Polish governor helped US buy Alaska 150 years ago today
150 years ago today USA paid Russia USD 7,2 mln for 1,5 sq. km of land, namely Alaska. A Russian historian Aleksandr Petrov talks Polish contribution to the history of Alaska and its after-sale fate.
Petrov said that the signing of the Alaska Sale Agreement to the US made the region a place of symbiosis of cultures. Petrov mentioned a number of Polish people who were part of the early history of American Alaska.
One of them was Gawriła Politkowski, from the Polish noble family, a member of Political Affairs Council at the board of the Russian-American Company, an institution which decided on the fate of Alaska.
Among other Polish names mentioned by the Russian historian in the Alaskan context were Pawel Buraczek, one of the vice admirals of the Pacific Fleet, Aleksandr Wiszniewski (Wisniewski) from Vilnius, and Feliks Pietraszkiewicz, a skipper on „Mikolaj I” ship.
In Petrov's opinion Polish researchers should address issue of the Polish input in Alaska's history.
A long time passed before the Americans began to exploit Alaska economically after they bought it from Russia. Instead the area quickly became a haven for all manner of criminals and smugglers from throughout the United States as well as Russia and Canada.
And this is where another Polish thread of American Alaska history begins. Wlodzimierz Krzyzanowski, a Polish-born U.S. government official was sent there as a representative of the US adaministration to fight crime. Born in Poland’s Wielkopolska region, Krzyzanowski arrived in America at the age of 21, fleeing persecution after his conspiratorial activities during the Spring of Nations were uncovered. He owed his promotion to the rank of general in the United States to his role in America’s Civil War. He also took part in negotiations on the purchase of the Russian colony. Highly valued by the American elites, Krzyzanowski seemed to be the ideal man for the job.(PAP)
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