Evening star., 1935-05-13
POLAND MOURNING
PILSUDSKFS DEATH;
PEACE IS INVOLVED
Continued From First Page.)


in Lithuania gathering material for
a book on Pilsudski's mother. has
been entrusted with the transfer OF
his mothers remains from Lithuanian
soil to Wilno This was the marshals
most emphatic command before his
death.
Messages of coincidence continued to
pour into Warsaw from all parts of
the world. 1t was expected Foreign
Minister Pierre Laval of France, who
left Warsaw for Moscow shortly before
PilsulSki died, would return TO attend
the funeral.
The only official position Pilsudski
held was that of minister of war, yet
his power over Polish governmental
affairs was virtually absolute. Recent
constitutional reforms had concen-
trated large powers in the hands OF
the presidency to which Pilsudski was
expected soon to have succeeded after
the resignation of President Ignace
Moscicki.
Speculation over who may be his
political heir named Gen. Edward
Rydz Smigly, his close friend and
popular army leader; DR.. Joseph Beck,
the foreign minister, and Gen. kasi-
mir Sosnowski. It was generally be-
lieved the dictator left a political
testament designating his choice.
Father of Country.
Pilsudski was generally recognized
as father of his country. Yet he was
a hot-tempered, If fond, parent.
Scornful especially of political man
coverings and chickering's in the Polish
Diet, he took matters into his own
hands in 1929, forced dissolution of the
national Legislature and by means OF
a general election obtained working
majority in the Sejm or Lower House.
He failed, however, to obtain the two
thirds vote that would have enabled
him to amend the constitution so as
to give the President, a man of his
own choice, greater executive power.
Pilsudski was born in the manor
of Zti1ow, Province of Wilma, on De-
cember S, 1867. His parents were OF
aristocratic Lithuanian lineage, but
the family had taken part in an up
rising against Russia in 1868, and
most of its estates had been con-
fiscated. In 1874 a destructive f1re
wiped out the Pilsudski farm build
ings, and the family moved to Wilma,
where it lived very simply on what
was left of its fortune.
Young Pilsudski attended a high
school in Wilma. but was constantly in
trouble with his Russian teachers be-
cause he insisted on talking in Polish
on the school grounds. Finally, in
1885, he finished his preparatory work
and went to the University of Khar-
kov to study medicine.
Expelled From School.
But in his first year there he or
gapiZed a socialist group and was ex-
PEELED. He went back to his home city,
continued his political agitation and in
1887 was arrested on charges of being
involved in a plot against the life of
Car Alexander III. He was eXiled 70
Eastern Siberia for five years.
That experience failed to cure him,
but it made him more cautious, and he
was not arrested again until 1900. He
WcO oClltC44SCd p1 loO41, 0uG 11ld34a6Co
to escape and settled in Cracow, them
an Austrian possession. He started at
once to organize secret Polish fighting
squads in anticipation of an eventual
war between Austria and Russia.
In 1905, when Japan was fighting
Russia in Manchuria, he went to
Toxic and tried to get backing for an
uprising in the Russian rear, but failed
to convince the japanese that his plan
was feasible.
His chance came when the World
War started In 1914. He entered the
Austrian Army as commander of a
Polish legion and took part in the
fighting against Russia in South
Poland. From this he progressed to
a scheme for an independent Polish
Army as nucleus of a rebirth of the
nation, but Austria refused to sanction
the plan, and Pilsudski quit active
service.
He was summoned from this retire
ment In 1916 when the central powers,
at the behest of the German high
command, proclaimed an intention to
free Poland. Pilsudski was made q
member Of the provisional government
in Warsaw, but soon quarrsled With