Polish immigration to the Ronchamp coal mines

It took place in three phases during the interwar period and strongly influenced the mining and cultural traditions of Ronchamp, which has been twinned with the town of Sułkowice in southern Poland since 2003.

Demand for labor was so great that the neighboring communes were no longer sufficient, and the company was forced to hire foreign workers.

[2] In Ronchamp, the labor problem was less acute, as miners from the Nord-Pas-de-Calais and Belgium coalfields, as well as German prisoners of war, had been employed in the mines since 1916.

In December of the same year, the Ronchamp collieries received 112 Polish farm workers from the Warsaw region to replace the Chinese.

[5] When France occupied Düsseldorf and Duisburg, many Polish miners moved to Westphalia with their families, a movement that gained momentum in January 1923.

[7] At the beginning of 1931, the Ronchamp coalfield was home to 1,017 Poles, including 424 workers, representing 90% of the foreign population and half of the workforce.

[10] Despite these financial difficulties, the company remained optimistic about recovery, choosing to halt new hiring, promote voluntary redundancies, and limit layoffs.

Some were retrained as farm workers thanks to government aid, while others preferred to move to other mining areas or work in factories around Belfort and Montbéliard.

Additionally, Polish workers' identity cards were restricted to the département where they were issued, which limited their mobility in seeking new employment opportunities.

[12] In 1938, the Daladier government took measures against foreigners, limiting their freedom of movement, making naturalization more difficult, and requiring them to have a health booklet.

[17] Associations are also set up to maintain Polish culture in Ronchamp, including music, dance, sport, theater, art, and religion.

[18] The company and local associations also seek to bring the two communities closer together, notably through sports clubs, a Franco-Polish festival committee and small businesses.

[20][21][22] As part of the cultural development policy of the Ballons des Vosges regional nature park, a contemporary dance show is created in Ronchamp by the festival committee to pay tribute to former Polish miners and celebrate the twinning with Sułkowice.

The show, entitled Swiatlo, which means “light” in Polish, was performed during the European Heritage Days in September 2004 by a troupe of three musicians and four dancers from Belfort.