How Poland Outsourced Its Colonialism

The history of Polish colonialism. Did Poland ever have colonies? Technically Poland never ran an overseas empire, but through the Duchy of Courland, a tiny Baltic vassal of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, it built Fort Jacob in Gambia and a sugar colony called New Courland on Tobago under Duke Jacob Kettler. This video also covers interwar Poland and its million-member Maritime and Colonial League, the failed colonial attempts in Brazil, Angola, and Liberia, the Madagascar Plan where Józef Beck proposed shipping Poland's Jewish population to the French island, and why empire was always more about prestige and symbolism than actual economics. Timestamps: 0:00 - Intro 1:09 - Duchy of Courland and Semigallia 3:11 - Jacob Kettler 3:47 - Gambian Colonies 6:50 - Colony on Tobago 8:32 - Interwar Poland 10:17 - The Maritime and Colonial League 10:58 - Brazil, Angola, Peru, Mozambique Attempts 11:32 - Liberian Attempt 13:25 - Poland Helps Haiti's Revolution 14:03 - The Madagascar Final Solution 15:39 - Outro Socials: Discord:   / discord   Reddit:   / polishdane   Instagram:   / polishdaneyt   Facebook:   / polishdaneyt   Threads: https://www.threads.com/@polishdaneyt Twitter/X: https://x.com/PolishDaneYT BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/polishdane.b... TikTok:   / polishdane_yt   Twitch:   / polishdaneyt   LinkedIn:   / polishdane   YouTube:    / @polishdane   Sources: Oeats - thanks for making the comic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish%... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_K... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curonia... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Couroni... https://www.colonialvoyage.com/tobago... https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/1... https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/1... https://latgale.academy/the-ambitious... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gdynia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coloniz... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haiti%E... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haitian... https://www.britannica.com/topic/Fire... https://wheelerblog.london.edu/firest... https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/1... https://www.academia.edu/64111417/Pol... https://www.cambridge.org/core/journa... https://polishhistory.pl/gdynia-polan...