Summer 1939 

The figure in the centre, presenting arms is the future Roman Catholic Pope Saint John Paul II.  At the time - July, 1939 - Karol Wojtyla was serving in Poland's "Academic Legion", service in which (originally voluntary) was by this time compulsory for university students (he was a student at the Jagiellonian University, Krakow).  The Academic Legion was supposed to spread military knowledge and values among budding intellectuals and professionals.  Its practical duties did not extend much beyond guard/sentry duty at official buildings and installations.  Some of its members must have ended up in the Polish Army proper, and these would have seen combat in the coming September.

As with many aspects  of the future John Paul's life, his activities in the course of WW2 are a subject of some controversy.  The main issue in this case is whether, in the course of his work for a subsidiary of German firm IG Farben, he was in effect a salesman involved in peddling Zyklon B cyanide canisters to the authorities at the Auschwitz labor/death camp.  The evidence for this accusation is, to say the least, thin.  More likely (if more mundane) is the account that places him as a worker for the Solvay chemical firm, first as a quarryman (they operated limestone quarries) and later in the water purification end of the business (a natural side-business for limestone extractors).  He opted for this employment, apparently, to avoid deportation for forced labor to Germany; at the same time, he was studying for the Catholic priesthood, under the tacit protection of the Bishop of Krakow.  The Bishop ordained him to the priesthood in 1946.

I was no great fan of "J2P2".  However, I do appreciate that, given the controversial character of his theology and pastoral work as Pope, accusations of the "Zyklon B" variety are subject to the suspicion that they were generated by the general swirl of controversy around him by his detractors.  In any event, the evidence for his alleged role as a salesman of mass murder (let alone a knowing one) is unconvincing.  Best regards, JR.

Church Militant.

Polish mounted unit. Can somebody identify the gun? 