The name Biega is rare, as a perusal of any phone directory will reveal. Anyone with this name undoubtedly has his or her origin in the region close to Sanok in south-eastern Poland.
In 1995 and 1996 I made pilgrimages to determine as much as possible about the early days of our branch of the Biega clan. In 1772 Austria established its reign over the area as its share of the partition of Poland together with Russia and Prussia. Southern Poland became the Austrian Province of Galicia. About 1800 the authorities ordered the churches to maintain permanent records of all births, weddings and deaths. Most of these books still exist today, having been protected by the priests from war and revolution, fire and plunder. These books are written in Latin, fortunately I learned this ancient language in school and still remember enough to be able to decipher most of the notations. In most cases the writing was legible in the copper-plate style taught by the religious schools of those days.

With the assistance of the parish priests in Sanok and Mrzygłód I managed to find important records. Given more time than I had allotted to this task, I am sure that I could uncover more. A starting point for me were the memoirs dictated by my father before his death. He had no reference material and they are based entirely upon his memory of events in his childhood 70 years earlier, but gave me essential names and dates with which to start my search.

The first register of births in Mrzyglód starts in the year 1804. It is amazing that the ink in this book is still black and the pages are essentially intact although yellowed. Under the date 12 May 1814 I hit pay dirt. On this date, in the village of Dębna, JAN BIEGA was born -- my great-grandfather. His parents were JOSEPH BIEGA of Dębna, a farmer (agricola) and Marianna of the family Szudkowski, also in Dębna. They would have been born in the period 1780-1790, before the books were started. If I had found the record of their marriage I would have learned more about them. Perhaps in the future, I or someone else, can go back to Mrzygłód and search for the marriage records, and for any records of any other children born to them.

Jan Biega was an educated man. I found the next record in the excellent book "Sanok", a 1010 page history of the city published by the city council in 1995. From it I learned that Jan Biega was an assistant teacher at the main school of Sanok (Kreis Hauptschule) in the years 1840-49. In 1843 or 1844 he married Amalia, the daughter of Franciszek Bobrowski and Anna Swoboda. Amalia was born in 1825 and probably Amalia's parents lived in some other town or village, because I could not find any record of the wedding in the books of the Sanok parish. However the following list of entries in the Sanok parish books provides a good picture of their children and changes in Jan's career.

• 8-XII-1844 -- Henryk Marian Jan is born. His father is recorded as school teacher, resident in Sródmiescie (town center). His godfather was the school principal Jan Kwiatkowski. See the picture of the 1844 Sanok parish register.
• 13-VIII-1846 -- Hipolit Henryk Marian is born. Presumably he died very young because no later family records mention him.
• 13-XI-1848 -- Leopold Marian is born. Jan's profession is noted as "clerk of C.K. prison" (C.K. are the initials for all federal government institutions from the Latin for holy emperor). Godfather is the pharmacist Walerian Szczerbicki.
• 7-VII-1850 -- Wladyslaw Albert Józef. Jan is now listed as a "private instructor" living in the district called Przedmiescie (the Suburb).
• The next two children obviously died young, as no further mention of them exists.
  1-IX-1852 -- Mariannna Izabela.
  18-XII-1853 -- Carol. The father is now listed as a clerk of the C.K. court.
• 8-X-1855 -- Amalia dies in childbirth at the age of 30, She is shown as being survived by five children. Perhaps the baby is the daughter Amalia remembered in my father's memoirs as being older than his father. The fact that there is no record of the birth in the Sanok parish book could indicate that some other family member took care of the baby in some other parish. In those days, births were always recorded at the time of christening.

A little over six years later Jan Biega remarries in Mrzyglód. The new wife is Antonina Czekaska, who was born 29-III-1843 in Polonia near Jasło (she is only two years older than her oldest step-son). The Mrzygłód parish books record the wedding on 4 February 1862 and indicates that the bride's father was an official and is deceased and that her mother is Marianna née Pieciak, now resident in Mrzyglód.

13-XII-1862 is born STANISLAW JAN ANTONI, my grandfather. His father Jan is listed as a clerk of the C.K. district prosecutor (diurnista C.K. Prokutorii Circulom), resident in the district Suburb. This is the last child of Jan Biega. My father remembered that his father was the youngest of Jan's children.
I could find no record of the death of Jan nor Antonina in the Sanok books. All parish records after the 1870's were removed to the Civil Registry Offices (Urząd Cywilny) in recent times. It is known that at the time of my father's childhood they were no longer living. The Civil Registry Office was less helpful than the parish priests and would not allow me to search through the old record books. However a young clerk did make a search for me through the years 1872 - 1896 without finding anything. Presumably they moved to some other town, maybe back to Mrzyglód, perhaps to Dynów?.

   New! In 2006 I learnt that a new primary school was built in Mrzygłód in 1865 and the first principal, from 1865 to 1870 was Jan Biega. It seems likely that this was my great-grandfather, since just three years earlier he had married a local girl, and they had a young child - my grandfather.

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The following is the information that I have gathered for all the surviving children.
HENRYK MARIAN BIEGA, born 8-XII-1844, died 6-XI-1907. Completed high school in Przemyśl and entered the Catholic Seminary. He became a priest in 1868 and for a short time was the vicar at Dobrzechów. Then he was vicar at the cathedral in Przemyśl and the religious teacher at the girl's convent school of the Benedictine Sisters. Subsequently he was named chaplain of the convent. From 1887 onwards he was, in addition, professor of theology at Przemysl Seminary. He died in Przemyśl at the age of 63. (based on an article in the Diocesan Chronicle, vol. 10, page 451)

LEOPOLD MARIAN BIEGA, b. 13-XI-1848, d. ? The following is assembled from notes in my father's memoirs, notes in the book "Sanok", notes in issues of the Sanok weekly paper "Gazeta Sanocka" in the archives of the Sanok Historical Society. Additional information may be obtained from archives of the Town Council, the Sanok branch of the Gymnastic Society "Sokól", and archives of "Gazeta Sanocka." Some of these archives are to be found in the Polish State Archives in Rzeszów.
He married Camille (Kamilla), but I could not find any record of the wedding, nor of their deaths. They had no children. They were still living in Sanok in 1914, but when my father records that he visited Sanok in 1920, he mentioned that they were no longer alive, so they died during the war years.
He was a member of the Town Council, at least during the years 1895-1910. In the 1880's he was a teacher in the primary school and later principal of the school. In 1910 he was a member of the committee that established a boarding house for children of peasants that came to study in Sanok schools. He was one of the founders of the Sanok branch of "Sokól" and in 1896 he was a director of the society and continued in this capacity at least until the beautiful new building was completed in 1904 (The building is still standing and is now a cinema and restaurant - see picture. The society was disbanded by the communist government after 1945.) He was a member of the editorial staff of the weekly newspaper "Gazeta Sanocka" which was founded 16 December 1894. It is also recorded that he was founder and director of the volunteer fire brigade.

WLADYSLAW ALBERT BIEGA, b. 7-VII-1850, d. 1924?
The information is from my father's memoirs and notes found on the internet. Undoubtedly there should be more information in records of Dynów, a small town on the river San, 30km. (18 miles) north of Sanok, where he was director of the primary school, in the period 1889-1924. He was also one of the founders of a cooperative credit organization in the small town of Brzozów in 1888.
He was married and had at least three sons and some daughters. The two younger boys were in the high school in Sanok when my father was studying there in 1910. The oldest son Wojciech, graduated from Sanok High School in 1899. He became a journalist and was on the staff of the Warsaw newspaper "Kurier Warszawski" in the 1920's. He had no children.
Stefan died at an early age. The youngest son, Wladyslaw, was younger than my father and they lost touch during the war years. There is no further information about him.

AMALIA, b. 8-X-1855 ? (see notes above). She married a Sanok man named Moskal. They had three sons: Joseph, Stanislaw and Adam. In June 1985 Adam was still living in Wroclaw, he would certainly be in his 80's. Adam had triplets: Stefan, Miroslaw and Leszek who were born in the Wroclaw area in 1947.

STANISLAW JAN ANTONI BIEGA, b. 13-XII-1862 in Sanok, d. 19-IV-1923 in Warsaw, my grandfather. There are many references for his life. The following edited translation from the Polish Biographical Encyclopedia, vol 2, page 25, summarizes his professional life:

Stanislaw John Anthony BIEGA (1862-1923), a social worker in Galicia. He was born 13 Dec. 1862 in Sanok, graduated from high school in Przemysl in 1882 and from the School of Law (at the Jagellonian University) in Cracow in 1887, when he entered the Government Tax Service in Sanok. He was transferred to Kolomiya in 1903. In 1905, when he was Senior Commissioner, he resigned and joined the newspaper "Slowo Polskie" (Polish Word) in Lwów, where he continued until June 1915.

In the fall of 1918 he returned to Poland (now liberated) and settled in Warsaw. Once more he devoted himself to the Sokół organization and achieved the forming of a Union of Polish Sokol Clubs, of which he was Vice President. He organized a Jamboree in Warsaw in 1921. He died in Warsaw 19 April 1923. He is buried in the Powazki Cemetery, Warsaw, Poland, (close to marker #221). A prominent red sandstone memorial, with a grieving falcon on top, was erected in his memory by the National Sokól Society in 1923.

My father's memoirs provide some more details of his personal life. In 1890 he married Maria, daughter of Stanislaw Baumann and Jadwiga Lubowiecka of a local family of landowners. Stanislaw Baumann was an engineer and one of the official surveyors for the Sanok county. His family originated from western Poland and had been forced to flee to Galicia after the 1830 insurrection against Russians. His grandfather had been awarded the most prestigious military decoration "Virtuti Militarii" for his valor in one of the battles for freedom. Maria had two older brothers -- Boleslaw, who later became an official of the Florianka Insurance Company in Cracow, and Stanislaw who had a son Tadeusz, later a school friend of my father. Stanislaw Baumann maintained close contact with his daughter's children after her death and gave generously to each of them in his will. He died in Sanok in 1920, having been a widower for 20 years.

Stanislaw and Maria Biega had three children, all born in Sanok -- Jadwiga in 5-II-1891, Stanislaw 5-IX-1893 and Boleslaw (my father) 27-IV-1896. Her health deteriorated particularly after the move to Kolomiya, where she spent much time at home with the children while her husband was busy pursuing his career and political interests. In 1905 they separated. The two boys returned to Sanok to attend school under the supervision of Uncle Leopold. Maria moved to Lwów with Jadwiga, who was placed in a girl's boarding school. She had developed tuberculosis and, in spite of several sojourns in spas and on the Dalmatian coast, her condition worsened and in August 1908 she died.

Undoubtedly there are further references to Stanislaw Biega in the archives of the Gymnastic Society "Sokól", known in the U.S.A. as the Falcon Society, as well as the archives of the newspaper "Slowo Polskie" which was published in Lwów from the 1880's until 1939.
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To complete this family record another generation needs to be filled in briefly, that of Stanislaw Jan's children. Each of their children will be able, if they wish, to add more detail for their own family records.

JADWIGA, b.5-II-1891. d.1983 in Warsaw. She attended the girl's school in Sanok, later in Kolomiya. In 1905 she was enrolled in the well known school of Zofia Strzalkowska. After her graduation she received employment at this school as a teacher and an assistant in the operation of the boarding school. She remained in Lwów throughout the war.
In 1918 she rejoined her father in Warsaw. There she joined the staff of the Institute for Deaf and Dumb as a teacher. She stayed in this position until 1939. 14-XI-1920 she married Boleslaw Brodzki who was an administrator at the Institute. He was born 19-VIII-1886, and died 21-III-1939. They had two children -- MARIA, b. 1921 and JAN, b. 1923. During the German occupation, and until 1974 she worked as a teacher in a school for retarded children in Warsaw. After her retirement she lived with her daughter's family in Warsaw until her death in 1983. Maria worked for the Polish Scout organization in Warsaw until she was 80 years old.
Jadwiga's son Jan Brodzki fought in the Warsaw Uprising in 1944. After several months in P.O.W. camp, he arived in London. Later he worked for Radio Free Europe in Munich, then for the Polish section of B.B.C. in London until his retirement in 1990.

STANISLAW, b. 5-IX-1893. He completed high school in Sanok in 1911 and enrolled in the Technical University (Politechnika) in Lwów. He joined the paramilitary organization Sokole Druzyny Polowe which became part of the Eastern Legion (Legion Wschodny). After its dissolution in Mszana Dolna (September 1914), he crossed the lines and returned to Russian occupied Lwów together with his father and brother. When the Russian retreat commenced, all three went to Kiev. He joined the Polish army, I Corps, organized in Russia by Gen. Dowbór-Musnicki in 1918. After fighting started with the Bolsheviks, 12-I-1918 he volunteered for service on the armored train under the command of Lt. Malagowski and took part in several battles, at Zlobin and Czerwony Krzyz. At the end of September 1918 he arrived in Cracow. Together with Malagowski he organized another armored train "Smiały" and they moved east to break the siege of Lwów by Ukrainians. Later they fought on the Byelorussian front against the Bolsheviks. He was awarded the prestigious "Virtuti Militarii" (#8195) for his valor.

In 1920 he was a subaltern in the Machine Battalion of the Wielkopolska Officer School (Wielkopolska Szkoła Podchorążych). He was promoted to Lieutenant in 1921 and to Captain in 1923, then he was attached to the 10th. Engineering Regiment at Modlin (near Warsaw). He married Irena Helbich 4-I-1923 and their son STANISLAW was born 4-III-1925. In 1927 he was attached to the Electrotechnical Battalion. 1927-29 he studied at the Superior War Academy (Wyzsza Szkola Wojenna). The next two years he was attached to HQ. X Corps, and from 1933 to 1937 he was Training Officer for the 2nd. Engineer Brigade at Powazki (Warsaw). Irena died 24-X-1937, after a long illness.

In 1937 he was promoted to Deputy Commander of the Engineer Battalion in Puławy (about 100km south of Warsaw). Here in 1938 he married Eugenia Zukowska, a dentist. A baby boy, MACIEJ, was born in 1939 as the war broke out. Stanislaw never saw his second son, because in March 1939 he was promoted to Major on the staff of Army Group "Poznan." He fought in the battle of the river Bzura and in the defense of Warsaw. Taken prisoner he spent the next several years at Oflag VIB Dössel where he was tragically killed by an Allied bombing error 27-IX-1944. He is buried in the cemetery there, together with 184 others killed in this tragic accident.
He was awarded the Valiant Cross (Krzyż Walecznych) four times. During the winter of 1939-1940, Eugenia returned from the Soviet occupied zone of Poland to Warsaw with her baby. In 1943 she was arrested by the Nazis and incarcerated in the Rawensbrück concentration camp where she was subjected to brutal experiments from which she never fully recovered. She returned after the war to Warsaw and died in 1990.

Stanisław's first son, also named Stanisław, fought in the underground army against the Nazis during WW II in the Holy Cross Mountains (Góry Świętokrzyskie). After the war he went to Australia, married an Australian girl Annette Smith. They have six children, see Biega in Australia .
Maciej stayed in Poland and became a sports journalist, winning the "Golden Pen" award of the Klub of Sports Writers. He married Renata Wołoszczuk and they have a son. Renata died in 1988, Maciej died 23-I-1993 in Warsaw. Their son, also named Stanisław, is an energetic defender of the environment and currently (2008) is a consultant in railroad affairs.

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BOLESLAW JOZEF, b. 27-IV-1896. His story up to 1937 is covered in full in his memoirs dictated on tape, now being edited by me. Further information is given in my book "Thirteen Is My Lucky Number." A short summary is included here to complete the narrative:

After his parent's separation in 1905, he and his brother lived in a boarding house operated by nuns while they continued their schooling in Sanok. In 1910 he moved to his father's flat in the new "Slowo Polskie" building in Lwów and ccompleted High School #3 in 1914. He participated in many activities of "Sokól" and belonged to the first Boy Scout Troop in Galicia, which was established in 1910. He witnesses many of the meetings of prominent figures in Polish political and cultural life who met in his father's flat. Many of these people played an influential role in his later professional life.
Together with his brother and father he arrived in Kiev in late 1915. He attended the university and also participated in the secret Polish organization "Zet." He joined the Carpathian Brigade which Gen. Haller had brought over to the Russian side from the Austrians. He had some anxious moments when his unit was surrounded by the German Army, but escaped from the train taking him to prison camp. Later he worked on the evacuation of the Brigade to Murmansk for transportation to France. When the Bolshevik revolution created chaos in Ukraine he managed to get to Warsaw in September 1918. Immediately he returned to university studies.

In January 1919 he and five others were selected to go to Paris for studies at the "Ecole des Sciences Politiques" at the Sorbonne in Paris. During this time he fell in love with an English girl who was working for the British delegation at the Versailles Peace Conference. In June 1921 he received his Diploma from the Sorbonne. October 29 he married Marjorie Thomas in London. She was the youngest daughter of a retired Anglo-Irish career officer in the British Army in India. They immediately went to Warsaw where he had been assigned to the Economic Section of the Foreign Ministry. 21-VII-1922 their son Boleslaw Christopher was born. One year later father was nominated to the position of Secretary at the Polish Legation in London. He worked with Edward Raczynski, who later became Polish Ambassador to Great Britain, finally Foreign Secretary, then President of Polish Government in Exile during World War II.

In August 1924 tragedy struck. While on holiday at Caen in France, Marjorie suffered a miscarriage while swimming and died. The shock caused a crisis for Boleslaw, he developed tuberculosis. Fortunately it was diagnosed quickly and a stay in Switzerland provided a complete cure. In November 1925 he married Baba Seely, the daughter of a retired lawyer. In the meantime his diplomatic career was proceeding well. In 1928 he returned to Warsaw and was shortly named Head of the Anglo-American desk in the Economic Section. For his role in the negotiation of several trade treaties he was decorated with the Order of Polonia Restituta 3-V-1934. Only two months later he was forced into retirement for refusing to join the political party of Marshal Pilsudski, who had taken over the government of Poland in a coup d'etat in May 1926.

He returned to political life and after several difficult months, during which Baba left him and returned to England, he joined the staff of the opposition publishing company "Zgoda". In 1936 he was named Managing Director of the evening newspaper "Wieczór Warszawski" (Warsaw Evening). He quickly introduced modern methods and machinery and also started a weekly magazine "Kronika Polski i Swiata." In 1938 he was elected vice-president of the Publishers' Association. At the same time he was becoming influential in the "Partia Pracy" (Labor Party -- not socialist, but a Christian-Democratic organization). In June 1938 he married a divorcee, Anna Falecka.

September 1, 1939 Poland was invaded by the Nazis and on the 17th. by the Soviets. Warsaw was under siege for three weeks. During this time Boleslaw arranged for all the newspapers to publish a joint news bulletin which was distributed up to the moment that Nazi troops marched into the city. He was awarded the Krzyż Walecznych (Valiant Cross) for his role in the defense of the city. All the presses were confiscated by the Nazis, but in the empty building he organized the production of food additives, which provided an economic base for survival during the years of occupation. It also provided a cover for his work as a member of the Underground Government (Delegatura Rządu). For two years he was director of the Documentation Section which documented war crimes and cataloged economic and cultural destruction and transmitted this information to the Polish Government-in-Exile in London. Then he became Secretary of the Central Committee of the Council of National Unity, in which representatives of all the political parties met and advised and approved actions of the executive committee.

He was fortunate to avoid arrest throughout the German occupation, although there were some close calls. After the collapse in October 1944 of the Warsaw Uprising against the Germans, the Underground Government continued its activities until the Soviet Army pushed out the Germans. Then he, and all the other members of the Underground Government were arrested by the Soviets. Again he was extremely lucky, he was not present when the Sixteen leaders were arrested and subsequently tried in Moscow. Instead, he was arrested on his way to the fatal meeting, at the railway station at Piotrków on March 25, 1945 and transported directly to a prison camp in the northern Ural mountains, without trial. Somehow, he managed to be included in a group of Germans that were being repatriated to communist East Germany, and then made his back to Warsaw just before Christmas 1945.

He went back to work for the Partia Pracy helping to prepare for the elections. These took place in January 1947, but were run by the communist police so that only communist delegates were elected, and hundreds of opposition candidates were either arrested or escaped to the West. The government needed my father's expertise and used him for negotiating the sale of Polish coal to Sweden and the Netherlands. Upon his return from one such trip, he was warned by a friend that he was about to be arrested by the UB (Communist political police). He still had his passport and got on the next plane back to Stockholm. May 1, 1948 he left Poland for the last time.

In exile, he continued his political work, first in Paris, then in March 1952 he received a visa to the United States. In September 1954 the Assembly of Captive European Nations, ACEN, was organized in New York. He was one of the Polish delegates and for 16 years was the chairman of its committee for social and economic affairs. In 1958 he became a member of the Polish Council of National Unity and was chairman of its American section. In 1971, after an accident, he retired and moved to Chicago. He died suddenly, as a result of a stroke, 19 January 1976.

See the story of his son Bolesław Christopher, generally known as Bill Biega.

Here is the Jan Biega family tree, covering 7 generations through 200 years, updated to November 1999. It starts in Dębna and ends on three continents in Australia, Poland, U.S.A. The related families Treutler and Helbich are also covered in part.
Any second marriages that did not result in children are not shown. Click on it to see full size.

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As noted above, the book "Sanok - Dzieje Miasta" has several references to Jan Biega, Leopold Biega and Stanisław Biega.
Although they were not direct relatives of Jan Biega, it is worth noting the following notations about various other Biega's in the book "Sanok":
Jędrzej Biega in 1905 is recorded as owning an estate of 74ha. in the village Liszna, directly across the river San from Dębna.
Roman Biega played a part in the "underground" educational activities during the Nazi occupation 1940-1944.
Marek Biega was the coach of the the football team "Stal" that entered the provincial league championships in 1989/90, and continues to be coach of various teams in southern Poland.

# # #
written: October 1996, by Boleslaw (Bill) Christopher Biega - latest additions November 2007,
North Brunswick, New Jersey, U.S.A.

LINKS to other Internet sources.

A.C.E.N. documents. (Assembly of European Captive Nations)
Brief history of Polish Underground Organizations and Home Army.

DOCUMENTATION SOURCES (for further research)

Archives of the "Gazeta Sanocka", 1894-1910 and "Tygodnik Ziemi Sanockiej", 1910-1920(?) in the Archiwum Panstwowe in Rzeszów, and in Muzeum Historyczny, Sanok.

Archiwum Panstwowe in Rzeszów contains also documentation on all aspects of life in Sanok, including Tow. Gymnastyczne "Sokół", and "Szematyzm Królestwa Galicji i Lodomerii" 1870-1914 (a periodically issued listing of names of people in various institutions)

Institut Historii at Jagellonian University, Kraków, and Archiwum Panstwowy Oddzial II at the Wawel may also possess documentation relative to Sanok and the area.

The Ossolineum Library in Wroclaw owns a large collections of documents and manuscripts. Among them: #1432 - "Zarysy Historii Sokolstwa" by Kazimierz Skarbowski (p. 322 biography of Stanislaw Biega);

#7997 Papiery Rozwadowskich and #15127 Letters of Waclaw Gasiorowski - include letters by Stanislaw Biega.

# 16501 to 16800 are the papers of the Delegatura Rządowa and AK.

#15578 papers of Leon Kaszubski - school years in Sanok 1899-1909.

Parish records of the parishes of Sanok (Ks. Marian Burczyk) and Mrzygłód (ks. Stanislaw Gorczyca), from 1804 to 1870s, later years in Urząd Cywilny, Sanok, perhaps some in Muzeum Historyczny.

BOOKS:
• "Sanok Dzieje Miasta"; published by the City Council of Sanok, 1995. ISBN 83-86077-57-3
• "Zarys Historii Tow.Gym.Sokół w Sanoku" by T.Mikisz. Pub. Sanok 1939
• "Gimnazjum Meskie w Sanoku 1880-1958" by J.Stachowicz - Kraków 1958
• "Sprawa Legionu Wschodniego 1914r." by Jan Rzepecki - Warsaw 1966
• "Pamiętniki" of Stanisław Grabski - published by "Czytelnik", Warsaw 1989
• "Thirteen is My Lucky Number", published by Syrena Press, NJ, USA, 1996, ISBN 1-57087-204-X

Genealogy resources.