On July 11, 1943, it became known as "bloody Sunday", as on that day a wave of panic directed by Ukrainian nationalists into the Polish Volynian community peaked. The Ukrainian Insurgency Army militias and her sidekicks then attacked over 100 villages inhabited by Poles.
Volyn... Land of villages – Polish, Ukrainian, as well as Czech or mixed and judaic towns. Borders of cultures, religions – exceptional mosaic of their common penetration. Mixed marriages were not uncommon, and neighbouring coexistence was a common everyday thing. Of course, there have been any fights about meat, irritations, and even fighting at games – but even in the family, between relatives, there are conflicts – a average thing... Of course, the radicals besides found themselves baking in their hatred and feelings of harm, but they did not perceive due to the fact that people wanted to live normally... Let us add – usually live in a time of peace, due to the fact that after the war began, hatred watered by old injuries dominated everything in everyday life – religion, culture, history. Lawlessness replaced the law, morality lost its right being, and the most crucial commandment became nationalism, not love for neighbor. Crime criminals became heroes...
Iron cartilage
After The outbreak of planet War II The Polish Kresy were the arena in which Hitler and Stalin stood up in their criminal politics. First russian deportations of the Polish population began, and after the outbreak of the German-Soviet war, the Essmanian commanda began actions to exterminate the judaic population. They were eager to aid them, and frequently were done by Ukrainian, Lithuanian, or Latvian nationalists, who hoped that Germany would let them to fulfill their dreams of their own countries. Not only Jews were killed at the time, but besides Poles who managed to defend themselves from deportation into the russian Union. Over time, another “apocalypse rider” appeared in the Kresach, a russian partisan who plundered the civilian population more frequently than she fought against Germany. And if she's already attacked them, it's in specified a way as to origin retaliation throughout the area. The German military and police in anti-partisan actions without pardon exterminated villages and colonies suspected of helping the guerrillas, and it was irrelevant whether this aid was forced or not.
Very quickly, too, it turned out that Germany did not intend to make free states on the seized Borders, and surely not free Ukraine, which for Hitler was to be the main storehouse of his future empire in the east. Failed in their hopes, Ukrainian nationalists began turning distant from their erstwhile German allies and decided to fight them. In order to complete this complex picture, it is essential to mention that Ukrainian nationalists did not make a unified camp. The biggest and strongest part of it was the movement led by Taras Borovcia "Bulba", who organized the alleged Sich Poleska on the border of Polesia and Volhynia, and then joined the creation of a partisan fighting both the Soviets and Germany. He called it the Ukrainian Insurgency Army. The Bulby initiative has greatly upset Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists Stepan Bandera, which had previously murdered a large part of the competition activists OUN Andrija Melnyk (called for discrimination from the men'smen's flags). By order of Bandera, his men began to leave Galicia for Volyn to form a conspiracy network. In time, they managed to infiltrate and control the Ukrainian police on the service of the Germans, and at the same time began organizing the partisans. The first bander guerrilla troops were formed in late 1942. At that time, they began fighting the russian partisan and began attacking Polish settlements.
Crime Spiral
After the German defeat in Stalingrad in early 1943 About 5,000 Ukrainian policemen escaped into the forest with a weapon in their hand, who were treated by Germans in anti-partisan actions and extermination of judaic and Polish people. Almost everyone switched to the banner side, which determined first the destiny of another Ukrainian groups. These mercenaries and bulldozers who did not submit to UPA Bandery were murdered. It was akin with all Ukrainians who opposed Bandera's methods and policies. It is crucial to remember that the first victims of the OUN-UPA (the German Gestapo) were Ukrainian opponents of this formation. The tactics of the UPA in Volyn were to avoid fighting Germany as far as possible, to halt the russian partisan and to ruthlessly destruct the Polish population. This 3rd point was the simplest to realise, as Poles were simply the easiest target. The National Army in Volyn was only creating its structures, and the peasant self-defense could not compare with either the russian partisan or the German forces.
The first mass execution of Poles was performed by UPA in Parosla I On February 9, 1943, killing according to various estimates from 149 to 173 of its inhabitants. The second large slaughter of UPA was carried out at night from 21 to 22 April 1943. It was then that Banderov hatchets killed about 500 Poles in Janowa Dolina and officially admitted it. The next days and months brought more slaughters and murders. The apocalypse of extermination and genocide occurred between 10 and 15 July 1943. It was then that UPA made about 100 robberies on Polish towns. On Sunday, July 11th, Poles were murdered at Masses of the saints in their churches. On that day only Ukrainian nationalists were to execution 3.1 1000 Poles (according to incomplete data). In Chrynów, Crimea, Poryck, Kisielina and Zabłoce Poles were murdered in churches. In total, 97 villages and colonies and 13 Polish estates attacked this Sunday. And this planned action continued in the following months. In time, amazed Poles began organizing themselves in self-defense. Real agrarian redoubts were created – the most celebrated is the disguises. any 18,000 people have been sheltered in this village, and banders have never managed to get it. These agrarian self-defenses later became the backbone of the 27th Volyn Infantry Division.
The collective mogul and monument of Poles murdered by UPA in Bereznica Mała in the erstwhile Tarnopolskie Voivodeship, now Ukraine.
It is highly hard to find the size of Polish losses in Volyn. According to the "Information Bulletin" by autumn 1943, about 20,000 people were killed by Ukrainian nationalists. Tens of thousands fled to the General Governorate, where many were then transported by the Germans for forced labour to the 3rd Reich. The Banderow started anti-Polish activity in Galicia district, exterminating about 12 1000 Poles there.
The Legacy of the Righteous
According to the assumptions of Ukrainian nationalists, the intent of their genocidal action was to separate Ukrainian and Polish nations erstwhile and for all. It was intended to supply a perpetual flame of hatred, and its cruelty—to become an eternal panic for those who would dare to think and do otherwise. present we know – nationalists following the Nazi German wire suffered not only military but besides moral defeat. Only they carried her back then, that tragic Sunday and another days of genocide. They besides carried it due to the fact that among the Ukrainians themselves there were people who were willing not only to argue crimes, but besides for their victims – their Polish neighbours – to give their lives. Omelan Bojczun for informing Polish residents of Kowalówka about the planned robbery, suffered martyrdom at the hands of the bandiers and was branded after the traitor. Thanks to him, Wacław Chmielewski wrote in an appeal to the Ukrainian ambassador in Poland: “Omelan loved life and people, for whom he gave his young life. He died a traitor to Ukraine and an enemy of the Ukrainian people. He was indeed a hero, opposed to thousands of bloodthirsty nationalists. He did not want to execution innocent people and defenseless neighbors.” There were more like him. A Ukrainian named Płaton under a pile of corpses of Stasin's murdered residents found a year-old boy and took him home. For 3 weeks, despite the threats of the risers, he and his daughter Sonia took care of him. He then gave the boy to the father, whom he found injured in Vladimir Volynski. Brothers Alexander, Makary and Prokop Majstruk saved many inhabitants of the Polish Kamionka colony from knives and ax. Petro Bazyluk not only saved Mieczysław Słojewski and his seven-year-old boy Edward of Huta Stepańska from the UPA hatchers, but besides prevented suicide attempts of despairing Słojewski. The father and boy survived at Basiluk's hideout until entering the Red Army Volyn.
These examples can be multiplied, but at the end, let us callback the peculiarly touching evidence of Anna Derkacz, the survivor of the slaughter. According to her stories, a Ukrainian-Polish matrimony lived in Stytechnowiec (Tarnopolski County). In 1943, the Ukrainian husband began to receive written orders from the settlers to execution his wife and 2 daughters due to the fact that they were Polish. He ignored it, but yet received a informing that if he did not do it himself, the executioners would come to him and execution his wife and daughter in front of him. “After this 3rd letter, Anna Derkacz reported,” he realized that the killers would come. He then sharpened the axe, but not to obey the order, but to defend itself. A fewer days later in the night, individual started knocking hard at the door, so he grabbed the hatchet and stood in the court behind the door. erstwhile the door was balanced, the first killer came in. The host defender hit him with an axe blade with all his power. The assailant fell, followed by another. Same thing happened to him. There were no more attackers. Then the host lit the lamp to see the flagmen. And he saw the bodies of his father and brother” ...
Someone will say: how fewer were these Ukrainian Righteous towards thousands of hordes of nationalists! No wonder. Regardless of time and nationality, there are fewer people who, in the hr of trial for the cost of their own lives, the threats of death in torment and eternal infamy among their own will decide to save and defend the “foreign”, frequently called “enemy”. American historian Timothy D. Snyder in his book Bloody Lands. Europe between Hitler and Stalin, he wrote that "a sacrifice made up of life feeds forever"... How hard it is to deny your community to bear witness to humanity. How hard it is to break the plague of nationalism and scope out to yesterday's enemy... And specified a motion will be false if you ignore the fact about the past or relativize it in the name of 1 policy or another... Finally, we must be very careful that nationalism does not usage the tragedy of years ago for fresh crimes, and that is undoubtedly what it feeds on, and that is how Russian nationalism fights in the war against Ukraine today. present the Kremlin focuses and merges into 2 streams of Russian nationalism – Tsarski and Bolshevik. It's not apparent to everyone, but Stalin was a large Russian nationalist. Mortal is simply a threat for both Poles and Ukrainians, and both Poles and Ukrainians should remember Sunday, July 11, 1943, so that specified Sunday never and never happen again.
Bibliography
Part. Birch, Poland in times of independency and planet War II (1918–1945), Kraków 2001
W. Szabłowski, Fair traitors. Neighbours from Volyn, Kraków 2016
Timothy D. Snyder, Bloody lands. Europe between Hitler and Stalin, Kraków 2011
