Blessed Michał Czartoryski

Blessed Michał Czartoryski was a Dominican, a priest, and a formator of young friars. During the Warsaw Uprising he was chaplain to the insurgents in Powiśle and was killed together with the wounded, whom he would not abandon. The Roman Martyrology commemorates him on September 6, the day of his death.

He was born on February 19, 1897, in Pełkinie near Jarosław and was named Jan Franciszek. He came from the princely Czartoryski family and was the sixth of the eleven children of Witold and Jadwiga née Dzieduszycka. In childhood he suffered a severe case of scarlet fever, after which he was hard of hearing for the rest of his life. He attended the “Ognisko” school in Stara Wieś, run by Father Jan Gralewski, and passed his secondary school final examinations in Krakow in 1916. In 1917 he began studying architecture at the Lviv Polytechnic.

War interrupted his studies. In November 1918 he joined the defense of Lviv, then fought in the Polish-Ukrainian War, and in 1920 in the Polish-Soviet War, for which he received the Cross of Valor. In 1921 he returned to the university. He was one of the founders of the Lviv circle of the Catholic Academic Youth Association “Odrodzenie” and its first president, and he organized closed retreats for students. He completed his studies as a qualified architect.

In 1926 he entered the seminary in Lviv, but a year later he chose the Order of Preachers. On September 18, 1927, in Krakow, in the chapel of Saint Hyacinth, he received the Dominican habit and the name Michał. He made his final vows on September 25, 1931, and on December 20 of that year he was ordained a priest. Almost until the end of his life he was master, that is, formator of the novices and student brothers, in Krakow and in Warsaw. As an architect he oversaw the construction of the priory and house of studies in Warsaw’s Służew district. He preached retreats and was the spiritual guide of many lay people.

The outbreak of the uprising on August 1, 1944, found him in Powiśle, cut off from his priory. He reported to the command of the Home Army’s III Group “Konrad” and became chaplain to the insurgents. He celebrated Mass, heard confessions, and cared for the wounded in a hospital in the cellars of a building on the corner of Tamka and Smulikowskiego streets. On the night of September 5 to 6 the units withdrew to the city center, and the seriously wounded who could not be moved remained in the hospital. Friends urged him to take off his habit and leave with the civilians. According to a witness, he replied that he would not take off his scapular and would not abandon the wounded.

On September 6, 1944, the Germans took Powiśle and shot Father Michał together with the wounded insurgents. Accounts differ on the details of the execution. The bodies of the dead were burned, and his remains could not be identified later. The Holy See recognized his martyrdom by a decree of March 26, 1999, and John Paul II beatified him on June 13, 1999, in Warsaw among the 108 martyrs of the Second World War, for whom he set a common memorial on June 12 in the formula of beatification.