The January Uprising by the citizens of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (present-day Poland, Lithuania, Belarus, Latvia, parts of Ukraine, western Russia) against the Russian Empire begins on January 22, 1863, and lasts until the last insurgents are captured in 1865.The uprising begins as a spontaneous protest by young Poles against conscription into the Russian Army, and is soon joined by high-ranking Lithuanian officers and various politicians.

The insurrectionists, severely outnumbered and lacking serious outside support, are forced to resort to guerrilla warfare tactics.

They fail to win any major military victories or capture any major cities or fortresses in Russian-occupied lands.

But they do blunt the effect of the Tsar's abolition of serfdom in the Russian partition, which had been designed to draw the support of peasants away from the nation.

Severe reprisals against insurgents, such as public executions and deportations to Siberia, lead many people to abandon armed struggle and turn instead to the idea of "organic work": economic and cultural self-improvement.