Cieślicki Jan & Cieślicka Stefania

Cieślicki Jan Cieślicka Stefania Gideon Brener was born to Samuel and Jatka Brener in 1941, shortly before the Germans occupied the town of Stryj, in the Stanisławów district, in western Galicia. In February 1943, the Germans stepped up security around the ghetto’s borders prior to the liquidation of Jews who were “unfit for work.” In desperation, Samuel Brener asked his friend, Jan Cieślicki, to look after his little son. Of one accord, Jan and Stefania Cieślicki, themselves parents of two little children, agreed to Brener’s request and took the Jewish baby in. Before they were killed, Gideon Brener’s parents managed to deliver their will to the Cieślickis, with instructions concerning custody of their son after the war. Throughout the war, the Cieślickis looked after Gideon devotedly. After the war, he was handed over to the representative of the Jewish “Coordination Committee” and, as stipulated in his father’s will, was sent to Israel to be taken care of by relatives. In risking their lives to save Gideon Brener, the Cieślickis were guided by humanitarian motives, which overrode considerations of personal safety or economic hardship, and never expected anything in return. On June 25, 1991, Yad Vashem recognized Stefania Cieślicka and Jan Cieślicki as Righteous Among the Nations. File 4887