They helped construct bombs, organized bombings, managed weapon warehouses. And at the same time:they demanded equality in every area of life. According to the researchers, Polish feminism began with them.
“Encourage your sister to your brother's fight, let him be brave. That he would take the freedom of what was in the hand of the executioner, that he would work and live for the cause. These were the words of the workers' song To the barricades . In the years 1905-1907 it was sung almost continuously. And it perfectly illustrated what was happening in one of the hottest periods in the history of Poland in the 20th century.
Officially, a country like "Poland" did not exist then. As a result of the defeated national uprisings, the Russians tightened the screw:the use of language was forbidden, property was confiscated, and careers were blocked. And a ruthless police regime was introduced on the Vistula River. At the beginning of the century, however, the dictatorship shook itself.
In the aftermath of the lost war with Japan, a powerful workers revolution swept through the Russian Empire. It also paralyzed life in the "Kraj Nadwiślański" for many months. Hundreds of thousands of Poles took part in demonstrations, protests and parades, demanding better working conditions, fair wages, and limiting the brutality of the authorities.
Every few days there were bloody clashes with the police and the army. Streets were flooded with blood, even a kind of uprising broke out in Lodz, hundreds of barricades sprang up. Attacks on tsarist officials, policemen and military personnel were also organized. Most of these activities were completely uncoordinated. However, a few illegal organizations tried to control the crowd. Especially the Polish Socialist Party - fighting not only for better living conditions, but also for independence, or at least autonomy for Poland.
Bomb explosion during revolutionary events. A drawing by Antoni Kamieński.
Women in combat
History actually forgot about it, but in this so-called "revolution of 1905" women played a huge role that cannot be overestimated.
"Workers and intelligent people, old and young, old women and girls, children almost did a lot of various jobs," emphasized Stanisława Woszczyńska in 1929. Participant of the events from the beginning of the century and a person deeply convinced that without women there would be neither a party (which will help Józef Piłsudski gain power after many years), nor a revolution, nor any fight for independence.
Who collected, invented money and brought it to party coffers (except for seizures)? Women.
Who invented, arranged, ensured the safety of housing for illegal people, illegal "tissue paper", printing houses? Women.
Who was carrying and transporting weapons, cartridges, brochures, appeals, periodicals? Women.
Who looked after the prisoners, provided them with food, underwear, and facilitated their correspondence? Women.
Who did the interviews, searched and organized offices, stamped out, stored addresses? Women .
Another journalist, Aniela Bełzówna, emphasized in the interwar press that women served the cause at every stage:"through prisons, hard labor and gallows." Although efforts were made to limit their role in the immediate fight, it happened that they even took part in attacks against tsarist officials. When in 1906 an attempt was made to murder the Governor-General Gieorgij Skałon, the bomb was thrown by a fighter, Wanda Krahelska.
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It also happened that "tsarist martial courts sentenced women to death or life imprisonment on a par with men." In total, as historian Adam Próchnik recounted during the interwar period, at least a hundred women were brought to trial for participating in the revolution, and only in two major agglomerations of the kingdom. It is known about seven ladies that they were sentenced to death. At least one was executed by shooting.
Memories of an armorer
Aleksandra Piłsudska - one of the participants of the revolution, who played the responsible role of the party armistress, spoke a lot about the important role of her friends in the years of free Poland, and especially at the end of her life.
In an article from 1955, Mrs. Revolvers and dynamite were stored "in Pruszków at the doctor of the mental institution", "at the landowner near Pruszków", who also helped in hiding the pursued revolutionaries, and finally "at the doctor at the Infant Jesus Hospital". Another lady, a certain Guzowska, ran a secret library with military literature.
A number of female activists were responsible for maintaining the communication network. Some kind of contact boxes were, among others, a fruit shop on Chmielna Street, run by Mrs. Osińska, and another shop on Teatralny Square, owned by Mrs. Golińska.
Site of the assassination of Georgy the Rock. The bomb was thrown by a woman - Wanda Krahelska
Among the couriers, as much as Aleksandra remembered them, more than 85% were women. Also in the import of weapons from abroad, in one of the directions an experienced stagger, Józefa Rodziewiczówna, was brilliant:she was about forty years old, she could carry huge amounts of ammunition, and "when she cooperated with younger, inexperienced companions, she looked after them like a mother". After many years, Aleksandra still remembered her "beautiful sapphire eyes shaded by black eyelashes" and "little plump hands with which she made delicate lace".
The party armorer emphasized that the militants could never count either on fire assistance or escort from men, and even less on the support of a passive society. They acted alone, taking all the risks. And "even under the toughest conditions, none of this group refused to follow the instructions".
Aleksandra proudly recalled that "there was not a single case of arrest due to ineffective packing of the weapon", which her cadres were very envious of by competing parties. Most of all, however, it never happened that the courier betrayed and went over to the side of Ochrana. Meanwhile, these cases were common among men.
"There was no such department where there were no women," confirmed Aniela Bełzówna. However, there was no way to count on the fact that similar words of appreciation would fall from men. In free Poland, orders were hung only rarely on the breasts of former militants. They could not expect promotions, glory and support from the authorities.
Wanda Krahelska. A fighter and a terrorist, sentenced to death in the first instance
Only historians, after the Second World War rather than after the First World War, shyly admitted that it was women who constituted the backbone of the party organization. They prepared hiding places, weapon and tissue depots, communication systems, illegal passport offices ... Without the managers of the so-called Central Office - that is, the group that included Aleksandra Szczerbińska, but also Maria Woyczyńska or Cezaryna Kozakiewiczówna - the whole system would not be allowed to function.
Terrorists at the service of the cause
The socialists themselves did not in the least deny that their activities were terrorist. Today, researchers and journalists also openly use the term "terrorism" to describe the activities of the PPS and other organizations involved in the workers revolution of 1905.
One of the most important works on the subject is entitled "Terrorism in the service of left-wing and anarchist groups in the Kingdom of Poland until 1914". A few years ago, the book "Polish terrorists" was also published, mainly devoted to the revolution of 1905. Both books deal mainly with men:"terrorists" such as future prime ministers Józef Piłsudski, Aleksander Prystor or Walery Sławek ...
But if they practiced terrorism for the sake of independence, so did their reliable companions. And unlike the men, they could find the revolution a success.
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The birth of Polish feminism
Little has been written about the events of 1905-1907, because the grassroots uprising did not fulfill the hopes placed in it. The Polish Socialist Party collapsed, the workers' fervor died down, and the tsarist authorities - after a short stage of concessions - quickly returned to the policy of ruthless repression.
However, while for men the balance sheet of the revolution was indeed debatable, in the history of Polish women it is perhaps a forgotten, but still - a completely key card.
The events of those troubled years have proved to Polish women their own potential; they awakened their determination and conviction that the postulates were right.
Before 1905, people spoke of equal rights, timidly, and with reserve. The most far-reaching demands - not only protection at work, the parity of earnings or the rejection of the civil code in force, drawn up in the times of the great misogynist Napoleon Bonaparte, but also political rights and access to state positions - came to the fore after the revolution. There are even scholars in whose opinion 1905 should be considered the exact moment when Polish feminism was born.
Aleksandra Szczerbińska - later Piłsudska - in the photo from her youth
In the shadow of the biggest strikes and the most powerful demonstrations, the first congress of emancipated women took place in Warsaw, demanding that the elections to the self-government promised by the tsar be held without the criterion of gender.
A few months later, the new congress of women covered not only Polish women from the Russian partition, but also from all other lands occupied by the occupier. And it was the first such conference in history. Its participants demanded the overthrow of the disgusting order that almost owned them in the hands of their husbands and fathers. They spoke firmly and bluntly. Finally, they had the opportunity to count and organize themselves.
The following years will be full of new meetings, trainings and publishing initiatives. Books and newspapers outright defeating Polish sexism will start coming out. The word "patriarchy" will come into common use, with the use of all instances. Repeated for so long and so loudly until men - both Russians and Poles themselves - agree to share the world with women.