Jasper County Democrat, Volume 21, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 July 1918 — HONOR BRAVE POLE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

HONOR BRAVE POLE

Kosciuszko Will Ever Be Name to Be Revered by Those Who Recognize His Life's Devotion tg the Sacred Cause of Human Liberty. PUBLIC attention has, to some extent, recently been turned back to the career and tlihea of Thaddeus Kosciuszko. In England a measure of recognition has been given to the virtues and accomplishments of the Polish patriot. In the United States his contemporaries and their descendants have paid tribute to his memory. Some Americans have joined in testimonials, but only in an inconspicuous way, while their government has taken no official cognizance of the proceedings at home or abroad. The apparent indifference to the memory of this remarkable man by a nation to which he gave his services freely a trying hotfr inay be hastily attributed, in some quarters, to the proverbial ingratitude of republics, but the seeming neglect was doubtless very largely due to the state of the and the incessant demands on attention by important current events. Had conditions been normal, respect and honor would have been freely bestowed upon the name of the great Pole. Time was when the United States vied with his native land in acclaiming him a hero. The opportunity of the nation to whom he proved a friend in need did not, however, wait upon the present revival of interest in him, nor will the gratitude of the people of that nation cease when the revival shall have spent itself. The United States can and will, in due season, , pay its debt to Poland in the name of Kosciuszko with quite as much grace and quite as much honor as it is striving to pay its debt to France in the name of Lafayette. The part Kosciuszko played in the struggle of the colonies was made familiar to the school children of other generations in the Fourth reader. There Is little or nothing abgut him in the school readers of today. It was a§ an engineer rather than as a warrior that Jie proved most useful to Washington. History credits him with the'planning of the fortified camp of General Gates at Bemis Heights, and to his skill is attributed very largely the plans that made possible the victory at, Saratoga. Re constructed the fortifications of West Point, and helped to make Greene’s campaign in the

South a success. Congress recognized the value of his services, and tried to show adequate appreciation of them. He was given a vote of thanks and breveted a brigadier general. When tlie American cause triumphed he decided to depart for Poland. Kosciuszko returned to & Poland that was outraged, torn, and stripped. He plunged into what seemed a hopeless situation, and would have saved it. were it not for the weakness of Stanislaus, who concluded a humiliating peace. When the second partition occurred, in 1793, a general rising of the population took place, and Kosciuszko was made dictator. For a time he swept everything before him; the Russian garrison at Warsaw was wiped out; success for his cause seemed almost assured. Then a Prussian army entered the country from one side and two Russian armies from the other, and, after a gallant struggle, the Poles suffered a crushing defeat at Macieowice, where their commander fell, covered with wounds. He arose again, however, and. after imprisonment in St. Petersburg, was set free by the Emperor Paul, from whom he refused a commission. In the course of time he revisited the United States, received a pension and a parcel of land, and was given popular as well as public honors, but he was not contented. He could not reconcile himself to the alien law. At length he settled quietly in Switzerland, and one of his last acts was the granting of freedom to the serfs on his paternal estate. Thaddeus Koscluszko’s name is indelibly written, not only in the history, but in the nomenclature of the United States. The Americans of his time, the pioneers and nation-builders, were not unmindful of or indifferent to his Services, and they strove to prove their gratitude by naming after him many counties and towns. —Christian Science Monitor.

Kosciuszko.