most spectacular in the region. The Nazi authorities made further significant expansions to the city boundaries in 1940–42, incorporating most of the territory of today's city, thus almost tripling its size to . They also replaced Polish names for districts with German ones (sometimes newly invented). The Polish names were restored after the war, but the expanded city boundaries were retained. As the Soviet Red Army advanced into Poland in January 1945, Poznań was declared a Festung, meaning that it was to be defended at all costs. Greiser himself fled, but evacuation of civilians was forbidden until January 20. Soviet forces reached the city on January 25 and, following nine days of artillery bombardment, began their ground assault on February 18, aided by some Polish civilians and a unit of the 2nd Polish Army. On the night of February 22, the German commander, Ernst Gomell, committed suicide, and the following morning the remaining garrison surrendered. The struggle left over 55% of the city destroyed, including over 90% of the Old Town. For more details, see Battle of Poznań (1945). Since 1945 Many Germans had fled the region as the Soviets advanced; the post-war expulsions of Germans from Polish territory (and emigration of remaining Jews) left Poznań with an almost uniformly ethnically Polish population, which totalled 268,000 in 1946. During the early post-war years much of the city was rebuilt from ruins. The city again became the capital of Poznań Voivodeship, now within the communist People's Republic of Poland. In 1950 the size of the voivodeship was reduced, and the city of Poznań itself was given separate voivodeship status. In June 1956, workers at the city's Cegielski locomotive factory, the largest factory in Poland, demanded talks with Prime Minister Józef Cyrankiewicz to protest at low wages, lack of overtime pay, tax changes and food shortages. The government refused to talk, and after a series of strikes, on June 28 a workers' protest march was fired on by the authorities. The situation escalated; crowds ransacked the communist party headquarters and attacked the secret police headquarters, where they were repulsed by police fire. According to official figures, 67 people were killed; hundreds more were injured or arrested. The riots continued for two days until being quelled by the army. These protests are seen as an early expression of resistance to communist rule in Poland. For more details, see Poznań 1956 protests. From the