Hel — Unrug faces the German envoy

Józef Unrug, 55, rear admiral, has commanded all Polish naval and coastal-defence forces since 1925. Born in Brandenburg into a family of Germano-Polish minor nobility, an officer of the Kaiserliche Marine from 1914 to 1918, he opted for Poland in 1919. Perfectly bilingual, he had vowed, on becoming a Polish citizen, never again to speak a word of German in public.

The Hel peninsula — a 35 km strip of sand and forest jutting into the Bay of Danzig — has served as the Polish Navy's fortified camp since 1936. It holds three heavy batteries (152 mm Bofors, 105 mm Schneider guns and the Laskowski battery with its four Danish 152 mm guns), a garrison of 3,000 men, bunkers, depots and a military railway. On 1 September, after the rapid fall of Gdynia — Kępa Oksywska would fall on 14 September — Hel becomes the last Polish foothold on the Baltic.

From 9 September to 2 October the peninsula is pounded by three German capital ships taking turns — Schleswig-Holstein, Schlesien and Admiral Hipper — by Stukas of St.G. 2 and He 111s of KG 26, and by a ground offensive launched along the isthmus by the 207th Infantry Division. By 30 September, after the fall of Warsaw on the 27th and Modlin on the 28th, Hel is the last pocket of resistance. The ammunition will not last more than four days. On 1 October, Reichenau sends an envoy.