160 years ago the January Uprising broke out | going.pl
160 years ago, on January 22, 1863, the January Uprising began with the Manifesto of the Provisional National Government, a Polish national uprising in the 19th century. “The uprising was an act of desperation, but it was not madness,” noted historian Prof. Andrzej Nowak.
After Russia’s defeat in the Crimean War, support for Poles for regaining independence or autonomy of the Kingdom of Poland began again. Conspiracy associations were organized in the areas formerly separated from the Commonwealth, whose participants undertook preparations for the fight. In the underground circles, they distinguished two functions. so-called He called the “Reds” was the commander of the armed struggle for independence and was looking for a national uprising. The “White” party, although also oriented towards independence, was against too precise plans of the uprising, propagating the idea of similar work.
In June 1860, the funeral of the widow of the hero of the November Uprising, General Józef Sowiński, turned into a national demonstration and initiated further patriotic manifestations. On 1861, on the 30th anniversary of the battle of Olszynka Grochowska, a procession was organized, the participants of which carried the banner with the Eagle and the Pursuit. He was dispersed by the gendarmes in the Old Town Square. Two days later, on the Castle Square, a large procession made it possible to free the arrested and grant them national rights. The Russians fired on the procession, killing five of its participants.
The patriotic manifestation organized on April 8, 1861 in the Castle Square in Warsaw, bloodily suppressed by the Russian army, which shot at defenseless people, was of crucial importance. At least 200 people were killed, 500 commands injured. The tsar’s governor, Mikhail Gorchakov, wrote to Tsar Alexander II: “Science has had a strong effect; everything is quiet now and trembles with fear. However, demonstrations, patriotic services, anniversary celebrations were still held in Warsaw and, among others, in in Kalisz, Płock, Radom, Lublin.
The patriotic manifestation organized on April 8, 1861 in the Castle Square in Warsaw, bloodily suppressed by the Russian army, which shot at defenseless people, was of crucial importance. At least 200 people were killed, 500 commands injured.
The tsarist authorities doubled the staffing of the Warsaw garrison. On October 14, 1861, he led the Russian services in the territory of the Kingdom of Poland under martial law. The army camped in the streets of Warsaw, the cannons were fired. Three days later – on October 17 – the City Committee of the “Red” group was established, having an uprising, visible in 1862 in the Central National Committee.
At the end of January 1862, a car following the uprising of civil authorities in the Kingdom. defining the limits of the reform: “Neither the American Constitution nor the Polish one; any political autonomy; great administrative autonomy. On May 22, 1862, Alexander II appointed his brother Fr. Konstanty Mikołajewicz, the governor of the Kingdom of Poland, and the leading step of the civil margrave Aleksander Wielopolski.
Assessing the actions of the Russian authorities, prof. Jerzy Zdrada wrote: “Concessions for Poles (…)
On January 22, 1863, the Central National Committee issued a Manifesto confirming the uprising and referring to the Provisional National Government.
Wielopolski implemented some of the social reforms, e.g. rented out peasants and a new education act, which did not, however, calm the situation in the Kingdom. His reaction to the insurgent process was a threat in 1862 to the new rules of conscription to the Russian army, the so-called Brands. For the first time since the installation of years, it is not by lottery, but on the basis of name lists. The aim of these activities was to break up the underground structures. “An ulcer swollen and cut belongs to him. I will crush the uprising within a week and then I will be able to govern,” Wielopolski told his trusted collaborator.
Branka strange in Warsaw unexpectedly on the night of January 14/15, 1863. This decision was the direct cause of the uprising. The next day, the Central National influence of Wielopolski “a great wicked committee of crimes and a traitor.” On January 19, the Committee resolved to entrust the dictatorship and the high command to General Ludwik Mierosławski.
On January 22, 1863, the Central National Committee issued a Manifesto confirming the uprising and referring to the Provisional National Government.
“The infamous invading government, enraged by the resistance of its tormented action, caused it a decisive blow – take the number of thousands of its bravest, most zealous defenders, put on the hateful Moscow uniform and rush thousands of miles to eternal misery and perdition. Polish youth vowed to throw off the accursed yoke or die. Behind her, then, the Polish nation, behind her! After the terrible disgrace of captivity, after the incomprehensible torments of oppression, the Central National Committee, currently the only legal Your National Government, seek you on the battlefield of the last, on the field of glory of life that will give you, and by the name of God in heaven, give me an oath” – it was written in the Manifesto. regarded as one of the most beautiful written texts in the history of Poland, a kind of culmination of Romantic ideas.
The insurgents, despite the support of armament and staff shortages, attacked the Russian site throughout the Kingdom of Poland. The authorities of the uprising also sought to join in it “brothers of Lithuanians and Ruthenians”, which create a common area of fighting for almost the entire territory of the Republic of Poland within the borders of 1772. Not only the Eagle, but also Pogoń and Saint. Michael the Archangel – a symbol of Kiev, Ukraine, where this uprising, although less so, is also located” – wrote prof. Andrzej Nowak.
Initially, Russia was terrified of the vision of the intervention of Western powers and a defeat greater than in the Crimean War. St. Petersburg offered the creations of insurgents as rebels murdering sleeping Russians, Germans and Jews. However, European sympathy was on the side of the insurgents and their ideas. In the public mind, the governments of Great Britain and France are governed by legal, not diplomatic, rules. “The credulity and crawling of the member states that apply to the Russian influence, under which the policy of conduct has degenerated so cruel as to be almost equal to the Russian one,” commented the London Times. Russia support Prussia, which diplomatically and intelligence-intelligence with St. Petersburg. Thus, Berlin fulfilled the promise of Chancellor Bismarck, who in 1861, upon hearing about the manifestations in Warsaw, wrote in a letter to his sister: “Beat the Poles so that their will to live will go away; and.
According to history, over a thousand clashes took place during the uprising, and in the Polish special forces a total of about 200,000. persons.
According to history, over a thousand clashes took place during the uprising, and in the Polish special forces a total of about 200,000. persons. Despite the effects of the insurgent troops, the occupying powers began to gain action. At the end of 1863, the total number of Russian troops was over 400,000, 170,000 in the Kingdom of Poland, 145,000 in Lithuania, and 90,000 in Ukraine. The National Government had no more than 10,000 partisans in this field.
The authorities of the uprising sought to win over peasants to fight, the race is cured in this tsar’s emancipation edict of March 1864, granting them ownership of the cultivated crop. The uprising began to slowly collapse at that time, the last fights continued in places until the late autumn of 1864.
Ludwik Mierosławski, having lost the fight, discontinued the proceedings after a month. The uprising of later dictators by Marian Langiewicz and Romuald Traugutt, who became a tragic symbol of the uprising. On the night of April 10/11, 1864, as a result of denunciations, the Russian police arrested Traugutt in his Warsaw quarters. Imprisoned in Pawiak, then transported to the 10th Pavilion of the Warsaw Citadel, during the investigation he did not betray his comrades.
On July 19, 1864, a Russian military court found him to be hanged to death. Sentence on the slopes of the Warsaw Citadel on August 5, 1864 at 10. Just before the execution, witnessed by a crowd of 30,000, the dictator kissed the cross. Together with Traugut, other participants of the uprising were executed – Rafał Krajewski, Józef Toczyski, Roman Żuliński and Jan Jeziorański.
After finding the Poles, they were subjected to numerous repressions, e.g. confiscation of noble estates, dissolution of monasteries in the Kingdom of Poland, high contributions and, above all, active Russification. At least 669 people were sentenced to death for participation in the uprising. Over 38,000 people were sentenced to exile.
In the period of the Polish People’s Republic, many members of the independent intellectual life gave the value of the uprising against Russia and were critical of attempts to discredit it. Frequent reflections on the events of 1863 were an allusion to the Soviet occupation after 1944.
“Judging by appearances, after the failure of the uprising, the Polish cause reached the bottom. The Kingdom’s autonomy was liquidated, the Polish language was removed from schools and offices, and the School of Activity was closed. Because of Poland, they stopped counting on the international arena” – this is how Stefan Kieniewicz summed up in the monograph “January Uprising”. The January Uprising was equally an inspiration for the health service for independence. Józef Piłsudski and his younger Legions attached particular importance to the insurance of 1863-1864. Most of them grew up in families that have surrounded the cult for half a century and its veterans.
In the Second Polish Republic, they were considered symbols of national martyrdom. On the eve of the anniversary of the outbreak of the January Uprising – the first one celebrated in free Poland on January 21, 1919 – the Temporary Head of State of the special mission of veterans of this independence uprising, whom he considered “the unsurpassed ideal of heart, sacrifice and perseverance in an unequal fight, in the hardest physical conditions, behind the next Polish soldier, fighting for the effects and effects of many soldier virtues that should be imitated”. On that day, they were recognized as soldiers of the Polish Army with the right to wear a special uniform.
In the period of the Polish People’s Republic, many members of the independent intellectual life gave the value of the uprising against Russia and were critical of attempts to discredit it. Frequent reflections on the events of 1863 were an allusion to the Soviet occupation after 1944. “When a man or nation looks at any substance and constrained when he sees that there is no freedom, opinions and opinions, freedom, culture and work, but everything it is taken in some kind of chains and buckles, everything is bound like steel corsets, so no complexes are needed. Just be a decent person, have a sense of honor and personal dignity, to rebel against such slavery, using the means and ways to get out of it, said Primate Stefan Wyszyński on the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the January Uprising.
Author: Michał Szukała
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