Saint Anne church
Lechitic (early Polish) settlement developed from the 8th century, and a
stronghold was erected in the 8th or 9th century. In the 10th century it became part of the emerging Polish state. As a result of the fragmentation of
Piast-ruled
Poland, it formed part of the provincial
Duchy of Masovia, before it was reincorporated directly to the
Polish Crown. Kolno was first mentioned in 1222, and received
town rights from Duke
Janusz III of Masovia in 1425. Major economic expansion took place in the 16th century, with more trade and crafts. Kolno was a county seat and
royal town of the Kingdom of Poland, administratively located in the
Masovian Voivodeship in the
Greater Poland Province. Kolno was destroyed by fire during the
Kościuszko Uprising (1794). After the
Third Partition of Poland (1795) it became part of
Prussia, till 1807, and subsequently, part of the short-lived Polish
Duchy of Warsaw. From 1815 it belonged to
Congress Poland in the
Russian Partition of Poland. In the 19th century, many Jews settled in the town, following Russian discriminatory policies and the expulsion of Jews from Russia to the Russian Partition of Poland (see
Pale of Settlement). After the massacres of Polish protesters committed by the Russians in
Warsaw in 1861, Polish demonstrations and clashes with Russian soldiers took place in Kolno. Kolno was destroyed again in the
First World War, during battle between
Russian and
German empires. In 1918, it was eventually reintegrated with Poland, as the country regained independence after the First World War. On 25–26 August 1920, the Battle of Kolno was fought, in which the Polish
14th Infantry Division defeated the
invading Soviets. It was the last battle of the large
Battle of Warsaw, which definitely halted the Russian advance and the
spread of communism westwards into Europe. According to the
1921 census, Kolno had a population of 4,494, 51.9%
Polish and 48.0% Jewish.
Jan of Kolno Polish historian and cartographer
Joachim Lelewel (1786–1861) was the first to gather all available mentions of
Jan of Kolno known as Johannes Scolnus, and claimed that Scolvus was really Jan z Kolna (English: John of Kolno), a Polish navigator of the Danish fleet. He also found mentions of a Joannis de Colno who studied at the
Kraków Academy in 1455, and a Colno or Cholno family of merchants and sailors living in
Gdańsk.
World War II Following the Nazi German and Soviet
invasion of Poland, which started
World War II, Kolno was taken over by the German forces on 8 September 1939. On 12–13 September 1939, the German
Einsatzgruppe V entered the town to commit various
crimes against the populace. On 29 September Soviets entered the area in accordance with the
Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact. The Soviets carried out mass deportations of the inhabitants to the Soviet Union. The town remained under
Soviet occupation until
Operation Barbarossa (22 June 1941) when it was overrun again by the
Wehrmacht. On 5 July 1941,
Hermann Göring and
Erich Koch visited the town, and some 30 to 37 Jews were murdered by local Poles. The rest of the Jewish population, some 2,350 to 3,000 Jews, were executed by the Germans in several stages beginning on 15 July 1941. The leader of the local Polish resistance, Stanisław Milewski, was killed by the Germans in July 1944. ==Transport==