Tczew (, ; formerly ) is a city on the Vistula River in Eastern Pomerania, Kociewie, northern Poland with 59,111 inhabitants (December 2021). The city is known for its Old Town and the Vistula Bridge, or Bridge of Tczew, which played a key role in the Invasion of Poland during World War II.
It is the capital of Tczew County in the Pomeranian Voivodeship and the largest town of the ethnocultural region of Kociewie.
The city is the location for the annual English Language Camp arranged by the American-Polish Partnership for Tczew.
Geographical location
Tczew is located on the west bank of river Vistula, approximately south of Gdańsk Bay at the Baltic Sea and south-east of Gdańsk.
History
Middle Ages
Tczew (Trsow, Dersowe, ‘weaver's town’) was first mentioned as Trsow in a document by Pomeranian Duke Grzymisław bestowing the land to the Knights Hospitaller in 1198. Around 1200 Sambor I, Duke of Pomerania, built a fortress here. In some documents, the name Derszewo appears, which stems from the name of a feudal lord, Dersław. It is unknown whether Trsow and Derszewo referred to the same or two neighboring settlements. In order to obtain better control of traffic on the Vistula, Pomeranian Duke Sambor II moved his residence from Lubiszewo Tczewskie to Tczew. By 1252 the settlement was known by the names Tczew and Dirschau.
In 1258 a city council was created and in 1260 Tczew was granted town rights. It is the only case in Poland for a city council to be established before granting city rights. Craft and trade developed, there was a port on the Vistula and a mint. Duke Mestwin II in 1289 brought the Dominican Order to the city. It was part of Poland until 1308. Following the Treaty of Soldin in 1309, Tczew was purchased from Brandenburg by Heinrich von Plötzke of the Teutonic Knights, despite the fact that the initial claims to the region by Brandenburg were of dubious legality. The townspeople were expelled by the Teutonic Knights and the town's organization ceased to exist for more than half a century. It was rebuilt from 1364 to 1384, and was granted Kulm law by Winrich von Kniprode. After the Polish victory in the Battle of Grunwald in 1410, the town was briefly recaptured by Poland. In 1434 the town was burnt down by the Hussites. In 1440 the town joined the Prussian Confederation, opposing Teutonic Order's rule. In 1457, during the Thirteen Years’ War, Bohemian mercenaries on the Order's service sold Tczew to Poland in lieu of indemnities. The Second Peace of Thorn (1466) confirmed the reincorporation of Tczew to Poland. It became a county seat within the Pomeranian Voivodeship in the newly created Polish province of Royal Prussia, soon also part of the Greater Poland Province.
Modern era
During the Protestant Reformation most of the town's inhabitants converted to Lutheranism. In 1626, it was occupied by king Gustav II Adolf of Sweden, who built a pontoon bridge across river Vistula and who had his camp at the southern side of the town. After the war Tczew was visited twice by Polish King Władysław IV Vasa, in 1634/1635 and 1636. Although it was rebuilt, it then suffered during the Polish-Swedish Wars. In a nearby battle on 2 September 1657, the Poles were defeated by the combined troops of Brandenburg and Sweden under general Josias II, Count of Waldeck-Wildungen.
The region was annexed from the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth by the Kingdom of Prussia during the First Partition of Poland in 1772. Tczew, as Dirschau, became part of the newly founded Province of West Prussia. During the Napoleonic Wars and the Polish national liberation fights the town was captured by Polish troops of General Jan Henryk Dąbrowski in 1807, but became Prussian again in 1815. In 1818 Prussians closed down the Dominican monastery. In October and November 1831, some Polish infantry, cavalry and artillery units of the November Uprising stopped in the city on the way to their internment places, and later on, one of the insurgents' main escape routes from partitioned Poland to the Great Emigration led through the city.
With the unification of Germany, the town became part of the German Empire in 1871 and from 1887 was the capital of the Dirschau district in the Province of West Prussia. The town grew rapidly during the 19th century after the opening of the Prussian Eastern Railway line connecting Berlin and Königsberg, with the Vistula bridge near Dirschau being an important part.