Background
Janina Lewandowska was born on 22 April 1908 in Kharkiv, Ukraine, at that time Russian Empire. Her parents were Józef Dowbor-Muśnicki and Agnieszka née Korsońska.
Matejki 8/10, 60-995 Poznań, Poland
Janina Lewandowska graduated from II High School Generałowa Zamoyska and Helena Modrzejewska in Poznań.
Janina Lewandowska was born on 22 April 1908 in Kharkiv, Ukraine, at that time Russian Empire. Her parents were Józef Dowbor-Muśnicki and Agnieszka née Korsońska.
After graduating from junior high school Gen. Zamoyska in Poznań, Janina studied at the Music Conservatory.
Already in junior high school, Janina was interested in gliding due to the shows at Ławica. She graduated from the College of Pilotage and courses in Lviv and Dęblin in the field of radiotelegraphy. She was directed to a radiotelegraphic course in Lviv in 1937.
Lewandowska was drafted in August 1939 for service with the 3rd Military Aviation Regiment stationed near Poznan, Poland. Her unit was evacuated by train, but on 22 September its members were taken prisoner by Soviet forces (reports that Lewandowska was shot down over Soviet territory were later proven false). Lewandowska was one of only two officers in the group; both were taken to the POW Camp for Polish Officers in KozeLsk, about 250 kilometers southeast of Smolensk. There was some doubt about Lewandowska's identity; survivors reported that a woman officer there used an assumed name to disguise her family relationships from her Bolshevik captors for political reasons. However, other survivors later testified that the woman imprisoned at KozeLsk was, in fact, Janina Lewandowska.
Lewandowska's subsequent fate is unknown, although it seems likely that she died in the Katyn Massacre.
In the spring of 1940, the Soviets systematically executed almost all Polish officers, cadets, and NCOs who had been captured in 1939; most of them were buried in the Katyn forest near Smolensk. Lewandowska's name appears on the so-called Katyn List, compiled by Adam Muszynski in 1949, but is missing from the German "Katyn List" of exhumed bodies identified as the former inmates of the Polish officers' POW camp in KozeLsk, Soviet Union. However, Lewandowska might have been buried in one of many other scattered graves.
Janina Lewandowska was a member of the Poznań Aeroclub.
Early in life, Janina developed three major passions: flying, parachuting, and singing.
With her beautiful, charismatic voice Janina was given the nickname, the Poznan Nightingale.
On June 10, 1939, Janina Lewandowska was married to Mieczyslaw Lewandowski.