Polish Tomb of Unknown Soldier Now 90

[henryk]

http://www.thenews.pl/1/9/Artykul/22727 ... s-90[quote]

Warsaw’s Tomb of the Unknown Soldier turns 90

Radio Poland 02.11.2015 16:07

A commemorative ceremony, attended by Polish Defence Minister Tomasz Siemoniak, was held at the Piłsudski Square in Warsaw on Monday afternoon.

Photo: PAP/Paweł Supernak

High-ranking officials, military personnel, veterans and Warsaw residents gathered at the site to pay tribute to the country’s fallen soldiers, whose memory was honored with a 21-cannon salute and a military parade.

“The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is a monument that is close to the heart of every Pole – one without which this country would be incomplete,” deputy prime minister Tomasz Siemoniak stated at the event.

The memorial site, which serves as a tribute to thousands of unsung heroes who sacrificed their lives for Poland’s independence, is one of the “most sacred places in Warsaw,” historian Andrzej Kunert, secretary of the Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites, told Polish Radio.

The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier was unveiled on 2 November 1925. On that day, the remains of a young, unnamed defender who perished in the battle at Lwów (now Ukrainian city of Lviv) in 1918, were laid to rest at the site. At the time of the battle the boundaries of the Polish state were being drawn after the country regained independence in the aftermath of WW I. The city of Lwów/Lviv was contested by Poles and Ukrainians. The monument to the Unknown Soldier symbolizes all the soldiers who struggled for Poland’s freedom. (aba)

Source: IAR, mon.gov.pl
[/quote]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomb_of_t ... quote]Tomb of the Unknown Soldier (Warsaw)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier (Polish: Grób Nieznanego Żołnierza) is a monument in Warsaw, Poland, dedicated to the unknown soldiers who have given their lives for Poland. It is one of many such national tombs of unknowns that were erected after World War I, and the most important such monument in Poland.[1]

The monument, located at Piłsudski Square, is the only surviving part of the Saxon Palace that occupied the spot until World War II. Since 2 November 1925 the tomb houses an unidentified body of a young soldier who fell during the Defence of Lwów. At a later date earth from numerous battlefields where Polish soldiers have fought was added to the urns housed in the surviving pillars of the Saxon Palace.

The Tomb is constantly lit by an eternal flame and assisted by a guard post by the Representative Battalion of the Polish Army. It is there that most official military commemorations take place in Poland and where foreign representatives lay wreaths when visiting Poland.

The changing of the guard takes place on the hour of every hour daily and this happens 365 days a year

History
In 1923, a group of unknown Varsovians placed, before Warsaw's Saxon Palace and the adjacent Saxon Garden, a stone tablet commemorating all the unknown Polish soldiers who had fallen in World War I and the subsequent Polish-Soviet War. This initiative was taken up by several Warsaw newspapers and by General Władysław Sikorski. On April 4, 1925, the Polish Ministry of War selected a battlefield from which the ashes of an unknown soldier would be brought to Warsaw. Of some 40 battles, that for Lwów was chosen. In October 1925, at Lwów's Cemetery of the Defenders of Lwów, three coffins were exhumed: those of an unknown sergeant, corporal and private. The coffin that was to be transported to Warsaw was chosen by Jadwiga Zarugiewiczowa, mother of a soldier who had fallen at Zadwórze and whose body had never been found.

On November 2, 1925, the coffin was brought to Warsaw's St. John's Cathedral, where a Mass was held. Afterward eight recipients of the order of Virtuti Militari bore the coffin to its final resting place beneath the colonnade joining the two wings of the Saxon Palace. The coffin was buried along with 14 urns containing soil from as many battlegrounds, a Virtuti Militari medal, and a memorial tablet. Since then, except under German occupation during World War II, an honor guard has continuously been held before the Tomb.

Architecture
The Tomb was designed by the famous Polish sculptor, Stanisław Kazimierz Ostrowski. It was located within the arcade that linked the two symmetric wings of the Saxon Palace, then the seat of the Polish Ministry of War. The central tablet was ringed by 5 eternal flames and 4 stone tablets bearing the names and dates of battles in which Polish soldiers had fought during World War I and the Polish–Soviet War (1919–21). Behind the Tomb were two steel gratings bearing emblems of Poland's two highest Polish military decorations — the Virtuti Militari and Cross of Valor.

During the 1939 invasion of Poland, the building was slightly damaged by German aerial bombing, but it was quickly rebuilt and seized by the German authorities. After the Warsaw Uprising, in December 1944, the palace was completely demolished by the Wehrmacht. Only part of the central colonnade, sheltering the Tomb, was preserved.

After the war, in late 1945, reconstruction began. Only a small part of the palace, containing the Tomb, was restored by Henryk Grunwald. On 8 May 1946 it was opened to the public. Soil from 24 additional battlegrounds was added to the urns, as well as more tablets with names of battles in which Poles had fought in World War II. However, the communist authorities erased all trace of the Polish–Soviet War of 1920, and only a few of the Polish Armed Forces' battles in the West were included. This was corrected in 1990, after Poland had regained its political autonomy.

There are plans to rebuild the Saxon Palace, but as of 2009 it is unknown when and whether these plans will be realized.[citation needed]

Battles currently featured on the stone tablets (Ed see source)[/quote]