Maria Piłsudska

Maria Piłsudska, née Koplewska (1865-1921), was the first wife of Marshal of Poland Józef Piłsudski, and ostensible first lady during most of his service as Poland's Chief of State.

She was born in 1865 in Wilno to Konstanty Koplewski, a prominent physician. After graduating from gimnazjum (high school) she moved to St. Petersburg, Russia. There she studied in the "Bestuzhev Courses," effectively a university for women, while cultivating friendships among revolutionary circles. There, also, she met Marian Juszkiewicz, a young railway engineer whom she married in 1883. The marriage was not a happy one, however, and fell apart soon after the birth of their daughter Wanda in 1887.

In 1892 the beautiful, intelligent and socially poised Maria met Józef Piłsudski. After seven years of friendship, they married on July 15, 1899, at the village of Paproć Duża near Łomża. Since Maria was a divorcee and the Catholic Church did not recognize divorce, she and Piłsudski converted to Protestantism. Soon afterward they settled in Łódź, where Józef continued his revolutionary activities. In February 1900 they were arrested when a clandestine printing press was discovered in their apartment. After eleven months Maria was released, while Piłsudski remained imprisoned in the infamous Tenth Pavilion at the Warsaw Citadel in the Russian-occupied part of Poland. Upon his subsequent escape from a mental hospital in St. Petersburg, Russia, to which he had been transferred, the couple moved to Lwów in eastern Galicia (Austrian-occupied southern Poland).

In mid-November 1901 they moved to London, England, the seat of the Polish Socialist Party's leadership. In April 1902, however, pursuant to the needs of the PPS, they returned to Lwów, and in 1904 moved to Kraków.

In May 1906 Piłsudski met Aleksandra Szczerbińska, who was working with the PPS paramilitary organization. After a time, the two began an affair. In 1908, Maria Pilsudska's daughter by her first marriage, Wanda, died. By 1909 Maria was aware of Jozef's affair but refused him a divorce, and they continued to share a home until the outbreak of the First World War. Maria was very popular among the PPS and its paramilitary, and helped gain Józef adherents. The marriage progressively deteriorated, however, and after his release from Magdeburg prison Piłsudski did not return to her. Aleksandra Szczerbińska became his de facto wife, although for propriety's sake they had to maintain separate homes. Maria Piłsudska withdrew from public life and continued to reside in Kraków.

Maria Piłsudska died in Krakow on August 17, 1921. She was buried at the Rossa Cemetery in Wilno. Piłsudski did not attend the funeral; two months later he married Aleksandra, by whom he had had a daughter, Wanda, in 1918, and a second daughter, Jadwiga, in 1920.