Stan zachowania przedwojennych cmentarzy ewangelickich. Zarys problemu na przykładzie wybranych gmin powiatu żarskiego

After the Second World War Poland received some territories in the west and north. Earlier these territories were inhabited by the Germans who were displaced from there. The Poles who settled in the so-called “Recovered Territories” showed hostility towards any German traces. Their attitude was expressed by destroying shopping windows, burning German brochures, newspapers and books, dismantling buildings, and even devastating and looting churches, chapels and evangelical cemeteries, the cemeteries which were mostly abandoned after 1945. In the 1970s, lots of these cemeteries were destroyed and the material was carried away. Some cemeteries were adapted to new – Catholic ones. Recently, the Poles have grown more interest in evangelical cemeteries. They begin to create lapidaria from the surviving tombstones, to put up commemorative plaques to the former inhabitants and to clear overgrown and forgotten areas.