Martial law was introduced in Poland on 13 December 1981. In Upper Silesia, where mining was the foundation of the local Solidarity, the mine crews responded with occupation strikes. Some of them ended within days, one lasted two weeks underground, and in two places firearms were used. This text sorts out what happened in the first days at the Manifest Lipcowy, Piast and Ziemowit mines, and is based mainly on accounts by historians of the Katowice branch of the IPN (Institute of National Remembrance) cited by the PAP agency.

Why the miners stayed underground

The first information about the arrests and internments of Solidarity activists reached the mines from the night of 12 to 13 December. In Jastrzębie-Zdrój the protest at the Manifest Lipcowy mine began on news of the detention of members of the plant commission, while the remaining members hid in the plant. The commission soon turned into a strike committee. The plant had a special significance for the movement: it was here that the Jastrzębie agreement was signed in August 1980.

In Bieruń the miners of the Piast mine learned on 14 December of the internment of the Solidarity board at the mining works enterprise cooperating with the mine, and of the detention of the deputy chairman of the plant commission. It was decided that the crew would not ride up to the surface. The demands were similar everywhere: the lifting of martial law, the release of detained activists and respect for the Jastrzębie agreements.

Manifest Lipcowy: the first shots

On 15 December the Manifest Lipcowy mine was surrounded by the militia and the army. Before noon assault units entered the grounds of the plant and met resistance. The gate was forced with the use of tanks, first tear gas and flash-bang grenades were used, and later members of a special ZOMO platoon opened fire. Four miners suffered gunshot wounds. According to PAP it was the first use of firearms against protesting miners under martial law. In the afternoon the pacifying forces were withdrawn and the crew went home. The mine is today called Borynia-Zofiówka.

A day later, on 16 December, the tragedy occurred at the Wujek mine in Katowice, where nine miners were killed. This event has its own article in the Places of Remembrance section, and you can read about the mine itself in the entry Kopalnia Węgla Kamiennego Wujek. Information about the museum can be found in the entry Muzeum Izba Pamięci Kopalni Wujek.

Piast and Ziemowit: a strike without an assault

The strikes at Piast and Ziemowit took a different course, because an assault was not possible with an underground protest. IPN historians report that the authorities considered pacification, among other things sending ZOMO units underground or using gas, and rumours were also spread of the mine being flooded. As a factor that may have cooled such ideas they point to the mining explosives stored underground and available to the strikers. According to the same assessment, bloodshed was avoided primarily thanks to the prudence of the miners themselves.

At Piast the protest began on 14 December, at Ziemowit in Lędziny a day later. At both mines about 2,000 people were on strike at first, and about a thousand held out to the end. The strike at Ziemowit ended on the morning of Christmas Eve, after nine days, and at Piast it lasted until 28 December. The story of the latter protest has its own article: the underground strike at the Piast mine and the Christmas Eve underground.

A shorter strike in those days was held by the crew of the Anna mine in Pszów. A PAP source says that it was on strike for six days from 14 December, and spent almost five days underground, until news arrived of an attack by ZOMO being prepared. Today the former mine is recalled by the entry Kopalnia Anna, with the Chrobry I shaft complex.

After the strike: dismissals, trials, internments

The end of the strikes did not mean the end of repression. At Piast, according to the IPN account, within a few hours after the miners rode up 18 people were detained, of whom 11 were interned and 7 arrested. Almost all participants of the strike, more than 900 people, were dismissed disciplinarily and had to apply to be taken back, and about a hundred were not allowed to return to work. In May 1982 the court of the Silesian Military District acquitted the arrested strike leaders, which at that time was exceptional. Witnesses withdrew in court the testimony given during the investigation. After leaving the courtroom, however, the acquitted were detained again and interned.

At Ziemowit 273 people were dismissed from work unconditionally, and more than a thousand employees had to be hired anew. Nine strike leaders were arrested and sentenced to prison terms.

Scale and remembrance

During the whole period of martial law 10,131 Solidarity activists were interned, and more than 70 people lost their lives. Historians of the Katowice IPN assess that the underground strikes of December 1981 are still underestimated in historical awareness, because they are overshadowed by the tragedy at Wujek. They also recall that each of the protests at Piast and Ziemowit lasted longer than the First Silesian Uprising. This assessment should be read as the opinion of historians, not as an established fact.