Польшаның Цеханув қаласының тарихы

Ciechanów is a city in north central Poland. From 1975 to 1998, it was the capital of the Ciechanów Voivodeship. Since 1999, it has been situated in the Masovian Voivodeship. As of December 2021, it has a population of 43,495. and together with the region of Mazovia, it became part of the emerging Polish state in the late 10th century. In 1254, Ciechanów is mentioned as the seat of a castellany (Rethiborius Castellanus de Techanow (Racibor, Kasztelan Ciechanowa)). In 1400 Janusz I of Czersk granted Ciechanów town privileges. The area eventually become a separate duchy with Casimir I of Warsaw using the title "dominus et heres lub dominus et princeps Ciechanoviensis." In the Middle Ages, the defensive gord of Ciechanów protected northern Mazovia from raids of Lithuanians, Yotvingians, Old Prussians and later, the Teutonic Knights. It is not known when it was granted a town charter. This must have happened before 1475, as a document from that year, issued by Duke Janusz II of Warsaw, states that Ciechanów has a Chełmno town charter. In the period between the 14th and 16th centuries, Ciechanów prospered with the population reaching 5,000. In the late 14th century, Siemowit III, Duke of Masovia, began construction of a castle, while his son Janusz I of Warsaw invited the Augustinians, who in the mid 15th century began construction of a church and an abbey. The Augustinian Friars were brought to Ciechanów in 1358 by Duke Siemowit III. They experienced the most turbulent times during the Reformation. From the 17th century, the Augustinians’ pastoral presence was growing in the towns. The monastery – characterised by mild observance – was usually inhabited by four to seven monks. In 1526, together with all Mazovia, Ciechanów was incorporated directly to the Kingdom of Poland. It was a royal city of Poland, the seat of the Land of Ciechanów, a separate administrative unit within the Masovian Voivodeship in the Greater Poland Province. The town was handed over to Bona Sforza, as her dowry. Ciechanów prospered until the Swedish invasion of Poland (1655–1660), when the town was burned and ransacked. After the second partition of Poland (1793), Ciechanów briefly became seat of a newly created voivodeship. In 1795, it was annexed by the Kingdom of Prussia, and reduced to the status of a provincial town in Przasnysz county. In 1806, during the Napoleonic Wars, Ciechanów was ransacked and destroyed. In 1807 it became part of the short lived Polish Duchy of Warsaw. Since 1815, the town belonged to Russian controlled Congress Poland. Its residents actively supported Polish rebellions. As part of anti Polish repressions, the Augustinian monastery was dissolved in 1864. The one remaining Catholic priest was harassed by the occupiers, however, thanks to the intercession of the local population, he avoided deportation or death. 150 Polish soldiers were hid from the Russians by the local Jews in the synagogue. Some local socialists and intelligentsia joined the occupation structures for diversionary purposes, and when the Polish army reached the city again on August 15, 1920, they immediately disarmed several hundred Soviets. In the Second Polish Republic, Ciechanów remained seat of a county in Warsaw Voivodeship. In 1938, its population was 15,000, and the town was a military garrison, home to the 11th Uhlan Regiment of Marshall Edward Smigly Rydz.

Ciechanów was captured by the Wehrmacht on the night of September 3/4, 1939. The town was annexed by Nazi Germany and was known as Zichenau in German. It was the capital of Regierungsbezirk Zichenau, a new subdivision of the Province of East Prussia. The vast majority of the Polish and Jewish population was seen as racially inferior and Germany planned its eventual annihilation. The Einsatzgruppe V entered the city on September 10, 1939, and carried out first mass arrests among local Polish intelligentsia. Residents were imprisoned in Gestapo jails established in municipal buildings and the Town Hall. Several hundred Poles were transported from the jail in Ciechanów and murdered in large massacres in the nearby village of Ościsłowo as part of Intelligenzaktion. Local disabled people were also murdered in Ościsłowo on February 20, 1940. Local teachers were arrested in October and November 1939, and deported to the Soldau concentration camp, where they were murdered in December 1939, and some were also murdered in the Mauthausen concentration camp. Poles were also subjected to expulsions. Around 600 people were expelled in December 1939, further expulsions were carried out in subsequent years. In Ciechanów, the Germans also organized a transit camp for Poles deported for forced labor to the areas of Klaipeda, Tilsit (Sovetsk) and Königsberg (Kaliningrad), and a forced labor "education" camp. Before World War II, Ciechanów was home to a large Jewish community of 1,800, but during the Nazi German occupation, in November 1942, the majority of the Jewish community were transported to the Red Forest (Czerwony Bór) northeast of town and murdered in a mass shooting. During the war many Polish Jews and resistance fighters were executed by the Germans in the castle. On January 17, 1945, Ciechanów was captured from Nazi Germany by the Red Army, and was restored to Poland after the war.