Second Polish Republic Facts for Kids

Quick facts for kids

Republic of Poland

Rzeczpospolita Polska

1918–1939

Flag (after 1927)

Coat of arms

Anthem: "Mazurek Dąbrowskiego"
(English: "Poland Is Not Yet Lost")

Second Polish Republic in 1930

Capital

Warsaw
52°14′N 21°1′E / 52.233°N 21.017°E

Common languages

Official:
Polish

Unofficial:

Religion

1931 census
Majority:
64.8% Roman Catholicism

'Minorities:'

11.8% Eastern Orthodox
10.5% Greek Catholic
9.8% Jewish
2.6% Protestant
0.5% Other Christian
0.02% Other

Government

Unitary parliamentary constitutional republic (1918-1935)

Unitary presidential constitutional republic (1935-1939)

President

• 1918–1922

Józef Piłsudski^a

• 1922

Gabriel Narutowicz

• 1922–1926

Stanisław Wojciechowski

Prime Minister

• 1918–1919 (first)

Jędrzej Moraczewski

• 1936–1939 (last)

Felicjan S. Składkowski

Legislature

Sejm

• Upper chamber

Senate

• Lower chamber

Sejm

Historical era

Interwar period

• End of World War I

11 November 1918

• Treaty of Versailles

28 June 1919

• Peace of Riga

18 March 1921

• German invasion

1 September 1939

• Soviet invasion

17 September 1939

• Fall of Warsaw

28 September 1939

• Complete occupation

6 October 1939

Area

1921

387,000 km² (149,000 sq mi)

1931

388,634 km² (150,052 sq mi)

1938

389,720 km² (150,470 sq mi)

Population

• 1921

27,177,000

• 1931

32,107,000

• 1938

34,849,000

Currency

Marka (until 1924)
Złoty (after 1924)

ISO 3166 code

Preceded by

Succeeded by

	Kingdom of Poland
	German Empire
	Russian SFSR
	Republic of Zakopane
	Ukrainian PR
	West Ukrainian NR
	Komancza Republic
	Lemko-Rusyn Republic
	Galician SSR
	Galicia and Lodomeria
	Republic of Tarnobrzeg
	Central Lithuania
	Belarusian DR

Nazi Germany
Military Administration
Soviet Union
Lithuania
Slovak Republic
Polish Underground State
Polish govt-in-exile

As Chief of State (Naczelnik Państwa).

The Second Polish Republic, commonly known as interwar Poland, refers to the country of Poland in the period between the First and Second World Wars (1918–1939). Officially known as the Republic of Poland (Polish: Rzeczpospolita Polska), the state was re-established in 1918, in the aftermath of World War I. The Second Republic ceased to exist in 1939, when Poland was invaded by Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union and the Slovak Republic, marking the beginning of the European theatre of World War II.

In 1938, the Second Republic was the sixth largest country in Europe. According to the 1921 census, the number of inhabitants was 27.2 million. By 1939, just before the outbreak of World War II, this had grown to an estimated 35.1 million. Almost a third of population came from minority groups: 13.9% Ruthenians; 10% Ashkenazi Jews; 3.1% Belarusians; 2.3% Germans and 3.4% Czechs and Lithuanians. At the same time, a significant number of ethnic Poles lived outside the country's borders.

When, after several regional conflicts, the borders of the state were finalised in 1922, Poland's neighbours were Czechoslovakia, Germany, the Free City of Danzig, Lithuania, Latvia, Romania and the Soviet Union. It had access to the Baltic Sea via a short strip of coastline either side of the city of Gdynia, known as the Polish Corridor. Between March and August 1939, Poland also shared a border with the then-Hungarian governorate of Subcarpathia. The political conditions of the Second Republic were heavily influenced by the aftermath of World War I and conflicts with neighbouring states as well as the emergence of Nazism in Germany.

The Second Republic maintained moderate economic development. The cultural hubs of interwar Poland – Warsaw, Kraków, Poznań, Wilno and Lwów – became major European cities and the sites of internationally acclaimed universities and other institutions of higher education.

Images for kids

Polish defences at Miłosna, during the decisive Battle of Warsaw, August 1920
Polish pavilion at Expo 1937 in Paris
Polish pavilion at the 1939 World's Fair in New York City
Poland's MS Batory, and MS Piłsudski, at the sea port of Gdynia, 18 December 1937
The Eastern Trade Fair in Lwów, 1936
Gdynia, a modern Polish seaport established in 1926
Industry and communications in Poland before the start of the Second World War
The CWS T-1 Torpedo was the first serially-built car manufactured in Poland.
Ciągówka Ursus was the first Polish farm tractor, produced from 1922 to 1927 in the Ursus Factory.
Prime Minister Kazimierz Bartel, also a scholar and mathematician
The National Museum in Warsaw (Polish: Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie), popularly known as the MNW, opened in 1938.
Poland's population density in 1930
Contemporary map showing language frequency in 1931 across Poland; red: more than 50% native Polish speakers; green: more than 50% native language other than Polish, including Yiddish, Hebrew, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Russian and less frequent others
Officers from the Second Mountain Brigade of the Polish Legions in the First World War establishing the Polish-Czechoslovak border; they are pictured near the summit of Popadia in Gorgany during the formation of the Second Republic, 1915.
Physical map of the Second Polish Republic
Polish infantry marching, 1939
Polish soldiers with anti-aircraft artillery near Warsaw Central Station during the first days of September, 1939
Polish 7TP light tanks
ORP Orzeł was the lead ship of her class of submarines serving in the Polish Navy during the Second World War.

Second Polish Republic facts for kids

Images for kids

See also