WEBLINKS
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FACTS
| Politics: Poland was the first of the eastern European countries to overturn Communist rule in 1989
Population: 39 million
Life expectancy: 68 years (men), 77 years (women)
Monetary unit: 1 zloty = 100 groszy
Main exports: Machinery and transport equipment, foodstuffs, chemicals
Average annual income: US $4,200
Prime minister: Leszek Miller became prime minister in a coalition government in October 2001
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 |  | Report by Christiaan van Lierop
The first large wave of Polish migration to Britain took place during World War Two. Hundreds of Poles signed up with the British based Free Polish Forces, to fight for the freedom of their beloved country.
After the war, many ex-servicemen and their families decided to make a new life for themselves in Britain. Coventry is one of the many towns in which they made their home.
Life was far from easy for those Poles who settled in Britain just after WW2. Denied access to proper council housing, hundreds of families were housed in military style barracks. To begin with, only the lowest paid jobs were open to Poles, as scores of qualified men learned that their degrees and qualifications were worth nothing in Britain.
| Μύ |  | The Warsaw skyline
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"No Irish, No Blacks, No Poles" read signs in boarding houses up and down the country. "Poles Go Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ" screamed the graffiti on the walls of local houses.
Yet the Poles had no home to return to. The country they had known and loved, had vanished, replaced by a Communist regime that was subservient to Moscow. Of those who did return, countless were tried as western spies, never to be seen again.
Although there was no hero's welcome for the Polish war veterans in Britain, they set about rebuilding their lives, undeterred, raising churches wherever they settled and playing an active role in the lives of their local communities.
The Polish community has since contributed greatly to many areas of both public and local life in Britain. Famous Poles in Britain include fashion designers Tomasz Starzewski and Arkadius.
Despite successive waves of migration to Britain from Poland, notably during martial law in Poland in the 1980s, the vast majority of Coventry's Polish community stems from those first Polish settlers who arrived after WW2.
ΜύOn 1 September 1939 Germany invaded Poland without declaring war. German troops crossed each of Poland's borders with the Reich and over 21 cities, including Warsaw, were bombed from the air.
| Μύ |  | One of the incinerators in Auschwitz, Poland
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Poland had prepared itself for an invasion as all able-bodied men had been called up for military service and all horses, cars, motorcycles and bicycles were requisitioned for the army. But the invasion was more thorough and more violent than anyone had expected.
In response, on 3 September the British prime minister, Mr Chamberlain, sent an ultimatum to Germany to withdraw from Polish territory immediately. No reply came and war was declared between Britain and Germany.
On September 17, the Soviet Union invaded Eastern Poland. Germany and the Soviet Union effectively divided Poland between them.
Many families were forced to leave and were transported to concentration camps specially built by the Germans in Poland. These included Auschwitz, Treblinka and Majdanek.
After almost six years of fierce fighting and political manoeuvres, in 1945 Soviet troops and the Allies liberated those imprisoned in Auschwitz and other Polish camps. Poland regained independence, in the form of a communist state that was closely allied to the Soviet Union.
The post-war communist regime was never accepted by the Polish government in exile based in London, and many Polish ex-servicemen in Britain severed all links with their homeland.
This, they argued, was not the Poland that they had fought for. Many of them never lived to see a free and democratic Poland.
The Polish government in exile continued to function as a separate entity until Poland's first democratic elections in 1989. The Polish Presidential Seals, which had been kept safe in London until freedom reigned again in Poland were then presented to a jubilant Lech Walesa, the first freely elected president of Poland after the war.
After a period of nearly 50 years, Britain's Polish exiles were finally reunited in freedom with their fellow countrymen in Poland.
ΜύCoventry's flying Poles
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Bramcote airbase, north of Coventry, was responsible for training all the bomber aircrew for the Polish forces in the RAF in 1940. Four Polish bomber squadrons were formed there before being moved to other bases after training.
In the battle of Britain 145 out of 2928 pilots were Polish, some flying as part of the Polish Air Force and some as individual Polish pilots flying with British squadrons. The Polish contingent was the second largest after the British to take part in the battle.
ΜύMany Polish servicemen and their families came to Coventry to be trained and to join the Polish Air Force. Along with them came Polish government representatives and Polish wartime refugees.
After the war many 'displaced' Polish people also chose to settle in Coventry and many other industrial British cities. It has been estimated that by October 1949 there was a Polish community in Britain of 162,200 people.
The 1991 Census recorded there were 3,404 residents of the West Midlands born in Poland. Many of those have British-born children who also uphold Polish traditions, continue to speak Polish and keep in contact with relatives in Poland, making the Polish community significantly larger than this figure suggests.
The Catholic Church continues to play an important role in the lives of the Polish community. Coventry also has a Saturday language school that ensures future generations of Polish children are able to read and write in the language of their forefathers.
ΜύThe Polish community in Coventry is celebrated every Sunday on Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ WM in their Poles Apart programme. You can hear Poles Apart on Sundays at 7-8pm on 94.8, 104 and 103.7 FM.
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