with access did these peasants go into battle. and on april 4, 1794, the russians attacked them. and the surface charged with russian cannons with nothing more than the size and here is a surf named [inaudible] who took his hat and extinguished the fuse on the cannon and the other surfaced in the same and they extinguished the fuses and took the canons away from the russians and then took the sides and taxes and chopped 600 russian soldiers to bits cutting off arms and taking away the canons. well, this was incredible because they were not armed only with these things, these size, so the surface or the less valuable unit in the battle and the military tradition in poland at the time the commander of the

army would put on the jacket of whoever were the most valuable troops in the battle and since the service for the most valuable unit in a battle, kosciuszko put on what is known as a suit, seen here which is basically a peasant rope made out of war wool. the new prince declared it would be a separate branch of the polish and cherry to become a literary and the model is the feet and defend. and duke [inaudible] given his freedom and the poles brought the canons back. now the following month, and the european equivalent of lincoln's emancipation proclamation, may 17th, 7094, kosciuszko issued the proclamation freeing the serfs and granting liberty under protection of the government. so, kosciuszko was basically

trying to free the white slaves. then he wrote to the russian orthodox church saying, quote, why don't you join your hearts with the poles who defend our freedom and yours. later a polish historian turned the fraser bound for your freedom and hours and that the temple and's on official model. this army marched this way of the river to warsaw whereby now the word can out that kosciuszko's army was a multicultural army and they even had muslim soldiers in the army basically descendants of those who invaded poland over the years and kosciuszko was met by this man who showed up in poland to join the revolution. now, in addition to john peter, the jews decided not only were they going to be part of the

army, but this man decided he wanted to form a jewish calvary made up completely of jews. this was the first hole lead jewish military unit since biblical times. and kosciuszko was pleased with this and he wrote in his newspaper, the government gazette which was the propaganda organization of the union that nothing will convince other nations of sanctity of cause and the just of the revolution them fact we set aside different religions and traditions of those that support our uprising and that of our own free will be offered to lay down their lives. kosciuszko's article went on to explain how jews suffered over the centuries but now they were willing to die for poland. and when the fighting started, even the embassadors from austria and sweden started writing saying this is unusual because even the jews are taking up arms. and a couple of weeks later there was an appeal written in

the government is said to the jews saying listen, children of the tribes of israel, you who have in your heart implanted the image of god almighty, all five are willing to help in the struggle for the fatherland we should act, the time has come to concentrate, concentrate all of our strength, let us fight for the country as long as every drop of blood is left. my beloved brothers awaken like lions and leopards. unfortunately, once again poland was attacked by three sides. and at the battle, kosciuszko was surrounded and he had a giant pike driven to his hip and another driven through his back and a punctured a sciatic nerve and he couldn't walk and he was thrown into prison in russia. in russia and he spent two years in prison but after catherine the great died, kosciuszko maza offered freedom by her son,

paul. here we see him over to the site with kosciuszko during the incarceration in russia and the first kosciuszko was not sure if he should take the offer because he had 12,000 soldiers sitting in sidey area -- siberia. he made a deal if you let mine in go i will go and the saar said okay but you can never come back to poland and have to promise never to attack again so in order to free his men who were imprisoned, kosciuszko agreed. so he also gave kosciuszko 6,000 -- 60,000 rubles that he would in a bank account in london and he gave him a fur coats because he was going to cross sweden in the river to go to england so he figured he needed to be warm. you see the call were here when kosciuszko made his way back to america after the revolution, he gave the coat to thomas jefferson. now thomas jefferson is seen

here in the most famous portrait of him in addition to that if you go down to the jefferson memorial you will see jefferson is also portrayed wearing this fur coat. now it wasn't just blacks, jews and peasants that kosciuszko stood up for but he also stood up for the native americans when he saw the founding fathers began murdering them and pushing them west. well this is chief little turtle who showed up in kosciuszko's room in philadelphia with a present. a combination tomahawk and peace pipe and he gave kosciuszko this peace pipe and said i hear the your a righteous white man standing up for everybody so we want to show you that we appreciate this. well, kosciuszko saw chief little turtle was squinting so he gave him his glasses and chief little turtle put on the glasses and said my got to have given me new highs. and kosciuszko also gave him his jacket and then he gave to

pistols and said these pistols i've carried and used on many hard fought battle fields in defense of the oppressed, the week, the rahm of my own race. i now present them to you with the injunction with them you shoot dead the first man who comes to subjugate you or to spoil the view of your country. eventually in this room kosciuszko was visited quite often by thomas jefferson and the head during long discussions on slavery and the fact that thomas jefferson who was vice president at the time owned slaves. so kosciuszko decided by now the americans owed $17,000 what he would do with this money is live off the salary but when he died he wanted jefferson to take the money and buy him slaves and free them. so he left the last testament with jefferson and made jefferson the edna straighter of his estate and this is kosciuszko's hand written well at that time in which he wrote i

beg mr. jefferson in case i should die without a will or to estimate he should buy out my money so many girls and free them, that the remaining sum should be sufficient to give them education and provide for their maintenance. he went on to say that each of these black men that were freed must be married and have 100 acres of land with instruments, cattle for tillage and know how to manage and governor house well as behave towards the neighbors. and the only thing kosciuszko montanan concern was to make themselves as happy as possible. jefferson took office and read wrote in his own making his own slaves the beneficiaries of the will but unfortunately after kosciuszko died, jefferson never carried it out. he washed his hands of the will and left the matter to others. now kosciuszko always wanted to go back to poland and after the american revolution, there was a clause i war between the united states and france because much

like we have a somali pirates trying to capture ships, commerce of the horn of africa the french started capturing ships, american ships because they didn't want the americans to do business with the british, and so jefferson need someone who knew the french well and as kosciuszko was made an honorary citizen of france during the revolution after the xyz jefferson sent kosciuszko to try to free, when the freedom of these american sailors. and so he did go back to paris and he did help get the freedom of the soldiers. but while he was there he also met napoleon bonaparte. napoleon had been running around with all these different conquests and he just returned from egypt where he stole a bunch of artifacts and murdered a bunch of egyptians in doing so, and when he got back to paris the first person he wanted to see was kosciuszko and he

walked into his room in paris and said i urgently wanted to meet the hero of the north and kosciuszko replied i'm happy to see the conqueror of europe and hero of the east. but after talking to him for awhile kosciuszko realized she doesn't care about freedom our liberty or any of those things in fact he's going to be a tyrant, he contacted his friends in the french director running the government and said keep them on the young man, he might spoil the arrangement. it turns out he was right because three weeks later napoleon stage a coup de taha and declared himself in charge. now, there's much more like to tell about kosciuszko but then you will not buy the book. [laughter] but there are two plants that i would like to make in closing. in 1908, there was a journalist named israel white who was the literary editor of the evening news and he was writing about kosciuszko's will and he wrote

this is an unwritten chapter in american history. it is possible if the suggestions had been followed there might have been no civil war in the united states and the problem of today wouldn't be so perplexing to economists. years later and african-american educator named booker t. washington was traveling through europe and stalked and wrote in the memoirs i knew from my school history what kosciuszko had done for america in the early struggle for independence. i didn't know however until my attention was called what kosciuszko had done for the freedom and education of my own people. the polish patriot is buried under the cathedral which is the westminster abbey of poland and filled with memorials of the honor of the country. kosciuszko lies in a fault beneath the marble floor of the cathedral as i look upon his to my thought how small the world is after all and how curiously interwoven are the interests

that blind people together. when i visited the tomb of kosciuszko i placed a rose in the middle of my race. thank you very much. [applause] i would be happy to take any questions and there is a microphone in the back for anybody. there is a gentleman over here. >> [inaudible] >> i'm sorry, can you speak up so we can hear you? >> [inaudible] >> three things came to mind when i was listening to your presentation. one of them was a theology, one

was philosophy and one was typography. could you flash those topics out as to what you feel influenced him in terms of those three points? and also another one but i will send you an e-mail. [laughter] >> all three of those sound like books in themselves. well, topography obviously kosciuszko was born in about the high ground and where he would be attacked from. his philosophy obviously buzz that we are all equal in fact she wrote a letter to his sister and which it said remember we are all equal accept some of us have more money and education than others and that is the only difference. so about was his philosophy and that everyone deserves a chance to make a living and be happy. he often used the word happiness

even the letters you see before the declaration of independence he used the word we should be as happy as possible and in terms of theology, kosciuszko laws bourn a catholic but later on was more upset with the catholics because the catholic church also owned serfs and for him this was on conscionable. so as he got older he was more distant from the catholic church and he died in exile in switzerland and there was a point where there was a protestant minister aging and for his retirement date decided they were going to get him a fancy town and this protestant minister decided he is happy where he is giving nasa is to the poor peasants of switzerland in the mountains. when kosciuszko heard this he jumped on his horse and raced to the minister first thing in the

morning and this minister was shaving and kosciuszko burst in on him and gave him a hug and said finally a cleric who i can identify with. and i look forward to your e-mail. [laughter] >> georgetown university library. i was curious about the fortress you showed before he started building them. it had a kind of star structure and reminded me -- >> in the drawing? >> in the drawing that looked like the pattern of the great builder of fortresses -- i'm curious to defied any connection >> that six ackley right, he studied that in paris because he had to enroll in art school but he bought into all of the glasses and paris and for those of you that don't know this was perhaps the greatest expert in

military history of siege graft and how to build and attack for its and kosciuszko was very influenced, that is true. >> i'm curious why would azar paul mog do anything for kosciuszko, why wouldn't he kill him? azar paul felt sorry for him and had faults on easing up on the us serfs. he later eased up on the serfs of russia, not as quickly as kosciuszko but like him to, but he was of the same faults in general and cuba sent a tyrant like his mother catherine the great who wanted to stretch russia as far as she could. >> in your book you mentioned that there was [inaudible]

written about kosciuszko on polish and american sides. can you comment on the reasons you think that is because it is a fascinating story and surprising so little is known so far. >> well, i think for starters he has this unpronounceable name american historians wouldn't even know where to begin, and heave was this humble guy who didn't seek the limelight but benedict arnold and people from history and historians in poland many years didn't have access to archives in the united states and american historians didn't have orchitis, access to archives in poland and as i am fluent in both languages i decided i am going to try and bridge the gap between the two. >> can you say anything about kosciuszko's linguistic ability? how did he communicate when he

was here in the u.s.? >> when he first arrived he spoke french because he studied in paris for five years and in fact everybody thought he was french at first and the first references to him from george washington and others are we here there's a smart french engineer but he bliss here eight years and as you read his letters going on his english gets better and better every year. >> if he arrived in 1776 he was a 30-year-old man. i think he was born 14 years after george washington who was born in 1732 and kosciuszko, if i'm pronouncing that correctly, was born in 1746, the same year as [inaudible] and heat arrived in philadelphia as you said after a shipwreck in the indies.

but you didn't mention much about his encounters with george washington, who i read several places and also in the beautiful book that was given commemorating the 400 years of poland and america which was rendered to all of us at the celebration on the second of october of last year with a commemorative poland in my stat of virginia in jamestown in 1608. but george washington as reported in the book celebrating the great poles in history to have given kosciuszko to pistols, they were not the pistols he gave to little turtle, were they? [laughter] >> i think they are now in a military museum in wausau and in addition to that he gave a sword

with an inscription and kosciuszko was actually at the tavern when george washington said goodbye to the troops, and in fact he gave kosciuszko -- kosciuszko was made a member of the board of cincinnati, and washington when he was saying goodbye actually slated a hearing on his finger and said in the book the irony of this is it was as if washington was passing the baton to kosciuszko because you have one general passing the baton to another general trying to win freedom for his country. and as far as kosciuszko's relationship with washington it wasn't as more and fuzzy as the relationship he had with general horatio gates because general gates later freed his slaves and allowed us leaves to join his army as themselves rather than

in the name of their owner, slave owners, so it was more of an offical relationship and washington spent probably the most amount of time with kosciuszko and on the visits to west point he would be given tours of the various readouts he was building. in fact later on when kosciuszko arrived in the united states for the second time, george washington invited him to mount vernon and rather than travel down to virginia he went to sea hero she'll gates, who now had a number of black people working for him in new york and they were freed black people and kosciuszko identified with that more than with going to a slave plantations. >> and the lady who had the box or the trump with all the plants

that was laid out and then burn them for fear they would fall into the hands of the british. was there any evidence or anything written that showed kosciuszko and benedict arnold ever crossed paths or spoke to each other? >> they did know each other, in fact because kosciuszko was so close to general gates they were all together at the battle of saratoga and kosciuszko had much more respect for the command of authority and gates and benedict arnold were constantly at each other's throats. dietz was at the top of the hill and the british were marching up the hill, and benedict arnold wanted to run down the hill and gates kept saying we are fine where we are, let them march up and we will shoot as they march up and in fact i found one memoir where kosciuszko talks about benedict arnold and says he was a jongh could at

saratoga. so i don't think that they were the same kind of people. i don't think they would have liked each other but they definitely knew each other at west point and the battle of saratoga. there is a woman back there. >> my name is sylvia and i just wanted to say that actually i wanted to thank you for writing this book that i think was long overdue. since you are involved in the kosciuszko foundation of new york by wonder if you know that a few years ago and i cannot remember exactly when, there was a play don about kosciuszko and his life in switzerland and he lived with a swiss family that had a growing the daughter, i don't remember, 70 or something, and kosciuszko supposedly tutor

her in various subjects, and the girl fell in love with him, and i just wonder if it plus a complete fantasy and unfortunately i can't remember the name of the plea right or was it a touch of truth about it? at the same time that witnessed this play it was so had this great hero of america and poland ended up with a british family tutoring a girl and nobody knew who he was although he had visitors from poland according to the play and i wonder if he would comment about that? >> well, kosciuszko dedicated the last years of his life to education specifically education of serfs in poland and france

and a desk, he did tutor the daughter of mr. zell miller and he was very involved with different fees on education and there was one educator -- there was one educator that kosciuszko became involved with and tried to introduce him to napoleon and napoleon's i can't waste my time with abc's. and you mentioned this family, this swiss family. kosciuszko at the end of his life lived in paris for a while and so that he wouldn't be living alone, he went to live with the selzer family and he was a swiss diplomat who lived in paris and married a very pretty french woman and by all rumors of the time were that one of the daughters actually that mr. zell miller had was actually kosciuszko's daughter.

and this is a rumor that on a present in the book as rumor and simply provide the evidence that existed at the time and edna i am convinced this was his daughter because he leaves money to her so i'm convinced kosciuszko had two children out of wedlock. he tried to get married twice and both times. the father said you don't have enough money to marry my daughter so there's a rumor he had the child with mrs. zeltner and also with one of the officers of poland and recently a friend of mine was in washington and met with a french politician by the name of nathalie kosciuszko and he asked her well, kosciuszko, how do you have this name and she said well, we were supposedly descendants of kosciuszko's

brother. but i contacted her by e-mail and she said we will thin the family essentially we all know that my great-grandfather said that his great, great grandfather was a descendant of the relationship that kosciuszko had with the wife of one of his officers. so, i don't know about that play but kosciuszko seems to have an active social life on the side. [laughter] are there any other request and? over here. there's a microphone. >> one of the things in your book that's sort of striking at least struck me was the fact jefferson actually offered kosciuszko to come to monticello

to be part of his family and to be buried in monticello. that is an incredible offer. didn't kosciuszko take up jefferson on that because that was a very close relationship obviously. >> what do i think? welcome kosciuszko was good friends with jefferson and in one of the letters jefferson writes to kosciuszko say we are both older now and don't have many years left ahead of us and i have this plot where i am going to be buried and come to virginia and live on my state, but at monticello and you can be buried next to me. why think the reason kosciuszko didn't return as he had these high hopes either napoleon or somebody would attack russia and freed the poles from, you know,

the russians and prescience and austrians who had all taken them and kosciuszko was also given 500 acres in ohio as the result of his being a general in the american revolution so he had his own land he could have come to live in ohio on that land as well and the reason i think he didn't return is because he always held hope he would be able to free the peasants of poland. that was his obsession, not only did he want to free american slaves but and feudalism, free the serfs and peasants of europe. ..