Before the war Hel was the main base of the Polish fleet. In September 1939 the peninsula was bombed from the air, on 3 September the Wicher and the Gryf were sunk in the harbour, and from the middle of the month the defenders were cut off from the mainland. Hel held out for 32 days and was the last Polish point of resistance on the Baltic: the capitulation was signed in Sopot on 1 October, and on 2 October the Germans entered the tip of the peninsula.
1939
- 1 September – 2 October 1939BattleBattle of HelFrom 1 September to 2 October 1939 some 3,000 soldiers and sailors held the Hel Peninsula, the last Polish centre of resistance on the Baltic.
- 3 September 1939EventThe sinking of Wicher and GryfOn 3 September 1939 German dive bombers sank the destroyer Wicher and the minelayer Gryf in the naval port of Hel, Poland’s largest warships in the Baltic.
- 2 October 1939EventThe surrender of HelOn 2 October 1939 the Germans entered the Hel Peninsula. The day before, the last pocket of resistance on the Polish coast had signed its surrender in Sopot.