The citizens took part in the Greater Poland uprising (1848) during the Spring of Nations, fighting against better armed Prussians in the battle of Odolanów on 21 April 1848.

[8] The events shortly after World War I (Republic of Ostrów and the Greater Poland Uprising) are an important part of the town’s history.

[9] On 1 September 1939, the first day of the German invasion of Poland, which started World War II, Odolanów was quickly captured by the Wehrmacht.

Local mayor Jan Krak was arrested and imprisoned in nearby Kalisz and then murdered in a large massacre of over 70 Poles from the region, carried out in Winiary on 14 December 1939.

[10] The Germans destroyed the pre-war monument to the fallen insurgents of the Greater Poland uprising,[9] and established and operated a Nazi prison[11] and a forced labour camp for Jews in the town.

On 22 October 1945 the troop of Jan Kempiński, nom de guerre Błysk, operating in the Odolanów area was smashed by the Department of Security forces.