Onuphrius Kasperowicz

Mark reveals the life story of a client’s Polish ancestor, who was involved in the November Uprising

Nigel Kasper of South Wales discovered that his 3x great grandfather Onuphrius Kasperowicz (born c1811) was a junior officer in the Polish Army, and fought in the uprising.

Onuphrius fled to England where he received the monthly pension of £2 from 1834, and appears in a record from 1840 listing Polish refugees who received medical treatment (pictured). He married Lucille Le Scelleur from Jersey.

The couple had a son, Alfred, in 1842, then moved to London. In 1849, Onuphrius commuted his pension in return for a lump sum, then unfortunately vanishes from the records. It is likely that he joined the Poles fighting in the Hungarian Revolution, and fled to Constantinople when it failed.

By 1877, Alfred Kasperowicz was living in Constantinople where he married a Polish girl called Julia Borowska. She gave birth to a son, Constantin, Nigel’s great grandfather. On Alfred’s death in 1879, Julia and her son journeyed back to Britain where they settled permanently.