Warsaw – St. Hyacinth’s Church

This Dominican church was constructed in the early seventeenth century and Father Abraham Bzowski arrived here in 1603 with eleven holy brothers. The church was though mostly destroyed during the Swedish War in 1655 and then rebuilt in the early 1660s. There was a reconstruction needed after Napoleon’s soldiers used it as a garrison and the frontage was also redesigned in the 1820s to put a new facade and row of shops in front of the church.

During the Second World War, the church was used as a hospital for insurgents and was badly damaged by the occupying Germans, with over 1,000 people dying here. Some guides mention that some of the bodies of those killed in the vaults of the church couldn’t be removed at the time, so remain there at rest.

The church was restored between 1947 and 1959, but the facade wasn’t put back and so the entrance is set back from the road again.

The nave of the church, which is all relatively plain, perhaps inevitable given the historic damage which has been done to the building over the centuries.

A partially damaged tomb, with the tomb on the left of the above photo being the one below, showing the damage done to the church.

Despite the location in the heart of Warsaw and its somewhat turbulent history, this church was today quiet and peaceful and retained a sense of serenity.