Brigade-General Władysław Franciszek Jabłonowski (25 October 1769 – 29 September 1802) was a Polish military officer who served in the French Revolutionary Wars. He is the first known Polish general of African descent. After joining the French army, he died of yellow fever in 1802 in Saint-Domingue, after being sent there as part of the Saint-Domingue expedition, which saw Polish troops fighting alongside the French to restore slavery in the colony. After the French and Polish suffered heavily from yellow fever, they withdrew their surviving forces from Saint-Domingue.
Early life
Władysław Franciszek Jabłonowski was born on 25 October 1769 in Gdańsk, Poland. His mother was Princess Maria Franciszka Dealire, a British woman who had married into the Polish nobility, and an unknown Black footman; the conception had occurred while Maria was visiting Paris. Dealire's husband, a Crown Army officer named Konstanty Aleksander Jabłonowski who was also known to engage in extramarital affairs, was "blithely unperturbed" when it became apparent the newly born child was not his son. Possibly due to Konstanty's desire for a male heir and the fact that anti-Black racism had not yet firmly taken root in Poland, he accepted the child as his son, naming him Władysław Franciszek Jabłonowski. During his early childhood he was nicknamed "Murzynek", a common Polish term for Black people.
Jabłonowski began studying at the École Militaire in Paris on 25 February 1783. During one schoolyear, his classmates included Napoleon and Louis-Nicolas Davout; the former subjected Jabłonowski to racist abuse, to which he once responded by stating that it was "[better] to be a Negro with a white heart than a white man with a black heart." Jabłonowski's relationship with Davout was much better, and the two became friends. Upon graduating on 20 February 1786, Jabłonowski was commissioned into the French Royal Army's Royal German Cavalry Regiment at the rank of second lieutenant. However, Jabłonowski lost his commission after going on an extended stay in Poland. Following the beginning of the French Revolution in 1789, he became a supporter of the revolution in Paris and survived the Reign of Terror.
Military career
In 1794 Jabłonowski fought in Tadeusz Kościuszko's uprising against Tsarist Russia. and commanded a legion in the Alps. There he fought against Black rebels who had revolted against French rule in mid-1802. Jabłonowski died from yellow fever on 29 September 1802 in Jérémie. They settled in what became Haiti, where their descendants are known as Polish Haitians.
In Polish culture
Jabłonowski is mentioned in Adam Mickiewicz's notable epic poem Pan Tadeusz, in the context of a veteran of the Polish legions recounting what he had seen:
::how Jabłonowski had reached the land where the pepper grows
::and where sugar is produced, and where in eternal spring
::bloom fragrant woods: with the legion of the Danube there
::the Polish general smites the Negroes [Murzyns], but sighs for his native soil
See also
- Saint-Domingue expedition