Polish American History - 19th Century

19th Century

Though generally not considered a "wave" of immigration, many Poles emigrated to America following numerous national uprisings against the three partitioners of Poland: Prussia, Russia, and Austria. These emigrants often had ties to the political life of Poland and were often nobility, intellectuals, and political exiles escaping occupation. One of them was a doctor of medicine and a soldier, Felix Wierzbicki, a veteran of the November Uprising. He published the first English-language book printed in California, "California As It Is and As It May Be", printed 1849. The book is an "unvarnished" description of the culture, peoples, and climate of the area at that time. Wierzbicki described prospective settlers and included a survey of agriculture and hints on gold mining. Polish political exiles founded organizations in America, and the first association of Poles in America, Towarzystwo Polakow w Ameryce (Association of Poles in America) was founded March 20, 1842. The association's catchphrase was "To die for Poland". The sense of Polish nationalism was so strong among certain Polish intellectuals, that they warned repeatedly against assimilation into American culture. It was the duty of the Pole to someday return to liberate the homeland, they argued to newly arrived Poles in America. The newspaper of the Polish National Alliance Zgoda warned in 1900, "The Pole is not free to Americanize" because Poland's religion, language and nationality had been quote partially torn away by the enemies. In other words, "The Pole is not free to American eyes because wherever he is – he has a mission to fulfill." The poet Teofila Samolinska, known as the "mother of the Polish National Alliance," tried to bridge the gap between the political exiles of the 1860s and the waves of peasants arriving late in the century. She wrote:

Here one is free to fight for the Fatherland;

Here the cruelty of tyrants will not reach us,

Here the scars inflicted on us will fade.

Nevertheless, the ordinary people did assimilate – they adopted American clothing, holidays, work habits, housing, sports and the English language, while clinging to their religion and their cuisine.

The first-ever monuments to Kosciuszko and Pulaski were unveiled in Washington, DC in 1910. The political moment was highly sought after by Polish American activists, who held the first ever Polish American Congress the next day.