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Powazki Cemetery
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Powazki Cemetery (Polish Cmentarz Powazkowski)/Military Cemetery is the oldest and most famous cemetery in Warsaw, Poland, and is situated in the western part of the city. It contains a mausoleum with memorials to many of the greats in Polish history, including many interred since 1925 along the "Avenue of the Meritorious" (Aleja Zasluzonych, est. 1925). It has also a very large military section for the graves of those who fought and died for their country since the early 19th century, including the large number of those involved in the ill-fated Warsaw Uprising against the Nazis during World War II, the Battle of Warsaw, and the September Campaign.
zki is actually a necropolis, consisting of a whole complex of cemeteries.

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Powazki Cemetery (Polish Cmentarz Powazkowski)/Military Cemetery is the oldest and most famous cemetery in Warsaw, Poland, and is situated in the western part of the city. It contains a mausoleum with memorials to many of the greats in Polish history, including many interred since 1925 along the "Avenue of the Meritorious" (Aleja Zasluzonych, est. 1925). It has also a very large military section for the graves of those who fought and died for their country since the early 19th century, including the large number of those involved in the ill-fated Warsaw Uprising against the Nazis during World War II, the Battle of Warsaw, and the September Campaign.
Details
Powazki is actually a necropolis, consisting of a whole complex of cemeteries. In 1790, most cemeteries in the Warsaw city centre were closed for sanitary reasons, and a new Catholic cemetery was created in the western suburb of Powazki. Soon afterwards, several other cemeteries were founded in the area: Jewish, Calvinist, Lutheran, Caucasian and Tatar. The Orthodox cemetery is located not far from the Powazki necropolis.
The latest addition to the complex was the "Military cemetery," currently known as the "Communal cemetery." It was founded in 1912 as an annex to the Catholic cemetery, but after Poland regained independence in 1918, it became the state cemetery, where some of the most notable people of the period were buried, regardless of their faith. Like many of the old European cemeteries, Powazki's tombstones were created by some of the most renowned sculptors of the age, Polish and foreign. Some of the monuments are excellent examples of various styles in art and architecture.
On All Saints Day (November 1) and Zaduszki (November 2) in Warsaw, vigils are held not only in the Roman Catholic cemeteries, but in the Protestant, Muslim, Jewish and Orthodox cemeteries as well. At Powazki cemetery, all the graves are decorated with candles.
A large part of the cemetery is occupied by graves of Polish soldiers who fell in the Warsaw Uprising. Most of the graves were exhumed between 1945 and 1953 from the streets of Warsaw. In many cases, the names of the soldiers remain unknown, and the graves are marked only by the Polish Red Cross identification number. Until the early 1950s, brothers-in-arms of many fallen soldiers organised exhumations of their colleagues on their own, and there are many quarters where soldiers of specific units are buried. Also in the cemetery are several mass graves of (mostly unknown) civilian victims of the German terror during World War II and of the Warsaw Uprising.
Notable people
A few of the notables buried here (Military Cemetery) are:
- Boleslaw Bierut (1892-1956), communist dictator
- Wojciech Boguslawski, writer, actor, director
- Tadeusz Borowski (1922-1951), Polish writer, journalist, and Holocaust survivor.
- Lucyna Cwierczakiewiczowa, (1829-1901) writer
- Ignacy Dobrzynski (1807-1867) composer
- Wladyslaw Filipkowski (1892-1950), military commander.
- Wladyslaw Gomulka, communist leader
- Stefan Jaracz (1883-1945), actor
- Jacek Kaczmarski (1957-2004), poet and singer
- Jan Kiepura (1902-1966), singer and actor
- Krzysztof Kieslowski (1941-1996) film director
- Jan Kilinski
- Stefan Kisielewski (1911-1991), art critic and writer
- Krzysztof Komeda (1931-1969), jazz composer
- Ryszard Kuklinski (1930-2001), Cold War master spy
- Jacek Kuron (1934-2004), historian, dissident and one of the Solidarity leaders
- Samuel Bogumil Linde lexicographer
- Tadeusz Lomnicki (1927-1992), actor
- Jozef Krzucki, chemist
- Witold Lutoslawski, composer
- Witold Malcuzynski (1914-1977), classical pianist
- Stefan Mazurkiewicz, co-founder of the Warsaw school of mathematics
- Stanislaw Moniuszko, composer
- Witold Pilecki (1901-1948), freedom fighter
- Lech Pijanowski, film-maker and game designer
- Kazimierz Porebski (1872-1933), vice-admiral
- Boleslaw Prus (1847-1912), journalist and novelist
- Marian Rejewski (1905-1980), mathematician-cryptologist
- Wladyslaw Reymont (1867-1925), Nobel Prize-winning novelist
- Leon Schiller, theater director and theoretician
- Irena Sendlerowa (1910-2008), head of Children's Section of the Zegota
- Waclaw Sierpinski (1882-1969) mathematician
- Edward Rydz-Smigly Marshal of Poland and Polish chief of state 1935-1939
- Stanislaw Skalski (1915-1994), WWII fighter ace
- Andrzej Soltan (1897-1959), physicist
- Stanislaw Sosabowski (1892 - 1967), general
- Wladyslaw Szpilman (1911-2000), pianist
- Karol Swierczewski, army general
- Michal Karaszewicz-Tokarzewski (1893-1964), general
- Julian Tuwim (1894-1953), poet
- Jerzy Waldorff, art critic and one of the beneficiaries of the cemetery
- Henryk Wieniawski, composer
- Kazimierz Wierzynski (1894-1969), poet and writer
- Stanislaw Wigura (1901-1932), aircraft designer and aviator
- Stanislaw Wojciechowski, president of Poland
- Aleksander Zelwerowicz, actor and director, patron of the Warsaw Drama Academy
- Stefan Zeromski, writer
- Jan Zumbach (1915-1986), World War II fighter ace
- Franciszek Zwirko (1895-1932), aviator

The Jewish Cemetery, located on Okopowa Street next to the Protestant Cemetery and near the Powazki necropolis, was established between 1799 and 1806. Some of the prominent Jewish citizens buried here are:
- Solomon Anski, writer (Solomon Zangwill Rappaport), author of "The Dybbuk"
- Szymon Askenazy, archaeologist
- Mathias Bersohn, philanthropist
- Adam Czerniaków, head of Warsaw Ghetto Judenrat
- Maurycy Fajans, founder of the first steamboat line on the Vistula River
- Jacob Dinezon (1852-1919), writer
- Esther Rachel Kaminska (1870-1925), "mother of Yiddish Theater," mother of Ida Kaminska
- Janusz Korczak (1878-1942, cenotaph), children's writer and educator
- Samuel Orgelbrand, publisher of Universal Encyclopaedia
- Isaac Loeb Peretz, writer
- Hipolit Wawelberg, founder of Warsaw Technical College
- Ludwik Zamenhof, creator of Esperanto
Gallery
See also
- List of famous cemeteries
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