Tadeusz Chciuk-Celt

Tadeusz Chciuk-Celt
Tadeusz Chciuk-Celt abroad
Born	17 October 1916 Drohobych
Died	10 April 2001 Munich
Other names	Marek Celt
Occupation	Underground soldier, journalist, non-fiction writer
Known for	Cichociemni

Tadeusz Chciuk-Celt  Listen  (17 October 1916 - 10 April 2001) was a Polish Cichociemny fighter during World War II, later journalist, and published author. He did two parachute missions into German occupied Poland and for his bravery was honored with the Order of Virtuti Militari. After the war he was persecuted by the Stalinists and left Poland in 1948. Chciuk-Celt worked for four decades for Radio Free Europe. He also wrote several books beginning with By Parachute to Warsaw under the literary double Marek Celt in 1945.

He was declared a National Hero of Poland after the collapse of the Soviet empire and buried in Warsaw on May 28, 2001. Seven years later Tadeusz Chciuk-Celt was posthumously awarded one of the highest Polish honours, the Commander's Cross with Star of the Order of Polonia Restituta on September 5, 2008.

Tadeusz Chciuk was born on 17 October 1916 to the Polish Catholic family of Michal Chciuk and his wife, Maria; the fourth of their five children in the city of Drohobycz in the crumbling Austro-Hungarian Empire. In the reborn Poland Chciuk became active in the Polish Scouting Association from 1927 on, and was a Scoutmaster from 1936. After graduating from Jagiello High School, he went on to obtain his master's degree in Law at the Jan Kazimierz University in Lwow in 1939. He also got the intermediate degree in Music at the Szymanowski Conservatory in Lwow.