Westerplatte 1939 – 1/35 scale figurines

Ten post dostępny jest także w języku: Polish

75th anniversary of WW2 is coming tomorrow. One of first to fight was Polish Army post Westerplatte in Gdansk (Danzig). Today we present a small diorama of Westerplatte a day before WW2 outbreak. See model photos and read more about history of that extraordinary unit and their excellent combat record.

Diorama of Westerplatte sentry 1939

Diorama presents an officer with guard observing Kriegsmarine battleship on Gdansk harbour a day before war.

The first figurine presents the infantry soldier of the Polish Army in full 1939 summer field service uniform with his sentry equipment. The summer dress was made of from linen of olive colour. It was worn daily during the Summer drill and frequently washed usually faded in khaki-sand or gray. Westerplatte soldier is armed with the Polish made derivative of the Mauser 98, a bayonet, a gas mask and a haversack. Instead of regular boots and anklets the high boots were used which could be put on fast in case of sounded alarm.

More information and photos – see internet SRH Cytadela

Second figurine presents officer with officers service uniform. He is armed with excellent ViS pistol. His eguipment is gas mask, map holder, field binoculars. Set contains two head, one with field cap and second with helmet.

See also Cytadela website

Diorama set contains also base with brick wall, photoetch parst and insignia decals.

History

Westerplatte is a small wooded peninsula at the mouth of the Vistula river in Gdańsk. There was a Polish Army Store in the Free City of Gdańsk in 1926 – 39. Gdańsk was the main harbour on the Southern coast of the Baltic. It had the border with Poland and Germany (East Prussia). The port was extremely important for Poland and Germany because of military and economic reasons. The League of Nations has granted the right to the Polish Army to store the military equipment there and guard it by the small infantry unit. It was strongly opposed by the local German a authorities which constantly watched the place and tried to provoke the guarding garrison.

The Garrison

Westerplatte was garrisoned by 180 of volunteers who were carefully selected from the best soldiers. It was equipped with one 76.2mm gun, two 37mm antitank guns and four heavy 81mm mortars. All the guard houses had invisible pill-boxes in the basement unknown to Germans. Expected was a possible provocation and attack from Gdansk or Germany’s Eastern Prussia. The guard was supposed to defend the place for 12 hours till it could be assisted by the Polish Army force from Poland. Unfortunately it was out of the questions because of regrouping of the Polish Army units facing the fully mobilized Wehrmacht in summer 1939.

The War

On the 1 of September 1939 at 4.45 AM the storm company of the training battleship DKM “Schleswig Holstein” supported her artillery (4x280mm) and heavy machine gun from the port assaulted Westerplatte. The ship fired her salvo at shortest possible range from the port canal close to Westerplatte. The attackers faced an extremely hard resistance that repulsed them many times. The Germans made a lot of logistic and organizational mistakes. The most important was the lack of the accurate reconnaissance and their arrogance. Forces of the 3500 soldiers, Krigsmarine ships, 220mm mortars and 40 diving bombers Stuka were not able to overcome the small Polish Garrison for 7 days. The Poles have surrendered after having fired 94% of their ammunition. There were about 15-22 soldiers killed. The German losses were much heavier because of several hundreds killed and injured. Defense of Westerplatte became an important part of Polish history and culture similar to Thermopilae. It was also a great help for Polish Navy bases defense forces making Germans busy in the first week of war.

Buy Westerplatte Diorma 1/35 in Arma Hobby shop