Karolina Lipińska, née Gauthier

The collection of the Wincenty Pol Museum in Lublin includes a photograph of Karolina Lipińska, daughter of Pelagia née Longchamps de Bérier (a sister of Eleonora Poll – the poet’s mother) and Michał Gautier, owner of the Bychawa estate. The exact years of Karolina’s life are unknown. It is certain that she was born at the end of the 18th century – her youngest sister, Pelagia Franciszka, was born on February 8, 1795, and died sometime after 1864. Besides Pelagia, she had two other sisters: Henrietta Borowska and Janetta Tchórzewska.

As a child, Wincenty Pol (1807-1872) many times travelled from Lviv to his mother's family and met with his older cousin Karolina. After the November Uprising, their personal contacts became impossible, as the poet was banned from entering the Russian partition. They met again in the second half of July 1858, when Wincenty, forced to leave Warsaw, stayed in Lublin with Karolina and Wilhelm Lipiński. Two years later, after the Pol family had regained the Firlejowszczyzna farm, Wincenty Pol entrusted his cousin with the task of its temporary administration.

Of Karolina’s relationship with Wilhelm Lipiński the following children were born: Aleksandra, married to Aleksander Roman, Teodor (born 1837) and Paulina. Pol’s correspondence from the mid-1860s mentions his efforts, undertaken together with his sister Wiktoria, Aleksander and Bogusław Longchamps, to obtain Austrian citizenship for Karolina’s son, Teodor, most probably a participant of the January Uprising. An autograph (manuscript) of a letter of September 5, 1864, from Karolina Lipińska, with a request addressed to the poet, is kept in the collection of the poet’s museum as a deposit of the Lublin Village Museum.

The photograph was donated to the Museum in 1987 by Janina Romanówna Mierzejewska (1904–1991), daughter of the actor and singer Władysław Justyn Roman (1868-1905), great-granddaughter of Karolina and Wilhelm Lipiński and an outstanding actress of the Lviv and Warsaw theatrical scenes.

Grażyna Połuszejko