JANUARY 15 - DAILY CHRONICLES OF HISTORY

JANUARY 15

1582

The Truce or Treaty of Yam-Zapolsky was signed between the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Tsardom of Russia, was one of the treaties that ended the Livonian War. Russia ceded Livonia & Estonia to Poland, and lost access to Baltic.

1937

Construction of Polish Radio Baranowicze station was announced by the press. The station was opened on July 1, 1938. Its frequency was 520 kHz and range - 120 kilometers, which covered most of the Nowogrodek Voivodeship and northern part of the Polesie Voivodeship. Main office was located in a building at Narutowicza Street 72, in the outskirts of the city. Currently, the 1938 office of the radio is used by the Belarusian TV.

1938

The Polish submarine, ORP Orzel was launched in the Dutch port of Vlissingen. The name means "eagle" in Polish. She was a modern design (designed by the joint venture of Polish and Dutch engineers), albeit quite large for the shallow waters of the Baltic Sea.  Orzel specifications were as follows:  Length:  84.00 m (275 ft 7 in);  Surface speed:   19.4 knots (35.9 km/h; 22.3 mph); Submerged Speed: 9 kn (17 km/h; 10 mph);  Armaments: 1 × Bofors wz.25 105 mm (4.1 in) gun, 1 × double Bofors wz.36 40 mm (1.6 in) AA gun,  1 × Hotchkiss 13.2 mm (0.52 in) HMG,  12 × 533 mm (21.0 in) / 550 mm 22 in) torpedo launchers (4 aft, 4 rudder, 4 waist),  and 20 torpedoes.

1945

In Poland, the 1st Ukrainian Front took Kielce while the 2nd Belorussian Front crossed the Pilica in Poland and attacked toward Radom, Łódź and Posen.  It was part of the Vistula–Oder Offensive, a successful Red Army operation on the Eastern Front. It saw the fall of Kraków, Warsaw and Poznań. Within a matter of days the Soviet troops advanced hundreds of kilometers, taking much of Poland and striking deep within the pre-war borders of the Reich. The Offensive defeated Army Group A, which left remaining German forces with weakened military resistance.

1951

Witch of Buchenwald:  Ilse Koch, wife of the Karl Koch,  commandant of the Buchenwald concentration camp, was sentenced to life imprisonment in a West German court.  The nickname, "Witch of Buchenwald” was an apt name for her extraordinary sadism.  The most horrifying was the collection of lampshades, book covers, and gloves made from the skin of tattooed camp prisoners.  The following testimony was given at the Nuremberg Trials by a German inmate, “All prisoners with tattooing on them were to report to the dispensary… After the prisoners had been examined, the ones with the best and most artistic specimens were killed by injections. The corpses were then turned over to the pathological department, where the desired pieces of tattooed skin were detached from the bodies and treated further.”