Early Career
Edmund Charaszkiewicz was born on October 14, 1895, in Punitz (in Polish, Poniec), in the Province of Posen, an area of the German Empire that had been annexed from Poland by Prussia in the Third Partition of Poland (1795). He was the son of Stanisław Charaszkiewicz, a building contractor, and Bronisława, née Rajewska. Edmund completed his elementary schooling in Poniec, then attended secondary schools successively in Krotoszyn, Katowice and Kraków. In the latter city, before World War I, his family lived at ulica Długa 63 (63 Long Street). In Kraków Edmund graduated from secondary school on December 17, 1915, while already a soldier in the Polish Legions.
In that period, it was common for secondary-school students in Galicia to join Polish patriotic paramilitary organizations. On November 1, 1913, Charaszkiewicz, aged 18, joined the Riflemen's Association and in 1913–14 attended an Association noncommissioned-officers' school, using the pseudonym Kalikst (his second given name).
Soon after the outbreak of World War I, on August 4 or 5, 1914, Charaszkiewicz enlisted in the Polish Legions. He served successively in several units and convalesced from several illnesses. In November or December 1917 he was inducted into the Polish Auxiliary Corps (the former Second Brigade of the Polish Legions), in which he served till February 1918 as senior sergeant major. He was then released from the Legions to serve in the German Army. In order to avoid such service, and because he was liable to arrest and internment as a former Polish Legionnaire, he went into hiding from February 18 until June 1918 in Kraków, and from November 1918 in Warsaw, where he worked at the Ministry of Military Affairs of the Polish Armed Force. His superiors there were two future Polish generals: Colonel Marian Żegota-Januszajtis and Major Stefan Pasławski.
Just after the close of World War I, on November 15, 1918, Charaszkiewicz joined the Polish Army in the rank of sublieutenant. During the Polish-Soviet War (1919–21) he participated in battles at Nowoświęciany, Podbrodzie, Bezdany, Vilnius and Ejszyszki. During the Polish defense of Vilnius, he was taken prisoner by the Lithuanians and was interned, July 19 – August 18, 1920. He escaped and, on returning to the Białystok Rifle Regiment (Białostocki Pułk Strzelców), temporarily commanded the 11th Company (September 21 – October 6, 1920), then served as a junior officer in the 9th Company. On February 27, 1921, for conspicuous valor behind Soviet lines, he was recommended for Poland's highest military decoration, the Virtuti Militari.
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