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Kharytyna Pekarchuk

Kharytyna Pekarchuk (née Tina Izbytska; 14 October 1894, Simferopol — 11 March 1973, Dornstadt, Germany) was a Crimean Ukrainian of Polish descent, a soldier of the Ukrainian People's Republic (UNR) Army, a participant in the national liberation struggle of 1917–1921, and a recipient of the Symon Petliura Cross. A native of Simferopol, she became one of the symbols of the Crimean people's Ukrainian choice during the revolutionary era.

Overview

Kharytyna was born on 14 October 1894, the feast of the Intercession (Pokrova), in Simferopol, into a russified Polish family of wealthy landowners (her maternal grandfather was a Polish insurgent). Her Ukrainian identity was shaped by her daily contact with hired laborers from the Poltava region and with her Ukrainian peasant nanny; her passion for Ukrainian theater and Shevchenko's "Kobzar" made her a conscious Ukrainian as early as her gymnasium years.

After the 1917 revolution, she became one of the founders of the Simferopol "Prosvita" (Enlightenment) society, organizing a Ukrainian choir, a theater group, and literary evenings. In May 1917, a mass march of about 15,000 soldiers under Ukrainian flags took place in Simferopol (led by Yurii Vorotov-Khvylynskyi, with the parade reviewed by Yurii Tiutiunnyk) — an event that Pekarchuk considered the beginning of the Ukrainian military formation in Crimea. When the city battalion set out for the mainland, Tina joined it as a private.

After the Bolshevik coup in Crimea (January 1918), she was forced to flee. She endured captivity by the Bolsheviks in Kremenchuk and worked as a typist in the commandant's office in Yelysavethrad. She refused to swear an oath to Hetman Pavlo Skoropadskyi. In November 1918 she joined the Bohun Regiment, initially under the male pseudonym "Stepan Knyshenko." During the Winter Campaign she led a medical train, was wounded twice (in the leg and abdomen), and contracted typhus. For her combat service she was awarded the badge of the Iron Cross Order and the Symon Petliura Cross.

In May 1920, after a severe concussion, her military service came to an end. She was interned in camps, and in 1921 she fled to the Carpathians to join her husband — Ukrainian People's Republic Army officer Ivan Pekarchuk (they married in 1919). She emigrated to Czechoslovakia (1922), studied at the Ukrainian Commercial Academy in Poděbrady (from 1924), and in 1925 she contracted tuberculosis. In 1929 she moved with her husband to Poland. World War II brought new hardships: a move to Vinnytsia (1941), arrest by the Gestapo for partisan ties, flight westward, and displaced persons camps. From 1945 she lived in the Reinhard camp in Neu-Ulm. She died on 11 March 1973 in a nursing home in Dornstadt.

She published her memoirs, "My Service to Ukraine, as a Soldier," in the journal "Dorohovkaz" (Toronto); her personal émigré diary together with all the photographs, unfortunately, has been lost.

Key Details / Subtopics

  • Crimean roots: born and raised in Simferopol; gained Ukrainian consciousness through laborers from the Poltava region and her Ukrainian nanny, despite a Polish-russified family environment.
  • Public activity: co-founder of the Simferopol "Prosvita" (1917), organizer of a Ukrainian choir, theater group, and literary evenings.
  • Military service: private in the city battalion, later a soldier of the Bohun Regiment (under the pseudonym "Stepan Knyshenko"), leader of a medical train during the Winter Campaign; wounded twice, concussed (1920).
  • Awards: badge of the Iron Cross Order (for the Winter Campaign) and the Symon Petliura Cross.
  • Emigration: Czechoslovakia (Ukrainian Commercial Academy in Poděbrady), Poland; during and after World War II — Vinnytsia, Gestapo arrest, displaced persons camps in Germany.
  • Credo: "I was no heroine, but I did everything that my youthful ardor and love for the Ukrainian people suggested to me."
  • Kharytyna Pekarchuk: a Crimean Ukrainian in the ranks of the UNR Army — primary source (article by Serhii Konashevych, "Krymska svitlytsia," 2016, No. 42).
  • Crimea within the Ukrainian State (1918) — context of the national liberation struggle and the Ukrainian movement in Crimea in 1917–1921.
  • Pavlo Skoropadskyi — the hetman to whom Pekarchuk refused to swear an oath.
  • Hryts Bozhok — another soldier of the UNR Army whose recollections of Crimea during the liberation struggle were published in "Krymska svitlytsia."
  • Levko Chykalenko — a member of the Ukrainian People's Republic Directorate delegation at the negotiations with Wrangel (1920), son of Yevhen Chykalenko; an article about him was published in "Krymska svitlytsia."
  • Andrii Shchekun — chief editor of the newspaper "Krymska svitlytsia," in which the article about Kharytyna Pekarchuk was published.