Xawery Czernicki

Who was Xawery Czernicki?

Rear Admiral Xawery Stanisław Czernicki was a Polish engineer, military commander and one of the highest-ranking officers of the Polish Navy. Considered one of the founders of Polish Navy's logistical services, he was murdered by the Soviet NKVD during the Katyn massacre.

Xawery Czernicki was born October 16, 1882 in a szlachta family in the village of Giedeikiai near Vilna. After graduating from a local gymnasium in 1901, Czernicki joined the Imperial Naval Engineering School in Kronstadt. In 1905 he graduated from the shipbuilding faculty and joined the Russian Navy in the basic officer's rank of michman. The following year he was admitted as the Second Lieutenant and served as an engineer in the St. Petersburg naval base. In 1910 he became the head of a small naval shipyard in Sretiensk, where he authored several river monitors. Until 1914 he also served as a deputy engineer and then lead engineer of the Gangut class battleships Sevastopol and Petropavlovsk. Promoted in 1913 to the rank of Captain, until the end of World War I Czernicki served as the lead hull designer in the naval shipyard in Reval. In 1917 he was promoted to Navy Lieutenant Colonel and the following year he resigned his post.