= 0,1 mm". Normy klimatyczne 1991-2020 (in Polish). Institute of Meteorology and Water Management. Archived from the original on 15 January 2022. Retrieved 12 February 2022.
^"Średnia grubość pokrywy śnieżnej". Normy klimatyczne 1991-2020 (in Polish). Institute of Meteorology and Water Management. Archived from the original on 15 January 2022. Retrieved 12 February 2022.
^"Liczba dni z pokrywą śnieżna > 0 cm". Normy klimatyczne 1991-2020 (in Polish). Institute of Meteorology and Water Management. Archived from the original on 21 January 2022. Retrieved 12 February 2022.
^"Średnia suma usłonecznienia (h)". Normy klimatyczne 1991-2020 (in Polish). Institute of Meteorology and Water Management. Archived from the original on 15 January 2022. Retrieved 12 February 2022.
Schmidt, Roderich (1996). Handbuch der historischen Stätten Deutschlands, Band 12, Mecklenburg/Pommern. Stuttgart: Alfred Kröner Verlag. p. 388. ISBN3-520-31501-7. (in German)
Gustav Kratz: Die Städte der Provinz Pommern – Abriss ihrer Geschichte, zumeist nach Urkunden (The towns of the Province of Pomerania – Sketch of their history, mostly according to historical records). Berlin 1865 (reprinted in 2010 by Kessinger Publishing, ISBN1-161-12969-3), pp. 247–251 (in German, online)
Lindemajer, Józef; Machura, Teresa (1982). Dzieje Lęborka (in Polish). Poznań: Wydawnictwo Poznańskie.