Bronisław Bohatyrewicz

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Graves of Gen. Makary Smorawiński (left) and Bronisław Bohatyrewicz at the Katyn War Cemetery

Bronisław Bohatyrewicz of Ostoja Coat of Arms (1870 – 1940) was a Polish military commander and a general of the Polish Army. Murdered during the Katyn massacre, Bohatyrewicz was one of the two Generals whose bodies were identified during the 1943 exhumation.

Born February 24 or April 24, 1870[1] (sources differ) in Grodno (modern Hrodna, Belarus), to a Polish szlachta family, Bohatyrewicz joined the Imperial Russian Army, where he received officers training[1]. In September 1918 he joined the Polish Army. He started as the commanding officer of self-defence units in Grodno during the opening stages of the Russian Civil War and then the Polish-Bolshevik War. Successful in the battle of Grodno, in 1919 he became the commander of the Polish 81st Infantry Regiment. After the war he continued his career in the army and received further training in the Higher War School in Warsaw. Between 1923 and 1926 he commanded the infantry units of the Polish 18th Infantry Division and the following year he was promoted to the rank of generał brygady and retired from active duty[1].

After the Polish Defensive War of 1939 Bohatyrewicz was arrested by the NKVD[2] and imprisoned in Kozielsk[3][4] in the Soviet Union. He was murdered in Katyn in the spring of 1940, during the Katyń massacre[5][6].

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b c Editor Anna Cienciala Katyn A Crime Without Punishment Yale, 2007 ISBN 978-0-300-10851-4 Page 386
  2. ^ Stanoslaw Swianiewicz In the Shadow of Katyn Witold, 2004 ISBN 1-894255-16-X Page 233
  3. ^ J.K.Zawodny Death in the Forest Notre Dame, 1962 Page 145
  4. ^ The Crime of Katyn Polish Cultural Foundation, 1989 ISBN 0 85065 190 0 Page 18
  5. ^ J.K.Zawodny Death in the Forest Notre Dame, 1962 Page 23
  6. ^ Allen Paul Katyn Naval Institute, 1996 ISBN 1-55750-670-1 Page 208

[edit] See also