Tadeusz Jordan-Rozwadowski (19 May 1866 – 18 October 1928) was a general of Poland who fought in World War I and the Polish-Soviet War.
Biography[]
Tadeusz Jordan-Rozwadowski was born on 19 May 1866 in Babin, Galicia and Podolia, in the Austrian Empire (present-day Kalush Raion, Ukraine) to a Polish noble family. Rozwadowski joined the Austro-Hungarian Army as an artillery officer in 1914 at the start of World War I and learned how to ride a horse at the Spanish Riding School in Vienna. He became the commander of the Austro-Hungarian 12th Artillery Brigade and later took over the Austro-Hungarian 43rd Infantry Division, which he led during the Battle of Gorlitz-Tarnow in May 1915. At the end of the war he rose to the rank of Major-General.
After Poland gained independence at the end of the war in 1918, he commanded the Wschod Army that fought in the Polish-Ukrainian War of 1919. In June 1919 he became the leader of Poland's efforts to win over international support for Poland in their war with the West Ukrainian People's Republic and the Soviet Union, gaining the support of the Kosciuszko Squadron of American volunteers. On 22 July 1920 he became Chief of the General Staff of the Polish Army and was the commander of Polish forces at the Battle of Warsaw under the leadership of dictator Josef Pilsudski. Leading the plan that encircled the Soviet armies and wiped them out, he was responsible for the "Miracle at the Vistula" and he was awarded the Virtuti Militari (two times) and the Cross of the Valorous (four times).
In 1926 he was imprisoned after Pilsudski's overthrow of the government of Poland, as he commanded the government's forces. On 18 October 1928, he died of poisoning after spending two years in an unheated cell in prison.