In addition to his business activities Lutosławski was a member of the Polish National Democratic Party and co-founder of the student society Macierz Szkolna. He was one of the initiators of the new Citizens' Committee as well as the Polish Committee for Sanitary Aid (Polski Komitet Pomocy Sanitarnej, PKPS) at the beginning of World War I. In 1915, during World War I, most of the Lutosławski family fled to Russia after Poland was occupied by German forces. There, he and his brother Józef organized Polish military forces hoping to liberate Poland with the help of Tsarist Russia. He represented the Central Committee of the PKPS in Moscow in order to help Poles expelled from Congress Poland return to their re-emerging nation. His activities included setting up Polish day care, workshops, hospitals, and centers of assistance and medical care abroad. In 1917, the Russian Revolution broke out. The National Democratic Party, to which Marian and Józef Lutosławski belonged, was strongly opposed to Bolshevik rule. Marian helped evacuate Polish refugees through Murmansk to France and England. He also supported a revolt by Polish forces in Murmansk against the communists.Kalendarium 1913–1919. Towarzystwo im. Witolda Lutosławskiego, Warszawa. For this, Marian Lutosławski was arrested by the Bolsheviks in Murmansk on 23 April 1918 on suspicion of being a counterrevolutionary. He was taken to Moscow along with his brother Józef, who was arrested two days after him.
