Edward Bernard Raczyński

Count Edward Bernard Raczyński (19 December 1891 – 30 July 1993) was a Polish diplomat, writer, politician, President of Poland-in-exile (between 1979 and 1986).

He was the longest living (101), and oldest serving Polish President (from the age of 88 to 95).

Biography


Count Edward Bernard Maria Raczyński was born on 19 December 1891 in Zakopane to a Polish aristocratic family. His father was Count Edward Aleksander Raczyński of Nałęcz coat of arms, and his mother Róża née Countess Potocka. The Raczyńskis were related to the Austro-Hungarian house of Habsburgs. The full name was "Raczyński z Małyszyna", as they were a branch of the noble family Nałęcz-Małyski from Greater Poland (the area of the town of Wieluń) and about 1540 took their name from the estate of Raczyn near Wieluń. However, the Raczyńskis remained relatively unknown until the 18th century, when four of them became Senators of Poland under different reigns. One of the Raczyńskis became a Knight of the Order of the White Eagle during the reign of King August the Strong, six of them were awarded the Virtuti Militari order during the time of Duchy of Warsaw and three received the same distinction during the November Uprising of 1831. The title of Count was awarded to different branches of the family by Prussian Kings Friedrich Wilhelm III (in 1824) and Wilhelm II (in 1905). One of their kin was a Knight of the highest Prussian Order of the Black Eagle. The Raczyńskis were a bookish family who had long been known for using their great wealth to serve patrons of the arts. Following his family's traditions, Raczyński was a well known bibliophile who was well read on a number of subjects.

Raczyński spent most of his childhood in Kraków, in the family palace Pod Baranami and in the family palace in Rogalin in Greater Poland. He studied law in Leipzig, Kraków, and London (the London School of Economics) and was awarded with a doctorate of the Jagiellonian University in Kraków in 1915. In November 1918, Raczynski joined the army of the resuscitated Poland, from which he was called to the diplomatic service in May 1919. Until 1925, he worked in Polish embassies and missions in Bern, Copenhagen and London. Back in Warsaw, he became the head of the department of international agreements. In 1932, Raczyński was appointed Polish ambassador to the League of Nations and in 1934 he became the ambassador of the Republic of Poland in the United Kingdom.

Both the British government and the British public at large tended to view Anglo-Polish relations via the prism of Anglo-German relations. In the interwar period, the Treaty of Versailles was widely felt in Britain to be too harsh towards Germany, and the British government tended to sympathise with Germany's demands for the return of the Free City of Danzig (modern Gdańsk), the Polish Corridor and Upper Silesia. The British Foreign Secretary Sir Austen Chamberlain had pursued the Locarno treaty of 1925 largely to facilitate German revanchism in Eastern Europe peacefully. France had signed a defensive alliance with Poland in 1921 and with Czechoslovakia in 1924, which were meant to deter German invasions of both states. Chamberlain believed that if Franco-German relations were improved, then France would abandon its allies in Eastern Europe, which in turn would force Poland and Czechoslovakia into the German sphere of influence as both states would have no Great Power protector such as France anymore. Raczyński himself noted right from the moment that he arrived in London as ambassador that Poland was not a nation that British officials liked very, and the British historian Adam Zamoyski wrote that Raczyński "mobilised all the reserves of his breeding, sense of humour and immense personal charm" to champion Poland's case. Zamoyski noted: "Although he was vivacious and surprisingly active, even in his nineties, Raczynski was not a forceful personality."

The two British politicians whom Raczyński was most close to were Sir Samuel Hoare and Winston Churchill. However, the reasons for the interest of Hoare and Churchill differed. Hoare was an ardent appeaser who favored a deal under which Poland would allow the Free City of Danzig to rejoin Germany while returning the Polish Corridor and Upper Silesia to the Reich. Churchill by contrast favored a "Grand Alliance" against Nazi Germany.

The Danzig crisis
During the Sudetenland crisis of 1938, Raczyński reported to his superior, the Foreign Minister Colonel Józef Beck that Poland's stance in pressing its claim to the disputed Teschen region had made a negative impression both with the British government and the British public. The Polish historian Anita Praźmowska wrote that despite the way that the government of Neville Chamberlain had favored the German claim to the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia that the Chamberlain cabinet regarded Poland's actions in pressing its claims to the Teschen region of Czechoslovakia as a treacherous and base action. On 9 December 1938, the British Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax told Raczyński that he wanted to see the League of Nations end its role as the protector of the current status of the Free City of Danzig (modern Gdańsk) by 16 January 1939. The United Kingdom was one of the veto-holding permanent members of the League Council (the executive arm of the League analogous to the Security Council of the United Nations) and thus had much say in the running of the League. The decision to have Carl Jacob Burckhardt, the League of Nations high commissioner for Danzig, pulled out created much alarm in Warsaw as the end of the League's role in protecting Danzig's status would end international involvement in the Danzig question and reduce the issue down to a bilateral German-Polish dispute. Raczyński protested very strongly that Poland wanted the League to continue its role in Danzig and succeeded in the having the question postponed. In response to Polish protests, the League Council ruled that Burckhardt would stay on as the League of Nations High Commissioner for Danzig until at least late 1939. Anglo-Polish relations were distinctly unfriendly in the first months of 1939. Raczyński reported to Warsaw on 8 February 1939 that the Chamberlain cabinet seemed to accept all of Eastern Europe as being in the German sphere of influence and stated that Chamberlain had a strong dislike of the Soviet Union. Raczyński wrote "one could risk the statement that by this "forgetting" of the Soviets, Prime Minister Chamberlain was flirting with the German partner". On 1 March 1939, Raczyński in a dispatch to Warsaw wrote the Chamberlain government was increasing its military estimates to Parliament, but stated that Chamberlain was still committed to appeasement with the increased defense spending merely being a bargaining tool with the Reich. Raczyński reported that based on his sources within the British government that Chamberlain was primarily concerned about Adolf Hitler's demand that Britain return the former German African colonies administered by Britain as mandates for the League of Nations. Raczyński expressed concern that Chamberlain might strike a deal with Hitler under which Britain would recognise Eastern Europe as being in the German sphere of influence in exchange for the Reich renouncing its claim to its former colonies in Africa. On the other hand, Raczyński predicated that if Britain and Germany failed to reach a settlement on the issue of former German colonies in Africa, then Britain would be more friendly towards Poland as a counterweight to Germany. Raczyński concluded that the future of Anglo-Polish relations depended upon whatever Britain and Germany could reach a settlement over the issue of the former German colonies in Africa.

In March 1939, the "Tilea Affair" led to increased Anglo-German tensions as the Romanian minister in London, Virgil Tilea, claimed that Romania was on the brink of a German invasion. Germany had no source of oil of its own (through German scientists were working on a project to build refineries for artificial oil) and Germany's need to import oil from abroad left the Reich very vulnerable to a British naval blockade. From the British perspective if Germany were to occupy Romania, it would have its own source of oil that would immune to a British naval blockade, hence Tilea's claims of an imminent German invasion caused much alarm in London. The defense policies of the Chamberlain government and the Baldwin government before it had been based on the "limited liability" doctrine on which the bulk of British defense spending was to go to the Royal Air Force, to be followed by the Royal Navy and the British Army to be placed last. Under the "limited liability" doctrine the British Army was to serve as a glorified colonial police force just strong to put down uprisings in the colonies of the British empire and would be too small to ever make the "continental commitment" (sending a large expeditionary force to the continent of Europe) again. As a result of the "limited liability" doctrine, the British Army was far too limited, small and underfunded to face the Wehrmacht, and as such Britain would need help to save Romania. As such, the British government asked Poland to save Romania. Romania and Poland had signed an defensive alliance in 1921 directed against the Soviet Union, but it remained unclear if Poland would go to war if German invaded Romania. France and Romania had signed a defensive alliance in 1926, but it was widely that the French Army would remain behind the Maginot Line in the event of war, which would not stop the Reich from overrunning Romania. At a cabinet meeting on 18 March 1939, Lord Halifax pressed for Britain to save Romania while the minister of the co-ordination of defense, Admiral Chatfield stated the British Army was too weak to do anything for Romania and that the two other nations that could save Romania were Poland and the Soviet Union. The British government sent out appeals to the governments of Poland, the Soviet Union, Greece, Yugoslavia and Turkey asking to join some sort of an alliance to protect Romania.

The need for Polish support for Romania led to the British taking an interest in the Danzig crisis. On 21 March 1939, Lord Halifax presented to Raczyński a note stating in regard to the Danzig crisis: "That His Majesty's government should consent, as an exceptional measure in view of the special circumstances, to the conclusion of a confidential bilateral understanding between the two countries by which the two governments would undertake to act in accordance with the terms of the proposed declaration, as supplemented by the interpretation which I had given to the Ambassador; at a previous consultation as regards in particular, the question of Danzig". Halifax asked that Raczyński not inform the French ambassador, Charles Corbin, of this offer, saying he wanted to keep this matter secret from the French. Halifax added to Raczyński: "If Poland and Germany could settle the Danzig question by direct negotiations so much the better; but if the Danzig question should develop in such a way as to involve a threat to Polish independence then this would be a matter of the gravest concern to ourselves". Colonel Beck was highly suspicious of the British offer because one of the states in the projected "peace front" was the Soviet Union and because he still believed it was possible for Poland and Germany to peacefully settle the Danzig crisis. On 23 March 1939, Beck's chef de cabinet, Michael Łubieński, told Raczyński that the British offer of help in the Danzig crisis should be treated with caution as he believed that the "peace front" was more likely to cause a German-Polish war than stop it, and because Poland did not want any sort of alliance with the Soviet Union. On 24 March 1939 Raczyński submitted to Lord Halifax a proposal asking for Anglo-Polish "consultation" in response to any threat to security of Poland, which was rejected by Lord Halifax who wanted a firm Polish commitment to save Romania. On 31 March 1939, Chamberlain announced in the House of Commons the famous British "guarantee" of Poland stating that Britain would go to war if the independence of Poland was threatened, though Chamberlain notably excluded the frontiers of Poland from the "guarantee". On 1 April 1939, Raczyński submitted to Sir Orme Sargent of the Foreign Office a note protesting on behalf of Poland that the "guarantee" was "so worded as to give perhaps the wrong impression to those who wished to minimise its importance". In particular, Raczyński complained about that "paragraph 2 of the Prime Minister's statement might be so distorted as to actually weaken and undermine the position of the Polish government vis-à-vis of Germany. It seemed to suggest that there were large and urgent questions in dispute between the two countries and that immediate negotiations were necessary and desirable in order that they should be settled".

The principal problem with Poland with the arms race with Germany was the far greater size of the German economy. Germany was the world's second largest economy and as thus the Reich could afford a level of military spending that was far greater than what Poland was capable of. For example, the total Polish defense spending in the five years 1934-1939 for the Army, Navy and Air Force combined amounted to just one-tenth of the Luftwaffe's budget for the year 1939. As the United Kingdom was the world's third largest economy, Raczyński urged that Poland use its new alliance with Britain to furnish Poland with a loan that might allow Poland to catch up with the Reich in the arms race. In addition, the Polish Finance minister Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski complained on 26 April 1939 to Count Jan Szembek, the deputy secretary of the ministry of foreign affairs, that the costs of keeping the Polish military semi-mobilised-which had been the case since late March 1939-was bankrupting Poland. Colonel Beck out of a sense of pride did not want to ask Britain for a loan and it was the British Foreign Office that first raised the subject of a British loan to assist Poland both with the costs of keeping the Polish military semi-mobilisd and with the arms race on 27 April 1939. In early May 1939, Beck grudgingly ordered Raczyński to ask the British for a loan. On 12 May 1939, Raczyński met with Sir William Strang to ask for a £66 million pound loan. Raczyński was forced to explain to Strang that Poland was a backward country with hardly any arms industry of its own, and the Poles needed £24 million pounds to build an electronic grid to bring electricity to areas of Poland that currently lacked any electricity. Raczyński argued that in this way by bringing electricity to all of Poland would lay the foundations of an arms industry, and thereby rid Poland of the irksome need to import arms from abroad. Raczyński further noted that the areas of Poland that currently had electricity and were industrialised such as Upper Silesia were inconveniently on the border with Germany while many of the areas in the interior of Poland away from Germany tended not to have electricity. In addition, Raczyński stated that Poland would need at least v18 million pound to buy weapons from abroad as the current lack of an arms industry forced Poland to import almost of its weapons and another £24 million pounds to import strategical materials that Poland lacked such as oil.. Much to the disappointment of the Poles, the British were only willing to grant a loan made conditional upon the Poles buying only British materials and products as opposed to the Polish wish to use a British loan to import materials and weapons from whatever they wanted to buy them.

On behalf of Poland, he signed the Polish-British alliance (25 August 1939) which ultimately led the United Kingdom to declare war on Nazi Germany after the country's invasion.

World War II
Following the 1 September 1939 German Invasion of Poland Raczyński remained in London where he continued to serve as the ambassador of the Polish Government in Exile and one of its prominent members. On 18 September 1939, Colonel Beck sent out a message to all Polish ambassadors around the world stating the Polish government had decided to leave Poland along with much as the Polish Army as possible via Romania with the intention of going to France to continue the war. In response, Germany issued a threat stating that it regarded the droit de passage of the Polish government across Romania as a violation of Romanian neutrality and threatened to invade Romania. Raczyński lobbied Lord Halifax to pressure King Carol II to assure the Poles the droit de passage, saying the continual existence of a Polish government in exile was crucial to the survival of his country. To provide the Romanians with a face-saving excuse, Raczyński devised a plan under President Ignacy Mościcki would resign and name as a successor a Pole in France.

When the Polish government-in-exile arrived in London, Raczyński's importance vastly increased as he was one of the few Polish officials fluent in English and as the long-time Polish ambassador to the court of St. James was the Polish official best known to British officials. The German historian Julia Eichenberg described wartime London as "a sort of capital for free Europe" as London hosted the governments-in-exile for Poland, Norway, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and Greece along with the French National Committee that represented Free France. During the war, Raczyński often negotiated with Edvard Beneš, the president of the Czechoslovak government-in-exile along with Hubert Ripka and Jaromír Smutný about the future relations between Poland and Czechoslovakia. Another leader whom Raczyński was in frequent contact was Paul-Henri Spaak, the foreign minister of the Belgian government-in-exile and an advocate of a federation to be called the United States of Europe to be created after the war. Significantly Raczyński later entitled his 1962 memoirs In Allied London, which reflected that he negotiated just as much with the other governments-in-exile as he did with the British government.

Between 22 July 1941 and 14 July 1943 he was also the Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs in the cabinet of Władysław Sikorski. In this capacity, he provided the Allies with one of the earliest and most accurate accounts of the ongoing Holocaust ("The Mass Extermination of Jews in German Occupied Poland", Raczyński's Note addressed to the Governments of the United Nations on 10 December 1942") and pleaded for action.

In July 1944, Raczyński told the British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden that Warsaw was on the brink of a rebellion and stated that the Polish government-in-exile would soon start Operation Tempest, a plan for the AK (Armia Krajowa-Home Army) to rise up to seize Warsaw as it was reported that German forces were pulling out of Warsaw. Raczyński also asked that the BBC's German language service should broadcast a message asking for the Germans to treat the AK as legitimate soldiers entitled to being treated as prisoners of war and not summarily execute captured members of the AK as they usually did as the Germans insist that the AK were guerrillas who were operating outside of the laws of war.

Later life
After 1945, when the government of the United Kingdom broke the pacts with Poland and withdrew support for the Polish government, Raczyński remained in London, where he acted as one of the most notable members of Polish diaspora there. He was active in various political and social organisations in exile, including the Fundusz Pomocy Krajowi (Help for the Country Fund) which actively supported the democratic opposition in communist-controlled Poland. Between 1954 and 1972 he was one of the members of the Council of the Three, the collective presidential body of the Polish government in exile. He was also a member of the Committee for Polish Affairs and an advisor of various British governmental agencies and ministries.

In March 1979, Raczyński became president in exile, after being previously chosen by the outgoing President Stanisław Ostrowski. In turn, he chose as his successor Prime Minister Kazimierz Sabbat.

During the Raczyński presidency (1979–1986) the Solidarity movement was established in Poland. Raczyński played an important role in raising awareness about the events in Poland in Western countries and in establishing closer ties with the opposition movement in Poland.

President Raczyński at some point considered naming Władysław Bartoszewski as his successor, as he wanted to choose someone "from the country" and with strong ties to the Polish opposition movement. Bartoszewski, however, declined the offer.

After serving a 7-year term he resigned from his post on 8 April 1986. He was the last Polish President-in-Exile who had held an important office during the era of the 2nd Republic: his successors, Kazimierz Sabbat and Ryszard Kaczorowski were in their twenties at the outset of the Second World War. As he left office he received a praise for reuniting the Polish political emigration and reshaping the Government in exile.

Death and legacy
Raczyński died on 30 July 1993 at his home in London, the last male descendant of his line. His coffin was placed in the mausoleum of his family located at the chapel in Rogalin. In his last will and testament, Count Raczyński bequeathed his family's palace in Rogalin, and his library to the Polish nation. He was the longest living head of state in Poland's history and one of the very few centenarians among European politicians of the 20th century.

In 2004, a blue plaque was installed on the house where he lived and died, No. 8 Lennox Gardens in Brompton.

Honours

 * Order of the White Eagle (Poland)
 * Grand Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta (Poland)
 * Honorary Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire (GBE)
 * Grand Cross of the Order of Pius IX from the Pope
 * Doctor Honoris Causa of the Polish University Abroad, London, in 1982; Jagellonian University in 1992
 * Honorary citizen of the cities of Kraków and Poznań

Family
In 1925, Edward Raczyński married Joyous Markham, daughter of a British coal mining mogul, Sir Arthur Markham, 1st Baronet, but she died in 1931.

On 25 August 1932 he married his second wife, Cecylia Maria Jaroszyńska, by whom he had three daughters: In 1962, his second wife Cecylia died.
 * Wanda Dembińska née Raczyńska (1933-2016), wife of Capt. Ryszard Dembiński (1924-2008), who was chairman of the Polish Institute and Sikorski Museum in 1979-2003
 * Viridianna Rey, née Raczyńska (b. 1935), wife of Count Xawery Rey (1934–1987)
 * Katarzyna Raczyńska (b. 1939)

In 1991, at the age of 99, Edward Raczyński married his third wife, Aniela Lilpop (daughter of architect, Franciszek Lilpop), thus legalizing a union of many years.