Rating: 0 out of 5 stars
0 ratings
Loading
AP![]()
author
Alexandra Pilsudska
Alexandra Piłsudska (12 December 1882 - 31 March 1963), née Szczerbińska, was the second wife of Józef Piłsudski, the Polish statesman most responsible for the creation of the Second Polish Republi...view moreAlexandra Piłsudska (12 December 1882 - 31 March 1963), née Szczerbińska, was the second wife of Józef Piłsudski, the Polish statesman most responsible for the creation of the Second Polish Republic in 1918, 123 years after it had been taken over by Russia, Austria and Prussia.
Born in 1882 in the Suwałki Governorate, Russian Empire (now in Poland), her parents died when she was ten years old, and she was raised by her grandmother and her aunt. She graduated from high school in 1901 and soon began her studies at the Flying University.
In 1904 she joined the Polish Socialist Party (PPS), one of the two main revolutionary and political movements in partitioned Poland, the other being National Democracy. She was soon acting as a PPS agitator in Warsaw and also joined their military arm, couriering and stockpiling weapons.
She met Józef Piłsudski in 1906, when the PPS split into two factions, supporters and opponents of Jozef Piłsudski, and she remained with the Piłsudski faction. During WWI, she worked in the intelligence and communication section of the First Brigade of the Polish Legions, and soon became involved with the Polish Military Organisation. She was arrested in 1915 by the Germans in Warsaw and imprisoned in Pawiak. On her release in 1916 she returned to Warsaw and resumed her work in an organization called the Women’s League, where she became a patron and a leader in 1926 and chairwoman of a number of other associations.
After the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 she fled with her daughters via Lithuania, Latvia and Sweden to the United Kingdom. There she wrote her memoirs, and lived in London until her death in 1963, aged 80.view less