Poland and the Poles through the Eyes of a Don Cossack: Memoir, Journalistic and Literary Heritage of Ivan S. Ulyanov, Staff Officer of Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich

Abstract

Major General Ivan S. Ulyanov served more than ten years in Poland. He was one of the most famous public figures of the Don Region in the mid-nineteenth century. Ulyanov was an officer of the headquarters of Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich and was captured by the Poles during the November Uprising of 1830–1831. He wrote a number of manuscripts about Poland and made translations from Polish into Russian, most of them remained unpublished during his life. Among the most interesting materials, there are, in particular, his “Notes” about the Polish captivity, which were published by the famous Don Region historian Khariton I. Popov in the early twentieth century, in regional editions. Later they were forgotten. In the article, for the first time in historiography, an attempt was made to systematize Ivanov’s materials related to Poland. Both published and unpublished documents from the State Archive of the Rostov Region (GARO) have not yet been put into scholarly circulation. The author analyzes the circumstances of appearance of these materials, Ulyanov’s biography and his thoughts. The author concludes that Ulyanov’s work is interesting both as evidence of contemporaries, containing factual material about Poland in the years of 1830–1831, and as a cultural phenomenon as such. It is considered to be unique, because it is the first Polish-Russian translation made by a Don Region author. Also, it was an expression of a certain concept of Russian-Polish relations, formed under the influence of Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich. This concept assumed friendship and cooperation between the two nations, but under the condition of the Russian domination over the Poles.