WAR LOSSES: A THREE-VOLUME PUBLICATION OF THE MUSEUM OF GDAŃSK

Released in three separate volumes, thepublication continues the Polish museology series publishedfor several years now and related to the losses incurred asa result of WW II within the borders of today’s Republic ofPoland. The Preface to Volume I on the war losses of the TownHall of the Main City of Gdańsk by the Director of the Museumin Gdańsk Waldemar Ossowski, contains reflections essentialfor the discussed issue.The three-volume series opens with the War Losses of theTown Hall of the Main City of Gdańsk (Vol. I). Briefly, the mostessential facts have been highlighted in the story of its raising,and the functions of the major Town Hall interiors, both sumptuousand serving as offices, have been described: the GrandHallway, the Grand Room called Red or Summer Room, theSmall Room of the Council called Winter Room, the GrandRoom of the City Council, the Treasury, and the Deposit Room.In the final months of WW II, Gdańsk lost about 80% of its mostprecious historic substance within the Main City. As early as inApril 1945, the search for and the recovery of the dispersedcultural heritage began.War Losses of the Artus Manor and the Gdańsk Hallway inGdańsk (Vol. 2) begins with a sepia photograph from 1879. Asof October 1943 to January 1945, the following took place:dismantling together with signing and numbering of the objects,packing into wooden chests, and evacuation to severallocalities outside Gdańsk. It has already been ascertainedthat as early as in mid-June 1942, some dozen of the mostprecious historic monuments were evacuated from the ArtusManor, of which several items have not been recovered: late--mediaeval paintings (Boat of the Church, Siege of Marienburg,Our Lady with Child, and Christ, Salvator Mundi), several elementsfrom the four sets of tournament armours from the sectionof the Brotherhood of St Reinold, the sculpture Saturnwith a Child, the sculpture group Diana’s Bath and Actaeon’sMetamorphosis, as well as some dozen elements of the décorof the Grand Hall. All these historic pieces were transferred tothe village of Orle (Germ. Wordel) on the Sobieszewo Islandon 16 June 1942. Only fragments of tournament armours havebeen recovered: they were found at various locations under thecircumstances hard to clarify many years later.The most extensive war losses have been presented forthe Uphagen House (Vol. 3). The majority of the gathered artworks, the interior equipment and usable objects essential inthe burgher’s tenement house transformed into a museum inthe early 20th century have not been found, thus they have notreturned to their original location.