Article: POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SURVIVAL IN THE LATE RUSSIAN EMPIRE: THE CASE OF THE KORWIN-MILEWSKI BROTHERS.

The half century following the failed 1863 "January Insurrection" was a dark one for the Polish nation. The failure of the uprising marked also the end of an era. The Romantic ideals and revolutionary dreams that had inspired the insurgents of 1830 and 1863 seemed overdrawn and unreal in light of the harsh post-1863 repressions.(1) The vital question facing Polish society (that is, the middle and upper classes--the peasantry will not appear here) was how to preserve Polish traditions and culture without a Polish state. The failure in 1863 had tarnished the romantic revolutionary ideal of active striving for the resurrection of Poland. For the post-1863 generation, a more ...