Tytus Woyciechowski

The spelling of Woyciechowski's surname is an archaic version of the more common "Wojciechowski", with a "y" instead of a "j".

Woyciechowski was born in Lemberg, Austrian Empire (now Lviv, Ukraine).

In his youth Woyciechowski was a fellow student of Chopin's at the Warsaw Lyceum, boarding with the Chopin family. He went on to study law at Warsaw University. Chopin dedicated to him his Op. 2 Variations on "Là ci darem la mano". Woyciechowski wrote on the front page of the Variations "J'accepte avec plaisir" ("I accept with pleasure"). Prior to that, he had already dedicated to him the Variations in F major for piano four hands, which are now lost. In October 1829 Chopin sent him the Waltz Op. 70,3 together with a letter. In July 1830 Chopin visited Woyciechowski for a month at his estate in Poturzyn, which Woyciechowski had inherited from his mother. Chopin recalled this visit in a letter: Although Chopin repeatedly and unequivocally referred to Woyciechowski as 'his lover', many biographers believe that he acted as a confidant for Chopin during an alleged infatuation with the singer Konstancja Gładkowska. Woyciechowski is shown in Chopin's letters to him to be amongst the composer's favorite friends, or perhaps a lover: Woyciechowski accompanied Chopin in his 1830 journey to Austria but, on learning of the November 1830 Uprising, returned to Warsaw to take part in the fighting. He became a second lieutenant and was awarded the highest Polish military decoration, the Virtuti Militari. While the two never met thereafter, they continued to correspond.

In 1838, Woyciechowski married Countess Aloysia Poletylo, by whom he had four children – their second son being named Fryderyk, after Chopin. Woyciechowski dedicated himself to agriculture, pioneered the introduction of crop rotation in Poland, and in 1847 founded one of the first sugar factories in the country. In 1857, he temporarily stood in for Julian Fontana in the process of publishing Chopin’s Songs, Op. 74. 1861–62 he was an active member of the White Party, which took part in the failed January 1863 Uprising. He died in Poturzyn, now Poland. The Woyciechowski collection of Chopin memorabilia was destroyed by fire in 1914: It contained a piano made by the Buchholtz company, on which Chopin played and composed, copies of his compositions (the piano Variations à quatre mains ending in a fugue, written on 17 pages, and a contredanse), Chopin's letters to Tytus Woyciechowski and a pen in the shape of a column, with a head and base in gold and a core in coloured mosaic. The base, decorated with the initials T.W., served at the same time as a seal. A card with Chopin's dedication lay in a special case. The family manor house at Poturzyn was destroyed during the Second World War.

Tytus Woyciechowski is recorded with the occupation industrialist. Recorded as industrialist, large estate owner, jurist and composer.