Search for the roots of the family Nicia, settlers in colony Węglowice

The triangle Trčkov-Freiwalde (Lesica)-Rokytnice sounds probable. But you won't know for certain until you check in the church records (both Catholic and Protestant) whether the names are attested in the area. You have to find the names of the parishes where the villages belonged and see if the records from the early 19th c. are available on Family Search. If they are not accessible online, you can try at one of Mormon Family History Centers where they should have the microfilms. I believe there must be one in Amsterdam, but there may be more in the Netherlands or elsewhere closer to your home. Even if they don't have the microfilms in the Netherlands, they will bring it for you from Salt Lake City, Utah for a small fee.
One correction: it is Silesia, not Selesia, Schlesien in German and Śląsk in Polish. And one comment: if your father lived in Sucha Góra, he may have been called up to the army in Rokitnica (Rokittnitz), which is now a district of Zabrze (Hindenburg in German) less than 10 km away, i.e. walking distance from Sucha Góra, rather than gone all the way to Rokytnice in the Bohemian Sudetes, more than 200 km away. The only problem here is that during the war Rokittnitz was re-named as Martinau. I know all these places well as I lived all my formative years in Bytom.

Very valuable input on how to take up further investigation!!
Indeed Rokittnitz versus Rokitnitz is very confusing and could easily lead to misunderstandings.

By reconstructing Józef’s life story I met some white spots in the period August 1942 – January 1944.
Józef (1925) was from 1 Oktober 1940 till 22 May 1942 apprentice-carpenter at company “Cyzik” and from 23 May 1942 till 1 Oktober 1943 apprentice-carpenter at company “Reitzig”, both are carpentries in nearby Tarnowitz / Tarnowskie Góry. On 27 February 1943 he passed the exam for journeyman-carpenter.

Józef was made prisoner of war by British forces, on 17 August 1944. Shortly afterwards he was interrogated and stated at question 16, the above. The cut-out of Q16 I have attached. The exact dates I obtained from his exam certificate.
Subsequently, at Q17 he had to answer in what way he joined the German army. Also, of Q17 I attached a cut-out. The information he gave was:
(1) Kom. Pob. 28 August 1942 in Bytom (I have no idea what Kom. Pob. means)
(2) Wcielony 30 September 1943 – Rokitnitz– Gren. Ers. Btl. 406 (Wcielony is unclear to me too)
There is anoverlap between his apprentice-time and the army involvement between 28 August 1942 and 30 September 1943, which I don’t understand.
 
From the Bundesarchiv – Deutsche Dienststelle I received the chronology, that I attached too.
It says similarly Grenadier Ersatz Bataillon 406, Rokitnitz. The web-link below gives some details about this battalion. So, I still think that is meant Rokitnitz in the Adlergebirge and not Rokittnitz nearby Sucha Góra.
www.lexikon-der-wehrmacht.de/Gliederunge...t/InfErsBat406-R.htm
… At that time existed the Grenadier Replacement Battalion 406 (Grenadier-Ersatz-Bataillon) and Reserve Grenadier Battalion 406 (Reserve-Grenadier-Bataillon). The reserve battalion was relocated to the Atlantic coast at La Rochelle. The replacement battalion was transferred to Rokitnitz in the Eagle Mountains (Adlergebirge) …

However,Józef was transferred with 18 days to Reserve Grenadier Bataillon 54, located nearby La Rochelle at the Atlantic coast (a huge submarine base).
Hopefully you can give some insight for the period between 28 August 1942 and 30 September 1943.
Best regards, Antonius Nicia.

Kom. Pob. is the abbreviation of Komisja Poborowa, which is military draft office. That is where conscripts are only registered and undergo medical checkup to find out if they are fit for service - your Józef turned up for this on Aug 28, 1942. This is not yet actual joining a military unit (in Polish wcielenie - 'wcielony' literally means incorporated (into the unit)), which in his case occurred more than a year later on Sep 30, 1943. From Q 16 in the document  I deduce that your father continued working in the Reitzik (?Germanized Rajczyk?) carpentry in Tarnowskie Góry until that time (Q16 is "what did he do before starting his service in the German army?", which was Sept 1943),  so there are no white spots in his story - his interrogators would never have allowed that!
And I feel convinced concerning Rokytnice - it's not far from Goerlitz, where Grenadier Bat. #406 originated.

By the way, I'm in a similar situation: my father passed away 20 years ago, long before I got interested in the family history about which he could have explained a lot to me...

You hit the nail on the head! My father passed away in 1981, just at the age of 55. Nevertheless, I had plenty of opportunities to ask him for all details in the past, but didn’t do so. Therefore, we only shared the headlines. Even in Poland there were lots of chances as I was with my parents in Sucha Góra for family visit in 1958, 1962, 1964, 1968. All relatives who could share our family
history were still alive at that time.
Somewhere around 2000 I got a copy of the EXTRACT that I attached when opening this thread. It was the trigger to start investigating our family history, as I now had the “proper” age . More recently, I travelled several times to Poland between 2002 and 2010. Together with my cousin in Sucha Góra, who fortunately speaks German, I visited Węglowice, Dlugi Kąt and Bór Zapilski. We found some Nicia’s over there, who were willing to tell us about the local history.
 
My EXTRACT is dated 5 August 1940. I am curious whether it is based on the Truskolasy records, or that some other archives are involved. Could it be that it is partially based on verbal interrogation, as “Traktdorf” nowhere is mentioned in the Truskolasy records? Furthermore, my guess is that the document is meant for ethnic profiling, i.e. categorizing in Deutsche Volksliste.
 
My father was captured by the British during the Battle of Caen in Normandie, close to Falaise. His personal documents in the Bundesarchiv (Wehrpass, Wehrstammbuch, Stammrolle) are lost because of war damage. The earlier mentioned questionnaire states location and date in Q24, of which I have a cut-out attached. The handwritten answer is only partially clear to me.
 
In the same questionnaire in Q19 Józef states that in March 1942 his parents and he were put on the Deutsche Volksliste III. Was this quite common in his region?
 
Regards Antonius Nicia

The literal translation of Q24 goes like this: 

Question: When and where taken captive? The details and circumstances of being taken captive:
Reply: 17 Aug 1944, near Breteville, by the English. While his unit were retreating, he remained in hiding with two Poles and waited for the arrival of the English troops. He served in 8/981 Inf[anterie] Reg[iment].
My comment: A lot of  Silesians deserted the German army and went over to the Allies side whenever opportunity occurred. My geography teacher was one of them, who with the estimated 90 000 men joined the Polish army and fought the Nazis afterwards.

Q19:  Did he or his parents or any close relatives (voluntarily) join or were compulsorily included in the Volkslisten (enumerated in German) and under what circumstances?  R: His parents and he himself signed Volksliste III in March 1942. His father works in Bytomka Coalmine as a labourer.
My comment: March 1942 was quite late. For Volksliste categories see: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volksliste
The third category was most numerous: more than a million people in this (Polish) part of Silesia that was annexed to Germany in 1939. The refusal could be punished seriously: eviction, loss of property, resettlement to GG, concentration camps, etc. Poland's government-in-exile in London, Resistance commanders and the church authorities suggested that under the circumstances the Silesians should sign the list so that they might survive in Silesia. March 1942 was quite late, as the Nazis had insisted on that since the beginning of the war.

The late signing of the Volksliste had no consequences, as Antoni could keep his house and his land until his death in 1974. This piece of land he had acquired pre-war, and was located near the cemetery in Sucha Góra. In original state the land was quite useless as it contained some deep pits, remnants of silver (opencast) mining. Antoni managed to equalise the soil and could use it for growing vegetables and holding a large flock of geese. Is it known when this opencast mining near Sucha Góra was stopped?
 
I didn’t know that my father deserted together with two other Poles, when the Division already was retreating. He just told me that he was hiding in a barn with inside a big hay stack and as soon as British soldiers, who where cleansing the area, entered the barn, he showed the white flag to surrender.
 
By the way Józef had to go a long way from La Rochelle before arriving at the battle fields of Normandy. From the reserve battalion he was after 3 months transferred to Antwerp – Belgium to join the 272 Infantry Division. Two months later the Division was moved to nearby the Spanish border to guard a sector of the French mediterranean coast, as the allied invasion was expected over there. At 6th June it was clear that the real invasion was in Normandy, subsequently the 272 I.D. was moved with high speed and arrived on 11th July south of Caen.
 
When Józef was captured, the British officers were aware that many of the prisoners were Polish. They all got the offer to join the 1st Polish Armoured Division of general Maczek. Nearly all of them accepted, including Józef. Mid September 1944 he was moved to Scotland for training as a wireless operator. From that point in time onwards he was given the name Jozef Pełka. Could this be a more or less randomly picked Polish name or has it a certain meaning? The alias was needed because when captured by the Germans he would for for sure get the death penalty. The map of the route of the 1st Polish Armoured Division I have attached.