Józef Piłsudski still arouses many emotions today, and his biography would be enough for several people. He was born in a family with noble traditions, and he edited a magazine for workers. Initially, he was educated to be a doctor. He was a member and leader of the Polish Socialist Party. Literally in love with the army, despite the lack of any education in this field, he gave himself the title of the Marshal of Poland. Not always mourning a dictator is an expression of an authentic social reflex. In the case of Józef Piłsudski, however, we were dealing with real regret for the loss of a man who was placed on enormous hopes and whom he trusted enormously. On May 12, 1935, however, there was no marshal surrounded by a national myth. It was this legend that did not allow for a long time to write the whole truth about how he died.
The first information about the name of "Piłsudski" appears in the history of Lithuania in the 15th century. In 1413, Prince Ginet from the ducal Dowsprung dynasty appeared as an envoy at the congress in Horodło. In the mid-15th century, they changed their name, linking it with their Piłsudy estate. Józef Piłsudski's grandfather was (according to the Marshal's second wife, Aleksandra), Piotr Kazimierz Ignacy Piłsudski (according to his biographers, he was named Piotr Paweł; his date of birth is only 1795).
Józef Piłsudski's father, Józef Wincenty Piłsudski was born in 1833 (he died in 1902 in Saint Petersburg). During the January Uprising, he was the commissar of the insurgent government. He married his distant cousin, Maria née Billewicz. The spouses had twelve children.
In 1867, on December 5, Józef Klemens Piłsudski was born in Zułów - the property brought in as a dowry by his mother. He was the fourth child of his parents, he was called Ziuk at home. He lived there with his family for several years, when his father's inept management of the property and fire forced them to move to Vilnius in 1874. There, three years later, Józef and his older brother Bronisław began to study in a gymnasium. In order not to succumb to intense Russification, the brothers set up a club called Spójnia, under which they imported Polish books from Warsaw.
Maria Piłsudska died in 1884. A year later, Józef graduated from high school and started medical studies in Kharkiv. There he began his underground activity and was arrested for the first time for participating in a demonstration. In the spring of 1887, he was arrested on suspicion of preparing an attempt on the life of the tsar - he was sent to Siberia for five years.
After returning from Siberia in 1892, he became a member of the socialist movement. He started as a correspondent of one of the underground magazines. A year later, the young Polish Socialist Party involved him in the work of its Lithuanian section. Then he takes up the subject of the dominant Russification in Lithuania and accuses the Jews of this process. When in 1894 the Polish Socialist Party established the Central Workers' Committee, Józef Piłsudski became the editor-in-chief of the "Robotnik" magazine.
The Party also sent him as one of its representatives to the Congress of the Second International. Among the members of the PPS, he also met his first wife - Maria. They got married in 1899, and for the chosen one, the future marshal changed his religion to Evangelical-Augsburg. Together with his wife and her daughter from his first marriage, Wanda, he moved to Łódź (today there is a commemorative plaque on the tenement house in which he lived). In 1900 he was arrested again and held in various places for a year, but eventually managed to escape. After his return, he took decisive measures, thanks to which the weakened party could strengthen its position.
Taking advantage of the Russo-Japanese war and his increasingly important functions in the PPS, he went to Tokyo, where he tried to obtain the support of the local government for his independence plans. At the same time, Roman Dmowski was there as well, and for the same purpose, he was the representative of the National Democracy. This led to the emergence of a heterogeneous image of Poland in Japan and the refusal of activists to receive more serious support. Piłsudski, however, managed to establish cooperation with Kempeitai, the Japanese military police. Kempeitai paid cash for informing PPS members about the situation in Russia and allowed them to buy weapons.
Under the influence of the revolution in 1905, he organized the Fighting Organization of the PPS. After the internal crisis, he founded a new party called Polska Partia Socjalistyczna - Revolutionary Faction. Soon Józef Piłsudski began intelligence activities for Austria, directed against Russia. In 1908 in Lviv, he established the Union of Active Combat - an organization whose description of competencies made it possible to see in it the nucleus of the future Polish army. A few years later, Piłsudski also joined the Riflemen's Association or the Polish Rifle Teams. Waiting for the outbreak of the great war between the partitioning powers, he developed the topic of paramilitary organizations created in Galicia, which he planned to direct against Russia.
Piłsudski always saw Poland as the main enemy of Poland in Russia. He also did not trust the Germans. Therefore, when there was an opportunity to cooperate with the Austrian Empire, which agreed to create Polish military units, he took advantage of it. In this way, Polish legions were created in the fall of 1914. Piłsudski was the commander of the First Brigade there. His biography did not show any military preparation, therefore he was denied command of all divisions. On the other hand, he himself informed about the creation of a Secret Government in Warsaw, to which he obeyed, and which appointed him the Commander-in-Chief of the Polish Army, which was an absolute lie.
However, he managed to secure for himself the most important thing for the commander: the faithfulness and devotion of many members of the legions who were ready to lay down their lives for him. After his resignation in 1916, he managed to convince some of his former subordinates not to swear allegiance to the German emperor in the following year - it was the so-called oath crisis. Piłsudski himself was soon arrested (July 22, 1917) and finally imprisoned in Magdeburg. At the time of his arrest, his first daughter was born (due to the relationship with his later wife - Aleksandra Szczerbińska), Wanda. When Piłsudski's biography "enriched" this arrest, the future marshal gained even more popularity over the last few years.
Piłsudski was released and on November 10, 1918, he returned to Warsaw. His most important task was now to ensure the development of independent Poland. The next day, he took over the functions of supremacy and command over the army, and on November 12 he began forming the government. After the end of this process, Józef Piłsudski appointed himself the Head of State, taking full supreme power in the country until the Legislative Seym was convened.
The appointed Seym, by the Act of February 20, 1919 (known as the Small Constitution), extended his powers of the Head of State. At the same time, Piłsudski, at the head of the army, began his expedition to Vilnius, which was the beginning of the Polish-Bolshevik war. The conflict that had grown since the end of the Great War, and the important elements of which were also the Kyiv expedition and the Battle of Warsaw, led to the settlement of disputes between Poland and Russia until 1939.
In March 1920, Józef Piłsudski created a new, highest military position for himself - the First Marshal of Poland. Although there was no strong legal basis for this, and he did not sew any additional functions and privileges in tandem with the office, the next marshal was appointed only three years later. The First Marshal himself withdrew from politics on December 14, 1922, handing over power to the newly elected first president of the country - Gabriel Narutowicz.
Since then, the marshal has been releasing subsequent functions. He withdrew with his wife and daughters to Sulejówek, where he focused on writing. Piłsudski's literary output was published in 10 volumes by the Józef Piłsudski Institute devoted to the Study of the Recent History of Poland as collective journals. It contains documents, letters, orders, as well as a description of more important events in the life of the marshal.
When, in July 1934, Krakow councilors adopted a resolution to designate Wzgórze Sowiniec as the Mound for them. Marshal Piłsudski, press mentions appeared in large numbers in the press. The news on this subject was also read by Major Mieczysław Lepecki, Józef Piłsudski's adjutant, who described the following:
“I put down the newspaper, my heart squeezed. They will gravitate to the Commander, I thought. How they poured out on Krak after death, how they poured out on Wanda and how they poured out on the head of Kościuszko. But why do they want to do it in his lifetime? Sad thoughts overwhelmed me. "
Piłsudski continued to observe the political situation in the country. By resigning from office, he believed that the citizens had matured to exercise power independently through their representatives. But the passing of time only made him believe he was wrong. Finally, in 1926, on May 12, the May Coup took place, as a result of which Piłsudski and his supporters came to power again. The introduced authoritarian system of government persisted in the country even after the Marshal's death.
The undeniable fact is that Józef Piłsudski was worshiped during his lifetime. The mound is one of many examples of honoring the marshal. Of course, apart from enthusiasts, there were also critics, led by supporters of national democracy, for whom, for example, Piłsudski's federal concept was a reason for criticism. Despite this, the person of the marshal moved from the world of living people to the world of national myth long before he died.
Józef Piłsudski was not one of those people who care about their health too much, it seems that he believed in the strength of his own will more than in medicine. Health problems were noticed as early as 1914 when tuberculosis was suspected and heart weakness was noted. Trips, short periods of rest, or escapes to Vilnius were not enough to repair health, which was constantly damaged by intensive work.
Stomach cancer attacks very quickly. It probably appeared in Piłsudski's body in the second half of 1934, and in the winter the pain, swelling of the legs, and considerable weakness made themselves felt.
In 1935, the health condition deteriorated rapidly, as can be seen in the photos from that period. It was caused by an illness accompanied by vomiting, and fasting, which the marshal considered a remedy, only aggravated the weakness.
The future Prime Minister of Great Britain, Anthony Eden, who visited Józef Piłsudski on his way back from Moscow, already had a man standing by the grave in front of him. After this visit, Józef Beck canceled all visits, and for the first time gave information about the marshal's tragic state of health.
In April, Professor Wenckenbach, a Viennese doctor, came to Warsaw to take care of the Marshal's health together with a group of Polish medics. The cancerous tumors were easily felt under the skin. The diagnosed liver cancer was a metastasis of gastric cancer.
Józef Piłsudski repeated that he was not afraid of death. The father of the federal concept still tried to be interested in foreign policy matters. In his sleep, he cursed and repeated the names of French politicians who led to the signing of the pact with the Soviets.
In the last days of his life, however, the marshal was also an optimist. He was entertained by films played from a portable camera, and good humor, jokes and chants were perceived as a positive sign.
Aleksander Hrynkiewicz, one of the adjutants, noted that "this mood of the Commandant shared with us, deceptively invading our souls, giving rise to hope for better, future days." We do not know to what extent it was a bluff of a man who wanted to cheer up a distressed environment.
We would like characters of this format to embrace disease and death in a fear-free manner. Such a picture emerges from the notes of Adjutant Lepecki, who wrote about the marshal: “Not once did he break down, even in half-conscious deliriums he did not call for help, did not show any trace of anxiety or weakness of spirit. He was walking towards His destiny as in the whole life, with a proudly held high head, withdrawn and calm. What would frighten and break others, did not distort the slightest trait of character in Him (...) He expressed himself cheerfully about everything and everyone, as in the days of health. The disease did not change his attitude towards matters and people in any way. The consciousness of mind still did not leave Him. "
Unfortunately, in the diary of the aforementioned Hrynkiewicz, the Marshal's last days are described in a very painful way. At times, Piłsudski lost touch with reality, even mistaking adults for his daughters. The most painful, however, seem to be curses directed at people around you. The head of the medical commission, General Stanisław Ruppert, was particularly hard hit and at every opportunity, but other people who looked after Piłsudski could count on a "good word": "You want to torture me with your constant care, you want to kill me, you losers ...".
Both descriptions are completely contradictory, but it should be remembered that they relate to two completely different people. The first was the mythical Józef Piłsudski, who "revived" Poland, so even on his deathbed he had to show superhuman qualities. It was this person that the mound was built in Krakow. The second was Józef Piłsudski, who had a human organism, a human fear of death, a choleric temperament, and a tendency to blunt language.
Therefore, admiring the brutal and vulgar words of the marshal, we must remember that the other side of the coin is, among other things, insults against people who undoubtedly worshiped him.
Four days before his death, he visited Wenckenbach again, his diagnosis leaving no room for optimism. On the evening of May 11, there was a hemorrhage. The next day, the Viennese doctor and priest Korśmieowicz, who gave him the last rites, were summoned to the Marshal, who was losing consciousness.
Józef Piłsudski's last moments were, in fact, a solemn matter, Hrynkiewicz, who did not create for the purposes of a myth, described in a very sublime way how the Marshal died:
“The commandant looks into space with his glassy and motionless eyes. As if he was reviewing his heroic and tragic life. He reveals some thoughts, some will with a weak movement of his hands, which were always so active and mobile during his lifetime and during his illness. The silence of the graves lies behind the room, the Commander's heavy breathing is only interrupted by the faint, muffled whistle of the air squeezing through the larynx, connected as if with the gurgling of some axis of fluid in the throat. As if with a gust of spring wind, life fled on its wings as a sign made for the last time by the Commander's hand. "
After a long fight with the disease, on May 12, 1935, Józef Piłsudski, the most important father of independent Poland, died at 8:45 PM, in the Belweder Palace on the ninth anniversary of his coup d'état. Piłsudski's death only strengthened the nation's cult of the Marshal, which has been strong for several years and continues to this day. His body was buried at Wawel, and the following year his heart was placed in his mother's coffin at the Vilnius Rossa.
Józef Piłsudski's funeral was a great patriotic demonstration. Almost everyone honored his memory. The public's reactions were genuine, which is not always the case after the death of a dictator. Stanisław Cat-Mackiewicz recalled that in his hometown of Vilnius, a city with which Józef Piłsudski was also connected, during the mourning of the marshal, not a single case of theft was reported.
It can be said that Piłsudski's federal concept was finally buried together with the Marshal's body. A sign of this was the Eastern and Western liturgical vestments belonging to the Catholic and Uniate clergy present in the funeral procession.
The death of the marshal is also the "date of birth" of the new Poland. Not only Piłsudski's teenage daughters were left without a father, but also the entire ruling camp. There was no longer the moral authority that was commonly believed could bring even the greatest mess to order. There was no "Grandfather" who would "frown and everything would be fine". The Marshal's grave is located at Wawel in Kraków.
Bibliography:
Garlicki A., Józef Piłsudski 1867-1935, Znak Horyzont, Krakow 2017
Piłsudska A., Memories, Novum Press and Publishing Institute, Warsaw 1989
Wójcik Z., Józef Piłsudski 1867 - 1935, Oficyna Wydawnicza RYTM, Warsaw 2010
Lepecki M., The Diary of Adjutant Marshal Piłsudski, PWN, Warsaw 1987.
Hrynkiewicz A., Journal of the adjutant of Marshal Józef Piłsudski, in: Zeszyty Historyczne, No. 85 (1988), Literary Institute, Paris 1988.
Cisek J., Józef Piłsudski, Świat Książki, Warsaw 2007.
Garlicki A., Józef Piłsudski 1867-1935, pub. Znak, Krakow 2012.
Zaremba, History of the 20th century (1918-1939), National Institute for them. Ossoliński, Wrocław 1991.
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