Maria Wojciechowska

Maria Wojciechowska, née Kiersnowska (Warsaw, 15 December 1869 – Gołąbki, 14 September 1959), was the First Lady of Poland from 1922 to 1926 as the wife of President Stanisław Wojciechowski. Biography Early life Maria Kiersnowska was born on 15 December 1869 in Warsaw as one of the twelve children of Antoni Kiersnowski of the Pobóg coat of arms. She was brought up in the Independence tradition. Her paternal grandfather, Jan Kiersnowski was sent to Siberia for participating in the November uprising, and her maternal uncle, Stanisław Iszora, a priest and vicar from Żołudek (now Belarus) was shot on 22 May 1863, in Vilnius on Łukiszki Square for reading the manifesto of the National Government from the pulpit and urging parishioners to participate in the uprising, becoming the first victim of Murawiow's terror. Career She graduated from the Mariinsky Institute in Vilnius, the highest education available to women at that time, she was a friend of Józef Piłsudski from school. She later became involved in the underground work and became a courier for the Polish Socialist Party (PPS). During this activity, she met Stanisław Wojciechowski, they were married in 1899, before leaving for emigration. The wedding took place under a conspiracy, because Wojciechowski used false documents, so he did not have the civil form required in the Russian partition. As a result, they already entered into a civil marriage in England, in Bethnal Green on 2 December 1899.