Stefan Bobrowski

Stefan Bobrowski
Stefan Bobrowski in 1862
Born	(1840-01-17)January 17, 1840 near Berdychiv, Kiev Governorate, Russian Empire
Died	April 12, 1863(1863-04-12) (aged 23) Kraków, Grand Duchy of Cracow
Organization	"Reds" (Czerwoni)
Movement	January Uprising

Stefan Bobrowski (17 January 1840 – 12 April 1863) was a Polish politician and activist for Polish independence. He participated in the January 1863 Uprising as one of the leaders of its "Red" faction and as a member of that faction's Central National Committee (Komitet Centralny Narodowy), and of the Provisional National Government (Tymczasowy Rząd Narodowy).

To rally peasants to the cause, he advocated land reform and an end to serfdom, while at the same time trying to ensure support from the szlachta (nobility). He also tried to establish links with potential revolutionaries within Russia who opposed their country's tsar.

Bobrowski died in 1863 in a pistol duel with a member of the "White" faction, Count Adam Grabowski. He had agreed to the duel though he was sure to lose due to his extreme near-sightedness.

Stefan Bobrowski was an uncle to English-language novelist Joseph Conrad, and a possible inspiration for the protagonist of Conrad's Lord Jim.

Bobrowski was born to a Polish szlachta family in Terechowa near Berdyczów, which at the time was part of the Russian Empire (now in Ukraine). In 1852 he attended a gymnasium in Nemyriv and two years later in Saint Petersburg. In 1856 he began attending Saint Petersburg State University and studying Philosophy. During this time he established contacts with radical Russian and Polish students. In 1860 he abandoned his studies and moved to Kiev, where, while pretending to be a student, he engaged himself in political activism and joined the Triple Society (Związek Trojnicki); the name was a reference to the three parts of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth which had been taken by Russia in the Partitions of Poland but not included in Congress Poland (Volhynia, Podolia and the Kiev area). The purpose of the society was to promote an end to serfdom without compensation to the landlords in the three areas and attracting the peasants to the cause of Polish independence. However, ultimately, Polish and Ukrainian members of the society disagreed on the question of Polish and Ukrainian statehood and language, and its founder, Volodymyr Antonovych left the organization, and was replaced on the ruling committee by Bobrowski. Bobrowski organized an illegal print shop in Kiev Pechersk Lavra and oversaw the publication of the society's two newspapers Odrodzenie (Rebirth) and Wielkorus (Great-Ruthenian). The Tsarist police found the print shop and closed it down in 1862, while Bobrowski avoided capture because the police mistakenly arrested another student with the same surname "Bobrowski" (who was shortly released). Stefan Bobrowski escaped to Romania. The authorities kept the case open until 1871, eight years after his death, when they finally closed it due to the "continued absence of the accused".