In mid 19th century, during the Partitions of Poland, the population of Kowale Pańskie (and the adjacent Wola Kowalska) was only 323 people, half of whom lived and worked around the local historic manor (built in 1750), owned by industrialist Robert Schultz who run a steam-powered mill.

[2] With the German invasion of Poland at the onset of World War II, Kowale became part of Turek Kreis in Reichsgau Wartheland territory annexed directly to Nazi Germany.

Kowale county was chosen as the location of a transit ghetto for Polish Jews from the entire region spanning 16 settlements including Turek.

[4] The ghetto – centred around Czachulec – was known in German as Heidemühle in reference to an old windmill standing there; all Polish families were expelled from the zone with younger Poles taken to Germany for slave labour.

The inhabitants of Babiak, Dąbie, Dęby Szlacheckie, Grodziec, Izbica Kujawska, Kłodawa, Koło, Nowiny Brdowskie, and Sompolno were deported to Chełmno before March 1943.