IF YOU NEED INDIVIDUAL STAMPS RATHER THAN THE WHOLE SET PLEASE WRITE TO ME AND I WILL LIST THEM SUBJECT TO AVAILABILITY.
SOLIDARITY STAMPS WERE PRINTED ON WHATEVER PAPER WAS AVAILABLE AS BETWEEN 1982 AND 1990 EVERYTHING WAS SCARCE IN POLAND. THIS GIVES RISE TO VARIETIES WHICH ARE DISTINGUISHED BETWEEN BY THE DISCERNING SPECIALIST.
AS FAR AS I AM AWARE, BASED ON THE MATERIAL I HAVE PERSONALLY SEEN, THIS ISSUE EXISTS ONLY ON ONE KIND OF PAPER
PLEASE NOTE THAT THE SCAN IS A STOCK SCAN. YOU WILL RECEIVE STAMPS OF A SIMILAR QUALITY
THIS PROPAGANDA STAMP SET WAS ISSUED BY THE POLISH UNDERGROUND SOLIDARITY MOVEMENT AS A DIVERSIFICATION STATEMENT AGAINST MARTIAL LAW WHICH HAD BEEN DECLARED BY THE COMMUNIST AUTHORITIES IN POLAND. IT IS A VERY RARE AND COLLECTABLE ITEM . THE UNDERGROUND MEMBERS WHO ISSUED THIS STAMP RISKED A LOT, BECAUSE IF CAUGHT THEY WOULD HAVE BEEN IMPRISONED WITHOUT TRIAL.
THIS IS AN OPPORTUNITY TO OWN A UNIQUE PIECE OF HISTORY. IT IS A MUST FOR EVERY SERIOUS HISTORIAN AND COLLECTOR OF THIS PERIOD AND WILL MAKE AN INTERESTING ADDITION TO YOUR COLLECTION.
General Wojciech Jaruzelski announced the introduction of martial law in a speech first broadcast on radio and television at 6:00 am on December 13, 1981. In order to isolate members of the opposition (from the Solidarity movement), 52 internment centers were created. A total of 10,132 internment orders were issued against 9,736 people during the period of martial law.
Andrzej Bobola (Andrew Bobola, 1591-16 May 1657) was a Polish missionary and martyr of the Society of Jesus, known as the apostle of Lithuania and the "hunter of souls".
He was born in 1591 into a noble family in Strachocina, Poland. In 1611 he entered the Jesuits in Vilnius, Grand Duchy of Lithuania. He subsequently took solemn vows in 1630 and then served for several years as an advisor, preacher, superior of a cloister, etc., in various places. From 1652 he also worked as a country "missionary", in among other places Polotsk, Grand Duchy of Lithuania, where he was probably stationed in 1655, and also in Pinsk, Lithuania (both now in Belarus). On 16 May 1657, during the Khmelnytsky Uprising, he was captured in the village of Peredil, Lithuania by the Cossacks of Chmielnicki and subjected to a variety of tortures and killed (in Janów Poleski).
One description of Bobola´s death written in 1865 states: In the same year, the Cossacks surprised a holy Polish Jesuit, in the town of Pinsk, and conferred on him the palm of martyrdom, on the 16th of May, 1657. Father Andrew Bobola, whose untiring zeal had rendered him obnoxious to the schismatics, had just offered up the holy sacrifice, when a horde of Cossacks attacked the town. On beholding the barbarians, Father Bobola fell upon his knees, raised his eyes and his hands toward heaven, and, having a presentiment that his hour had arrived, exclaimed, "Lord, thy will be done!" At that moment, the Cossacks rushed upon him, stripped him of his holy habit, tied him to a tree, placed a crown upon his head, as did the Jews upon the head of our adorable Saviour, after which they scourged him, tore out one of his eyes, burned his body with torches, and one of the ruffians traced, with his poignard, the form of a tonsure on the head of the venerable Father, and on his back the figure of a chasuble! To do this, the executioner had to strip off the skin of the holy martyr! But this was not yet all. The fingers of the apostle had received the priestly unction. The executioner tore from them the skin, and forced needles under his nails! And during this indescribable torture, the hero prayed for his tormentors; he preached, both by word and example, until the schismatics tore out his tongue and crushed his head! Father Andrew Bobola, whom the Church declared Blessed on the 30th of October 1853, was sixty-five years of age.
At the beginning of the 18th century nobody knew where his corpse was buried. In 1701 Father Martin Godebski, the rector of the Pinsk college, reputedly had a vision of Bobola. This caused him to order a search for the body. It was reportedly found completely undecomposed, which was recognized by the Church and its supporters as proof of holiness. In 1719 the casket was officially reopened and the body inspected by qualified medical personnel (five physicians and pharmacists). It was reportedly still completely undecomposed: pliable and with soft flesh.
In 1922 Bolsheviks moved the corpse, later described by an American journalist as a "remarkably well-preserved mummy", to the Museum of Hygiene of People´s Commissioners of Health in Moscow. The whereabouts of the relics was not known to the Catholic authorities, and Pope Pius XI charged the Papal Relief Mission in Russia, headed by American Jesuit Edmund A. Walsh, with the task of locating and "rescuing" them. In October 1923— as a kind of "pay" for help during famine — the relics were released to Walsh and his Assistant Director Louis J. Gallagher. Well packed by the two Jesuits, the relics were delivered to the Holy See by Gallagher on All Saints´ Day (1 November) 1923. In May 1924, the relics were installed in Rome´s Church of the Gesu, the main church of the Society of Jesus. Since 17 June 1938 the body has been in Warsaw.
Declared Blessed by Pius IX on 30 October 1853, Bobola was canonized by Pope Pius XI on 17 April 1938. His feast day is held on 16 May. Since 16 May 2002 Andrew Bobola is a patron saint of Poland and the Archdiocese of Warsaw.
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