Poles in Russian Manchuria
Manchuria, an enormous geographic territory in eastern Asia, inhabited by peoples belonging to the Tungusic language family, has for hundreds of years been part of China. At present, in result of the conquest started in 1849, and treatises of 1858-1860 extracted by force from China, its northern par...
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| Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
| Language: | Polish |
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Katolicki Uniwersytet Lubelski Jana Pawła II. Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL
2019
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| Online Access: | https://bibliotekanauki.pl/articles/1964106.pdf https://bibliotekanauki.pl/articles/1964106 |
| Summary: | Manchuria, an enormous geographic territory in eastern Asia, inhabited by peoples belonging to the Tungusic language family, has for hundreds of years been part of China. At present, in result of the conquest started in 1849, and treatises of 1858-1860 extracted by force from China, its northern part together with the Ussurian Country (Primorje), constitutes an integral part of the Russian state. This annexation triggered Polish history in these territories. The first Polish settlers in Manchuria were soldiers from the November uprising sent into exile to the Russian-Chinese border. Even before that those Poles who were convicted for their opposition against the Russian rule were put in border garrisons. After 1831, however, the influx of soldiers of Polish origin, including recruits, was so large that in the garrisons of the General Amurian Province every second soldier was Polish. They were used not only as armed forces, but also dealt with scientific research, administration and development of the occupied territories. Among them captain Jan Czerkawski was involved in the construction of almost all Russian posts on the Amur and was made the first commanding officer of Vladivostok, today a 650.000-harbour city. After the defeat of the January Uprising in Polish territories thousands of insurgents and civilians were sent into exile. Official data report ten thousand Poles exiled to East Siberia. From the 1880s onwards, when the Russian plan to colonize Manchuria and Primorje was put into effect, the exiles were sent only to Sakhalin. The most prominent of the Polish convicts on this island was Bronislaw Piłsudski, a brother of the future marshal and chief of the regenerated Poland. He was exiled there in 1886. His research on the language and culture of the natives of Sakhalin: the Ainu and the Gilac people brought him fame and earlier release from exile. Among the Polish convicts on the island there were numerous socialistic activists, and the last group of Polish political exiles in Far East consisted of the ... |
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