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Poland raised the 2nd Polish Armoured Regiment in France on 29 January 1940 as the 2nd Tank Battalion and fought under this title in the French campaign of 1940. Members of the regiment reformed in Scotland on 13 November 1942 after the fall of France adopting the designation of 2nd Armoured Regiment. The reconstituted unit returned to France in late July 1944 as a part of the 10th Armoured Cavalry Brigade, 1st (Polish) Armoured Division. . Its most memorable action in Normandy being it first, one fought at Saint-Aignan on 8 August 1944; a battle which is still commemorated annually by the regiment.
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country located in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative subdivisions, covering an area of 312,696 square kilometres (120,733 sq mi), and has a largely temperate seasonal climate. With a population of approximately 38.5 million people, Poland is the sixth most populous member state of the European Union. Poland's capital and largest metropolis is Warsaw. Other major cities include Kraków, Łódź, Wrocław, Poznań, Gdańsk, and Szczecin.
A regiment is a military unit. Their role and size varies markedly, depending on the country and the arm of service.
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Sharing a border with England to the southeast, Scotland is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, by the North Sea to the northeast and by the Irish Sea to the south. In addition to the mainland, situated on the northern third of the island of Great Britain, Scotland has over 790 islands, including the Northern Isles and the Hebrides.
Following the Normandy campaign the unit saw action in Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany. The cease-fire in May 1945 found them in northwestern Germany.
Operation Overlord was the codename for the Battle of Normandy, the Allied operation that launched the successful invasion of German-occupied Western Europe during World War II. The operation was launched on 6 June 1944 with the Normandy landings. A 1,200-plane airborne assault preceded an amphibious assault involving more than 5,000 vessels. Nearly 160,000 troops crossed the English Channel on 6 June, and more than two million Allied troops were in France by the end of August.
Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Western Europe. It is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to the southwest, and the North Sea to the northwest. It covers an area of 30,688 square kilometres (11,849 sq mi) and has a population of more than 11.4 million. The capital and largest city is Brussels; other major cities are Antwerp, Ghent, Charleroi and Liège.
The Netherlands is a country located mainly in Northwestern Europe. The European portion of the Netherlands consists of twelve separate provinces that border Germany to the east, Belgium to the south, and the North Sea to the northwest, with maritime borders in the North Sea with Belgium, Germany and the United Kingdom. Including three island territories in the Caribbean Sea—Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba— it forms a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The official language is Dutch, but a secondary official language in the province of Friesland is West Frisian.
Today the traditions of the regiment are continued by the modern 10th (Polish) Armoured Brigade stationed in Świętoszów, Poland.
Świętoszów is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Osiecznica, within Bolesławiec County, Lower Silesian Voivodeship, in south-western Poland in the Lower Silesian Wilderness, on the river Kwisa. Prior to 1945 it was in Germany.
