Westerplatte (Guardhouse No. 1 and Defenders' Monument)

Westerplatte is a peninsula at the mouth of the Dead Vistula in the Nowy Port district of Gdansk, Poland, reached along Majora Henryka Sucharskiego Street. In the interwar period the Free City of Danzig allowed Poland to maintain a military transit depot there for ammunition. In the early morning of 1 September 1939 the German battleship Schleswig-Holstein opened fire on the depot, and German forces attacked the garrison of fewer than 200 Polish soldiers under Major Henryk Sucharski. The defenders held out for seven days before surrendering on 7 September, and the defence has since become a symbol of Polish resistance and the start of the war. The site today is an open memorial landscape rather than a conventional museum. The ruins of the barracks, guardhouses and fortified positions remain in a wooded park. Guardhouse No. 1, which was destroyed by an air bomb and an explosion, is now a small branch of the Museum of the Second World War and is open seasonally from April to September, with displays of original objects and maps of the fighting. The Defenders of the Coast Monument, a 25-metre concrete and stone structure built in 1966 on a mound, dominates the peninsula and was designed by Adam Haupt, Franciszek Duszenko and Henryk Kitowski. The site has a visitor centre and paths with information boards describing the positions. The condition of the ruins is a mix of preserved remains and conservation work, and some structures are fenced for safety. The approach is outdoor and chronological, following the events of the first week of the war. The peninsula is accessible by road, bus and in season by water tram from the city centre.