Recent research has discovered an ancestor who was one of the survivors of the Polish November Uprising of 1830-1.
How over 200 young Polish servicemen came to England, were welcomed by the people of Portsmouth and one of them surprisingly ended up in the direct line of ancestry of my own East Sussex Hunnisett family line (by marriage) is explored further here.
The November Uprising
The Cadet Revolution or November Uprising of 1831 started when young Polish officers from the Military Academy revolted against Tsarist Russia, the overlord of a partitioned Poland. It started well, with the army rallying to the cause and other outlying areas of the Russian Empire joining in. Eventually local support fell away and the uprising was crushed by the Imperial Russian Army. Tsar Nicholas I closed the University of Warsaw and took Poland completely within the Russian Empire.
When the end came, rather than surrender to the Russians, over 20,000 men crossed the border into Prussia and surrendered there on the 5th October 1831. This gave the Prussians a real problem, Russia lent on them to send the men back and promised no reprisals. Some went, with disastrous results. Others left Prussia in bands of between fifty and a hundred, and travelled towards France through the various German principalities and were greeted with enthusiasm by the local populations.The Prussians made it very uncomfortable for the remaining Poles by putting them to work with convicted criminals on the roads. A different solution needed to be found; eventually in 1834, 3 ships set off for America with the reluctant remnants of the Polish Army – mainly “other ranks”.
They didn’t make it to America, the weather in the English Channel was very bad and the ships made land where they could. The Elizabeth landed at Le Havre, where the men were welcomed by the French and stayed in France. This was seen as the very best option as Polish-French relations were very good. The Union landed in Harwich, on the east coast of England. They eventually left again to go to Africa, this might seem like a strange change of direction but they were to join the French Foreign Legion and become French that way.
The 3rd ship, the Marianne , landed at Portsmouth where 212 young men (plus one wife) got off the ship and peaceably refused to get back on.
This is a transcription of the letter the Poles wrote to Captain of the Marianne about their decision to stay in England.
We, the undersigned Polish refugees, shipped by the Prussian Government, at Danzig, aboard the Mariane, bound to the United States of North America, and driven into this port, by stress of weather, and determined not to proceed to America, but to unite with our countrymen and warriors, who are in France, in order to be nearer to our own country, and not to seek our fortune in another hemisphere, having remained three months on board the Mariane, and the captain being obliged to prosecute his intended voyage we have decided not to prevent any longer the ship proceeding to sea, but land here, and now think it a duty we owe to Capt. Claasen of the Mariane, before he leaves us, on his intended journey, to declare, that during the whole of the voyage, we have received the provisions and comforts allowed us by the Prussian Government by his hands, in every accordance with Justice; and, that Captain Claasen has, with every humanity towards us, done his duty to the Prussian Government as likewise to his owner, for which we beg he will accept our most cordial thanks.
Signed by the 211 Polish Officers and Men who were embarked in the above ship. Portsmouth Feb 16 1834
The government were unprepared for this and did not offer any support or encouragement. However the local population in Portsmouth rallied round, raised money and helped the young men with food and accommodation .
” The non-commissioned officers of the 12th regiment contributed £7 and the 77th Depot gave £12, while a concert at the Green Row Rooms brought in £60”(Wikepedia)
What’s the connection?
Arthur James Hunnisett b. 1884 in St Leonard’s Hastings married Fanny Elizabeth Mary May in Hastings in 1910. Arthur’s family line goes back to the mid 1500’s all in East Sussex. However Fanny’s family turned out to be a little bit different. Her father was George M W Way and her mother was Fanny KISIELEWSKI, both born and then married in Portsea,Hampshire (the naval area of Portsmouth).
Finding Michel Kisielewski
Fanny senior is found on the 1901 census in Portsea, living at home with her parents Michael and Mary Ann Kisheliski, Michael’s birth place is stated as Poland and he was a tailor.
Michael KISIELEWSKI married Mary Ann Ross in Portsea in 1838. They are on the 1841 census, having started their family of eventually 7 children. Many of his compatriots are in the Polish Refugee Hospital, also in Portsea and in the 1841 census.
Michael and Mary Ann stay in Portsea for the rest of their lives, their surname spelt in many weird ways in each record. Their four daughters all marry but their sons do not, so this branch of the KISIELEWSKI name does not continue.
Was Michal part of the November Revolution?
In 2004 the Polish population in Portsmouth raised money to finish a memorial for the survivors of the November Revolution who came to Portsmouth in 1834. The memorial contains a list of the 213 people who landed, with their name and rank and tells a bit of the story, and there on the list is
Michal KISIELEWSKI,
He left Poland when he was about 23 and lived the rest of his life in Portsmouth
What brought the May family to St Leonards?
George May was career Navy, as was his father before him. In 1881, the census shows him still in the Royal Navy and living in Portsmouth.
However in the 1891 census, the family had moved to Hastings (including their daughter Fanny) and George was an instructor in the Royal Navy Artillery Volunteer School. This was a government backed relatively new endeavour and provided training for any young man, of the professional and commercial classes, who wished to be in the naval reserve and had no background in the navy. George would have run training in Boat skills, General fitness and Weapons handling, “The drills will comprise those for great guns, rifle, pistol, and cutlass”.
How did George & Fanny get to Hastings, East Sussex?
By the time of the next census in 1901, George had changed roles and was the Superintendent of the White Rock Baths in Hastings This was an underground complex built on land reclaimed from the sea, when George was in charge there were both gentlemens and ladies baths and also a fashionable turkish bath. According to the newspaper reports it was always teetering on the bring of bankruptcy so it can’t have been a very settled existence.
There is a photograph in the Hastings & St Leonards Pictorial Advertiser, showing George & Fanny’s sons in their WW1 uniforms, along with their son in law, A Hunnisett. This last was Arthur Hunnisett who had married Fanny May in 1910. The photo was taken in early 1917 and by then George was the manager of the local Masonic Hall, presumably a bit less precarious an occupation than managing the White Rock Baths.
Sources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_Uprising
THE ORGANISATION OF THE ROYAL NAVAL ARTILLERY VOLUNTEERS EXPLAINED BY
THOMAS BRASSEY, M.P, 1874
http://www.victorianturkishbath.org/6DIRECTORY/AtoZEstab/England/HastWhite/1HastWhiteSF.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_into_Hampshire
Hampshire Telegraph – Monday 24 February 1834 © THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Milosz K. CybowskiUniversity of Southampton
First and last refuge: France and Britain as centres of the Polish Great Emigration
150th anniversary of the Polish landing – https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-26315789
http://www.memorialsinportsmouth.co.uk/cemeteries/polish.htm
Ancestry. co.uk, FindMyPast.co.uk, FreeBMD
Hastings & St Leonard’s Observer, British Newspaper Association,