Railway bridge near Wrotków

In view of the approaching Bolshevik offensive in 1920, the authorities of Lublin faced a serious decision to secure the city. The construction of fortifications and entrenchments became a necessity; it was an important undertaking that could decide the fate of the city. A Provincial Committee of National Defence was formed, which, together with the local authorities, decided not to order the evacuation of the inhabitants, but to prepare the city for defence.

News of the approaching Bolshevik army, appearing in the press, caused widespread anxiety. People were afraid of looting and rapes committed by the Bolsheviks. There was unrest in the city, food prices rose and there were shortages of bread in shops. Some inhabitants left the city, although the authorities called for defence. Fortunately, the Russian army offensive of 1920 bypassed Lublin, and the Polish army under Piłsudski regained other cities.

The fortification works in Lublin were documented in photographs, eight of which have survived. They are stuck on embossed cardboard, some of them described. People who supervised the works posed for them, including the Lublin voivode. The prints were made in the workshop of Stanisław Zawadzki in Lublin.

Stanisław Zawadzki was born in 1868 in Lublin. It is not known when exactly he took up photography, but he became the heir of the Lublin photographer Aleksander Stepanow. He managed the establishment after the death of the famous owner, initially under the former name of A. Stepanoff. In 1905, he changed the name to Stanislaw Zawadzki's Artistic Photography Establishment, formerly Stepanoff. In the interwar period, it entered into cooperation with Ludwik Radzikowski. At that time, the workshop moved from its headquarters at 2 Kościuszki Street to premises in the building of the European Hotel on Krakowskie Przedmieście Street in Lublin.