Volksdeutsche in Cracow and the Cracow District of the General Government, 1939-1941

One of the first tasks of the German occupation authorities after taking over Poland was to identify and assign Polish citizens of German stock to a special ethnic category called Volksdeutsch. The aim of this article is to describe how this process played out in Cracow and its environs in the first years of the German occupation. There were some villages inhabited by people of German origin who used an archaic dialect of German, but nonetheless refused to register as Volksdeutsche. Others became a Volksdeutsch, because of the material and social advantages that designation brought with it, but whose German heritage was highly doubtful. The article also discusses the tensions and conflicts between the Reichsdeutsche, or the civilian Germans from the German Reich who settled in Cracow and were onsidered first-class citizens, and Volksdeutsche, who were treated as the second-class citizens.