Below is the second of my three threads, culminating with the curious story of Madam Sowiński, the widow of the Polish general Józef Sowiński. The first thread is here
https://twitter.com/threadreaderapp/status/1299470593994248193?s=21
It lead up to the beginning of the November Uprising of 1830. This one will be a

about the uprising itself. I don’t want to go into full details as it would need a long book to do so and I want to get to the main part quickly but as it is an important and relatively little known episode in Europe history, I think I will have to write more than I originally

intended. Its importance lies not only in the political sphere, for the uprising not only played a big role in the rise of Polish nationalism but it also was hugely important for Russian nationalism and one could even make a good case that the continuing hostility of Russian

nationalists to the West originated with these events. It is also of great cultural importance, as it involved the greatest Polish romantic poets: Mickiewicz, Słowacki and, in a completely different way, Krasiński, but also Chopin (see, for example, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Étude_Op._10,_No._12_(Chopin) )

and Pushkin.

The uprising began on the 29th November in Warsaw. It was by young cadets, studying to become officers in the School of Infantry Cadets in Warsaw. Their motives were patriotic, although resentment against Grand Duke Konstantin also played a role.

They attacked the Belvedere Palace, the Grand Duke residence, but he managed to escaped (supposedly dressed as a woman) to to the protection of Russian and a small number of Polish troops that remained loyal.
Immediately after failing to kill Konstantin,

the young rebels captured the Arsenal (weapons depo) and started looking for senior officers to lead the uprising. On the streets of Warsaw that night they met 6 generals and one colonel, whom they asked to join and actually lead the uprising. After meeting refusal and being

harshly berated they shot these officers dead (one general was shot by mistake, after being confused with a Russian officer). The dead generals were all distinguished Napoleon’s officers.

One of them, Maurycy Hauke was an ancestor of Queeen Elisabeth of England ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Maurice_Hauke ).

After the fall of the Uprising Tsar Nicholas would order the building of a monument to commemorate the “loyal officers” in Warsaw. The monument would stand until 1917, when socialist members of the City Council asked for and received permission to dismantle it from the German

occupying authorities.

Another officer, who came very close to being killed that night, is a central figure of this story who would later be remembered as the greatest hero of the uprising - colonel, lateer general Józef Sowiński.

Sowiński took part in many of Napoleon’s battles and lost a leg at Borodino. On the night of the Uprising, Sowiński was the head of the Application School, which mainly trained cadets for artillery units. It was more elite than the School of Cadets - only the most

outstanding cadets could be accepted to the Application School.
When Sowiński heard about what he thought to be a riot on the streets, he ordered the gates of the school to be locked, so that his cadets could not take part in it. But on the 30th of November, the rebellious

cadets broke in. Sowiński realising now that it was a serious rebellion attempted to argue with them and persuade them that the Uprising was senseless and would make things worse.

One the cadets then attempted to stab the one legged officer with a bayonet, but was prevented by another , who put himself in front of Sowiński and cried “What are you doing?! He is an invalid!”

Sowiński’s attitude was typical of the majority of senior Polish military. The great majority with them did not believe in the possibility of a Polish victory and wanted to reach compromise with the Tsar.

Besides, being born in the 18-th century, they were seriously bothered by the fact that they had taken an oath to the tsar. They remembered that Prince Poniatowski, who commanded all the forces of the Duchy of Warsaw and died in the battle of Leipzig, refused to abandon Napoleon

saying that honor comes before Fatherland. Because of this, senior officers attempted to pacify the uprising. Some, like general Krasiński, who commanded Napoleon’s Polish Imperial Guard openly sided with the Russians. Krasiński left for Russia and became a General-Adjutant of

Tsar Nicholas. He was the father of the third of the trio of great Polish romantic poets, Zygmunst Krasiński. The first two Adam Mickiewicz (who was exiled for patriotic activities during the reign of Alexander and was in Rome when the Uprising broke out) and Juliusz Słowacki

(who served on the staff of the revolutionary Polish government) supported the Uprising, but Krasiński, influenced by his father, opposed it.

Grand Duke Konstantin did not want a Russian intervention. He wanted the Polish army to put down the Uprising itself. But events in Poland were soon out of the control of the army. A famous Napoleonic general, Józef Chłopicki, was appointed dictator of the Uprising.

Like most other Polsih generals he attempted to gain time and negotiate with the tsar.
As long as Grand Duke Konstantin remained in Poland, the tsar did not attempt to intervene. But in December, seeing that the Polish army failed to put down the rebellion, Konstantin

returned to Russia. After it became clear that negotiations with the tsar were yielding no result, the Polish Parliament officially dethroned him as King of Poland, and Nicholas sent a large army under field marshal Hans Karl von Diebitsch (who had fought against Napoleon)

to crush the rebellion.
Not all Polish officers believed that war with Russia was a hopeless cause. The brilliant Chief of Staff, general Ignacy Prądzyński, make plans to take offensive actions, which aimed for a complete defeat of the Russian army in Poland,

but these plans were scaled down by the high command. General Józef Dwernicki, who defended Paris in 1814, achieved a number of brilliant battle victories.

Some of the most impressive military achievements of the Poles were due to the remarkable artillery officer Józef Bem, who would later play the most important military role in the Kossuth uprising of 1848 in Hungary.

Grand Duke Konstantin was now in Vitebsk, in Belarus, where he attentively followed news from Poland. He scandalized his Russian relatives by showing visible pleasure at every Polish victory. He died of cholera before the defeat of the Uprising.

General von Diebitsch also died of cholera (just before his death he managed to achieve a victory in the bloody and closely contested battle of Ostrołęka). Nicholas sent a new army under field marshal Ivan Paskevich.

Russia’s enormous superiority in human and economic resources now began to tell. The only hope for the Poles was now an intervention by the Western powers, especially France. Western public opinion was strongly anti-Russian and that lead to a reaction on the part of newly

emerging Russian nationalism. The surprising spokesman for them was Alexander Pushkin, an admirer and friend of the Polish poet Adam Mickiewicz.

While Mickiewicz was trying to persuade France to intervene on behalf of Poland, Pushkin published his poem “To the Slanderers of Russia” ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_the_Slanderers_of_Russia ).