Antoni Tyzenhaus

Antoni Tyzenhaus (or Tyzenhauz) was the noble of Tyzenhaus family. He was the Treasurer of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, industrialist, financier, personal friend of the last King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania Stanisław August Poniatowski.

Antoni Tyzenhaus , son of Benedykt Tyzenhauz, was born in the rich and influential noble family in Wilno (Vilnius) in 1733. Studied at the Jesuit College in Vilnius.

As a young man he served for the powerful Prince Czartoryski family, at their court at Wołczyn. At that time Tyzenhaus befriended the last King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania Stanisław August Poniatowski, who was born and educated at Wołczyn, as Czartoryskis were his uncles. After the election of Stanisław August Poniatowski to the throne of Poland-Lithania (1764) with the support of the Czartoryski family, Antoni Tyzenhaus was nominated to the post of Court Treasurer of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (1765) and the Governor (Starosta) of the region of Grodno (in Belarus). He was elected to Sejm - (Polish-Lithuanian Union parliament)in 1766.

He built several factories in Lithuania, not always looking at their economical viability. They were meant to use forced labor of the local peasant population. He rebuilt the city of Šiauliai, as the center of Grand Duchy properties. In 1769 he faced a violent revolt of peasants of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania properties in the Northern Lithuania (so-called in Polish: Powstanie Szawelskie), Tyzenhaus decided to reform the economical relations in the managed by him enterprises. He began to care for the level of life of the lower classes and antagonized with his polices many of his powerful and rich contemporaries.

He extensively traveled to the Western Europe in 1788, met with Jean-Jacques Rousseau .

In 1780 all his enterprises were pronounced bankrupt. Tyzenhaus was accused of fraud and released of his duties by the Grand Duke of Lithuania. Many of his problems were result of the activity of the powerful Russian ambassador in Warsaw Otto Magnus von Stackelberg, who for years intrigued against Tyzenhaus. Put on trial in 1783, Antoni Tyzenhaus lost all his wealth as the result of the court proceedings. In 1783 a special Investigation Commission of Sejm freed Tyzenhaus of all charges and returned all his confiscated private property back to him.

Antoni Tyzenhaus died in Warsaw on March 31, 1785.

Antoni Tyzenhaus Palace in Vilnius, Lithuania, rebuilt by the Soviet authorities into the building of small flats and his baroque residence in Hrodna, Belarus, built by an Italian architect Giuseppe di Sacco, remain important historical monuments in both cities.