Qualla: Battle of Grodno (1939) https://qualla.com/battle-of-grodno-1939 en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:35 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/u/9/8/c/battle-of-grodno-1939-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Battle of Grodno (1939) https://qualla.com/battle-of-grodno-1939 Battle of Grodno (1939): Introduction https://qualla.com/battle-of-grodno-1939/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Tadeusz Jasiński was fifteen years old. He had a bottle of gasoline. The Soviet tanks of the 27th Light Tank Brigade were rolling through Grodno on September 20, 1939, and Tadeusz, like other Polish boy scouts in the city, had been trained over the previous weeks to throw improvised firebombs at them. He threw his. The Soviet crew caught him. They tied him to the front of one of their tanks as a human shield and drove on into the city. He was one of perhaps three hundred Polish defenders the Red Army would kill at Grodno or murder in the days after the surrender. Many of them, like Tadeusz, were children.

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]]> Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/9/8/c/battle-of-grodno-1939-wp/u98c-battle-of-grodno-1939-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Battle of Grodno (1939): The Other Border https://qualla.com/battle-of-grodno-1939/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. On September 1, 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland from the west. On September 17, with the Polish army still fighting and falling back, the Soviet Union invaded from the east in accordance with the secret protocol of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. The Polish high command had drawn ...

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]]> Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/9/8/c/battle-of-grodno-1939-wp/u98c-battle-of-grodno-1939-the-other-border.mp3 0:06 2 full Battle of Grodno (1939): Improvised Defence https://qualla.com/battle-of-grodno-1939/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Brigadier General Józef Olszyna-Wilczyński, the area commander, had concluded by September 18 that Grodno could not and should not be held. He ordered some troops to retreat and left the city without designating a successor. The mayor, Roman Sawicki, and the regional governor sta...

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]]> Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/9/8/c/battle-of-grodno-1939-wp/u98c-battle-of-grodno-1939-improvised-defence.mp3 0:06 3 full Battle of Grodno (1939): Two Days https://qualla.com/battle-of-grodno-1939/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Komkor Ivan Boldin's Dzerzhinsky Cavalry-Mechanized Group rolled toward Grodno with three cavalry divisions, two rifle divisions, and tanks of the 15th Tank Corps under Mikhail Petrov — about twenty-six thousand men against perhaps three thousand defenders. The first Soviet tanks...

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]]> Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/9/8/c/battle-of-grodno-1939-wp/u98c-battle-of-grodno-1939-two-days.mp3 0:06 4 full Battle of Grodno (1939): After the Surrender https://qualla.com/battle-of-grodno-1939/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Polish historians Andrzej Krzysztof Kunert and Zygmunt Walkowski have estimated Soviet casualties at roughly 800 killed, missing, or wounded, plus 19 tanks and four armoured cars destroyed. Soviet records claim only 57 killed and 159 wounded; the lower figure is unlikely. Polish ...

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]]> Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/9/8/c/battle-of-grodno-1939-wp/u98c-battle-of-grodno-1939-after-the-surrender.mp3 0:06 5 full Battle of Grodno (1939): Augustów Forest https://qualla.com/battle-of-grodno-1939/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. What was left of the Wołkowysk Cavalry Brigade — the last organised Polish military force in the area — broke through Soviet lines of the 2nd Light Tank Brigade reconnaissance battalion at the Battle of Kodziowce and rode north into the Augustów Forest, hoping to make for the Lit...

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]]> Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/u/9/8/c/battle-of-grodno-1939-wp/u98c-battle-of-grodno-1939-august-w-forest.mp3 0:06 6 full