Background
The lands had been part of the Greater Poland and East Pomeranian (Pomerelian) regions, which until the late 18th century partitions of Poland had been incorporated into the Poznań and Pomeranian voivodeships of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The Kingdom of Prussia had established the West Prussian province on Pomerelian and Greater Polish territories annexed during the 1772 First Partition, followed by the annexation of remaining Greater Poland in the Second Partition of 1793, which ended the existence of the Polish state.
After the Napoleonic Wars and the Congress of Vienna in 1815, Prussia maintained the acquired lands, that however still laid beyond the borders of the German Confederation. Their population was predominantly Catholic and Polish-speaking, while a sizable Protestant German minority settled mainly in the western parts. The annexed lands were internally re-arranged within the West Prussia Province and the Greater Polish Grand Duchy of Posen, which finally lost its semi–autonomous status after the failed Greater Poland Uprising of 1848. With Prussia, these provinces became part of the unified German Empire in 1871. Ethnic tensions were exacerbated by the Germanisation policies of the Berlin government and the anti-Catholic Kulturkampf measures enacted by Chancellor Otto von Bismarck.
Read more about this topic: Posen-West Prussia
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