Wronowski, Joseph Longin
(Mar. 19, 1804 - Jan. 27, 1891)
Polish exileExactly where Joseph Wronowski was born is uncertain. He himself said he was born in the village of Wlodzimierz, supposedly the one 12 km southeast of Kalisz in the administrative district of Gmina Szczytniki, within Kalisz County, Greater Poland Voivodship, in west central Poland, but his obituary in the newspaper of Salem, Illinois, where he died January 27, 1891, stated he was born in Dubnor, Poland, which was unlisted in search engines like Google.
The derivation of the family name is wrona, the Polish word for crow, and judging from the distribution of Wronowski in Poland, 291 Of the 1400 persons of the same name in 1990 were found in the proximity of Lublin in east central Poland.
Without better records, it is best not to mention where he studied six years for the priesthood, until his mother died in 1822, and served six years in the Russian Army until he left it in 1831 to fight for his own country. After Wronowski's capture and escape to Austria, the head of the Austrian government, Prince Metternich, half baked a deal to deport him and other Polish insurgents, whom Austria held in a fortress at Brni, to the United States. The deportees marched slowly to Trieste, on the Adriatic Sea, and boarded two Austrian warships. On November 22, 1833, 234 Poles, each one wearing an overcoat and a new pair of trousers, sailed from Trieste on the Guerriera and Hebe. It took about four months to cross the water and unload the controversial cargo in New York.
The people of New York, led by Albert Gallatin, were not able to give each man $3 a week for food and lodging too long. When it was almost out of money, the New York relief committee sent 25 of them, including Wronowski, to Philadelphia, where Martin Rosienkiewicz opened a school, the first of its kind in history, to give them English lessons. In addition, each one was required to look for work and live with an English speaking family in order to learn English as fast as possible. To help them, Rosienkiewicz prepared the first Polish book in the United States. As soon as they knew that each one would receive 94 acres of land in Illinois to support themselves by farming, Matthew Carey gave them what was left in the relief fund and let them go on foot to the land grant, 1500 kilometers from Philadelphia, and closed the school in September 1834.
Wronowski worked his way to St. Louis, where he ran out of money, and in the nick of time the U.S. Army saved him. He enlisted on January 1, 1835, and in three years at the St. Louis Arsenal learned the trade of wagon maker. His obituary, however, claimed that he was also sent to Iowa and Florida to fight Indians during that time.
By 1838 it looked to Wronowski that he would do well as a wagon maker in Salem, Illinois, 100 miles east of St. Louis, where a four-horse stage and mail route was established in 1837. As Salem and Marion County grew, the streets around the courthouse and in front of stores were filled with wagons, and freguently the Polish wagon maker saw a judge, a lawyer, a minister, or someone else riding in one of his wagons. It is conceivable that early in his legal career Abraham Lincoln tried a case or two in the Marion County courthouse and Wronowski met him.
It was also time that he thought of a family. In 1839 he married a 14-year old-girl, Martha (Moore) Jackson, who came from Kentucky, where girls were married as soon as they could have babies, and they had the following children: Lucy, August 20, 1841; Sophia E., February 17, 1847; Cecilia, September 17, 1849; Frederick A., November 7, 1866, and Frank 1877. He left two married daughters and a son to mourn his loss.
On May 5, 1847, when President James K. Polk called for three regiments of volunteers from Illinois, Wronowski joined for duty with enthusiasm. Instead of carrying a gun in Mexico, however, he was on detached service most of the time in Illinois and was mustered out with the rank of sergeant on October 13, 1848, at Alton, across the Mississippi River from St. Louis, but slightly above it. He returned to Salem and resumed his trade. Gradually, as the carriage trade declined in the face of railroad expansion, he built houses instead of wagons and did other kind of carpenter work. He was also for many years coroner of Marion County.
Throughout his years at Salem he was an active member of the Masonic lodge in Marion County and the Cumberland Presbyterian Church (now known as First United Presbyterian Church). Although Salem has three historic homes on the National Register, perhaps the most important people he knew in Salem were Judge Silas M. Bryan and his son, William Jennings Bryan, who became famous in national politics. Frederick Wronowski attended Salem public schools with the judge's son, an Joseph Wronowski arranged a revival meeting when William Jennings became a Presbyterian. Actually, the senior Wronowski was a member of the Masonic fraternity and was familiar with its rituals since he was 21 years old. Upon his death the funeral services were held at the Presbyterian church under the auspices of Marion Lodge No. 130. His widow died July 22, 1902, in St. Augustine, Florida, to which the last three of her children moved.
From: Edward Pinkowski (2009)