MAPA
GREAT POLISH MAP
OF
Project to restore
General Maczek’s
GREAT POLISH MAP OF
The Great Polish Map of
Aerial image of the Great Map from Virtual Earth
Our campaign to restore the
Great Polish Map of
Then on Sunday 25 April
2010 at a public meeting and open day at Barony Castle, Eddleston,
we formally inaugurated the Mapa Scotland project,
its objects and organisation as set out in its first constitution
later revised in 2011 and
revised again to the current constitution here.
Background to the Great Map
of
Find out a lot more about current
progress of the project or the full history of the map and the role of Polish
forces in
Conceived by General Maczek and his Polish companions as a permanent
three-dimensional reminder of their part in
August
2010 - Clean-up starts.
In warm afternoon
sunshine,
21 May 2008: David Cameron,
Elizabeth Laudenslager and Roger Kelly discuss
restoration
General Stanisław Maczek
(March 31, 1892 – December 11, 1994) was the most accomplished Polish tank
commander of the Second World War. A
veteran of the First World War. The Polish-Ukranian and Polish-Bolshevik Wars, he
commanded Poland's only major armoured formation during the September 1939
campaign, led a Polish armoured formation in France in 1940, and was commander
of the famous First Polish Armoured Division, and later of the First Polish
Army Corps under Allied Command in 1942–1945.
Of Croatian extraction, Stanisław Władysław Maczek was
born in Lwów in 1892 in Austro-Hungarian
Galicia. Graduating from grammar school
at Drohobycz he attended the philosophy faculty of Lwów University where he
studied Polish literature and language.
After the outbreak of the Great War, Maczek interrupted his studies
hoping to join Piłsudski's Polish Legions, but instead was drafted into
the Austro-Hungarian Army. Assigned to the Italian front, he rose to become the
only Polish battalion commander in Austria-Hungary's Alpine regiments. At the
war’s end he joined the Polish Army and took part in its later Ukranian and
Bolshevik campaigns. His experience in speedy
movement and rapid response led -after military college, colonelship and a
series of infantry commands- to his taking charge of Poland’s first fully
motorised formation during the 1938 Munich crisis.
When Poland was attacked in force in 1939 Maczek led the only Polish units
not to lose a single battle. His forces made a dogged defence under Blitzkreig
attack but these efforts became eclipsed when Russia invaded from the
rear. Appreciated by his superiors and
respected by enemy commanders, Maczek was loved by his soldiers, who called him
“Baca”, a Galician name for a shepherd like the Scots gaelic “Buachaille”. Ordered to take his brigade over the
Hungarian border, he made his way to lead some of the Polish forces in France
at the end of 1939, but French commanders left unopened Maczek’s detailed
reports on the Blitzkreig tactics they should prepare for. After the fall of France Maczek and many of
his men made their way through Africa and Portugal to London, and formed the
nucleus of a Polish armoured unit based in Scotland for four years. Trained at Blairgowrie and equipped with the
latest Churchill and Sherman tanks, the Poles took up the defence of the
Scottish shoreline between Montrose and Dundee.
In July 1944 the division transferred to Normandy, attached to the First
Canadian Army, where General Maczek’s force and his gift for using natural
features contributed decisively in the Battle of Falaise. His Division continued to spearhead the Allied
drive across the battlefields of France, Belgium, Netherlands, and finally
Germany, where it captured the port of Wilhelmshaven and accepted surrender of
the garrison and 200 navy ships. After
Germany capitulated, General Maczek went on to become commanding officer of all
Polish forces in the United Kingdom until their demobilization in 1947.
General Maczek’s
Great Polish Map of Scotland stands in the grounds of
General Maczek
had been shown an impressive outdoor map of land and water in the
Set in the open air in the Peeeblesshire landscape at Eddleston,
General Maczek and his companions conceived The Great
Polish Map of Scotland as a permanent three-dimensional reminder of
General Maczek’s Great
Polish Map of Scotland
Aerial
image of the Great Map from Virtual Earth
General
Maczek died in 1994 aged 102 and is buried with
comrades at
MAPA
the campaign to restore
General Maczek’s
GREAT POLISH MAP OF
SCOTLAND
Roger Kelly,
David Cameron and Elizabeth Laudenslager acknowledge
the help of Steven Sweeny, Deputy General Manager,
The project, the Great Map,
and General Maczek were the subject of fuller displays (click to open) for
Penicuik Community Development Trust in the Cowan Institute,
Further exhibitions in
Penicuik in 2010 on 17 and 24 April and 5 June have brought even more material
and individuals to the group.
The Campaign to restore the Great Map was started in 2008
by a small group including Roger Kelly (convener of the Royal Town Planning
Institute in Scotland and member of the Saltire Society Council); David Cameron
(former convener of the Saltire Society and Edinburgh’s former Deputy City
Planner, who worked with the late Kazimierz Trafas on urban restoration in Cracow);
Krystyna Szumelukowa,
Edinburgh’s former Director of Economic Development; Keith Burns (Hydraulic
engineer with a long-term interest in the Map); and Alastair
Nimmo (Civil engineer and concrete specialist) and
the initial interest of Elizabeth Laudenslager –USA,
Diana Webster –Edinburgh, Jonathan Cosens -West
Linton, Anne Hardie –Penicuik, Alan Hardie –Penicuik, Mark Hutcheson –Edinburgh, Peter de Vink –Edinburgh, Reuben Crook –Leadburn,
Nick Macdonald –Edinburgh and George Futers –Eddleston. A meeting
to review and report progress to Janusz Szewczuk (one of the Great Map’s surviving cartographer-builders)
was called by Keith Burns at Hillend on Tuesday 11
August 2009 with Roger Kelly, Barbara Conboy, David
Cameron, Dave Peck, Nick Macdonald and James Barton. A study group on Saturday
12 September 2009 at Barony Castle, onsite at the water intake and at the Great
Map itself was hosted by George Futers with Keith
Burns, Roger Kelly, David Cameron, Anne Hardie,
Barbara Conboy, Krzysztof Chuchra, Krystyna Szumelukowa, Dave Peck, Nigel Rose, Jim Barton and Adam
Ward. A further meeting was held at
Contact Keith Burns, the project secretary, at mapascotland@gmail.com or Roger Kelly,
organiser of these campaign webpages, at roger@kosmoid.net
Szkocja
w Szkocji –the Great Map’s construction described in
Polish by Janusz Szewczuk
Scotland
in Scotland –translation of the above
Restoration
of the Great Map: Launch leaflet 2010
Polish
Road to Breda:
picture diary 1944 (shown
Before
and after pictures of the Map
Black
Barony Hotel grounds in 1940 (before the fall of
Polish Forces in Scotland in the Second World War
The Great Map
features in the Scottish Planner of June 2008 and in Cairt
–newsletter of the Scottish Maps Forum.
The Polish
Chamber Singers Affabre Concinui visited the Great Map while performing at the
2008 Edinburgh Festival Fringe Ż
The Murrays
of Elibank were also associated with Thomas Adams, the Carlops
farmer who became regional planner of
Proud
supporters of the Mapa Scotland Project:
Penicuik Community Development Trust presents
PENICUIK CINEMA in
the TOWN HALL
Krzysztof Kieslowski’s THE DOUBLE
LIFE OF VERONIQUE (La
double vie de Véronique / Podwójne
życie Weroniki)
Irene
Jacob music by Zbigniew
Preisner
Cert 15 92
mins 1991
Past
and current film season here
GENERAL MACZEK’S GREAT POLISH MAP OF
MapaScotland has a home page at http://www.mapascotland.makers.org.uk
Other
displays in the COWAN INSTITUTE PENICUIK