Wave of Deportation from Koscian, Koscian, Poznan, Poland to Steszew, Poznan, Poznan, Poland on 09/02/1940

On October 6, 1939, Poland was defeated by the invading German Wehrmacht and subsequently divided between Germany and the Soviet Union in accordance with a secret protocol of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (August 23, 1939). The following day, Adolf Hitler issued a decree for "the consolidation of German nationhood" and appointed Reichsführer-SS (RFSS) Heinrich Himmler as Reichskommissar für die Festigung deutschen Volkstums (Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood – RKFDV) to oversee a massive program devised to restructure the ethnogeography of the occupied territory in accordance with Nazi racial ideology. The German army, while still advancing in Poland, established the Military District of Posen (Poznań), the bulk of which was formed from Greater Poland and the adjacent areas. On November 20, the newly formed province was allotted additional territory and renamed Reichsgau Wartheland after its main river, the Warthe....