Raphael Kalinowski was a Polish Discalced Carmelite priest and military engineer born in Vilnius in 1835. Originally known as Józef, he served as an engineer in the Imperial Russian Army before participating in the January Uprising. Following his involvement with the insurgents, he faced ten years of hard labor and exile in Siberia. It was during this period of imprisonment that he converted to Catholicism, eventually joining the Carmelite order in Graz and later serving as a prior in Czerna.