TADEUSZ KOSCIUSZKO, the Father of American Artillery, (sketch is on the left) served under George Washington in the Continental Army during the American Revolution. The fortified defenses he designed at Saratoga were decisive in the battle against the British. His engineering skills in designing these and the defenses at West Point and Philadelphia earned him the rank of General.
Kosciuszko is credited as being one of America’s first civil rights advocates. In his Last Will & Testament he named his friend Thomas Jefferson as his executor and bequeathed his entire American estate to be used to purchase the freedom of Negro slaves and to educate them to become useful citizens.
In 1784 Koœciuszko returned to Poland. He became a Polish national hero when he led the fight to overturn the Partitions of Poland by Russia, Prussia, and Austria. Although unsuccessful, he instilled a strong sense of national pride into all the citizens of Poland. Supporting and identifying with the common man was the source of his personal fame and popularity. He is pictured wearing a peasant’s coat and a four-cornered Rogatywka hat and carrying a scythe. Scythes straightened into lances were common weapons of Kosciuszko’s peasant-soldiers. The rogatywka with its characteristic square shape has been symbolic of the Polish soldier since Kosciuszko’s time. It can be seen in various places on the monument.