Battle of Hel

The Battle of Hel (Obrona Helu, literally "the Defense of Hel") was a World War II engagement fought from 1 September to 2 October 1939 on the Hel Peninsula, of the Baltic Sea coast, between invading German forces and defending Polish units during the German invasion of Poland (also known in Polish historiography as the September Campaign). The defense of the Hel Peninsula took place around the Hel Fortified Area, a system of Polish fortifications that had been constructed in the 1930s near the interwar border with the German Third Reich. Beginning on 20 September 1939, after the Polish Army Pomorze had been defeated in the Battle of Tuchola Forest and after other Polish coastal strongholds had capitulated in the Battle of Westerplatte, Battle of Gdynia and the Battle of Kępa Oksywska, Hel was the only substantial pocket of Polish military resistance left in northern Poland. It was also the site of the invasion's only naval surface engagement. The Germans blockaded the defenders of the Hel Peninsula and did not launch major land operations until the end of September 1939. Some 2,800 Polish soldiers under Rear Admiral Włodzimierz Steyer, part of the Land Coastal Defence formation, defended the Hel Fortified Area for about 32 days, until they surrendered due to low supplies and morale. Construction of a Polish Navy port at Hel, on the tip of the Hel Peninsula, began in 1931, and in 1936 the north section of the Hel Peninsula was officially declared the Hel Fortified Area (Helski Rejon Umocniony). Construction of the fortifications had not been finished before war broke out, but over several months, as tensions between Poland and Germany had mounted, the fortifications had been reinforced with provisional earthworks. The Hel Fortified Area had coastal (anti-ship) and anti-aircraft artillery batteries. The Coastal Artillery Division's coastal batteries comprised one battery of four 152 mm (6-inch) guns, two older batteries of two 105 mm (4.1-inch) guns, and three batteries of eight 75 mm (3-inch) guns.