page_title: Lithuanian Provisional Governing Commission
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Lithuanian Provisional Governing Commission / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Dirk van Hogendorp as the gouvernor of Hamburg, with a map of the cities fortifications and a bust of Napoleon. Restored in 2005
context_page_description: The Provisional Government Commission of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania; also, the Lithuanian Provisional Governing Commission was a provisional administrative body for the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which had been overtaken by Napoleon's Grand Army during the 1812 French invasion of Russia.
context_section_description: The Commission was established on 1 July 1812 by order of French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte. Its chief tasks included the creation of Lithuanian armed forces, and the provisioning of Napoleon's troops. The provinces of Vilnius, Grodno, Minsk and Białystok were attached to the jurisdiction of the government of Lithuania. The Provisional Government of Lithuania had no connections to Poland.
  Supervision of the Commission was entrusted to the former French Resident in the Duchy of Warsaw, Commissioner Louis Pierre Édouard Bignon. Actual power, however, was exercised by Dutch General Dirk van Hogendorp, former governor of Java, who was appointed governor of Vilnius.
  Napoleon, contrary to the hopes reposed in him by the General Confederation of the Kingdom of Poland, had not restored Polish statehood to the former Polish–Lithuanian lands.  He had merely established, in the conquered territories, a provisional administration, thereby sidestepping final dispositions pending his further conquest of Russia.
  Józef Wybicki, sent on 11 July 1812 to Vilnius with a deputation from the Council of the General Confederation, unsuccessfully attempted to get the Emperor to declare the restoration of the Kingdom of Poland, including the territories that had been annexed in the Partitions of Poland. Napoleon also refused to attach the military units consisting of Lithuanians to the Polish ones.
  Only on 14 July 1812 did the Commission formally subordinate itself to the Council of the General Confederation of the Kingdom of Poland.
  After Russian troops invaded Lithuanian territory at the end of 1812, the Lithuanian government acted outside Lithuania.
caption: Dirk van Hogendorp
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