Polish People's Republic
The Polish People's Republic (, ) was a state in Central Europe that existed from 1947 to 1989, and the predecessor of the modern democratic Republic of Poland. With a population of approximately 37.9 million inhabitants near the end of its existence, it was the most populous state of the Eastern Bloc after the Soviet Union. Having a unitary Marxist–Leninist communist government, it was also one of the main signatories of the Warsaw Pact. The official capital since 1947 and largest city was Warsaw, followed by industrial Łódź and cultural Kraków.
Jan Henryk Dąbrowski
After the failure of the uprising he remained in partitioned Poland for a while, attempting to convince the Prussian authorities that they needed Poland as an ally against Austria and Russia. He was unsuccessful, and with the Third Partition of Poland between Russia, Prussia and Austria, Poland disappeared from the map of Europe. Dąbrowski's next solution was to convince the French Republic that it should support a Polish cause, and create a Polish military formation. This proved to be more successful, and indeed Dąbrowski is remembered in the history of Poland as the organiser of Polish Legions in Italy during the Napoleonic Wars. (These Legions are also often known as the "Dąbrowski's Legions".) This event gave hope to contemporary Poles, and is still remembered in the Polish national anthem, named after Dąbrowski. He began his work in 1796, when he came to Paris and soon afterwards met Napoleon Bonaparte in Milan. On January 7, 1797, he was authorized by the Cisalpine Republic to create Polish legions, which would be part of the army of the newly created Republic of Lombardy.