Born in 1869 in Zdrada near the town of Puck 10km north of Gdynia, Antoni Abraham is honoured locally as the Kashubian activist who campaigned for the incorporation of Kashubia into the newly formed Polish state after WWI.

Abraham had married Matylda Paszke from Orle in 1890 and they had 2 sons and 3 daughters. Abraham suffered the tragedy of seeing one of his daughters die in an accident as a child and further tragedy awaited when Abraham, his two sons and his son-in-law were conscripted into the German army in 1915. All three younger men were to die on the front while Abraham himself was seriously wounded.

He returned to Poland from France with General Haller’s Blue Army, presenting Haller with a traditional Kashubian snuff pouch at the ‘Marriage to the Sea’ ceremony in February 1920 when Poland regained access to the Baltic. Abraham moved into the house at ul. Starowiejska (now a restaurant) later that year and was awarded the Order of Polonia Restituta by President Stanisław Wojciechowski in 1922. Wojciechowski described Abraham as ‘a prince of the Kashubian people, whose enduring belief in his faith and language is the reason that the Polish flag now flies over the Baltic Sea.’

Designed by Stanisław Szwechowicz and unveiled on June 23, 2001 (the 78th anniversary of Abraham’s death), this 4m tall statue of the man carries the inscription ‘Son of the Kashubian land and fighter for its Polishness.’