Who was Józef Piłsudski?

A Polish revolutionary, soldier and statesman (1867 to 1935) who led Poland to independence in 1918 and became Marshal of Poland.

Why is 11 November Polish Independence Day?

On 11 November 1918 Piłsudski took command of the Polish forces in Warsaw, a moment seen as the rebirth of the Polish state.

What was Piłsudski's role in the Battle of Warsaw?

As commander-in-chief he directed the counterattack from the Wieprz river that broke the Red Army outside Warsaw in August 1920.

What was the May Coup?

In May 1926 Piłsudski seized power by force in Warsaw and governed Poland, formally or informally, until his death in 1935.

Where is Piłsudski buried?

In Wawel Cathedral in Kraków; his heart was buried in his mother's grave at the Rasos cemetery in Vilnius.

Józef Piłsudski: the marshal who restored Poland

For more than a century Poland had been wiped from the map. Józef Piłsudski spent his life trying to bring it back, as a conspirator, an exile, commander of the First Brigade of the Legions and, in November 1918, the leader of a reborn state. Two years later he directed the counterattack at Warsaw that stopped the Red Army.

A revolutionary from Lithuania

Born in 1867 near Wilno (Vilnius), in lands then ruled by the Russian Empire, Piłsudski was arrested at nineteen in connection with a plot against Tsar Alexander III¹ and spent five years in Siberian exile¹. He returned to become one of the leaders of the underground Polish Socialist Party, convinced that independence would come only through armed struggle.

The Legions

When the First World War broke out in 1914, Piłsudski led Polish riflemen, and then the First Brigade of the Polish Legions, into battle alongside Austria-Hungary against Russia. When, in July 1917, he urged his Legionnaires to refuse an oath of loyalty to the Central Powers, he was arrested and imprisoned at Magdeburg², which only increased his fame at home.

Józef Piłsudski standing with Legion officers in a trench, 1916 — Piłsudski (third from right) in the trenches of the 1st Infantry Regiment of the Polish Legions in August 1916, with Major Albin Fleszar and Lieutenant Bolesław Wieniawa-Długoszowski. Public domain

Independence, 1918

Released as the war ended, Piłsudski arrived in Warsaw on 10 November 1918¹ and the next day took command of the Polish forces. That date, 11 November, is celebrated as Poland's Independence Day. As Chief of State he built an army and fought for the new country's borders.

The Miracle on the Vistula

In 1920 the Red Army reached the gates of Warsaw. Piłsudski directed a counterattack from the Wieprz river into the Soviet flank³ that turned the Battle of Warsaw into a rout and saved Polish independence. He had been made Marshal of Poland in March¹ of that year.

Map of the Polish and Soviet armies around Warsaw on 13 August 1920 — The strategic deployment for the Battle of Warsaw on the evening of 13 August 1920, from General Lucjan Żeligowski's memoir published in 1930: the armies around Warsaw and the strike group gathered on the Wieprz to the south. Public domain

The coup and his legacy

Piłsudski withdrew from power in 1923 but returned by force in the May Coup of 1926¹, and ruled until his death in 1935 through a government that became increasingly authoritarian, including the detention camp at Bereza Kartuska opened in 1934⁴. He was buried in Wawel Cathedral in Kraków², and he remains one of the most admired and most debated figures in Polish history.

Piłsudski and a group of officers in greatcoats standing on a bridge, 1926 — Marshal Piłsudski (fourth from left) with officers on the Poniatowski Bridge in Warsaw on 12 May 1926, on his way to meet President Stanisław Wojciechowski at the start of the May Coup. Photograph by Marian Fuks. Public domain

Sources and notes

Numbered notes in the text point to the works below.

Encyclopaedia Britannica, “Józef Piłsudski” ↩ a b c d e
Muzeum Józefa Piłsudskiego w Sulejówku, “Józef Piłsudski 1867-1935” ↩ a b
Norman Davies, White Eagle, Red Star: The Polish-Soviet War 1919-20 (Macdonald, 1972). ↩
Andrzej Garlicki (ed. and trans. John Coutouvidis), Józef Piłsudski, 1867-1935 (Scolar Press, 1995). ↩
Wikipedia, “Józef Piłsudski”
Wikipedia, “Józef Piłsudski”