the freedoms they had enjoyed when they were part of Austria. Instruction in the German language was no longer permitted in public schools and lessons were conducted by independent teachers who moved from town to town, often under the watchful eye of the local authorities. An organisation known as the Association of German Catholics (V.d. K) was established in 1923 to promote cultural and social links between the isolated German settlements. When the Second World War broke out in September 1939, the Polish authorities jailed sixteen members of the V.d. K. from the Machliniec area. They were released a month later when Poland surrendered. Population transfers As per Article II of the secret protocol of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, all land to the east of the Narev, Vistula, and San rivers was to fall into the Soviet sphere of influence. As part of the Nazi-Soviet population transfers, all Volksdeutsche were to be granted German citizenship and resettled in Germany. In November 1939, Soviet and German officials arrived and prepared detailed lists of property and livestock which each family would have to leave behind. Each person was allowed to take a wagon with a limited amount of personal belongings and one team of horses. "The women and children went by train in boxcars, in December 1939. The men, with their teams of horses, went in January 1940 first to Przemyśl (in present-day Poland) to cross the bridge over the San River towards Germany. It took us two days in that very cold winter to arrive at the bridge. Crossing the bridge was very strictly controlled by the Russians. After we crossed over the bridge, we were loaded on a train with the team of horses and travelled west towards Posen, Poland." — Leo Merz 1988. Many children and older people died from the bitter cold, or from typhus and other diseases that were prevalent in the cramped conditions of the resettlement camps. The inhabitants of Machliniec were resettled throughout the Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany on farms that had been taken from Polish or Jewish families. Most of the men were conscripted into the German army and sent to the Eastern Front. In 1945, ahead of the advancing Red Army, the women and children were evacuated yet again. 1940 to the present Since 1940, Machliniec has been inhabited solely by ethnic Ukrainians. In 1990, descendants of the original settlers realized that