Son of Wawrzyniec, a steelworker and Marianna née Chojkowska. He was born in the Ksawera working group between Będzin and Dąbrowa Górnicza. Thanks to the relatively good material position of the family, he studied at the local elementary school. As a result of an accident suffered by his father, in 1913 he was forced to stop his education and take up a job. After the outbreak of the First World War, he left for agricultural work in Thuringia. He worked there until 1917, when he was arrested for hitting his overseer and sent to the prisoners of war camp in Erfurt. After escaping from there, he found himself in Upper Silesia, where he worked in a coal mine in Bytom and in the steelworks in Siemianowice Śląskie. After the outbreak of the revolution in November 1918 in Germany, he crossed the German-Polish border and settled in Dąbrowa Górnicza, where in December 1918 he volunteered for the Polish Army. He took part in the battles in defense of Lviv, and then in war activities on the Lithuanian-Belarusian Front of the Polish-Bolshevik war. In 1921 he was demobilized as a non-commissioned officer of the Polish Army, after which he returned to Dąbrowa Górnicza. For participating in the fighting in 1920, he was awarded the Cross of Valor.