Cichocka Stefania (Seniów)

Stefania Cichocka Seniów Ruth Shaf lost both of her parents in the course of one year, 1941-1942. The Shaf family was then living in Lwów, but after the parents’ demise, Ruth and her younger sister Stanisława moved to Borisław, where Ruth worked in a factory until the day German soldiers arrived to take all the workers away. Ruth jumped out of a ground floor window and got injured, whereupon a Polish woman came up to her and took her home to tend to her. The woman was called Stefania Cichocka-Seniów. Cichocka was known for helping many Jews in Borisław. She smuggled medicine and food into the ghetto asking for nothing in return, and saved the life of her Jewish friend Halina Weizmann. It was well-known that such actions were punishable by death, but Stefania persisted. Ruth Shaf recovered in Stefania’s house, after which her rescuer suggested her help in arranging for fake identification, and was even willing to lend her own name to the document. She managed to obtain for Ruth a correct photo I.D. with the name Stefania Seniów, with which she survived the rest of the war and continued with that name after the war as well. Ruth-Stefania remained in Borisław and worked in fields, staying with a Polish family together with her sister. As for the sister, Cichocka-Seniów found her a document in the name of Stanisława Turczyn, and as such, she was captured on the way from Borisław to Lwów and taken to work in Germany as a Polish girl. Both sisters survived the war. On 11/08/2009, Yad Vashem recognized Stefania Cichocka-Seniów as Righteous Among the Nations.