Michał Czajkowski was born in Halchyn (Halczyniec) to Stanisław Czajkowski and Petronela Głębocka, in a szlachta family settled in Ukraine for several generations. The Czajkowskis had origins in Czajki in Masovia, while the Głębockis were an old family from Kuyavia. Through his mother he was a descendant of the Ukrainian Cossack Hetman Ivan Briukhovetsky (reigned 1663–68). Her family cultivated the memory of Głębocki who married the Hetman's granddaughter. Czajkowski was raised in the spirit of szlachta and Cossackdom. He participated in the Polish insurrection of 1830-31. After the failure of this uprising, he went into exile in France where he developed his ideology of the resurrection of Cossackdom and wrote several novels on this theme. Very popular at this time, some of them were translated into several languages including French and German. In general, in his early writings, Czajkowski saw no conflict between Polish and Cossack interests and romanticized the history of Ukrainian-Polish relations.