Kyiv Post staff writer Maryna Irkliyenko’s grandparents suffered greatly for their love of Ukraine, but lived to see their dream of an independent Ukraine.
My grandparents, Ivan Irkliyenko, 92, and Vira Irkliyenko, 86, have suffered greatly for their love and devotion to Ukraine. As true patriots since childhood, they were among the biggest enemies of the communist regime that forcibly attempted to merge the cultures of the various nations of the Soviet Union into one “great” Soviet culture, based primarily on Russian culture.
Vira was born in western Ukraine during an era when the region passed from one invader to another. Ivan survived the Holodomor, the Stalin-ordered famine of 1932-1933, and fought in the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) in southern Ukraine. The Soviet authorities caught him and sentenced him to 15 years in concentration camps. My grandfather and grandmother found each other in cold Siberia, where they were exiled by the Stalin regime, and have been together since then.
This is their story:
Born on Sept. 10, 1916, in Krutyi Bereh village of Poltava Oblast, Ivan endured repression from childhood. In 1929, his family was subject to dekulakization, in which the Soviets seized private property in order to build socialism, where there would be no rich or poor, and where everybody would be equal. His family, which included six children, was left homeless.
He still remembers the day when he came home and saw the authorities take his disabled sister out to the yard and lock their home. They suddenly had nowhere to live. Neighbors were afraid to give shelter to such people, because it could have harmful consequences for them. But grandpa’s family had no idea how much worse things would soon get.
In 1932, the famine started as a result of dekulakization. Ivan stole green ears of wheat and plant roots to eat. There was nothing else. His mother was swollen from starvation. He heard news about a woman in the neighboring village who ate her children.
He was a talented student and loved to learn, but labeled as “dekulakized,” he was excluded from school and later college. Nevertheless, he managed to finish pedagogical college and taught in Kirovohrad Oblast.
It was there that he joined the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists with other patriots who dreamed about Ukraine’s independence. At that time, Ukraine was under attack by various invaders, including the Soviet Union, Germany, Hungary and Poland. He couldn’t stand watching his nation repressed. And so, in 1943, he became a partisan of UPA-South and began fighting for Ukraine’s independence. Their slogan was: “To get Ukraine’s independence or to die in the fight for it.”
In one battle near Semydub village, where UPA was fighting Germans, the Bolsheviks caught him and he was sentenced to 10 years in prison. After an escape attempt, Ivan got another five years tacked on to his sentence. He was transferred to another camp and tortured twice.
Vira also had a tough time. Grandma was born in western Ukraine, which at that time was under Polish occupation. At that time the Poles discriminated against the Ukrainians, who couldn’t get into universities no matter how smart they were. Finding a decent job was a real challenge.
So when the Bolsheviks came in 1939, people greeted them with bread and salt, hoping that life would change for the better. But the new power turned out to be much worse and much crueler than the Poles. The Soviets employed mass killings and mass arrests. They systematically removed all doctors, priests, engineers and other members of the intelligentsia and sent them to Siberia.
During World War II, the Nazis invaded. They killed Vira’s brother for releasing people from a school where they had been locked up and waiting to be shipped to Germany as slave workers. He was 26 when he was shot.
Vira’s father, a Greek Catholic priest, years later performed funeral rites for the young men killed, at which he said: “It’s a pity that such flowers of Ukraine are dying so young. But there will be the time when my children or my grandchildren will see Ukraine independent.” The Bolsheviks took him away, too, after somebody told the authorities about his remarks.
After Vira’s father was imprisoned, her family lived in fear that the Bolsheviks would come after them, too. So they always had their bags packed. And one night the Bolsheviks did come. She was herded on a cargo train to Siberia, where she witnessed older Ukrainians begging the guards to let them die in their homeland. But they wouldn’t listen.
When the captives reached their destination, a commandant made them sign documents agreeing to stay in Siberia for good. They were all desperate. But one woman said that when Stalin dies, they would be freed. And she was right. In 1953, Stalin died and they were let out.
Vira went to Ivan, the man she had known mostly from letters. Ivan had seen a picture of her and decided to start a letter-writing romance with her, as there were no opportunities for regular courtship at that time.
Ivan was released after Stalin’s death as well, 10 years into his prison sentence. Despite all the dramas and horrors they went through, they lived to see their dream come true. Ukraine got its independence. Today, Vira takes care of Ivan. Grandpa doesn’t go out much anymore. He prefers to stay in his room and listen to the radio. He wasn’t very willing to talk about his past. Nor did he want to be written about in the newspaper. He was worried about the recent elections in Moldova in which the Communists got a majority of votes. I understand his fears.
