Michal Sadykevich was born on October 26, 1924 in Lodz to a Jewish family. After the outbreak of World War II, he and his family fled to the east, eventually settling in Tambov (USSR), where he graduated from high school. In 1941 he joined the Red Army, and from 1943 served in the Polish Army formed in the USSR, taking part in battles on the Eastern Front and after the war - in operations against the anti-communist underground and the UPA.
Promoted to the rank of colonel in 1950, he commanded the 9th Dresden Infantry Division in Rzeszow. He graduated from the General Staff Academy in Rembertów and worked at the General Staff of the Polish Army. In the 1960s he was deputy head of the Training Board at the Land Forces Command. He also wrote screenplays for several documentaries.
He was dismissed from the army on July 18, 1967 for alleged "contacts with people with nationalist-Zionist views" and demoted in 1972. After a long struggle, he emigrated from Poland in 1971 and settled in London, where he was granted British citizenship. He published in "Zeszyty Historyczne" and for the RAND Corporation, among other publications. He returned to Poland in 1990.
He was closely associated with Wojciech Jaruzelski, even though it was he who removed him from the army and stripped him of his officer rank. Michal Sadykiewicz passed away on September 24, 2016 in Warsaw.
The set includes many of the badges and decorations shown in the photos along with ID cards, including a 634g silver medal.
