However, in 1898 he became a member of the Polish Socialist Party (PPS) and in 1902 he had to flee to Kraków, then in Austro-Hungarian Galicia, in order to avoid arrest by the Okhrana.

During his duty in terrorist Armed Organization, in 1909, together with Kazimierz Pużak Minkiewicz was in the execution squad to murder the Tsarist secret police agent and provocateur Edmund Taranowicz.

A commander of an infantry brigade and then the garrison of Warsaw, in November 1918 he headed the action of disarmament of soldiers of the Central Powers in the city.

Promoted to the rank of generał brygady on 1 July 1919, he became the commanding officer of the Polish 2nd Legions Infantry Division, with which he fought in the Polish-Bolshevik War.

Although officially in active service, he was left without assignment and settled in a small villa in the village of Jamno near Brześć Litewski (modern Brest, Belarus).

Among the Katyn victims were 14 Polish generals including Leon Billewicz, Bronisław Bohatyrewicz, Xawery Czernicki (admiral), Stanisław Haller, Aleksander Kowalewski, Alojzy Wir-Konas, Kazimierz Orlik-Łukoski, Konstanty Plisowski, Rudolf Prich (murdered in Lviv), Franciszek Sikorski, Leonard Skierski, Piotr Skuratowicz, and Mieczysław Smorawiński.