Gendarmerie in Poland. Outline of history

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aBstract: The paper presents the history of police military formations in Poland from the beginning of the 19th century to the present day. The specificity of the functioning of the police services in Poland in the 19th century was the fact that during this period Polish society was basically deprived of its own statehood, except for a short period of limited independence. At that time, the foundations of police systems based on foreign patterns were built, where gendarmerie units played an important role. Only after the end of World War I, attempts were made to create their own, independent state in the form of the Second Polish Republic. One of its inherent parts was the police system. However, the military police became only an internal police formation in the Polish army. During the communist rule in the second half of the 2th century, the Soviet police model was in force in Poland. After the systemic changes at the beginning of the 90’s the police services in a democratic state were established. One of them is the Military Police –a separate and specialized service of theArmed Forces of the Republic of Poland.

The gendarmerie in the Russian partition

The beginnings of the gendarmerie in the strict sense on Polish territory can only be talked about in the times of the Duchy of Warsaw. For the first time, we encounter the name of the gendarmeries in Polish formations during Napoleon’s expedition to Russia in 1812. After the French troops entered Lithuania, Napoleon gave an order in Vilnius on July 1, 1812 to establish a gendarmeries regiment in each of the Lithuanian governorates. Their tasks and competences were established in the relevant articles of the daily order:

“...By the order of the Emperor Napoleon from Vilnius on July 1, 1812, a gendarmerie is established in Lithuania.

Art. 9. In each of the governorates: of Vilnius, Grodno, Minsk and Białystok, a gendarmerie will be established under the orders of a colonel, who will have two squadrons under his command in the governorates