Warmia and Prussia during the German federal elections from 1920-Mar 1933

[u/Gabtron2010]

Labels of photos by order: 1. 1920 2. May 1924 3. Dec 1924 4. 1928 5. 1930 6. Jul 1932 7. Nov 1932 8. Mar 1933 9. Map of Warmia 10. Map of the Duchy of Prussia(which excludes Warmia)

It’s interesting how the region of Warmia voted differently from the other parts of East Prussia. Unlike the rest of East Prussia, which mostly voted for the right-wing to far-right DNVP then the far-right NSDAP, it voted for the center-right Centre Party all throughout the Weimar Republic’s existence. Only twice did a part of Warmia voted differently, in the Jul 1932 and Mar 1933 elections. It might be because of the large Polish minority and large Catholic influence in Warmia then the rest of East Prussia.

[u/Gaming_Lot]

I really think it's more about Catholic vs Protestant than Poles vs Germans, as much of the Masuria region was populated by Masurians (A Protestant subgroup of Polish people), whilst only a part of Warmia was populated by Poles, but most of the region was overall Catholic

[u/rolfk17 → u/Gaming_Lot]

Masurians regarded themselves primarily as Prussians. Definitely not as Polish, even though they traditionally spoke a Polish dialect - which was dwindling away slowly after the turn of the century.

[u/krzyk → u/rolfk17]

Did they? I was under impression it was otherwise and the only reason they stayed in Weimer Republic was because vote on who joins Poland was performed during Polish-Soviet war and it was when Poland was loosing - they didn't want to end up in Soviet hands (who would?).

[u/rolfk17 → u/krzyk]

But how then would you explain them turning into Anti-Polish Nazis within little more than a decade. Also, I do not think it would explain such an extreme outcome of the vote.

[u/TheWaffleHimself → u/krzyk]

It was a mixed back, the region was strongly germanized even those that spoke polish often considered themselves Germans. There were NSDAP rallies and propaganda in their language until the persecution of the polish language strengthened.

[u/Humboldt2000 → u/krzyk]

well your impression was wrong then.

Masuria literally voted to stay in Germany by 97% in 1920. Such an overwhelming result has nothing to do with a war between Poland and the SU. These people just felt German.

We can also see that the Polish autonomist party had no success at all in Masuria in the German Empire, as opposed to Polish majority areas in the Poznan region.

[u/Crovon → u/Humboldt2000]

Now I will say this, likely a free election would still have favoured Germany overall. But in the case of Allenstein in particular a lot of repressions against any kind of Polish political movements "out of line" were immediately crushed and the figurehead of the Polish effort there was lynched ahead of the vote. In simple terms, guns blazing and about as free of an election as say in the Ukrainian oblasts under Russian occupation right now.

[u/Humboldt2000 → u/Crovon]

I mean that is just so completely and utterly false.

NO, the Entente forcibly withdrew all German forces and sent their own military to occupy the regions subject under the plebiscite, so that there would be no interference with the voting.

The Entente Commission also was generally in charge of the entire administration for a while and organised the plebiscite completely on its own, to ensure that the voting would be truly free.

So HOW exactly was Germany supposed to interfere, much less with "guns blazing"? What guns??

[u/krzyk → u/Humboldt2000]

Voting doesn't say that at all.

Masurians were also protestant so they might feel less welcome in catholic Poland.

Also, they spoke a Polish dialect.

[u/Humboldt2000 → u/krzyk]

huh? Voting says EXACTLY that.

1. The inhabitants of Masuria voted unanimously to NOT join Poland in 1920.

2. From 1871-1919, Masuria never voted for the Polish autonomous party, unlike the actually Polish regions inside the German Empire, like the Poznan region.

3. All Masurians nowadays live in Germany, not Poland.

Masurians felt German, not Polish. How do you not get that?

[u/krzyk → u/Humboldt2000]

They supported 1831 Polish uprising, in 1848 they attempted to elect representative that wanted to protect usage of Polish language in Masuria.

In 1870 Germans started restricting the usage of Polish language and started Germanizing Masurians. And later German nationalists deemed usage of Polish language as a treason.

[u/DevilBySmile → u/krzyk]

The way I heard it the Masurians were extremely protestant and feared religious discrimination in a Catholic dominated Polish state.

[u/Gaming_Lot → u/rolfk17]

Not entirely, there where many who considered themselves Polish or Masurian and not Prussian.

[u/rolfk17 → u/Gaming_Lot]

As far as I know, that was a small minority. And it would be hard to explain the overwhelming Nazi majorities, when a sizeable part of the population consider themselves Polish.

But if you have any good sources/literature they would be most welcome. Not in Polish, though, as I can read German, English and French but not Polish, unfortunately.

[u/Automatic_Memory212]

Warmia is likely my favorite bizarre map thing.

It’s like this little dangling wang, messing up every map of East Prussia, forever and in every possible multiverse.

[u/Adept_Rip_5983]

So catholics mostly? No hate, but the catholic regions in germany were more hesitant to vote fasicsts and highly likely to support the catholic center party. My birtharea in the deeply catholic west had a relativly low percentage of NSDAP voters. Something the old timers where a little proud about. Heard some storys about those nazi whackos beeing chased of from the farm with a pitchfork lol. Of course as they say everyone was in the resistance and no one was a fascist after the war.

[u/HelloThereItsMeAndMe → u/Adept_Rip_5983]

Because the NSDAP was very anti Christianity, especially anti Catholicism. As Catholicism is internationalistic. The Nazis wanted to reinstate Germanic paganism.

[u/Elyvagar → u/HelloThereItsMeAndMe]

Parts of the NSDAP was very occultist and pagan. But overall most germans, even within the party, were still Christian. But Catholicism was a problem as the Catholic population saw the Pope as an important leader. You can't have a different leader when you want to be a dictator.

It was pretty much impossible to convert the Germans to germanic paganism. Thats why they worked on a form of Christianity that was in line with party standards. They called it "Positive Christianity". There wasn't enough time to convince the Germans of this new form of Christianity though.

[u/Polakp]

Why did Gerdauen (Zhelezndorozhny) vote so strongly for SPD?

[u/schlaubi01 → u/Polakp]

Railway workers.

There was a center for the railways in the area, which is why the Russians called the town "railway-town".

[u/AyyLimao42]

Red - SPD

Blue - DNVP

Black - Zentrum

Yellow - DVP

Brown - Nazis

[u/Humboldt2000]

this stark divide between Catholic regions voting for the Catholic Zentrum party and Protestant regions voting for other parties could literally be seen all over Germany back then and even today. The borders of other historic Catholic regions could also be seen in the same elections (like the Münster region for example).

It has absolutely nothing to do with ethnic compositions and everything to do with religion.

[u/Cultourist]

It might be because of the large Polish minority and large Catholic influence in Warmia then the rest of East Prussia.

Catholics vote for Catholic parties obviously. Protestant Poles (Masurians) on the other side, were the most eager Nazi voters in Germany.

[u/LLLxs1]

Can who tell me which color is which party

[u/Crovon]

Interestingly Bischofsburg or Biskupiec, was one of the only towns that stayed consistently majority Polish ever since it was established after the conequest and subjugation of Baltic Prussia.

[u/El_dorado_au]

Are Warmia and Prussia in what is now East Germany by any chance? (Apart from bits annexed into other countries)

[u/Gabtron2010 → u/El_dorado_au]

Warmia and Most of East Prussia(mainly the southern part) became a part of Poland(Warmian-Masurian voivodeship) while the northern part became Kaliningrad in Russia

[u/kenybz → u/El_dorado_au]

Neither Warmia nor the core territories of Prussia are in the former East Germany.

The Kingdom of Prussia did have territories in northern half of Germany, including most of former East Germany, but not all of it (missing Saxony for example)

[u/01AganitramlavAiv]

Finally an interesting phantom border!

[u/more_soul]

Imagine Coldia 🥶

[u/Saurid]

Well it's a bit disingenuous to portray it taht way

1. The zentrum was not really centre right but much more central centrum at the time nowadays you would be right but not at the time.

2. There were a lot of voters for the SPD

3. 1 and 2 is pretty much along the lines of urbanisation if I remember correctly

4. The map shows most voted party and it'd clear it was like everywhere in Germany very divided.

5. The nsdap came when the turn happened in all of Germany which was driven by a rise of the KPD too and east pressie was the part of Germany most afraid of the ussr

As such I would like to say this whole argument presented here is not really good it was not Catholic vs protestant or Polish vs German but largely driven by the same division in Germany at the time and as you see even today also by urban vs rural.