Customer Reviews

Thaddeus Kosciuszko: The Purest Son of Liberty

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James S. Pula's book is an excellent source for those interested in the American and/or Polish History. It is devoted to Thaddeus Kosciuszko's life and accomplishments. At the same time it presents a brief history of Poland dating from prehistoric times, through times of monarchy, Liberum Veto, anarchy to the three partitions of Poland and historical events up to 1817-the year of Kosciuszko's death. The book is also an examination of some major battles of the American War of Independence (defense of Philadelphia, Saratoga, West Point, etc.). It contains very interesting pieces of correspondence between Kosciuszko and his best American friends-Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and Gen. Horatio Gates. Kosciuszko's biography is presented with careful attention to detail. Pula presents many facts from Thaddeus' personal life that are not widely known and which make the Polish-American hero very human and very likable. Also, it contains three appendices: Kosciuszko's Will, and translations of Kosciuszko's Act of Insurrection, and Polaniec Manifesto (Uniwersal Polaniecki). Overall, the book is well-researched, with very interesting content, and written in simple (and elegant) English. It is a great reading material for scholars and high school students alike.

Matherson has done a very good review of this book here on Amazon, and I must completely agree with its content. This book is very well researched and footnoted. Pula clearly has thoroughly reviewed both original source material and secondary sources. Although Pula reports the less flattering things said about Kosciuszko, he dismisses them as biased. Meanwhile, any flattering thing said of Kosciuszko is thoroughly reported. The result sometimes reads as much like hagiography as biography.

We spend entirely too much time reading about the southern campaign of the revolutionary war, including focusing many pages on a stage of the campaign for which there is no documentation about Kosciuszko's whereabouts. After this, Kosciuszko's rebellion in Poland is treated in a somewhat cursory manner. Unfortuntely, Pula has failed to explain to us well enough how someone so consistently described as meek, amiable, humble, and unconcerned with self-promotion could end up being granted powers over Poland approximating that of absolute monarch. I left this book thirsting for more information about Kosciuszko's leadership in Poland, and wishing for considerably less detail about the british defenses at Ninety-six.

That said, this seems to be the best written, most thoroughly researched, most completely documented biography of Kosciuszko available in the English language today.

Check out any Polish neighborhood in the Rust Belt and your bound to find a street or bridge named after Thaddeus Kosciuszko. Who was this patriot who served with great distinction in the American Revolutionary War and led the 1794 Uprising in his native Poland? James S. Pula, one of Polonia's preeminent historians, has given us Thaddeus Kosciuszko: The Purest Son of Liberty, a well-researched biography which focuses mainly on Kosciuszko's time in America.

Quite puzzling is the inclusion of many lengthy passages describing developments in the Revolutionary War which did not directly involve Kosciuszko forcing readers to ponder whether they are reading a biography or a war history. In addition, Pula presents Kosciuszko as a saintly, completely selfless personality whose only vice was a fondness for coffee. There is definitely a tendency for Poles to romanticize their history to the point of saccharinity. Those criticisms aside, this is a valuable history of a great man celebrated as a hero in both America and Poland. I'm somewhat of a Revolutionary War buff but I was completely unaware of Kosciuszko's distinguished contribution to the Southern Campaign until I read this book.