It is best known as the site of the World War II Nazi German Potulice concentration camp.

In 1807 it was regained by Poles and included within the short-lived Polish Duchy of Warsaw, and after its dissolution in 1815, it was reannexed by Prussia.

From 1871 it also formed part of Germany, until it was reintegrated with Poland, after it regained independence following World War I in 1918.

Following the joint German-Soviet invasion of Poland, which started World War II in September 1939, the village was invaded and then occupied by Germany.

In 1945, the village was liberated and restored to Poland, although with a Soviet-installed communist regime, which then stayed in power until the Fall of Communism in the 1980s.