Ferdynand Antoni Ossendowski (1878-1945), Polish writer, journalist, traveller, educator, social and political activist. A student of mathematical and natural sciences in St. Petersburg, he took part in many scientific expeditions, including to the Caucasus, the Dniester River, China, Japan and India. In 1899, after the student riots in which he took part, he left for Paris. On his return, he was appointed docent at Tomsk Technical University, but resigned his post for the sake of his scientific career. In 1905 he was sent on a geological survey to Manchuria. Sentenced to death for organising protests in the Countin, but received extraordinary leniency. An associate of the Whites during the Civil War, he sent Sisson's documents to the West. After the fall of Kolchak, whose adviser he was, he was prosecuted by the Cheka for his anti-communist stance. He fled Russia to Mongolia. He returned to Poland in 1922 and was mainly involved in literary activities. Called the "Polish Karl May", he wrote mainly adventure books which sold in huge editions. He wrote, among others: Through the Land of Men, Animals and Gods (1922), The Desert Falcon (1928) and Lenin (1930 , a fictionalized biography that is a critique of Bolshevism). In 1943 he joined the National Party. He died two years later in Grodzisk Mazowiecki.