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The Polish Corridor was the name given to a strip of land transferred from Germany to a reformed Poland through the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. The Corridor (in some places only 40 km wide), effectively separated East Prussia from the rest of Germany and administratively, it was a part of the Pomeranian Voivodship.
Background
Giving Poland access to the sea was one of the guarantees proposed by United States President Woodrow Wilson in his famous Fourteen Points of 1918. The thirteenth of Wilson's points was:
- An independent Polish state should be erected which should include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, which should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be guaranteed by international covenant.
The transfer of this territory was said to be justified on three grounds:
- Historical. The area had been part of the Kingdom of Poland from the tenth century to the fourteenth century (see Kingdom of Poland (1025–1138), Kingdom of Poland (1138–1320), Kingdom of Poland (1320–1385), and Kingdom of Poland (1385–1569)) and from 1453/66 to 1772, when it was annexed by Prussia during the first partition of Poland.
- Ethnographic. The majority population of the region was either Polish (in the area on the west bank of the Vistula, between Gdańsk (Danzig) and Bydgoszcz (Bromberg)), or Kashubian (the direct descendants of an early Slavic tribe of Pomeranians) in the coastal area north-west of Danzig. Germans constituted a minority in this particular area, making about 421,000 people out of 990,000 inhabitants (42.5%) of the region. However, the major towns of Bydgoszcz (Bromberg), Toruń (Thorn) and Grudziądz (Graudenz) had a German majority in 1910 (see for data per county).
- Economic and political. It was argued that if the newly independent Polish state did not have an outlet to the Baltic Sea, it would be economically and therefore politically dependent on Germany. Since Britain and France wanted a strong Polish state as a counter-weight to Germany, they accepted this argument.
Consequences and the Post-War Era
Also in the post-World War I period, the important seaport of Danzig (Gdańsk), which had a largely German population, was made a seperate state called "Free City of Danzig" and put under the protection of the League of Nations without referendum. Taking advantage of the Corridor and reducing their dependence on Danzig, the Poles built a new seaport at Gdynia.
Following the appropriation of the Polish Corridor, the province of East Prussia was cut off from the rest of Germany, resulting in severe economic difficulties. In 1922 the "Seedienst Ostpreußen" (literally: Sea Service East Prussia) was established by the German Ministry for Transport to have a connection to East Prussia that was not dependant on the transit through Polish territory.
The creation of the Corridor aroused great resentment in Germany, and all post-war German governments refused to recognize the eastern borders agreed on at Versailles. The German statesman Gustav Stresemann, for instance, known for his policy of conciliation with the western allies, several times declared that Germany's eastern borders would have to be revised, and refused to follow Germany's acknowledgement of its western borders in the Treaty of Locarno of 1925 with a similar declaration with respect to its eastern borders.
Nazi Era
In 1933 the Nazi Party led by Adolf Hitler took power in Germany. Hitler at first ostentatiously pursued a policy of rapprochement with Poland, culminating in the Polish-German Non-Aggression Pact of 1934. In March 1938, Germany annexed Austria and in October, the Sudetenland. During the same month, Germany demanded that Poland join the Anti-Comintern Pact and allow for the incorporation of the Free City of Danzig into the Reich. In addition, Germany requested the construction of an extra-territorial highway and railway through the Polish Corridor to Danzig and East Prussia. Poland refused to join the Pact, but agreed to negotiations over German railway traffic and on building a German highway through the Polish Corridor.
However, this conflicted with Hitler's plans to gain support against, or isolate, the Soviet Union. Unsatisfied, Hitler offered Poland additional non-German territory as an enticement, but Polish leaders continued to fear for the loss of their independence and a shared fate with Czechoslovakia, although Poland had also taken part in its partitioning.. Backed by guarantees of support from both the Britain and France, Poland refused to negotiate the status of the Free State of Danzig. Throughout 1939, the Germans continued their attempts to establish boundaries that would be recognized by both countries. The resolution held that Danzig was to be incorporated into the Reich while the Polish section of the population was to be "evacuated" and resettled elsewhere. Poland was to retain a permanent right to use the seaport and a route connecting East Prussia and Danzig to the rest of Germany was to be constructed. However, the Poles distrusted Hitler and saw the plan as a threat to Polish sovereignty, practically subordinating Poland to the Axis and the Anti-Comintern Bloc and putting the country in a state of near-servitude.. .
A final attempt for peace was made by Nazis in late August, although Hitler's best offer had come and orders were already been given to attack Poland on September 1. At midnight on August 29, Ribbentrop handed British Ambassador Sir Neville Henderson a list of terms for Poland which would allegedly ensure peace. Danzig was to return to Germany and there was to be a plebiscite in the Polish Corridor; all Poles who were born or settled there since 1919 would have no vote, while all Germans born but not living there would. An exchange of minority populations between the two countries was proposed. If Poland accepted these terms, Germany would agree to the British offer of an international guarantee, but this would include the Soviet Union. A Polish plenipotentiary, with full powers, was to arrive in Berlin and accept these terms by noon the next day. The British Cabinet viewed the terms as "reasonable," except the demand for a Polish Plenipotentiary, which was seen as similiar to Czech President Hacha accepting Hitler’s terms in mid-March 1939. When Ambassador Lipski went to see Ribbentrop on August 30, he was presented with Hitler’s demands and asked if he had full powers to sign. When Lipski said no, Ribbentrop ended the meeting and it was broadcasted that Poland had rejected Germany's offer..
On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, and German forces captured the corridor during the Battle of Bory Tucholskie by 5 September. After Poland's defeat, by mid-October, Danzig and the Polish Corridor were re-annexed by Germany.
Post-War Era
At the Potsdam Conference, 1945, following the German defeat in World War II, Poland's borders were reorganized at the insistence of the Soviet Union, which was in occupation of the whole area. Territories east of the Oder-Neisse Line, including the Corridor and Danzig, were put under Polish control. East Germany recognised this border in 1953, West Germany did so in 1970 and the re-unified Germany did so in 1990.