Kormylo Mikhail

Kormylo, Mikhail Mikhail Kormylo (b. 1910) lived with his mother, wife and young daughter in the village of Myszkowice in the vicinity of Tarnopol (today Myshkovychi, Ternopil’ District). During the German occupation, Kormylo worked as a salesperson in a local spirits factory. From late 1942, he hid three members of the Gold family, Yaacov, his wife, Batya, and his brother, Ben-Zion, former residents of Tarnopol, in the cellar of his house. He also gave shelter to Sonya Mandel, a 22-year-old Jewish woman, who was a stranger to him. Mandel was born in Warsaw and raised in Tarnopol. After Mandel’s parents perished and she heard about a Ukrainian in Myszkowice who helped Jews, she escaped from a forced-labor camp and headed to the village. When she arrived at Kormylo’s home, she joined the Gold family in the cellar. The conditions there were difficult but Kormylo did his utmost to sustain his wards. His meager wage was spent on food divided equally between the hiding Jews and Kormylo’s family. Throughout the occupation, Kormylo’s neighbors shunned him and suspected that he was helping Jews but did not denounce him to the authorities. Luckily, the four were never discovered in the searches carried out in the house. Right after the war, the Golds left the Soviet Union and eventually settled in the United States. Mandel (later Joffe) immigrated to Israel. In 1993, only four years after Kormylo’s death, Mandel renewed contacts with his widow Stefa and daughter Nadia. On Septmeber 30, 1992, Yad Vashem recognized Mikhail Kormylo as Righteous Among the Nations.