Jan Henryk Wołodkowicz

Prince Jan Henryk Wołodkowicz, Henry Jean-Witold in French, was born the 17 of September 1765 in Sienna and died the 6 of August 1825 in St. Petersburg. He first married Anna Isabel Tepper de Ferguson, daughter of the banker Ludwig-Wilhelm Tepper de Ferguson. They had one child Joseph (officer in the French army and knight of the Légion d'honneur) and divorced in 1804. In 1805 he married Marie Thérèse Lasserey, daughter of Jacques Ambroise Lasserey. They also had one child, prince Alexander Henryk, French Henri Alexandre (Knight of the Légion d'honneur) . Henry got granted the title of count by Napoleon I.[1]

Prince Jan Henryk Wolodkowciz
Prince Jan Henryk Wolodkowicz
Nickname(s)Henry / Henri le beau
Born17 September 1765 (1765-09-17)
Sienna, Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
Died6 August 1825 (1825-08-07) (aged 59)
St. Petersburg, Russian Empire
AllegiancePolish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
 First French Empire
Duchy of Warsaw
Years of service1797–1815
RankGeneral de division
Battles/warsKościuszko Uprising; French Revolutionary Wars; Napoleonic Wars
AwardsCommandeur de la Légion d'honneur Virtuti Militari Order of Saint Stanislaus

Son of Josef Wołodkowicz and of Regina Broniec, he was a prominent member of the Polish nobility and military officer, who after the partitions of Poland emigrated to France in 1796 with 2 régiments paid on his own money and aided the French Revolution. On the first of frimaire year 8 he got employed as Général de brigade of the cavalry under the command of General Bon-Adrien Jeannot de Moncey for the French army in Italy. On the 29th of fructidor of the same year he was charged with commanding the left wing of the cavelarie in the army of Italy. In 1806 he was charged to organize and command, in quality of Général de division, the 2éme légion du Nord at Nuremberg, which was incorporated in the Grande Armée the 1st of March 1807. The 27th of September 1807 he was transferred to serve the Grand Duchy of Warsaw by order of the Emperor. The 1st of July 1812 he was made Governor of Minsk with the rank of Maréchal granted by Napoléon. Member of La Grande Armée during Napoleon's Invasion of Russia, he was taken prisoner and deported to Siberia by the Russians during the battle of Smolensk in 1812, in which his eldest son Joseph got killed. [2] He was the last Général of the Grande Armée to be released.

After being released in 1815 he spent the rest of his life fighting legal battles in St. Petersburg, to regain his confiscated and usurped estates in Poland and Belarus. The lawsuit only ended in 1903 without success due to the implication of high ranking members of the Russian nobility who embezzled facts in front of the Tsar. The Tsar perceived the request because of the defamation as a favor instead of a legitimate request, which is the reason why he rejected it. Instead Nicholas II confirmed the old princely title and allowed the inheriting of it through the female descendants of prince Henry. A last attempt to reclaim his ancestral holdings was made by prince Armand, one of Henry's great-grandsons, in 1920 after the formation of Poland, with the help of several Polish generals and the Radziwiłł family, but this project did not bear fruits because of the instability following the Polish-Soviet War.

According to some his name his carved on the west pillar of the Arc de Triomphe as "Henry", his surname given by Napoleon. The Wolodkowicz family tried three times to correct the name to Wolodkowicz, in 1840, in 1928 with the backing of the Polish embassy and in 1980. The French government always replied, that they can not alter a historic monument. Others argue it is the name of a French colonel Claude François Henry who died 1812 in Spain during the siege Valencia.

West Pillar of the Arc de Triomphe

References
  1. Autobiographic Novel, "Printemps gris" ,written by Willy de Spens d´Estignols, Edtitions de la table ronde 1974
  2. Andrzej Malejka, Wołodkowicz Jan Chrzciciel Henryk (1765-1825) (pol.)
  • [Autobiographic Novel, "Printemps gris" ,written by Willy de Spens d´Estignols, Edtitions de la table ronde 1974]


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