Early history There are indications that the origin of the town may have taken place in the 12th century. The first mention of it was found in a document concerning an endowment of
Łęczyca prepositure published due to a consecration of the collegiate church in
Łęczyca in the year 1161. According to the local folklore, both the town and the parish came into being in 1250, although official documentation to that effect is lacking. Most probably, the town began to be settled some time between the 12th and the 14th centuries; its name appeared for the first time in a document from the year 1301. The document had been published for his son Ziemysław by Leszek, Przemysł, and Kazimierz – duke of
Kuyavia in the presence of three
estate dignitaries as well as other people gathered during a convention in
Włocławek. References to Kutno concern the appearance of rector Michał from the church in Kutno on the list of witnesses. In 1386,
Siemowit IV, Duke of Masovia had given to Andrzej de Kutno the privilege of freeing Kutno and
Sieciechów villages from all charges and burdens excluding two coins (
grosz) out of every crop fee. The role of the provincial courts was transferred to the Duke. In 1386, the village of Kutno was given trade and town rights, and 46 years later, in 1432 a
municipal town charter. The first records that define Kutno as a town appeared in 1444. Kutno was historically famous for its rose fair which after 1989 changed its name to The Festival of Roses/The Rose Festival.
Early modern period residence of King
Augustus III of Poland, place of his stay during travels between Warsaw and Dresden, now a museum Kutno was a
private town, administratively located in the Gostynin County in the
Rawa Voivodeship in the
Greater Poland Province of the Kingdom of Poland. 1 July 1504:
Mikołaj of Kutno gained the right to hold the St. Wawrzyniec fair, improving the development of the town's trade. In 1701, the
Kucieński family gave up Kutno to Anna Zamojska. The
Zamoyski family fought amongst themselves for the property for a long time. The town fell into debt but the situation had normalized when
Andrzej Hieronim Zamoyski became the owner of Kutno. During that time Kutno was a town of prosperity and development. A route connecting
Warsaw with
Poznań and
Dresden ran through the town in the 18th century and King
Augustus III of Poland often traveled that route. The town's prestige increased after Augustus III ordered the construction of the Postal Palace and consequently, the Saxon Palace was built between 1750 and 1753, after a royal track leading from
Dresden to
Warsaw had been built. The palace was decorated with rich interiors according to John M Walter's plans. In 1753, Kutno was completely burned, resulting in the loss of the town records along with the settlement grant. After the fire, the King's Lord Councillor
Andrzej Zamoyski left Kutno in order to obtain another settlement grant, however, the town suffered another fire due to one of the many army march-passes in 1774 and the easygoing attitude of soldiers. In 1775, Andrzej Zamoyski sold Kutno to
Stanisław Kostka Gadomski – governor of
Łęczyca province. Under his reign, Kutno became one of the biggest settlements in central
Poland. The
Second Partition of Poland occurred in 1793. Kutno had been completely under
Prussian control and became part of the newly created province of South Prussia. The whole province of Kutno became part of the
Łęczyca department, then after the
Third Partition, it became part of the
Warsaw department.
Late modern period On 4 January 1807,
Napoleon Bonaparte passed through Kutno. In 1807, under the
Treaties of Tilsit, Kutno became part of the
Duchy of Warsaw. An 1808 fire, most likely set by Napoleon's army, destroyed 180 houses. In 1809 Kutno was visited by
Jan Henryk Dąbrowski. After 1815, the area was incorporated into the
Congress Kingdom of Poland. In 1826, the first town map was published due to the planned rebuilding of the town. In 1826,
Fryderyk Chopin travelled through the town. In 1840, a chapel was built which later became the Museum of the
Battle of the Bzura river. Built in the
Neo-Renaissance style and rotunda shape and crowned with a dome, it is part of the
Wiosny Ludów park. It formerly served as a mausoleum for the Rzątkowski and Mniewski families. Another fire destroyed nearly all of the houses on Królewska St. Only two buildings remained – nowadays Crocantino and MDM. In 1844, the first hospital in Kutno was opened, sponsored by Kutno's former owner Feliks Mniewski. A
City Hall was built in 1845 in
classicistic style. The building, located in the
Marshal Piłsudski square, currently serves as the Regional
Museum, in which one can see
mementos and records from the history of Kutno. In 1862, the
Warsaw –
Bydgoszcz railway line opened, leading Kutno to become an important railway junction and a trade and industry center. Directly before and during the period of the
January Uprising, Kutno was the seat of the head of the
Gostynin province. During the
January Uprising, clashes between Polish insurgents and Russian troops took place in Kutno on 1–2 July and 8 August 1863. In 1867, Kutno district was formed. This state endured until World War I outbreak. In 1886, on the place of the former
Gothic church, the St. Lawrence Church (designed in a
neo-Gothic style by Konstantyn Wojciechowski) was built. On 5 January 1904, the Polish writer
Henryk Sienkiewicz, a
Nobel Prize laureate, stayed in the Town Theatre, which was the seat of the Fire Brigade at that time. Income from his lecture was given to the poor children of Kutno. After his speech, a ball was held, to which only men were allowed, while women could watch it only from open windows. The famous Polish-Jewish writer
Szalom Asz was born in Kutno in 1880. In his collection of short stories "Miasteczko" ("The Town"), he described the situation of
Jewish people from this town – Kutno. Every two years, the town holds the Szalom Asz Festival, which includes a literary contest about his works. In the 19th c. Kutno was a center of a sizeable Jewish community. In 1900, 10,356 Jews lived there. From 15 to 16 October 1914, the Battle of Kutno took place between the
Russian and the
German. The Russians lost the battle, and the loss of Kutno provided the Germans with a direct access to
Warsaw. In 1915, a local parish priest Franciszek Pruski was executed by a firing squad. A plaque commemoratinf this event has been placed in the St. John the Baptist church. Many Kutno inhabitants took part in the Polish-
Bolshevik War. They also fought in the
Siberian Division. After the war, hundreds of 15-year-old boys enlisted in the Army Mining Corps, today known as the miner–soldiers. From April 1919 to January 1921, a future French president
Charles de Gaulle stayed in Kutno, as an instructor with the French military mission under general
Louis Faury. On 5 March 1938, Kutno received its
blazon, which depicts two rampant wild boars on the yellow background, leaning against a green bulrush.
World War II The
Battle of the Bzura river took place from 9 to 12 September 1939 during the German
invasion of Poland, which started
World War II. On 9 September the
Poznań Army (
Armia Poznań) operational group, led by General
Edmund Knoll-Kownacki, attacked the
German 8th Army led by General
Johannes Blaskowitz. On 11 September Poland's
Pomorze Army reinforced the Polish troops in battle. At first, the Polish assault was successful but the
Germans reinforced their troops on 12 September and started to counterattack. General
Tadeusz Kutrzeba ordered
Knoll to retreat beyond the
Bzura river. Kutno remained outside the battle area. Despite the ultimate defeat of
Polish army, the
Battle of the Bzura river made the Germans change their strategy and regroup and also delayed
the capitulation of Warsaw. On 16 September 1939, the German
Wehrmacht moved into Kutno, bombarding trains, the railway station, and houses throughout the district. At the junction of what is now
Kochanowski Street and Maja Street, a German
saboteur laid down a target for the bombers bombing the railway station. The area was annexed directly to Germany, and administratively became part of the Third Reich's
Reichsgau Wartheland, within the district/county (
kreis) of Kutno. In December 1939
expulsions began in accordance with
Nazi Germany's racial and ethnic policies, which aimed to make the town population purely
German. People were forced to leave their houses early in the morning with only an hour's notice and could take only of baggage and a small amount of money. Expulsion was very often carried out with violence. People were transported by trucks or wagons and then in sealed trains. The trip was up to eight days long, in terrible conditions.
Poles from Kutno were also among the victims of a massacre carried out by the German police in February 1940 near
Gostynin (see
Nazi crimes against the Polish nation). On 14 April 1940, during the
AB-Aktion, most of the Polish teachers from the Kutno district were arrested. Only a few survived having had left their houses earlier or having been prewarned. At least 173 Poles from Kutno and the county were murdered by the Soviets in the
Katyn massacre in April–May 1940 or died in Soviet camps. Subsequently, the
Germans created a
ghetto in Kutno on 15 June 1940. The entire area of a former sugar factory ("Hortensja" or "Konstancja" according to various sources) was surrounded by barbed wire. On the first day, the Poles were forbidden to leave their houses, while the Jews were forced to take all their belongings and proceed to the factory. The German soldiers and
SS members beat the Jews standing in the street. Eight thousand people were transferred to the area of the factory, within five buildings. On the first day, crowded and without any first-aid facilities, a few people died. The only food they had was a small amount of potatoes and bread. Prices of extra food were very high. For instance, one kilogram of potatoes cost 40 Pfennig in the ghetto, while it was 5 Pfennig in the rest of the town. However, a true nightmare started in winter, when there was not enough firewood, so that the Jews had to burn furniture or
scaffolding. In the following year, 1941, due to overcrowding of resettled people and transport difficulties, a
concentration camp was established at 7 Przemysłowa St. Due to terrible conditions in the camp, about 10 persons died of
dysentery every day. On 9 June 1941, at present-day Wolności Square, three Poles, Kalikst Perkowski, Wilhelm Czernecki and Piotr Sanda, were publicly executed in punishment for smuggling food to
Warsaw. Their deaths were intended to be a lesson and the presence of locals at the execution was compulsory; even the families of the executed were there. On 19 March 1942, the
ghetto was closed. All Jews, in alphabetical order, were deported to
Koło and then to the
Chełmno extermination camp. The 6,000 Jewish inhabitants of Kutno were killed there, while elder people who had been ghetto administrators were killed in Kutno itself. Additionally, a
forced labor camp operated in the area from January 1942 until January 1945. In 1943, 31 members of the
Polish resistance were sentenced by the Germans in
Dresden, 24 of them to death and executed there. On 19 January 1945, the
Red Army arrived in Kutno, ending the
German occupation, and the town was restored to Poland, although with a Soviet-installed communist regime, which remained in power until the
Fall of Communism in the end of the 1980s.
1945–1989 Cultural institutions resumed activity during first years after the war. Firstly, posts that had existed before 1939 were reopened. In June 1945 the Kutno District Public Library was opened. Thanks to donations by the public and the regaining of books that had been kept during the war, the library's collection grew rapidly. The public library was and still is fulfilling its important role in broadening culture. The
Polish anti-communist resistance was active in Kutno, including the nationwide
Home Army and the local
Mściwy Jastrząb (Vengeful Hawk) youth organization. Because of developed
railway and road trails, Kutno has been attractive for investors. Among the many branches of industry in Kutno, the most important was the electronics industry. In 1957
Radio Components Company Miflex opened, and would eventually employ over three thousand people. The Company is one of the important distributors of
capacitors, anti-
interference filters. At the
Marshal Piłsudski square Polish –
Soviet brotherhood was constructed, depicting two persons:
Red Army soldier and
People's Army of Poland soldier shaking hands with each other. After the monument had been constructed incidents such as vandalism and defacing it with paint by local high school students, members of the
Mściwy Jastrząb organization, occurred. In 1968 Kazimierz Jóźwiak, who was a choreographer and manager as well as director of the Kutno House of Culture founded the "Song and Dance of Kutno`s Land Band" ("Zespół Pieśni i Tańca Ziemi Kutnowskiej"). In 1971, the former
Town Hall at the
Marshal Piłsudski square Kutno Regional Museum was reopened. In 1975, the city was adjoined to the
Płock Voivodeship and would remain so for the next 23 years. Annually, since September 1975, the
Kutno Rose Festival takes place at the Kutno House of Culture, which has long been a center of cultural events in Kutno.
After 1989 In 1990 formula of the fair has been changed as well as its name: from The "Rose Fair" to "
The Rose Festival" In 1996 International Little League Baseball Tournament took place in Kutno. Since that time Kutno is the world-famous seat of the European Little League Baseball Center. On 18 August 1998 Higher School of Economics has been opened in Kutno in 7th
Lelewel St. In 1999 because of an administrative
resolution, Kutno district once again become part of the
Łódź province after 24 years. In 2001, Królewska St. and Marshal
Józef Piłsudski Square were renovated. ==Economy==