![[LITOPYS UPA: Chronicle of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army]](/upa/images/litopys.jpg)
SERIES 1
VOLUME 11
In this volume of Litopys UPA we are reprinting a remarkable
underground document: a collection of biographies of over 730
Ukrainian revolutionaries and UPA soldiers from the Ternopil region
who fell in the struggle for an independent, united Ukrainian state
during the period of renewed Soviet Russian occupation, in 1944-
48. The full title of this singular publication is The Ternopil Area:
A List of Heroes of the Ukrainian Revolution Fallen in the Struggle
with the Russian Bolshevik Occupying Power, 13. 3. 1944 -
31. 12. 1948. The same title has also been given to the present volume
of Litopys UPA. The original publication appeared in September, 1949;
it was 20 x 27 cm. in size and consisted of 158+5 pages of close
type.
Some further explanation of the title is required. "The Ternopil area" means the Ternopil region as defined by the underground administration; it corresponded to the UPA's Ternopil Military District (Taktychnyi Vidtynok - TV) "Seret I" (TV UPA 16). From the book it is apparent that the underground Ternopil region consisted of two megadistricts (nadraion): the Ternopil nadraion, composed of four districts (radon): Velyki Borkivtsi, Mykulyntsi, Kozliv and Velykyi Hlybichok, and the Zboriv nadraion, composed of two districts - Zboriv and Zalozhtsi. Districts as designated by the underground generally corresponded to the counties (povit) of the Polish administration, with some small changes that came as a result of the Soviet takeover. Thus, for example, the town of Pomoriany and a few villages, which had formerly been in the Zboriv county, were now included in the Lviv province (oblast), where Pomoriany became a district centre. We do not know for certain whether the underground Ternopil region included only two nadraions, or whether there were more; possibly, biographies from additional nadraions were, for some reason, not included in the published collection. The underground documents available to us have not made it possible for us to recreate exactly the administrative organization of the underground Podillia Krai ("Podillia"), of which the Ternopil oblast formed the basis. We also remain uncertain whether the UPA TV "Seret I" had the code number 16.
The book we are reprinting here provides biographies of those fallen after March 13, 1944. March 13 is the date on which the Red Army re-entered the territory of the underground Ternopil region and at that time members of the Ukrainian resistance began to suffer casualties in the struggle with the new occupying power. The authors of the book provide biographies only of those who died "in struggle with Russian Bolshevik occupying power" although there are some small exceptions to this rule. For example, in the list from the Velykyi Hlybichok district we see a biography of the nadraion assistant propagandist, Volodymyr Kachka ("Ptakh"), who was killed by retreating German troops in the village of Hliadky on March 9, 1944. In the list from the Zalozhtsi district, we see a biography of Company Commander Iaroslav Protsyk ("Zhuravel"), from the village of Hukalivtsi, Zalozhtsi district, who died before the indicated date of March 13, 1944. Protsyk died from a Soviet bullet, for he was active in the "Kora" battalion in Volyn, where the Soviet occupation began earlier. He was killed in February, 1944, by the Soviets in a surprise attack on the isolated farmhouses near the village of Dubinka, [1] where he was being treated for typhoid fever. Deviations like these from the stated principle are, however, few.
Although the book was completed only in September, 1949 (this date is given at the end of the book), it has no biographies of people killed in 1949. Clearly, the editors chose to keep to the cut-off date of December 31, 1948. Perhaps they planned to issue further volumes, which would provide biographies of the fallen from 1949 and later years.
***
The book makes no mention of its authors or editors, although at the end there is a signature - B-s. This, however, tells us very little. Considering the form and style of the book's biographies, it clearly was not prepared on the basis of archival materials. In the conditions in which the underground operated, it was impossible to collect and organize a rich archive spanning a period of five years.
The information could be gathered only with the help of the members of the armed underground who were active in the region in 1949; they were, in effect, the authors of the biographies.
To leading circles of the Ukrainian liberation movement it was becoming apparent at that time that the Soviet police machine could, in time, completely overcome the Ukrainian armed resistance. That is why instructions were issued to begin collecting and publishing materials about the Ukrainian armed struggle and the Russian Bolshevik terror. Information about this heroic struggle would thus be preserved for posterity and could serve as a tool for educating future fighters for freedom. Mention of such objectives of the publication is made in the introductory essay. Thus the book was one of the projects aimed at documenting the Ukrainian liberation struggle.
The project was executed more or less as follows. Most
likely still during 1948, an editorial board was established and
commissioned to gather material for biographies. The editors prepared
instructions on collecting biographical information. They also created
a network, with people at the nadraion, district and local cell
levels, which was responsible for gathering information about the
fallen in each locality from rank-and-file members of the underground
or the population at large. Undoubtedly, gathering these materials
presented a number of difficulties (the unusual nature of the project,
conditions of life in the underground, the educational level of the
underground cadres and so on). Thus there must have been instructors
who traveled through the area, dealing with problems, training people
to gather data, or themselves writing down information given by
private soldiers and civilians. The editors had much to do, collating
the raw data, organizing it according to the established plan and
publishing the final results. All of this was done in a very short
time. Collection of the material was completed in the spring of 1949;
in September the book was published. Considering the conditions of
life in the underground, this was a real achievement.
The book contains 718 numbered entries - mainly biographies, although some of the entries are just brief notices about certain fallen. These briefer entries are descriptions of last battles of insurgents from other districts, who were known only by their pseudonyms, or data about deaths of unknown insurgents. Listed under the Zalozhtsi district, for example, is entry no. 179, information about the graves of 60 insurgents from the Volyn companies "Mech," "Sokil," and "Dunai" in the villages of Panasivka and Zahiria. These insurgents were killed in a skirmish with MVD troops, which took place in the village of Panasivka on November 13, 1944. A similar entry, no. 180, tells of nine unknown insurgents from the detachment led by "Ostap" (Omelian Poliovyi, commander of the Military Region "Lysonia"), who were killed in the detachment's skirmish with the MVD on September 27, 1944, near the village of Al'banivka, Zboriv district, and buried in the village of Neterpyntsi, Zboriv district. In the list from Velykyi Hlybichok district, entry no. 135 described the last battle of 17 insurgents led by Company Commander "Hordienko" with more than 300 MVD troops in the forest near the village of Didkivtsi. Entry no. 137 describes two separate killings of UPA soldiers from the company "Siromantsi" in March, 1945, in the villages of Male Horodyshche and Nosivtsi. Of the fallen, five were unknown and seven were known only by their pseudonyms and their functions within the UPA.
Apart from the rather small number of entries with incomplete information about certain fallen, the rest of the book consists of biographies, which are presented according to a set pattern: 1) place and date of birth of the subject and his social origin; 2) education, professional and military training; 3) occupation and place of residence; 4) community activism; 5) membership and activities in the OUN; 6) information about service in the UPA or armed underground; 7) special training, functions filled, notable exploits, decorations and the like; 8) information about the last battle and place of burial.
Most of the biographies are rather short, for they are mainly accounts of the lives of private soldiers of the UPA or ordinary members of the armed underground, who met their deaths at a young age and did not have long careers. Equally short and often incomplete are the biographies of people from other areas, about whom the editors were unable to obtain precise information. The remaining biographies are well-rounded and give much information about a given UPA soldier or underground activist; indirectly, they also tell us about the liberation movement in general. There are over 50 biographies of UPA officers and notable activists of the underground and several dozen of UPA soldiers, who served in various units in Volyn, Polissia, the Carpathians and other Ukrainian provinces. (More than 30 UPA company or battalion commanders are mentioned in the biographies, as well as schools for officers and non- commissioned officers and professional training organized by the UPA, and so on). Much other valuable information can also be found here. Thus the book is an important source for the study of the Ukrainian armed liberation struggle, not only in the Ternopil area, but throughout Ukraine.
***
There is no historical account in the book, which would explain the events occurring in the Ternopil Region in 1944-48. Without such explanation, some of the information contained in the biographies may be incomprehensible. For that reason, we will look briefly at the history of the struggle of the UPA and the armed underground in the Ternopil area. We will base our account mainly on data provided in the biographies and will explain more fully questions that are left unclear in the original publication. To help fill these gaps, we will also make use of information from underground materials which will appear in the volume of Litopys UPA dealing with the UPA's Podillia Military Region "Lysonia."
The Ternopil Region does not have large forested areas, and thus is not suited to partisan operations carried out in large units. Only during the German occupation and in the first phase of the Soviet occupation, that is, in 1944, did large units, UPA battalions, operate in the region. For example, mention is made of "Ostap's" (or "Ostap's" and "Bondarenko's") large UPA detachment (zahin). These were two battalions of the "Lysonia" UPA Military Region, which carried out raids together along the border of the Lviv and Ternopil provinces in September, 1944. This UPA detachment also raided through the Zboriv into the Kremianets' areas and fought MVD troops near the village of Al'banivka, Zalozhtsi district, on September 27, 1944. [2] "Ostap" was first lieutenant Omelian Poliovyi, commander at that time of the Military Region "Lysonia," who briefly simultaneously commanded an UPA battalion and the large detachment. He was born in 1913 in the village of Yarchivtsi, in the Zboriv district. In circumstances unknown to us, he fell into the hands of the MVD, probably during the time of the great winter blockade of UPA territories by MVD troops, in 1945-46. He has now spent more than 38 years in Soviet prisons and concentration camps.[3] "Bondarenko" was Major Volodymyr Iakubovskyi, from 1943 Chief of Staff of the "Lysonia" Military Region, and from the time of the great blockade of 1946, commander of the whole military region. He came from the town of Zalozhtsi, Zalozhtsi district, and was killed on June 17, 1947, near the village of Vivsia, Koziv district. His detailed biography appears in this volume of Litopys UPA. In 1944, Major Volodymyr Iakubovskyi also commanded an UPA battalion which included the non commissioned officers' school of the UPA's "Lysonia" Military Region. Battalions of the "Lysonia" Military Region were reorganized in 1944 by the order of the UPA Supreme Command. From that time, the units were to operate mainly in platoons and squads, and make extensive use of underground bunkers. [4] Later, the UPA operated in the region by companies, platoons or even smaller units.
On the basis of existing documentation, it is hard to pinpoint precisely the beginnings of the UPA. Biographies of many fallen soldiers tell us that as early as in the spring of 1948 they went to join the UPA in Volyn, or the Ukrainian People's Self-defense (Ukrayins'ka Narodna Samooborona - UNS) in the Carpathians. There, some of them were killed. Some local fighting units also existed in the Ternopil area. In the biography of Ivan Pytliovanyi ("Gonta," "Pluhatar"), from the village of Zaruddia, Zboriv county, we are told that in the spring of 1943 he organized a "special unit, composed of several battalions" to battle "Polish chauvinist bands." Probably the word "battalion" (kurin) appears here by mistake instead of "squad" (rii), because bigger units did not exist at that time in the Zboriv area. Later this special unit merged with the UPA. In the Ternopil nadraion, Stepan Markiz ("Hordiy"), from the village of Dovzhanka, played an important role in organizing the UPA. We are told in his biography that during the German occupation, he was the nadraion (that is, county) military officer who trained a lot of younger revolutionaries, and in 1943 together with them joined the UPA. Eventually, he organized the company "Buini" and for a time was its commander, but after the "reorganization" of the company, he served as platoon commander. In the Zboriv county, a similar role was played by Petro Chip ("Karmeliuk," "Iaroslav") from Oliyiv, Zalozhtsi district. During the German occupation he was a district, and from the end of 1942, a county military officer. The author of his biography tells us that he organized military training of youth, and during the second Soviet occupation, organized SKV (Self-defense) units and an UPA company, which he trained thoroughly and which had "over a dozen skirmishes" with MVD troops. Petro Chip was killed on April 8, 1945. The biographies also mention the contributions of many other people in organizing the UPA. The first local UPA companies began to be formed in the Ternopil area during the winter of 1943-44. That was when the German-Soviet front moved to the centre of the Ternopil region. Newly-formed units of the UPA had to move away from the front, in order to train their new recruits away from danger, in the relative security of the forests. Many young men who were fleeing the front area also joined the UPA units that still needed recruits. That is how we can explain why so many young people from the Zboriv and Ternopil counties could be found in numerous UPA units organized in different counties and at different times.
The biographical notes often refer to the "stabilization of the
[German-Soviet] front" (March-July, 1944) during which time the
underground and the UPA sustained serious losses. There is even talk
of "devastated" or "neutralized" terrain. The war front moved to the
region in mid-March, 1944, but did not stabilize immediately. The city
of Ternopil, for example, was the object of battles for almost a
month, during which time the front-line shifted west or east several
times. Many dwellings were destroyed and both German and Soviet front-
line troops robbed inhabitants and forced many of them out of the
front zone. The Soviet authorities immediately undertook to mobilize
all men, and with the area saturated with troops, MVD detachments
began search and destroy operations against the UPA and members of the
underground. Those who were not killed or captured, moved behind the
front lines, to somehow get through that very difficult time. It was
only when the front moved to the Vistula River that life began to
return to normal both for the underground and the population at
large. The UPA units returned to the region at this time.
During the second Soviet occupation, in the summer of 1944, SKV units[5] and additional UPA companies[6] continued to be organized. It was in the fall of 1944 that here, as in all of Halychyna, the greatest number of UPA and SKV units existed, and had the largest number of members. Many UPA soldiers returned at that time to their native parts, particularly those who were either wounded or sick. After recovery, they continued to serve in the area. The biographies also show that in the Ternopil area, as in other regions of Halychyna, many peasants tried to escape mobilization into the Red Army and hid out from the Soviet manhunters. Many of them fell victim to the Soviets along with insurgents and underground members.
It was in 1944-45 that the most pitched and massive armed struggle with NKVD police troops took place. At that time UPA units and many SKV units were still operating in full force. On the enemy side, there were not only local NKVD garrisons, but also many special units, of battalion, regimental and even divisional strength. They carried out raids and manhunts in forests and villages, searching primarily for UPA and SKV units. Sometimes they billeted in villages and put whole areas under blockade. Many biographies make mention of massive operations by NKVD troops in the fall of 1944 and in the winter and spring of 1945. Comparing the numbers of fallen over five years, 1944-48, the book "ices the following picture of the Zboriv nadraion. In the Zboriv district, of the total 164 fallen, 32, or 19.5%, fell in 1944, and 105, or 64%, in 1945. In the Zalozhtsi district, of the total 247 fallen, 108 (including 60 UPA soldiers who were killed in the village of Panasivka), or 45%, fell in 1944 and 75, or 25%, in 1945.[7] In 1946, the Zboriv district had 14 fallen, that is, 8.5% of the five-year total of 164; the Zalozhtsi district had 33, or 13.4% of the total 247. This was the time of the 1946 great winter blockade by NKVD troops of all villages in the territory of UPA activity; the blockade also encompassed the Ternopil region.[8] There were also smaller blockades of whole areas during the summer and fall of 1946. In 1947, only six fallen or 3.7% of the total, were registered in the Zboriv district and in the Zalozhtsi districtã23 (9.3%). In 1948, the Zboriv district had five fallen (3%), and the Zalozhtsi district - 23 (9.3%). During 1947-48, the armed resistance of the region no longer waged battle operations; instead, it acted as a clandestine armed underground. For that reason its losses became smaller. Naturally, the cadres of the underground were much smaller in 1948 than in 1945.
From underground documents from other territories we know that by the end of 1949, all UPA units were disbanded and UPA soldiers had entered the armed underground, filling the cadres that had been reduced by losses. In many areas, especially unforested, open terrains, this "demobilization" of UPA units took place even earlier. What do the biographies of the fallen in the Ternopil area have to say on this subject? Up to the fall of 1947 there are still, among the listed fallen, UPA soldiers belonging to specific companies.[9] In the biographies of the fallen of 1948, only former UPA soldiers are listed who, we are told, held specific functions in the armed underground, some only as of 1947. This tells us that the final demobilization of UPA units in the region probably occurred sometime at the end of 1947. The commander of the "Lysonia" Military Region, Major Volodymyr Iakabovskyi, was killed on June 17, 1947.
Thus, in 1948 there were probably no more UPA units in the Ternopil region; instead, there was a clandestine collective network known as the armed underground. It was made up of former UPA soldiers, OUN members and non-partisan patriots who operated under the general direction of the Supreme Ukrainian Liberation Council (UHVR). Underground publicists of the 1950s, such as, for example, P. Poltava, referred to this network as "the Ukrainian armed underground," or, if they wanted to specify its membership, spoke of the "struggle of the UPA, OUN and armed underground." This tells us that apart from UPA soldiers and OUN members, the underground also included nonpartisan patriots or members of former political parties.
The book is made up of an introductory article, a collection of biographies and an alphabetical index of the biographies.
The introduction stresses the meaning of heroism in the struggle of the Ukrainian people for freedom, emphasizing in particular its significance for the education of youth and "future generations." The authors cite some examples of this heroism: they speak of heroic deeds performed by insurgents and underground members during the course of their last battles. Among the cited examples is that of assistant district leader of the Ukrainian Red Cross (Ukrayins'kyi Chervonyi Khrest - UChKh), Sophia Skladan ("Olenka"), who died under MVD torture, and county leader of the UChKh, Ievhenia Zvarych ("Murashka"), who, finding herself in a hopeless situation, took her own life.
The biographies are organized according to district (the district from which the fallen person originated, or the one in which he died.) Within each district they are listed chronologically, according to the date of death. The districts are presented in the following order: Velyki Borkivtsi, Mykulyntsi, Kozliv, Zboriv, Zalozhtsi and Velykyi Hlybichok. The main body of the book consisted in the original edition of 134 pages; there was also an "Addendum" with another 25 biographies, also organized according to district. It appears that additional biographies came in from the field when the book was already in print, so the editors decided to add them on to the end of the publication. As we explained earlier, some of the entries are not biographies, but rather information about the deaths of groups of unknown UPA soldiers. Such entries can be found under the Zalozhtsi district (2) and the Velykyi Hlybichok district (3). These are the numbers of biographies included under each district: Velyki Borkivtsi - 96, Mykulyntsi - 89, Kozliv - 51, Zboriv -164, Zalozhtsi - 181, Velykyi Hlybichok - 137. In our reprint of the book, we integrated the "Addendum" materials into the main collection of biographies.
The index was organized in tables and entitled "The Ternopil Area: a List of Fallen Ukrainian Revolutionaries (For the Period from 13. 3. 1944 to 31. 12. 1948)." It consisted of three sections:
Part (A) lists the fallen from the Ternopil region who were killed within that same region. Part (B) lists the fallen from the Ternopil region, who were killed outside the region. Part (C) lists the fallen from other regions, who were killed within the Ternopil region. In all three sections the lists are organized according to district, ordered alphabetically. For each person listed the following data is provided: entry number, surname, first name and pseudonym, function in the organization, date of death and the page on which the individual's biography can be found. The fallen whose names were not known, are included at the ends of the lists for given districts. Here is how the figures for each district compare:
| District | A | B | C |
|---|---|---|---|
| Velyki Borkivtsi | 62 | 15 | 24 |
| Mykulyntsi | 76 | 9 | 4 |
| Kozliv | 41 | 9 | 4 |
| Zboriv | 139 | 23 | 2 |
| Zalozhtsi | 134 | 24 | 24[10] |
| Velykyi Hlybichok | 113 | 7 | 30[11] |
| Total | 565 | 83 | 89 |
In our reprint of the book we omitted the reference to the page, because the pages of Litopys UPA do not correspond to the pages of the original. In any case, for Litopys we made a separate index, which has entries for pseudonyms, places, institutions, and other significant data. The alphabetical ordering in the original index was not perfect; in our version we corrected all such errors, and included in the alphabetical listings the pseudonyms of those persons whose surnames are unknown. For these reasons, a particular individual may appear under a different entry number in our version than in the original.
***
To what extent is the information provided in the biographies reliable? Almost all the biographies give precise and accurate data about their subjects' date of birth, education, participation in community life and the like. This shows that the editors made a concerted effort to get the underground network to gather facts about each person's life. The biographies are carefully put together and follow a standard pattern, which adds to the sense of the materials' reliability. Of course, errors may occur in cases where information was gathered through secondary sources, or was based solely on faulty human memory. For example, it is easy to get information about an underground member who lived his whole life in one village, for all his fellow-villagers know about him. But inaccuracies can easily slip into biographies of people who wandered from one place to another and had complicated careers. Thus, in the biography of Major V. Iakubovskyi we are told that he was Chief of Staff of the "Lysonia" Military Region from 1948 until his death in 1947. However a UHVR "Resolution" of August 25, 1947, mentions him as being the Commander of the "Lysonia" Military Region in January, 1947.[12] At times, the editors or authors of the book resort to standard generalizations, rather than giving precise information. For example, in the biographies of some UPA soldiers who had been in Volyn, we are told that a given individual "participated in raids into the East," but there is no information about which raid the soldier took part in, or to which company he belonged. We are told that some of the fallen, particularly civilians, "were killed as the result of enemy terror." This phrase in itself is not comprehensible. Only from the context can we deduce that we are being told of unarmed civilians shot or otherwise murdered by the NKVD. However, shortcomings of this type are relatively few, and in general, the biographies provide concrete and accurate information.
The editors tried to give their publication an educational, propaganda character, and for that reason devoted much space to descriptions of battle exploits of insurgents and underground members, particularly when these fighters stood in the face of death. Often other important information is neglected in a given biography. For example, in the biography of printer Mykhailo Turyla ("Zenko"), we are told that he gave over his printing equipment to the underground, while he himself entered the propaganda division, but we are never told, however, what happened to the printing facilities after that. The biography of Major Volodymyr Iakubovskyi ("Bondarenko"), a very important figure, devotes more than half its space to a description of his death; the rest is information about his five year activity in the UPA. We would have preferred that the biography given a more detailed account of his life, for we know very little about this eminent officer of the UPA. We would also have liked to know whether Mykhailo Turyla's printing equipment was used in the underground and what was done with it.
We point out these shortcomings in the book with a view of giving the reader a clearer picture of this underground publication. But in spite of its flaws, the book is a very rich source of information, because even when information is scant, it helps us to recreate a picture at least in part of the whole liberation movement. Thus, for example, in the biographies of UPA soldiers who served in Volyn, we are told that they returned to their native parts sick with typhoid. From these statements we can infer how widely the MVD spread typhoid in Volyn and Polissia. The biographies contain data about UPA skirmishes and raids, military and professional training and other matters which we have not so far encountered in other sources. Only in this book are there descriptions of the skirmish between an UPA battalion and MVD troops in the village of Panasivka. Only here is there mention of a raid carried out by the UPA battalion commanded by Major V. Iakubovskyi into the Carpathians, as well as of other raids and battles of UPA units. There is also much information about the conduct of MVD troops of occupation. Thus, the biographies tell us that during their raids, the MVD troops would shoot not only captured and wounded insurgents, but also unarmed civilians. To sum up, the book is a rich source of information about the liberation struggle, in the Ternopil area and beyond it.
This collection of biographies of the fallen of the Ternopil area also tells us something about the strength, level and ability to function of the local underground organization in 1949. It shows that the underground network covered the whole territory and had informants in all villages, for the biographies include people from almost all the villages. It also shows that the underground apparatus functioned well enough to complete such a project in a relatively short time, although this was not its main task. And finally, since the execution of such a project required a number of people with a certain level of education, it shows that there were such people in the underground and that they were capable of producing materials measuring up to the highest standards.
***
Unfortunately, the biographies reprinted here do not include photographs of the fallen. But there are probably many friends or relatives of these people living in the free world who have pictures of them, individually or as part of groups - families, school groups, sport teams, organizations and so on. We would ask for such pictures to be sent to us for inclusion in the next volume of Litopys UPA, which will be about the Podillia Military Region "Lysonia." If anyone notices someone missing from the biographies, we ask that they send that person's biography for possible inclusion in a future volume.
We obtained a photocopy of the original underground publication from the Archive of the Foreign Representation of the UHVR (ZP UHVR) (their document T 29-1). We are reprinting the book without deletions; we have, however, integrated the biographies from the "Addendum" into the main body of the book and made corrections to the alphabetical lists in the index where necessary. We have also corrected printer's errors, spelling mistakes and the most glaring grammatical errors and standardized abbreviations in the index. We wish to thank the Archive and everyone who helped prepare this volume of Litopys UPA. In particular, we thank Mykola Lebid and Petro Sodol for their assistance in the Archive and with other information; Antin Ivakhniuk for correcting texts; Volodymyr Makar for assistance in proofreading; Zonia Keywan for doing translations into English; Mykhailo Pytiura for making maps and drawings; Stephan Shpak for helping us to compile the index and Anna Mulyk for typing often-illegible manuscripts.
Yevhen Shtendera
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