Tomasz Wawrzecki

Who was Tomasz Wawrzecki?

Tomasz Wawrzecki was a distinguished Polish politician and military commander, a general of the Polish Army. During Kościuszko's Uprising in Warsaw he succeeded Tadeusz Kościuszko as the commander of the Polish forces. His surrender to Russian troops on 16 November 1794 marked the end of the uprising.

Tomasz Wawrzecki was born on 7 March 1753 in his family manor in a small village of Widze. Little is known of his early life. He was nominated by King Stanisław August of Poland to the rank of Grand Standard-bearer of Lithuania. A strong supporter of reforms of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and then the Kingdom of Poland, he was a member of the Four-Year Sejm and a partisan of the Society of the Friends of the Constitution.

He took part in the Russo-Polish War of 1792. After the outbreak of Kościuszko's Uprising of 1794, Wawrzecki founded and financed a number of military units to fight in the regions of Samogitia and Courland. At the same time he was also a plenipotentiary of the Supreme National Council, the de facto government of Poland. On 16 October 1794, he was promoted by Kościuszko to the rank of Lieutenant General.