The last veteran of the 1919-1921 Polish-Soviet War has died at a nursing home in Tursk, western Poland.

Polish officers 1920. Photo: wikipedia

Captain Jozef Kowalski, who was born in 1900, was due to turn 112 in February.

As a young cavalryman he fought as a lancer against the Red Army in the fabled Battle of Komarow on 31 August 1920.

The clash, near Zamosc in south east Poland, marked the largest cavalry battle in European warfare since 1813.

Polish commander Juliusz Rommel routed the Russian forces, providing a crippling blow to the Red Army's cavalry.

Within days Poles had won a subsequent victory in the Battle of Warsaw, the so-called 'Miracle on the Vistula,' during which the Red Army was repulsed from the gates of the Polish capital.

Kowalski later served in the Second World War, during which he endured a period of imprisonment in a German forced labour camp.

Two years ago, on his 110th birthday, he was awarded the Officer's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta by President Bronislaw Komorowski.

British Ambassador in Warsaw during the Polish-Soviet War Lord'Abernon concluded that the Polish victory had “saved Central, and parts of Western Europe from... the fanatical tyranny of the Soviet.” (nh)



Source: IAR