War Friends

War Friends

 

a secret revolutionary society that existed in 1825 in the Lithuanian Detached Corps and consisted of the officers K. G. Igel’strom, A. I. Vegelin, and others. They were joined by certain local intellectuals and members of the gentry who were in close contact with a Polish patriotic society.

There is information concerning the ideological closeness and organizational ties between the War Friends and the Decembrists (through M. S. Lunin and W. K. Kiichelbecker). On Dec. 24, 1825, members of the War Friends unsuccessfully attempted to disrupt the oath of allegiance to Nicholas I in certain units of the Lithuanian Corps stationed in the region of Bialystok. Igel’strom and Vegelin were sentenced in 1827 to forced labor in the Nerchinsk mines.

REFERENCES

Ol’shanskii, P. N.“K voprosu o sviaziakh dekabristov s pol’skim osvoboditel’nym dvizheniem (Litovskii korpus, Obshchestvo voennykh druzei).” Uch. zap. Akademii obshchestvennykh nauk, 1958, issue 36.
Vosstanie dekabristov: Materialy, vol. 8. Leningrad, 1925.

V. A. D’IAKOV