Thaddeus Kosciusko (Tadeusz Kosciuszko) (1746-1817) is a well-known name. The Poles consider him their national hero. He is an honorary citizen of France and the US, where he made a sizable contribution to the struggle for American independence. A monument to this Polish figure stands at West Point Military Academy (US), which cadets always salute.
In recent times Belarusians have begun referring to Kosciusko as their national hero. Belarus has established a foundation named after him, where an international conference dedicated to this outstanding personality was held, and restored a manor in Mereszowszczyzna, where Kosciusko was allegedly born. Contemporary Belarusian researchers are writing about Kosciusko as “one of them,” a Belarusian.
Meanwhile, Kosciusko is of little interest to Ukrainians. Since his activities do not fit the Ukrainian stereotype of national heroes, Ukrainians are not rushing to enshrine Kosciusko in their pantheon of outstanding personalities - even though he had close links with Ukraine and Ukrainians. In any case, there are grounds to speak of his ethnic Ukrainian roots.
1. ROOTS
There is no reliable information on Kosciusko’s ethnic origin. Undoubtedly, Kosciusko was under the powerful influence of Polish culture. He studied for some time in Poland and may have considered Polish his mother tongue. He used this language mostly in his everyday life. Yet it is not quite correct to say that he was an ethnic Pole. Although in some publications he is called a “Polish general,” “a Polish figure,” etc., in reality neither his last name nor his background is Polish.
Lately, some Belarusian authors have been trying to prove Kosciusko’s Belarusian origin. Their claim is bolstered by the fact that he was born in what is now the Belarusian state. The literature on this subject includes the widespread claim that Kosciusko’s mother, Tekla Ratomska, was a Greek Catholic, like the majority of Belarusians at the time, who had her son baptized in the Greek Catholic rite and named him Andrii. This name, which is very popular among both Belarusians and Ukrainians, is associated with Apostle Andrew the First Called, the legendary baptizer of the Kyiv land. When Kosciusko’s Catholic father, who had been away temporarily, returned and found out what his wife had done, he re-baptized his son as Tadeusz.
This theory is questionable. First of all, there is no serious documented proof. There is scant information about the place and time of Kosciusko’s birth and even this data is questionable. For example, there was a debate about Kosciusko having been born on the family estate of Siechnowicze or on the estate of Merachovshchyna near the town Kosovo. Second, this theory appears to be a beautiful but implausible legend. As a rule, in interdenominational (e.g., Catholic- Uniate) noble families, which were quite common in Ukraine at the time, parents would agree on the baptismal rite for their children. It was extremely unusual for a wife to baptize her child in a certain rite contrary to the will of her husband. Also unlikely was the “double baptism” in the same church because both Roman Catholics and Greek Catholics belonged to the same religious denomination. Nevertheless, anything was possible in this period, when the Polish Kingdom was rife with political anarchy and the nobility was free to do as it pleased.
In all probability, what prompted Belarusian researchers to opt for the theory of Kosciusko’s re-baptism was the fact that his full name was Andrii Tadeusz Bonawentura, although Kosciusko always used his second, not first, name and went down in history as such.
In order to determine Kosciusko’s ethnic origin, one should perhaps refer to his family tree as well as the ethnic face of the region where his ancestors lived and where he was born. It is widely believed that Siechnowicze (now Velyki and Mali Sekhnovychy, Zhabin district, Brest oblast) was the Kosciusko family village. According to another theory, this village is Signevichi, Berezovsky district, which is located in the same oblast. But whatever the case, these villages are close to each other and belong to the same region. According to the Jesuit author K. Niasecki (1682-1744), who used some documents (no longer extant) when he was compiling his Herbownyk, in 1458 a petty nobleman named Fedor received the estate of Siechnowicze and two nearby villages from the Grand Duke of Lithuania, Casimir IV Jagiellon. Fedor’s son Kost (Kosciuszko) served as secretary in the chancellery of the Grand Duke of Lithuania, Alexander I, and in the first years of the reign of Sigismund I the Old (approximately in 1492-1509). The latter confirmed the right of Kosciuszko Fedorovych to own Siechnowicze and allowed him to use a nobleman’s coat of arms. From then on representatives of this clan were named Kosciuszko-Siechnowicki. They owned land not far from Brest (Berestia) and Kobryn. They usually married local noblewomen; in other words, they were the natives of this region.
The Kosciuszkos were Orthodox and built Orthodox churches on their family estates. When the Orthodox of Berestia embraced the Church Union, in all likelihood the Kosciuszkos also became Uniates, although by all accounts there were Greek Catholic, not Roman Catholic, churches on their lands. In any case, this applies to Siechnowicze.
When present-day Belarusian researchers claim that the Kosciuszkos are an “ancient noble family line of Belarusian origin,” they are clearly stretching the truth. The region where the Kosciuszkos lived was not ethnic Belarusian territory. In ancient Rus’, Berestia, Kobryn, and neighboring Kamianets were part of the Principality of Volhynia with its capital in what is now Volodymyr-Volynsky. In the 13th century Prince Volodymyr Vasylkovych paid great attention to the development of the Berestia region. On his orders Berestia was restored and Kamenets (Bela Vezha) built. Incidentally, the world-famous Bela Vezha Forest was named after this town. Kobryn was first mentioned in chronicles in connection with Volodymyr Vasylkovych. The prince was also concerned cultural development, and he donated various church utensils and prayer books to Berestia and Kamianets.
The Berestia region was part of the Volodymyr-Berestia eparchy with Volodymyr-Volynsky as its seat. Naturally, there was intense cultural exchange within its boundaries. This was an undivided region in terms of culture and ethnicity. Even today, in spite of Polonization, total Russification, and subsequent Belarusization, regardless of the absence of Ukrainian schools and media in the Berestia region, you can still hear a very beautiful brand of Ukrainian in local villages and even small towns. It is no accident that the Ukrainian poet Dmytro Falkivsky, who extolled Polissia, was born near Kobryn. His poem “Reeds Were My Cradle” was set to music and became a Ukrainian folk song, a kind of anthem for Polissian Ukrainians.
Kosciusko’s Belarusian origin is supported by the hypothesis that he was born on the Mereczowszczyzna estate, located a few kilometers from the town of Kosova in what is now Ivatsev district, Brest oblast. This district is a transition zone between Ukrainian and Belarusian ethnic territories. Most of the district’s areas are Belarusian except for a few villages. In any case, Kosova and its environs should be considered Belarusian territory. Nevertheless, there is no clear evidence that Kosciusko was born in Mereczowszczyzna. It was only in 1834, 17 years after Kosciusko’s death, that the vicar of Kosova, Stanislaw Narbut, issued his birth certificate, which confirmed that he had been baptized in Kosova. There is not one word about Mereczowszczyzna in this document. After Kosciusko’s death, the prevailing opinion was that he was born in Siechnowicze. It was only in the 1880s and 1890s, largely thanks to the Polish historian T. S. Korzan, that Mereczowszczyzna began to be considered Kosciusko’s birthplace. Still, this theory is based on conjecture, not documented evidence. This is why even contemporary researchers are skeptical about the Mereczowszczyzna theory.
In this writer’s opinion, Kosciusko may well have been born on the family estate of Siechnowicze, where he spent his childhood and youth. But since there was no Catholic church here, his parents decided to have him baptized in nearby Kosova.
Confirmation of the Belarusian theory is Kosciusko’s self-identification. Aspiring to a general’s rank in the army of the Polish Kingdom, he referred to himself as a “natural Lithuanian.” But the term “Lithuanian” was one of the ethnonyms applied to Belarusians. To be more exact, the documents in which Kosciusko called himself a Lithuanian in fact testified to his political, not ethnic, status. He wanted thereby to indicate that his ancestors had lived on the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and held various governmental posts.
Analyzing the information on Kosciusko’s birth, family, and lineage, I arrived at the conclusion that was an ethnic Ukrainian, not a Belarusian. For many centuries (from the mid-15th century on) representatives of the Kosciusko line lived on ethnic Ukrainian territory. The family estates were located there, too. They usually married representatives of the local elite, who had long been Orthodox, and then Uniate, and considered themselves “Rusyns” (Ruthenians).
2. IN THE VERY BEGINNING
Kosciusko also spent his childhood and youth on ethnic Ukrainian territory. He lived in Siechnowicze until 1755. Then, in all probability, he studied in Lubeszow, now part of Ukraine (Liubeshiv). Kosciusko then returned to Siechnowicze, where he lived for about five years until 1765. He may have known Ukrainian, the language of the local population, and been familiar with their traditional culture. The only question is to what extent he accepted this. He may have had some interest in Ukrainian culture because, as far as his political views are concerned, Kosciusko was a democrat and tried to improve the plight of the ordinary people.
It is possible that, like his noble neighbors, he considered himself part of the elite and oriented himself to the elitist manifestations of Polish culture. The local Ukrainian nobility of the Berestia region was highly Polonized and Kosciusko was no exception.
He was educated mostly in the Polish and Latin languages. Apparently, he first studied at home and then in a secondary school. He completed his education at a Warsaw cadet school. His activities as well as his political and cultural views can be considered as being Polonocentric.
Thus, there are grounds to consider Kosciusko a deracinated Ukrainian who “became a Pole.” Of course, we have no grounds to call Kosciusko a “great Ukrainian” or a Ukrainian national hero. He was rather “a prodigal son of Ukraine.” Like many other prodigal sons, he served other nations in a very talented fashion.
But on the other hand, it would be wrong for us to repudiate him altogether. We should remember that one of the most outstanding Polish and American national heroes was an ethnic Ukrainian. At the same time, this should be a lesson to us. The case of Kosciusko (and others) makes us reflect on why talented and energetic people work for the benefit of other nations rather than their own.
