Kazimierz Orlik-Łukoski

Kazimierz Orlik-Łukoski
Memorial at the Piatykhatky mass grave in Kharkiv, with plaque of General Kazimierz Orlik-Łukoski among 3,739 names of victims of the local NKVD killing squad.
Born	13 September 1890 Sokół
Died	1940 Katyń, Soviet Union
Allegiance	Poland
Rank	Brigadier General

Kazimierz Orlik-Łukoski (13 September 1890 – 1940) was a Polish military commander and one of the Generals of the Polish Army murdered by the Soviet Union in the Katyń massacre of 1940.

He was born Kazimierz Łukoski in 1890, in the village of Sokół near Garwolin, in the Siedlce Governorate of the Russian Empire (in the Masovian Voivodeship of present-day Poland). After graduating from Wróblewski's School in Warsaw in 1910, he moved to Vienna, where he graduated from the School of Agriculture in 1914. During his studies in the capital of Austria-Hungary, he became involved in the Drużyny Strzeleckie para-military organization and adopted the nom de guerre of Orlik (Polish for lesser spotted eagle), which later formed a part of his surname. At the outbreak of World War I he joined the Polish Legions and became one of its officers. Initially a commanding officer of a battalion of the 3rd Infantry Regiment, he went on to command a battalion in the 2nd Infantry Regiment. Wounded during the battle of Husiatyn of 20 June 1916, he was withdrawn to rear duties. Prior to the Oath Crisis of 1917 he joined the Polnische Wehrmacht, where he became an adjutant to General Felix von Barth and the inspector of training. However, after the crisis he returned to the 2nd Regiment, with which he fought the battle of Rarańcza and crossed the lines to Imperial Russian held part of Ukraine.