Power of love

The couple who met in Auschwitz... then reunited 39 years on

- BY CLAIRE O'BOYLE

As the horrors of the Auschwitz concentration camp unfolded around them, two 20-somethings found love - leading to one of the most remarkable escapes of the Second World War.

Jerzy Bielecki, a Polish Catholic, and Cyla Cybulska, a Jew from eastern Poland whose entire family was murdered by the Nazis, worked together in the camp's grain silo.

"Amid the horrors of the death camp, men and women were actually forbidden to speak to one another," says historian Dr Kate Vigurs, right.

"But there were instances where they would come together on work details or brush up against one another within prison life.

"As in the case of Jerzy and Cyla, they met one another on a work detail. She caught his eye and the two instantly fell in love."

When Cyla witnessed an SS guard shoot her best friend dead, Jerzy knew they had to escape in order to survive.