Piłsudski w Winnicy. Epizod z dziejów polsko-ukraińskiego sojuszu
Pilsudski in Vinnytsia. An Episode in the History of the Polish-Ukrainian Alliance

Summary/Abstract: This article aims to present the meeting between Piłsudski and Petlura in Vinnytsia on May 16th 1920 against the background of the turmoil of the war fought against the Bolshevik Russia by the Second Polish Republic and the Ukrainian People's Republic, with the use of Polish and Ukrainian written sources: diaries and press releases. This work is not only an attempt to reconstruct a detailed plan for the arrival of Marshal Piłsudski in the temporary capital of the Ukrainian People's Republic, but also to explain the situation in the city in the face of the Bolshevik threat, to present the situation of the Polish population of the city, and finally, to answer the question: what was the subject of the talks between the Ukrainian authorities and Piłsudski. The importance of the Piłsudski-Petliura alliance is often emphasized, but what is often overlooked is the various burning issues that the participants of the meeting in Vinnytsia attempted to resolve. The moment of the arrival of Marshal Piłsudski in the capital of the Ukrainian state should be regarded as the apogee of the Polish-Ukrainian alliance. It was, however, the final moment of glory for Vinnytsia. Following the counteroffensive by the Bolsheviks and the withdrawal of Polish and Ukrainian troops along with the Ataman, the city became part of Soviet Russia as a result of the Treaty of Riga. The great moments in the history of the Polish-Ukrainian alliance have been preserved, however, in the memories of the contemporary inhabitants of the city, a proof of which was the funding of a memorial plaque in honor of the Marshal in the centre of Vinnytsia in 2008.

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