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Zeno Świętosławski, a Polish Forerunner of the Narodniki

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2017

Peter Brock*
Affiliation:
Universities of Cracow and Oxford

Extract

In recent years polish historians have become increasingly interested in the history of the Polish socialist movement. This interest, though undoubtedly stimulated by the political and economic changes which have taken place in their country since the last war, has been shared alike by opponents and supporters of the present regime. So far, however, the main emphasis has been placed on the later stages of the movement's development. The history of the first Polish socialist organization, Lud Polski (The Polish People), founded in 18 3 5 by a group of emigre peasant soldiers in the English seacoast town of Portsmouth, has not hitherto received adequate treatment.

The theories of this organization were, indeed, based on the peasantry and were concerned almost exclusively with the organization of agriculture, for Poland still had a predominantly agrarian structure. With industry only in its infancy, “the people” for these early Polish socialists, as for Herzen and the Russian narodniki of the seventies, could in fact mean only the peasantry.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies 1954

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References

1 See Witold Narkiewicz-Jodko and Szymon Dyksztajn, Polski socjalizm utopijny na emigracji (Cracow, n.d.); Stanisław Szpotański, Początki polskiego socjalizmu (Warsaw, 1907); Hanna Mogilska, Wspólna wlasność ziemi w polskiej publicystyce lot 1835-1860 (Warsaw, 1949), pp. 14-38; Czesław Wycech, Z przeszłości ruchów chłopskich (Warsaw, 1952), pp. 40-95; Stanisław Szpotański, Lud Polski (Z dziejów polskiej myśli socjalistycznej) (Lwów, 1907). See also Kazimierz Lepszy, “Projekt planu badań w zakresie problematyki historycznych wydawnictw zródłowych,” Kwartalnik historyczny, LVIII (Warsaw, 1950-51), p. 373. The history of philosophy to be published by the Institute of Philosophy of the Soviet Academy of Sciences is even to devote a short section, prepared by the Polish Instytut Kształcenia Kadr Naukowych przy KC PZPR, to the discussion of the ideas of Lud Polski. See “Historia polskiej postepowej mysśli społecznej i filozoficznej XIX w. (do. r. 1864),” Myši filozoficzna, No. 1 (3), (Warsaw, 1952), pp. 90, 109-116.

2 I have retained throughout the spelling of Świetosławski's first Christian name which he himself used in all his publications, but Polish writers usually refer to him as Zenon. His other Christian names were Adam Władysław Bolesław.

3 St. Szpotański, “Emigracya polska w Anglii (1831-1848),” Biblioteka Warszawska (1909), p. 560, based on Świętosławski's birth and marriage certificates as well as on information collected from relatives. Zygmunt Milkowski's repeated assertion in his Sylwety emigracyjne (Lwow, 1904), pp. 37-43, that Świętosławski derived from the Ukraine is unfounded. Milkowski was writing from memory a half century after his acquaintance with the subject of his sketch which is, therefore, full of errors. The Świętosławski family (herbu Kola) originated from the province (ziemia) of Dobrzyń, where they first make their appearance as minor gentry in the middle of the sixteenth century; and during the succeeding centuries members of the family came to hold a number of influential local offices. Another branch of the family did indeed settle later in the eastern province of Wołyń this may have given rise to Miłkowski's story. See Kaspar Niesiecki, HerbarzPolski, J. N. Bobrowicz, ed. (Leipzig, 1841), VIII, p. 580. I am grateful to Dr. Szymon Konarski in Paris for furnishing valuable information about the Świetosławski family history.

4 Boniecki, Adam, Herbarz Polski (Warsaw, 1911), XIV, p. 141.Google Scholar

5 Cf. Brock, Peter, “Boleslaw Wyslouch, Founder of the Polish Peasant Party,“ The Slavonic and East European Review, XXX, No. 74 (London, 1951), p. 140.Google Scholar

6 Lud Polski w emigracji, 1835-1846 (Jersey, 1854), pp. 315, 338, 339, 356. I would like to express my gratitude to Dr. Józef Zmigrodzki for allowing me to read his unpublished essay on Świętosławski, as well as for drawing my attention to several sources used in this article.

7 Szpotański, ibid., quoting Rocznik Towarzystiva HistorycznoLiterackiego wParyzu (1867).

8 Janowski, J. N., O poczqtku demokracyi polskiej krótka wiadomość (Paris, 1862), pp. 2230;Google Scholar Katalog rękopisów biblioteki narodowej, Helena Więckowska, ed. (Warsaw, 1933), III, p. 17.

9 Szpotanski, , ibid., quoting Pielgrzym Polski (Paris), January 25, 1833;Google Scholar Okólniki Towarzystwa Demokratycznego Polskiego (Poitiers, 1835), No. 401. Aleksander died in Paris on June 24, 1835, aged 24; see Kronika emigracyi polskiej (Paris, 1835), III, pp. 154, 155.

10 Lud Polski w emigracji, pp. 339, 340, 356.

11 Krótki rys wypadków zaszyłch w ogóle emigracyi polskiej tv Londynie (Paris, 1834), pp. 33, 34; Bolesiaw Limanowski, Stanisław Worcell (Warsaw, 1948), pp. 130-34; The Jersey Times, October 7, 1834. Kryński, an ex-officer and szlachcic, who learnt the tailoring trade while in Jersey, was to be active in émigré socialist politics for the next forty years and thus provides a link between the first Lud Polski and the modern Polish socialist movement.

12 For the events leading up to the foundation of Lud Polski, see my article “The Birth of Polish Socialism,” Journal of Central European Affairs, XIII, No. 3 (Colorado, 1953). Mogilska, op. cit., p. 18, has pointed out that the name Lud Polski, has in fact been imposed by later historians. At the time the members used it only to emphasize their claim that, unlike the other gentry émigrés, they formed an integral part of the Polish people in the home country.

13 Cf. Okólniki T.D.P., Lista członków T.D.P. z 20 marca 1835, pp. 6, 7.

14 Szpotański, ibid.; Miłkowski, op. cit., p. 40. In 1836 Świętosławski married Julia Ward, by whom he had ten children. His wife survived him, and his descendants in the male line later took on English surnames.

15 Szpotański, op. cit., p. 551; Limanowski, op. cit., p. 159; Zmigrodzki, op. cit.; Łukaszewicz, Witold, “Wielka emigracja (1831-1862),” Prace Polonistyczne, IX (WrocŁaw, 1951), p. 156.Google Scholar

16 For the first use of this expression in January 1834 by Voyer d'Argenson, see W. Łukaszewicz, “Wpływ Masonerii, Karbonaryzmu i Józefa Mazziniego na polska. myśl rewolucyjna. w latach poprzedzających Wiosnę Ludów,” W stulecie Wiosny Ludów, III (Warsaw, 1951), p. 259.

17 Miller, I., “Krestjanskij vopros v programme pol'skogo demokratičeskogo obśąestva,” Voprosy istorii, No. 9 (Moscow, 1948), repeats in effect the objections put forward by Lud Polski against the Democratic Society's agrarian program.

18 The effects of the Industrial Revolution in England were as abhorrent to Świętosławski as Tsarist despotism, see L.P.iv e., pp. 315, 316, 319, 332.

19 Świętosławski, like many contemporary Poles, advocated a western frontier on the Oder, see L.P.W e., p. III.

20 L.P.w e., esp. pp. 3-5, 23-28, 103-11. This work, a large volume of over 400 closely printed, double column pages, contains almost all that is known of the history of Lud Polski. In it Świętosławski reprinted the most important items— correspondence, reports, manifestos, pamphlets, etc.—which it issued during its ten years’ existence. His principle in selecting the 201 documents printed was, however, to include only such items as had been officially approved or were clearly written in the spirit of the organisation. He did not, therefore, publish the whole of its archives, and the remaining documents have never been traced. A short preface and some notes were added.>

21 Worcell, Krępowiecki, Dziewicki, and Gronkowski from Jersey with Rupniewski and Wątróbka from London. All six were now resident in Portsmouth.

22 Ibid., pp. 3-6, 11,341,356.

23 Krępowiecki had commended the revolutionary implications of the massacre in a speech in Paris on November 29, 1832 and quite a cult had grown up around it among the extreme democrats, see Łukaszewicz, op. cit., p. 226.

24 Nowa Polska (Paris, 1836), p. 439; L.P.iv e., p. n, 44; Miłkowski, op. cit., p. 38, is probably correct in supposing that the adoption of the Commune's provocative name was due to ŚwiętosŁawski's influence. This cannot, however, have been a result, as MiŁkowski asserts, of his having been reared in the Ukraine.

25 L.P.w e., pp. 130, 135, 136, 146-72, 398, 399.

26 Ibid., pp. 146, 340. See also Komitet emigracji Polskiej w Anglji, do emigracji Polskiej (London), May 10, 1838; Jan Kucharzewski, Od bialego caratu do czerivonego (Warsaw, 1928), III, pp. 548-52. Another member, Adam Wodzyński, was expelled at the same time, though the reasons for this action are not clear. Indeed by 1838 three of the Commune's eight founder members had been expelled.

27 L.P.W e., pp. 137-44, 163, 168-71, 184-203, 399; Limanowski, op. cit., pp. 168-85. A London branch (wydzial) of the Grudziąz Commune had been set up on March 21, 1839.

28 L.P.w e., pp. 162, 197-99.

29 For Lud Polski's influence inside Poland, see Łukaszewicz, “Wielka Emigracja,“ pp. 159 ff.; Szpotański, Lud Polski, pp. 85, 86, 92.

30 Kilka aktów i dokumentów odnoszących sig do działalności Andrzeja Towiańskiego (Rome, 1898), I, pp. 23-15. Cf. L.P.w e., p. 348.

31 slL.P.w e., pp. 259, 389. For Królikowski's life and beliefs, see Gryzelda Missalowa, “Francuski socializm utopijny i jego wpływ na polską myśl rewolucyjną w latach 1830-1848,” W stulecie Wiosny Ludów, III, pp. 132-46.

32 L.P.w e., pp. 230, 231; Polska Chrystusoiva: Pismo poświęcone zasadom społecznym (Paris, 1843), I, p. 388; Zbratnienie: Pismo pośvięcone sprawie polskie) (Paris, 1847), pp. 95-101.

33 L.P.w e., pp. 302, 311, 356.

34 Ibid., p. 230.

35 Ibid., pp. 315,319.

36 The Pope, for Świętosławski, was “a Tsar in the robes of the Church.” For examples of his violently anti-clerical Catholicism, somewhat similar to Mickiewicz's, see ibid., pp. 221, 381, 395, 397.

37 The Grudziąz Commune appears to have wished to retain the death penalty for other serious offences, but Świętosławski remained adamant on this point, see ibid., p. 351.

38 Świętosławski also advocated within the larger federation “a united Slavonic Republic,” into which Hungary was to be incorporated because the majority of its inhabitants were Slavs, see ibid., p. 306, 400.

39 Ibid., pp. 277-302. See also Szpotański, op. cit., chapter XI; Abraham G. Duker, “Polish Émigré Christian Socialists on the Jewish Problem,” Jewish Social Studies (October, 1952), pp. 323 and 324. Duker is unable to find in the Statutes any traces of anti-Jewish feeling which was not entirely absent, on the other hand, from WorcelPs writings. Nevertheless, the comparison, quoted from another document, of the Polish monarchists to “the stupid and damned Jews, the oppressors of the people's fatherland,” is Świętosławski and not, as Duker implies, Worcell's.

40 L.P.w e., pp. 249, 302-04, 313, 329, 343-63, 400. The correspondence issuing from the Praga Commune has not, unfortunately, been preserved for this period.

41 Ibid., pp. 361, 371, 374, 377. It appears that the Statutes were actually first published separately in London, though I have been unable to trace a copy of this edition.

42 Ibid., p. 260. Besides Świętosławski, Rupniewski who had come from Portsmouth in 1837, Hellmann and Dzierzbinski had remained on in the Commune in Jersey. But there were at that period at least twelve more Polish refugees on the island, see ibid., p. 370.

43 Ibid., p. 379, 390, 391. That Świętosławski sensed the approach of an uprising is shown by his article on “Przyszle powstanie Pblski,” composed for Królokowski in November 1845. See ibid., pp. 380-89; Szpotański, op. cit., chapter V.

44 Franciszek Stawiarski, “Dziennik emigracyi polskiey w Portsmouth” (Paris, Bibliothèque Polonaise), pp. 1030, 1032. For a previous visit of Świętosławski to Portsmouth in 1841 to help the peasant soldiers with their November 29 anniversary meeting, see ibid., pp. 716, 717. I wish to thank Mrs. Maria Danilewicz and Dr. Czesław Chowaniec for making this manuscript diary available for my use.

45 Cf. Okólniki T.D.P. (Paris), January 1846-May 1849. Łukaszewicz, op. cit., p. 168 is mistaken in assuming that most members rejoined.

46 L.P.w e., p. 378.

47 Listy emigracyjne Joachima Lelewela, Helena Więckowska, ed. (Cracow, 1952), III, 431; L.P.W e., p. II. In March 1848 there were 72 still left in Portsmouth and a further 70 in London. Stawiarski on behalf of General Dwernicki and Rupniewski for the Democratic Society were both active in trying to devise means to transport them back to Poland. See Stawiarski, op. cit., pp. 1162, 1163, 1178, 1183, 1196, 1200. This diary, however, does not say anything about how or when any of the men actually got to Poland.

48 For Świętosławski stay in Paris, Wł. Mickiewicz, Żywot Adama Mickiewicza (Poznań, 1895), IV, p. 45; Szpotański, Bibl. Warszawska (1908), p. 561.

49 Public Record Office (London), Treasury 50.94, Pay Lists for Polish Refugees.

50 For Świętosławski activities in Jersey during the early 1850's, see my article “Ślady polskie na wyspie Jersey,” Wiadomości, No. 400 (1953).

51 Demokrata Polski (London), June 25, 1858. Świętosławski colleagues in the Revolutionary Commune included three well-known émigrés, Ludwik Oborski, Konrad Dabrowski and his old friend Krynski, all of whom were later to take an active part in the émigré Xwiqzek Ludu Polskiego, the third association of that name, which worked closely with the First International in London during the seventies. Another prominent member was young Henryk Abicht (d. 1863), who arrived in London in 1857 from Wilno. After working for a time as Świętosławski assistant in his printing works, he transferred to Herzen's Kolokol (The Bell). For Abicht, see the article by Maksymiljan Meloch and Zofja Rutkowska, Polski Słownik Biograficzny (Cracow, 1935), I, 5, and also V. Kel'siev, “Emigrant Abikht,” Russkij vestnik (Moscow, January 1869), pp. 228-251, which gives an interesting though unreliable picture of the Polish socialist group in London about i860. Surprisingly enough there is no mention of Świętosławski.

52 The People's Paper (London), May 3, 1856.

53 Edgar Bauer, Die Wahrheit über die Internationale (Altona, 1872), p. 8. Bauer writes: “War die Internationale Verbindung 1855-1857 fast ausschliesslich in die Hände der Poien gerathen. An ihrer Spitze stand der eifrige[Świętosławski]. … Unter dem Antriebe dieser Männer war die Internationale lebendig genug.“ E. Bauer (1820-86) was one of three well-known brothers, neo-Hegelian philosophers and onetime associates of Karl Marx, whom Marx and Engels were later to attack under the name of die heilige Familie.

54 The People's Paper, July 12, 1856.

55 Müller-Lehning, A., The International Association, 1855-1859. A Contribution to the Preliminary History of the First International. Reprinted from the International Review for Social History, III (Leiden, 1938), p. 88.Google Scholar

56 This is brought out by the story of how the Revolutionary Commune was completely hoodwinked by the Poznan police president, Baerensprung, in their attempt to establish contact with the revolutionary movement in Poland. See Intrigues of the Prussian Police with a Revolutionary Committee in London (London, 1860), passim; Aleksander Guttry, Pamiętniki (Poznań, 1894), II, 22-30; Kucharzewski, op. cit., Ill, 584-91; A. Wojtkowski, “Plany powstańcze komunistów polskich w r. 1859,” Przegląd narodoivy, No. 5 (Warsaw, 1921), pp. 568-86.

57 Müller-Lehning, op. cit., pp. 32, 38, 42, 43, 49-51.

58 58L.P.w e., pp. 223, 375.

59 Herzen, A. I., Polnoe sočranie socinenij i pisem, Lemke, M. K., ed. (Leningrad, 1919), XIII, 619.Google Scholar Herzen with some exaggeration once described Worcell and Świętosławski as the only “really decent” Poles he knew among the émigrés, ibid., VIII, 505.

60 Ibid. (1920), XVI, 134. A list of the main works printed by Świętosławski in Russian for Trübner and Herzen are given in ibid., VIII, 549; IX, 48, 168; X, 52. Świętosławski also printed the International Association's bulletin, which appeared from June 1857 in four languages, French, English, Polish, and German, until after about a year it had to be discontinued for lack of funds. He was responsible, too, for printing the other propaganda material put out by the Association and its affiliates in French, English, Polish, German and Italian. The largest collection of pamphlets from his press is to be found in the International Institute of Social History at Amsterdam.

61 Kucharzewski, op. cit. (1925), II, 223.

62 The People's Paper, June 14/28, 1856.

63 Szpotański, op. cit., p. 561. I have been unable to discover the exact dates of the founding and dissolution of the Revolutionary Commune nor have I ever seen any publications issued by it. For the history or this Commune and of the Universal Printing Establishment in London, see my article in Robotnik Polski w Wielkiej Brytanji (London, November and December 1954).

64 Chronique de Jersey, December 11, 1875.

65 Szpotański, op. cit., p. 552, and Żmigrodzki, op. cit., have both assessed his literary talent very highly.