Facts about Tadeusz Kosciuszko

In the first half of the 18th century, the Mereczowszczyzna manor was owned by the Sapieh family. In 1733 it was pledged to Ludwik Tadeusz Kosciuszko, who possessed the grange until it was bought out in 1764. The Kosciuszko family then moved to the family estate of Siechnowicze.

Konstantin Fedorovich was diminutively called "Kostyushka," which years later became a family name. In 1509, Sigismund I the Old, as Grand Duke of Lithuania, granted Konstantin (by a privilege written in Old Belorussian) ownership of the Siechnowicze estate, which still included neighboring hamlets. Over time, the family became Polonized.

Tadeusz's father was a court official (swordsman) and the Lithuanian field roll regiment colonel.

He interrupted his studies in 1760, with both brothers returning home due to financial troubles following the death of their father.

With the support of the Czartoryski family, he entered the Cadet Corps of the Knights' School on December 18, 1765. The Knights' School was established on the initiative of Stanislaw II August (King of Poland, 1764-1795), and its purpose was to prepare a cadre of officers, enlightened, progressive people, and good citizens.

He studied Polish history and general history, philosophy, Latin, Polish, French, German, law, economics, arithmetic, geometry and surveying.

He remained at the school as an instructor sub-brigadier with the rank of ensign and graduated with the rank of captain.

During this stay, he deepened his knowledge at the Military Academy of the Cavalry of the Royal Guard in Versailles, where he learned about modern fortifications. He also studied at the Academy of Painting and Sculpture.

Pre-revolutionary France at the time made a huge impression on him, translating into his political and social beliefs.

He had no property (his brother ran the family farm), which was an obstacle to his marriage plans linked to Ludwika Sosnowska, daughter of Lithuanian Field Hetman Jozef Sylvester Sosnowski.

He left again for Paris and learned about the war in America - the war for American independence - the American Revolution. It was an armed conflict between the Kingdom of Great Britain and its thirteen colonies in North America, lasting from 1775 to 1783.

He set sail in June 1776, probably from Le Havre, on a voyage that lasted more than two months. He arrived in Philadelphia in September and was tasked with developing a section of the city's fortification in the Delaware River area. He later worked on fortifying the entire city.

In addition to Kosciuszko, these included Marie Joseph de La Fayette (French politician), Jean-Baptiste de Rochambeau (French general and marshal of France), Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben (Prussian officer), and Casimir Pulaski (one of the leaders and marshal of the Confederation of Bar).

He became famous after the Battle of Saratoga, where he performed his fortification work. His engineering skills were recognized, and he was entrusted with constructing the strong fortress of West Point on the Hutson River, which U.S. Army Commander-in-Chief George Washington approved.

For his services, by a resolution of Congress, he was promoted to brigadier general of the U.S. Army in 1783. He was also given some 250 acres of land and a substantial sum of money to be paid later in annual installments.

Kosciuszko entrusted the rest of his estate to Thomas Jefferson. The latter was the executor of his will, which dealt mainly with the problem of abolishing slavery and related human trafficking (abolitionism).

The Society of the Cincinnati was an association formed by veterans of the American Revolution on May 13, 1783, at a camp near the town of Newburgh, bringing together the most distinguished officers who, like the Roman Cincinnatus, "left everything for the defense of the fatherland." Society is still active today.

While Kosciuszko was in Philadelphia, he was visited by Indian chief Little Turtle, to whom Kosciuszko gave a pair of pistols, with the message to use them against "anyone who would seek to conquer you or your people."

He went to his hometown of Siechanowicz, where his brother-in-law administered his part of the estate. The estate was not in debt and even brought in a small profit to cover necessary expenses. Despite the negligible amount of income, Kosciuszko decided to limit the peasants on his estate to serfdom for two days a week and exempted women from work altogether. This decision did not please the local nobility.

Great political writers, such as Stanislaw Staszic and Hugo Kollataj, called for strengthening the central government and granting more rights to the bourgeoisie and peasants. Some of the patriotic nobility also joined these demands. Sitting in 1788-1792, the Four-Year Sejm (also known as the Great Sejm) undertook the work of repairing the Republic.

In October 1789, Kosciuszko received an appointment signed by the King as a major general of the crown army. It also entailed a hefty salary of 12.000 zlotys a year, which would put an end to his constant financial troubles.

Magnate conspirators (Szczęsny Potocki, Seweryn Rzewuski, Franciszek Ksawery Branicki) formed the Targowica Confederation abolishing the provisions of the May 3 Constitution. The guarantor of the old laws' return was Tsarina Catherine II. At the request of the Targowica Confederation, the Russian army entered Poland.

In May, the Russian army, with a strength of about 100.000 soldiers, entered the territory of the Republic, and the Polish-Russian War of 1792 began.

To commemorate this victory, the King established the Order of Virtuti Militari. The first list of awarded includes, among others, the name of Major General Tadeusz Kosciuszko.

His high command competence was recognized in the battles, which was reflected in his nomination as a lieutenant general. However, before this nomination reached Kosciuszko, it was announced that all hostilities against the Russian army had been halted, as King Stanislaw August Poniatowski had joined the Targowica Confederation.

He only stayed in Leipzig for two weeks, then went to Paris to try to obtain French assistance there for the uprising planned in the Republic.

It was awarded in recognition of his activities and struggle for the ideals of freedom.

The official date of the start of the insurrection is considered to be March 24, 1794. After a briefing by officers of the Krakow garrison, Tadeusz Kosciuszko and Jozef Wodzicki went to mass at the Capuchin church, after which they laid their sabers at the foot of the altar to be consecrated. After taking the sabers in their hands, they vowed readiness to give their lives for the defense of the homeland.

The act of the uprising gave Kosciuszko the title of Supreme Chief of the National Armed Forces and placed total authority in his hands.

Due to the lack of sufficient weapons, he ordered the formation of peasant troops armed with war scythes - they went down in history as Scythemen. He also set up units of sharpshooters, precursors of snipers (Kosciuszko used his American experience here - he recruited hunters, foresters, as well as Kurpies, who were famous in the Republic for their shooting skills). Thanks to the attack of the Kosynierzy on the Russian cannons, Kosciuszko's army achieved victory at Raclawice on April 4. To mobilize the peasants to fight, Kosciuszko promulgated the so-called Proclamation of Połaniec, which limited peasants' serfdom and granted them personal freedom.

It lasted eight months, from March 24 to November 16, 1794. It ended in total defeat, followed by the Third Partition of Poland.

The battle ended with the defeat of the insurgent army and the imprisonment of wounded Kosciuszko in the Petropavlovsk fortress in St. Petersburg.

The price he had to pay for freeing 20.000 Poles from Russian prisons and gulags was to take an oath of allegiance and pledge not to return to Poland.

In the United States, he met with his friends from the American Revolution, including Thomas Jefferson, who helped him obtain a passport under a false name. In America, he was received as a Polish national hero and a great soldier fighting for freedom. Thomas Jefferson called Kosciuszko "as pure a son of liberty, as I have ever known, and of that liberty which is to go to all, and not to the few or the rich alone."

In France, he took part in the formation of the Polish Legions and the founding of the Society of Polish Republicans.

He was opposed to the idea of tying the Polish cause to him. Napoleon called Kosciuszko a "hero of the north."

Probably the same year he left for Switzerland. He settled with Franz Xavier Zeltner in Solothurn, a town in the northwestern part of the country, on the Aare River. There he spent the last years of his life.

The Tsar wanted to gain approval for the creation of the Kingdom of Poland in this way. Learning that the planned Kingdom of Poland was to be smaller than the Duchy of Warsaw, Kościuszko left Vienna after unsuccessfully attempting to contact the Tsar by letter.

A year later, a coffin with Kosciuszko's embalmed body was brought back to the country and ceremoniously deposited in the crypt of St. Leonard in Wawel Castle. In 1832, the coffin was placed in a sarcophagus.

In 1819, Emilia took the urn containing Kosciuszko's heart to Vezia near Lugano and in 1829 to Varese, Italy. Finally, in 1895, the urn was donated to the museum in Rapperswil, where it was decided to place it in the local church of St. John the Baptist.

Since June 13, 1983, the urn containing Tadeusz Kosciuszko's heart has been kept at the Royal Castle in Warsaw.

Kosciuszko, however, as a republican by conviction, was said to have refused to accept.

He later replaced the medal with the Knight's Cross of the Virtuti Militari.

The Order of Cincinnatus is an American decoration established in 1783, awarded to members of the Society of Cincinnatians.

General Nathanael Greene (General of the Continental Army during the War of American Independence) called him "a master of his profession."

The anniversary celebrations were violently suppressed by the Russian army, including the desecration of churches.

He has been honored with several monuments, including a monument in Washington, D.C., erected in 1910 to a design by Antoni Popiel, funded by the Polish-American National Committee. The monument is set up in Lafayette Park. A copy of it is located in the Saxon Garden in Warsaw. Another monument is located on the Saratoga battlefield and in Detroit.

The academy is located in a former U.S. Army fort in West Point, New York, on the Hudson River. It is the oldest military institution in the United States. George Washington chose the site for the fort, and Tadeusz Kosciuszko designed the fortifications in 1778.

The Kosciuszko Museum operates at the mound.

It is located in the house where Tadeusz Kosciuszko and Juliusz Ursyn Niemcewicz (the friend with whom Kosciuszko went into exile after leaving the Petropavlovsk fortress) lived for six months in 1797-1798.

He was painted, among others, by Jan Matejko - "Battle of Racławice", as part of the Racławice Panorama by Jan Styka and Wojciech Kossak, et al.