Janina Lada-Walicka - ulan wojny 1920roku

Salvete Omnes,
[in Polish]
Hej! Hej! Ulani!
Malowane dzieci!
Niejedno serduszko
Za wami poleci!

    ... krotki wypis z linkiem do pracy pani kapral Janiny Łady-Walickiej, jej wspomnień z walk w obronie Lwowa i Polski latem 1920 roku, kiedy Lwow wystawił Małopolska Armię Ochotniczą, w skład której wchodziła Ochotnicza Jazda.

Kapral Walicka była weteranem walk  lwowskich, w obronie  Lwowa i Ojczyzny już od czasu rozpoczęcia wojny polsko-ukraińskiej. Walczyła pod komendą majora Romana Abrahama w obronie Lwowa 1918-19 roku, a od lipca 1920 stanęła w szeregi Detachement'u (oddziału lotnego Armii Ochotniczej) tegoż majora Romana Abrahama, w II Szwadronie zwanym 'Szwadronem Śmierci'.

II Szwadronem dowodził rotmistrz Ryszard Dittrich, a cala jazda Detachement'u czyli III Dyonem Jazdy rotmistrz Tadeusz Korab-Krynicki.

Zachowało się zdjęcie kapral Lady-Walickiej w grupie ze sztandarem szwadronu.

Na zdjęciu stoi, na lewo od chorążego ze sztandarem,  znanym we Lwowie pisarz  i krytyk literacki oraz wtedy jeszcze kapral (choć nazywa go kapral Walicka plutonowym)  Artur Schroeder (wkrótce bohater spod Zadwórza, naszych Polskich Termopil, które cudownie przeżył ale ciężką raną),
 

Kurier Lwowski z 20 sierpnia donosił o ranach Schroeder'a i niewoli dowódcy karabinów maszynowych porucznika Nittmana. (kapral Walicka opisuje okoliczności popadnięcia w  niewole bolszewicką porucznika)
 



Kapral Walicka pozostawiła zbiór wspomnień of owym lecie 1920r  pt  ''Ułani, Ułani Malowane Dzieci (Przyczynek do dziejów Armii Ochotniczej)'', Lwow 1921; kiedy obrońcy Lwowa wyszli do walki z 1sza Konarmia Budionnego.


My możemy żyć wesoło,
Bo nie wiemy, gdzie nasz grób:
Jedna kulka świśnie w czoło,
I na ziemie runie trup!
Taki los wypadł nam,
Dzisiaj tu, a jutro tam!

   Nota bene weterynarzem szwadronu była dr Maternowska.

Kura ze wsi wyskakuje
Gdy Żołnierza we wsi czuje,
Baba idzie do rotmistrza,
Kura z garnka łeb wytrzeszcza!

Autorka, pisząc w rok po wydarzeniach, zaznaczyła tylko parę faktów z bitwy pod Zadworzem, min sprawę wysłania do piechoty Detachement'u czyli batalionu kapitana Zajączkowskiego w Zadworzu plutonu III Szwadronu pod dowództwem podchorążego Zbroji.

a z ciekawostek to można się tam dowiedzieć, ze w czasie organizacji III dyonu Jazdy Ochotniczej 30 koni z rynsztunkiem  podarował II szwadronowi hrabia Włodzimierz Dzieduszycki, a ponad dwudziestu chłopom, którzy się zgłosili na ochotnika do wojska podarował po trzy morgi pola. Prowadzący konie urzędnicy z dóbr hrabiego Dzieduszyckiego pozostali w szwadronie - Horoszkiewicz, Krzysztofowicz i Biłycz.
Valete!

Polish Thermopylae - battle of Zadworze 17.08.1920

Salvete Omnes.
yesterday  there was the  100th anniversary of the battle of Zadworze (nowadays in Ukraine) known as the Polish Thermopylae.
 
Captain Roman Abraham, already very well known and capable soldier, organized and commanded the so called Abraham 'detachement'(detachment) in July 1920.
Abraham's unit, part of the Little-Poland Voluntary Army, was a special troop of very brave boys (Lwow Eaglets) and men and one woman (uhlan Janina Lada-Walicka in the photo below with her companions in arms as a part of the 2nd squadron also  called the Death Squadron) from Lwow, fresh from fighting during the Polish-Ukrainian war 1918-19.

The Abraham's Detachment, organized in July,   included only volunteers:
- battalion of infantry, (3 companies), commanded by captain Boleslaw Zajaczkowski,
- machine guns divizion under 1st lieutenant Dawidowicz
-machine guns squadron under 1st lieutenant and poet Tadeusz Nittman/later Krzywda Bogucki
-3 squadrons of cavalry under captain Tadeusz Korab-Krynicki,
-1 machine guns squadron -major Swiecki
-1 artillery battery under 1st lieutenant Karpowicz
- medical unit under second lieutenant Jaklinski
-logistics and wagon-kitchen unit etc 1st lieutenant Wojcicki*
*according to the volunteer chronicler Pogonowski, Boj of Lwow, 1921.
In total 1300 soldiers and 34 officers.

They went into action in the end of July in the defense of Lwow against the 1st Budionny Konarmia, According to prof. Lech Wyszczelski, Kampania Ukrainska 1920, the Abraham Detachment along with the 54th infantry regiment were withdrawing towards Winniki and Nowosiolki, to achieve the northern defense line of Lwow. Colonel Szemiot, the commander of this part of the Polish front, ordered Zajaczkowski's battalion to command the 222 hill in Zadworze while the 54th regiment moved away towards Winniki. Detachment's cavalry continued screening the front, but left their infantry withdrawing along the railway line in the morning of 17th August.
Masses of enemy cavalry from the 1st Konarmia 6th Cavalry Division etc - perhaps as many as 5000 strong -   had to circle back and retake Zadworze railway line and station.
Pogonowski, based on his contemporaries, stated that the infantry battalion was moving along the railway line in Zadworze towards Lwow, having successfully fought with their Detachment cavalry against the Bolsheviks in Nowosiolki, and was only about 2 km from the protective Barszczowicki forest where defense would have been easier against the cavalry, but during the fighting march along the Zadworze railway  Bolsheviks destroyed the munition wagons of the battalion,  and Polish soldiers faced the inevitable cavalry action along their wings and the final encirclement. 

So on August 17, 1920 for about 11 hours the 330 men strong battalion with their machine guns under overall command of captain Zajaczkowski fought  thousands of Bolshevik cavalrymen.
Eventually in spite of the heroic fighting and wonders of martial feats the 318 Polish infantrymen perished in this last stand fight.
In the rage that overtook many Bolsheviks upon the end of fighting they quartered with sabres the bodies of the Polish soldiers, and this barbaric act made their identification difficult by the loved ones. 
Some of the accounts of this battle were given by the railway's guard who was inside the Zadworze railway guard shack and by some of the survivors who were fortunately rescued by the armored Polish train, however this powerful armored train was too late to help the already fallen heroes.
 
Historians do not know how many Bolsheviks died this day.
The stubborn defense by this volunteer unit, and other volunteer units around Lwow, must have led to the abandonment by 1st Konarmia plans to capture and loot Lwow.
They marched north and soon met their Nemesis near Komarow - there will be another post about this battle, I hope

..
so in post-1920 Polish Republic this heroic battle of Zadworze became celebrated as Polish Thermopyle - and it was the Communist authorities in post-1945 Poland that suppressed and erased the memory of Zadworze in Polish collective memory. Perhaps the horrors of the Nazi and Soviet occupation of Poland helped to forget the glories of Polish Nation military victories and sacrifices of 1918-20.
Nowadays, the battle of Zadworze is very little known, but the tradition of celebrating the place - where a tall kurgan stands.


Nota bene on September 18, 1920 the City of Lwow buried, with much somber celebration aka pompa funebris, the bodies of 7 heroes of Zadworze:
Zajaczkowski, Obertynski, Demetr, Hanak, Marynowski, Gromnicki,Szarek, and their remains were buried in holly ground of  the famous Lwow Lyczakowski cemetery.

Salvete Omnes,