I n t e r v i e w with Georgiy Mytrofanovych MOSKALENKO
(Last reading on February 6, 2008)
V.V. Ovsienko: March 18, 2002, Georgiy Mytrofanovych Moskalenko. H.M. Moskalenko: Well, I'll start telling the story, let it record. I was born in 1938 in the city of Odesa. My parents were a working-class family. My father worked in the Odesa port, I don't know what he did there, and my mother worked as a cook in a sanatorium somewhere.
V.V. Ovsienko: And what was your father's name?
H.M. Moskalenko: My mother called him Mytrofan.
V.V. Ovsienko: And please mention your mother as well.
H.M. Moskalenko: My mother was Nina, her maiden name was Diyanova. She seemed to be of Bulgarian descent. Nina Parfentiivna Diyanova. And my father was Mytrofan Panteleiyovych.
In 1944, the liberation of Odesa began, Soviet ships approached from the sea and shelled Odesa heavily, it was all in smoke, in explosions. My father took us and moved us to the village of Yakymiv Yar in the Shyriaieve district of the Odesa region. In 1944, I was six years old, and I lived in the village from 1944 to 1954, I grew up in the village for ten years. After that, I came to work in the city of Kyiv for the rebuilding of the capital. From January—if you look at my work record book—1955 to this day, I have been working as a plumber. I was a fitter, a foreman, a master craftsman, a site supervisor. I did all the plumbing work for the installation of plumbing systems in Kyiv and the Kyiv region. I had up to forty people under my command—there were such periods. I am still working to this day. I can say these words: my contemporary, President Kuchma, also born in 1938, is working, so why shouldn't I work? I go and twist pipes a little.
As for the matter of raising the flag, what can I say? From a young age, we had displaced people from the western regions who told us about an independent Ukraine. This interested me, I was always drawn to those men, to listen to what this independent Ukraine was, what it was, what they wanted. They had been exiled from the western regions and resettled in the Odesa region. From literary works—maybe you studied it once—in Korniychuk's play “The Doom of the Squadron,” a lot is said about Ukraine. The short story “Shumeyko and Shafransky”—that's about the Arsenal workers. You didn't have that in your reader—it was studied in about the fourth grade. There were the Blue-Coats, the Grey-Coats—they stormed the “Arsenal” with Konovalets. So this started to interest me—it meant there was some kind of state. Later, in the process of my studies, I studied statistics, the “Kobzar,” and the history of Ukraine. I knew that since the times of Kyivan Rus, Ukraine had statehood, it had statehood under Bohdan Khmelnytsky, in the seventeenth or eighteenth century there was an independent Ukraine—so it should have statehood. In the sixties, on the eve of raising the flag—that was a period of the formation of many states in the world: Malaysia, Laos, Cambodia, Panama, Uruguay, Paraguay—all were forming their own states. People protested, went to demonstrations, they were shot at, dispersed with water, but they demanded independence or liberation from the colonial yoke.
V.V. Ovsienko: It was the collapse of the colonial system.
H.M. Moskalenko: Yes. There were posters of them breaking the chains of colonialism. And at that time, a question arose in my mind: why is it quiet here, no one is doing anything, no resistance? A slogan needed to be thrown to the people, so they would see that we are also an oppressed country. We had to remind both our own people and foreigners that we had a state and we should have our own state. Besides, studying statistics—I was studying at the Institute of Economics—I knew that Ukraine produced 60 percent of steel, rolled metal, cast iron, and sugar, flour, lard, meat, and that Ukraine contributed 20 percent of its national income to the treasury of the Soviet Union. And the national income at that time was about 300 billion rubles—which means Ukraine contributed a fifth part, that is, 60 billion in profit. If our own state were formed, we would probably live better...
We had about two dozen like-minded people at work, we didn't hide our views, we talked about it everywhere. Young people gathered in the dormitory and at work—everywhere, that Ukraine should have its own statehood, to be in a position like Czechoslovakia or Hungary—with its own armies, its own symbols, its own currency, its own form of statehood.
I met a like-minded person with whom I lived in the dormitory, in the same room—Viktor Ivanovych Kuksa. I met him as my like-minded person, and I began to discuss this issue with him. I had been thinking about the flag even before the army, I had a friend, but somehow it fell through. He said we would be shot on that roof. That friend backed out (before the army). But this friend agreed, and we began to prepare for this matter.
V.V. Ovsienko: And who was he? Tell us a little more about him.
H.M. Moskalenko: He was a worker, worked in construction as a tractor driver.
V.V. Ovsienko: Where is he from?
H.M. Moskalenko: From near Bohuslav, there is a village called Medvyn there.
V.V. Ovsienko: He's from Medvyn? That's a famous village.
H.M. Moskalenko: There was the Medvyn Republic there, there was great resistance to Soviet power. From the village of Medvyn. (Viktor Kuksa is from the village of Savarka, not far from Medvyn. – V.O.). He, for his part, was also interested in this issue, people told many stories about what happened there. We decided: “Shall we go?” – “Let's go!” I was studying at the Institute of National Economy, I figured out how to get there. At first, we wanted to do it at the Central Train Station, but a searchlight illuminates the roof there, so they wouldn't have let us hang the flag there, they would have shot us down from the roof. We chose the roof of the Institute of National Economy, where I studied. I took a look: there was a fire escape leading up. I scouted all the approaches. We went and bought blue and yellow material, took the design of the tryzub from a banknote of the UPR—the Ukrainian People's Republic, put it on the flag and wrote: “Ukraine has not yet perished, it has not yet been killed.” Not DP, but DPU—just like today's name. It was Valeriy Kravchenko who said “DP”—no, “DPU.” Our organization was called the “Democratic Party of Ukraine.” We even made a pin—see it on me in the picture? The ones that were planted, they stole them from the dormitory. We have a pin, but I don't know where it is now—wings, a rhombus, with “DPU” written in it. So it was a kind of embryo of the Democratic Party of Ukraine. This was after we hung the flag on May Day, 1966, that we had our picture taken. I have better photos, but this one is clearer. We were preparing to do this. I welded a homemade pistol, because I'm an electric and gas welder, a plumber. There was a common kitchen, half the dormitory used it. In a dormitory, it's like this: someone has something, a spoon, a fork, and someone has nothing, so everyone ran to the kitchen.
V.V. Ovsienko: Where did you live in the dormitory?
H.M. Moskalenko: In Sviatoshyn. Before the army, I lived on Chervonoarmiyska, opposite the stadium, and after the army, they settled me in Sviatoshyn, because it was a contracting organization for construction. Our construction clients gave us work and settled us there. I had a Czech briefcase, and the flag was already ready in it. The briefcase had a zipper, I took it to my classes, I was in the evening department. I put the flag, made in the dormitory with the tryzub and those inscriptions, inside it.
V.V. Ovsienko: And how did you sew it—it was in the dormitory, right?
H.M. Moskalenko: They were long scarves. We unraveled one, the blue one, the yellow one was whole. Now the flag is half blue. There was nowhere to see it—in our imagination, it was supposed to be similar to the Soviet one, where the red stripe was two-thirds and the blue one-third. We made the blue two-thirds and the yellow one-third—like a symbol: blue sky over a wheat field. We sewed it, placed the tryzub, the inscriptions.
V.V. Ovsienko: And the tryzub, how did you do it, did you embroider it or make it from something?
H.M. Moskalenko: We cut it out of black material and sewed it on.
V.V. Ovsienko: So it was black?
H.M. Moskalenko: Yes, yes, black. Why? We knew of a man named Rymarenko, who wrote pamphlets against nationalism. Rymarenko wrote that when the Germans were advancing, the Banderites called for people to paint the national symbol—the tryzub—in black on all the fences. Now the tryzub is golden, but we took from that the idea of painting it everywhere in black for agitation and propaganda. So we did the same.
I made the knife at work, and I welded the homemade pistol, which is why they gave me Part 1 and Part 2 of Article 222: I made the homemade pistol and I made the knife. Kuksa took this knife to the roof. Why did Kuksa end up there? I was getting ready to climb the ladder with this briefcase when he said: “I won't be able to shoot your homemade pistol, you should probably stay here, and I'll go up.” Well, so he went up there. He cut it down, hung ours, the wind caught it...
V.V. Ovsienko: What was it like up there, how many floors are there?
H.M. Moskalenko: This is a photo of us taken recently, and this, you see, is from 1968. There's a spire up there, over the entrance to the institute. The red-and-blue flag was hanging there. It's opposite the “Bolshevik” factory, near the tank.
V.V. Ovsienko: Now it's the Kyiv National Economic University—KNEU.
H.M. Moskalenko: And back then it was the Kyiv Institute of National Economy. When he cut the flag down, the wind carried it away while he was hanging ours. There was such a feeling of joy, that here was our own—and the wind was blowing that other one away. So we went in the morning to see… Just imagine, this was done around two o'clock in the morning. We walked from there to Sviatoshyn.
V.V. Ovsienko: And when did you arrive in the morning?
H.M. Moskalenko: Around ten, I can't say for sure. The flag was already gone. Some party organizer had come to the watchman: “What is that?” They immediately called the KGB, took pictures. All this is shown in our case file, everything is photographed there, in color. All this is preserved in their archives.
V.V. Ovsienko: So you photographed it?
H.M. Moskalenko: Not us, the KGB agents photographed it. It's in the case file in a color photo. The case file is in three volumes.
So Viktor went up, and I stayed below. And why did I get more—whose idea it was, who organized it, “who persuaded whom,” and so on. And they gave me a “three-spot” for it.
V.V. Ovsienko: I'd like you to tell us how you were discovered.
H.M. Moskalenko: How we were discovered. It's all said in the article—we didn't hide our views. We said that we should be independent. We said this openly, without fear, so to speak, at institute seminars when such questions were raised. The topic of my thesis was “CMEA—The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance.” If you recall, there was such a thing, right after the Warsaw Pact. When we studied these democratic countries, I spoke up. According to the communists' program—you probably studied the history of the CPSU too—Finland and Ukraine were recognized by Lenin on the same day, sometime in December 1917. Well, the West defended Finland, but Ukraine was occupied and destroyed. At seminars, I would simply stand up and say: “Why not put this question to a vote, ask the people if they want to secede? Let's be socialists, but live like Czechoslovakia. We will act together against invaders, but we need to secede, so there won't be this economic and social humiliation.” So it wasn't hard to find us.
This happened on May 1, 1966. I was finishing my fourth year, and then I was in my fifth. They searched for a long time. And then they planted an informer in our dormitory, settled him in our room, and he began to investigate. Then they went through our pockets, stole my notebook with addresses, and went through the entire Soviet Union—there was Tashkent, there was Alma-Ata… They later showed me the diagram they had worked out.
So it wasn't hard to find us. They first went through the entire full-time department, and then they got to the evening department. And I had written all those inscriptions on the flag in my own hand. They called me and my roommate to the military enlistment office to fill out forms in block letters, supposedly for a trip abroad. I understood that it was about this case. So they were already formally closing in on me. It became clear to them that I was the one who wrote it.
V.V. Ovsienko: And the one they planted with you—can you name him? Or do you not think it's necessary?
H.M. Moskalenko: I can recall it, but I need some time.
V.V. Ovsienko: Well, you can recall it later. (Oleksiy Lebid. – V.O.).
H.M. Moskalenko: And then they planted a guy from Makarov in my cell, his name was Shkolny, I forgot his first name. He had supposedly had a shortfall at a warehouse, two tons of nails were missing, so they imprisoned him. They planted him in my cell. Didn't they plant anyone with you?
V.V. Ovsienko: Of course, but that was during the investigation, and right now we're talking about how they found you.
H.M. Moskalenko: I'll remember the surname later. He's in a photo of mine, by the way. Some western-sounding surname—Veleha, Heleha, or something like that. So they planted an informer at my place of residence.
On February 20, 1967, I was working as a master plumber in Fastiv. The operatives came to our installation organization in Kyiv, called Fastiv, sent a car for me, and brought me to this installation organization. A so-called “bobik” [UAZ van] was already waiting there with three KGB officers in civilian clothes, operatives. And they took me to Rozy Luksemburh Street—you haven't been there, on Rozy Luksemburh?
V.V. Ovsienko: I've been there too.
H.M. Moskalenko: Martyniuk—have you heard of him?
V.V. Ovsienko: No.
H.M. Moskalenko: That's the one who arrested me. The head of the investigation department, Piddubny, and Martyniuk. They started interrogating me there, about what and how. We, of course, felt that they would arrest us soon, and we denied everything.
V.V. Ovsienko: You were arrested alone, right?
H.M. Moskalenko: They took me and the one who went to the military enlistment office with me, the one who was the informer. And then they took the third one, Viktor Kuksa. They took them, maybe back and forth, but they were definitely taking me, based on my handwriting. I denied all accusations for a day, when this Martyniuk says: “Man, don't waste our time or yours—here, read.” He gives me Kuksa's confession—Kuksa: “Yes, we did this and that.” He had already confessed. I say: “Well, since the man has already told you, I'll continue the story, but let this third one—Oleksiy Lebid, who lived with us in the room—go, because this man knew nothing and saw nothing.” They let the third one go, and they moved us to the KGB pre-trial detention center, where we slept on a couch under KGB greatcoats. They searched us and put us in cells, and the investigation began.
V.V. Ovsienko: And how long did they keep you on Rozy Luksemburh?
H.M. Moskalenko: One or two days, I forget. Maybe two days. But that was 35 years ago. Did they keep you there for less time?
V.V. Ovsienko: On March 5, 1973, they just filled out some papers for me there and then took me to spend the night at 33 Volodymyrska.
H.M. Moskalenko: And this guy tells me, “Confess to this, that, and the other.” They didn’t lay everything out precisely; they wanted it to be my confession. But I said I hadn’t seen anything, didn’t know anything, hadn’t heard anything. But when they gave me Kuksa’s handwritten statement to read, what was I to deny when everything had already been said? It was clear they were going to “lock me up.” They took me to Volodymyrska Street, to the pre-trial detention center. They took me in for interrogation two or three times a day. In the end, once they had figured out everything about the flag—who, what, where, how, and all that—the investigators, who had returned tan from a trip to Crimea, would say, “Oh, boys, you’re still here? Well, let’s add a little something more. Ah, a homemade gun? Well, we’re not interested in that, that’s a job for the militsiya, but let’s keep it in the file.” That’s when they tacked on the knife and the homemade gun, as if it were an additional charge. “You,” they said, “will be punished under the article for the flag, and the knife and the homemade gun—that’s just supplementary, for a lighter sentence.” At first, they were preparing a four-year sentence for me, but then they gave me three. The trial lasted for three days.
V.V. Ovsiienko: When did the trial take place?
H.M. Moskalenko: From May 31st to June 2nd. But it doesn’t say there how long the trial lasted. After the trial, we were transferred back to the detention center. It was June 1st, on Children’s Day. During that whole period, while the investigation was ongoing, they didn’t give us any newspapers to read—they had their own KGB tactic to prevent any information from reaching us, because maybe some announcement or something would appear in a newspaper, and that would be like a sign to me that everything was all right. That’s why I remember that they brought us newspapers on June 1st. They held us separately; we didn’t see each other. We didn’t meet before the trial. But there was some kind of KGB library, and they would bring fiction. And after the trial, they gave us newspapers for the first time. We were there for all of June, and it wasn’t until around July 18th that they took us to Kharkiv, to Kholodna Hora—weren’t you taken through Kharkiv?
V.V. Ovsiienko: Do you remember the names of the investigator, the judge? It’s worth remembering people like that.
H.M. Moskalenko: Yes, yes. The investigator was Major Razumny, the head of the investigative department was Lieutenant Colonel Dubovyk. General Tikhonov came to look at us—he was the head of the KGB for either Kyiv or all of Ukraine, something like that, a high rank. This Tikhonov is mentioned in the articles. He wanted to find out who had pushed us to do such a thing. He visited us more than once. What did I tell him? That in his time, Oleg Koshevoy did the same thing—he also took up arms, and he had people backing him up. “But that was for the idea, for the Motherland!”—and so on. “But we,” I said, “did something similar.”
V.V. Ovsiienko: And which court tried you?
H.M. Moskalenko: A closed session of the Kyiv Oblast Court. No, it wasn’t officially called closed, but it was. The trial lasted three days; they didn’t let the public in. In the courtroom, there were informers, KGB agents—about a dozen people and the guards.
V.V. Ovsiienko: You didn’t have any witnesses?
H.M. Moskalenko: There were witnesses. They summoned a young lad from the army who had lived in our dormitory at one time. The investigators let me read the testimonies of witnesses from the dormitory. The testimonies were neutral, but there was one—we considered him not quite all there, a boy who had just graduated from an FZU (factory apprenticeship school) and was eager for a career as a Komsorg or Partorg—and he said that we had enlightened him on the national question, that we said this, that, and the other, essentially accusing us. His name was Dmytro Holovchenko. He said that we had raised him on the Ukrainian idea. They called him Mitya. He informed on me. They asked him where he was born, where he worked…
I returned to the same organization, couldn’t get a residence permit for a long time.
V.V. Ovsiienko: But please, tell us how you fared in the zone and where you were—that’s essential.
H.M. Moskalenko: We left off with them taking us to Kharkiv, to Kholodna Hora, on July 18th. This is also an interesting moment. You know what it’s like in the “Stolypin cars,” with criminal inmates; they were transporting men, women, and girls, all behind bars, with a convoy leading us to the toilet. We still had our forelocks, they hadn’t cut our hair yet. The inmates were surprised: “Hey, boys, why aren’t your heads shaved, why aren’t you in uniform?” Of course, in the zone, they shaved and cut our hair regularly.
They brought us to Kharkiv during the day. It was scorching hot in that “Stolypin car.” With machine guns and German shepherds, just like when they took us to court. It made us laugh; we walked along laughing—an officer with a Nagant revolver in front, and the others practically prodding you in the ribs with their machine guns. It was the same when we were unloaded from the railcars. They crammed us into the car—you know how they pack people in—and baked us in the sun for about three hours. People were fainting in there; there was nothing to breathe. They did that to make you feel what a prisoner transport was like. They didn’t hold you in Kharkiv?
V.V. Ovsiienko: I was there, more than once.
H.M. Moskalenko: They unloaded us there, we went through delousing, and there they shaved our heads bald and threw us into a death row cell—iron beds, everything on chains, everything was iron.
V.V. Ovsiienko: That’s exactly right.
H.M. Moskalenko: They put one other person in with me; he was on his way from a concentration camp.
V.V. Ovsiienko: From Yavas?
H.M. Moskalenko: Yes, he was already heading somewhere for a follow-up investigation. He seemed to be an informer, convicted as a politsai. Later, in the camp, I was told he was a camp snitch. He told us where we were being taken and what it would be like there. We weren’t afraid of that cell.
V.V. Ovsiienko: Because you didn’t know what it was?
H.M. Moskalenko: We didn’t know it was a death row cell; he was the one who told us. We took it with a sense of humor. We stayed in those cells for a day or two, and then they moved us up to a general cell. There we met Mykhailo Osadchy. He was already “one of us.” We gravitated more toward Osadchy than to that old man. Osadchy began to explain a few things to us.
V.V. Ovsiienko: And where was Osadchy heading?
H.M. Moskalenko: They were taking him to Ukraine for a follow-up investigation.
V.V. Ovsiienko: Is this 1967? Because he was imprisoned in 1965. (M. Osadchy was arrested on August 28, 1965, so his two-year sentence was ending, and he was being transported back to Ukraine. – V.O.)
H.M. Moskalenko: So, they were transporting him in sixty-seven. I don’t know if he was being taken to a camp or from a camp. We spent about ten days there with Osadchy, on the third floor. There, women were “passing kites” to the men, sending things over.
They brought us to Mordovia. We already knew where we were going, that it was a Mordovian concentration camp. We were let off at Potma station. It was the first time I had been outside of Ukraine; it was like I had entered another country—as if the stars weren’t the same, and the moon didn’t look the same. For the first time since we were locked up in February, I saw green grass, because I hadn’t seen any greenery anywhere. It was already some relief. In Potma, we slept on common bunks, and bedbugs were eating my friend Kuksa alive; he would scratch himself in his sleep.
V.V. Ovsiienko: So you were already being transported together?
H.M. Moskalenko: Yes. When they took us to Kharkiv, they crammed us into a so-called “triplet,” a compartment meant for three, but there were nine of us. Criminals were riding above us. There were nine of us souls in that “triplet.” They asked us why our heads weren’t shaved and what we had done. I told them a little, but Kuksa couldn’t. And bedbugs never bit me.
V.V. Ovsiienko: Ah, so there’s a type of blood they don’t like.
H.M. Moskalenko: So I slept peacefully. They took us further for sorting. Then a truck came and brought us to the concentration camp. We already had a rough idea of where we were. We were told about the compatriot groups there—Banderites, politsai, Vlasovites, Balts. Of course, as you know, everyone is met there. Especially by those from the disabled barracks, since all the able-bodied men are at work. They ask, “Lads, where are you from?” “From Kyiv.” “Oh!” The Ukrainian language was generally dominant there, as you know. And all the rules were established by Ukrainians—how to behave in the concentration camp. So everyone looked to us. It was our insurgents who put everyone in their place who tried to walk all over us. Everyone kowtowed to the Banderites—the monarchists and all the others. Well, and the Balts—they were our allies, always on the same soccer team, the same basketball team.
They met us with joy and said that everyone would be back from work soon. They took us to have our picture taken, and there we were in those caps, looking at each other and laughing at what we looked like. And in the barracks, of course, they welcomed us.
V.V. Ovsiienko: So which zone was this? The 19th?
H.M. Moskalenko: The 11th. In the settlement of Yavas. The 19th is Lesnoy, 30 kilometers away. They treated us with great attention; dozens of people gathered. Especially the old-timers from Magadan, from Norilsk, the Dzhezkazgan veterans—the old guard, who had already served 20 years. Coffee was passed around, tea... As you know, they don’t ask what you were locked up for—you were locked up, and that’s it, the rest becomes clear on its own.
V.V. Ovsiienko: Yes, yes, they never ask about your case there.
H.M. Moskalenko: And it came from the guards. The guards, Russians from Leningrad, came up: “Ah, the standard-bearers—greetings!” The guards themselves had already said it. They told the soldiers in the watchtowers who was imprisoned there—such and such Banderites, old and young, and so on.
They met us and began to educate us—about what we knew and what we didn’t, they told us about the national movement. What was positive there was that in three years, I never heard a single swear word; everyone, older and younger, addressed each other formally, using “vy,” including me—I was 27 or 28 at the time—“Pan Yuriy,” because Heorhiy is George the Victorious, and the name Yuriy grew from the same root.
V.V. Ovsiienko: So they called you “Pan Yuriy”?
H.M. Moskalenko: Yes, the Galicians, mostly.
V.V. Ovsiienko: That was a good school.
H.M. Moskalenko: A good school. There was Dontsov, Mikhnovsky—everything, how to make kryivkas (bunkers), how to hide from persecution, all the tactics of the struggle were taught. There was a “Prosvita,” Kruty, Bazar—all of these were commemorated, our tragedies at Bazar, at Kruty, and many other things. By the way, Rymarenko’s pamphlets also provided a lot of information there. And Yuriy Smolych’s novel “Peace to the Huts, War on the Palaces,” and “The Wide Dnieper Roars and Moans”—have you read that?
V.V. Ovsiienko: Yes, yes.
H.M. Moskalenko: There, too, it talks about the proclamation of an independent republic, the bells of St. Sophia, how the battalions marched—all this was also information that was hidden from us. I still have those books now; the boys at my place read them.
V.V. Ovsiienko: And which of the insurgents do you remember? What impression did they make on you?
H.M. Moskalenko: Ah, here’s an article. There we met Stetsenko, who figures in Fadeyev’s “The Young Guard” as the commandant of Krasnodon. He told us who the Krasnodon members really were. In today’s terms, they were a gang of thieves: parcels arrived for the soldiers of the German garrison, and they robbed those three trucks of parcels and then started selling them. And the Germans punished theft severely. For theft, they would either kill on the spot or shoot them later. They caught them when they were selling cigarettes and all sorts of chocolates. They simply threw them into a mine shaft as thieves. And then, in 1947, Fadeyev was tasked with turning these thieves into a symbol of resistance against the occupying authorities. I spoke with this Stetsenko. Sinyavsky was also imprisoned there; I spoke with them. Although they seemed to have different views, as there was still polemics between the Russians and us. And this is the district head of the Security Service from Kolomyia, Vasyl Yakubiak... There is now a Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists named after Vasyl Yakubiak in Bila Tserkva. It’s written on their flag because after serving 25 years, he returned to Bila Tserkva. He has already passed away; he was eighty years old. It’s been about seven years since he died. He went through terrible transports. He escaped three times, and they tracked him down with German shepherds, dragging him back to the camp half-dead. A very intelligent man, he enlightened all the newcomers; he was that kind of person.
Well, maybe you’ve heard of Stepan Mamchur. I’m acquainted with his family. His family now lives in Irpin, and I always visit them. Maybe you know, Ivan Hel from Lviv was there, Bohdan Horyn, Yaroslav Lesiv—these were my closest comrades. Opanas Zalyvakha, Yosyp Terelia, who was imprisoned for religious activities, from Zakarpattia. He was digging a tunnel in the 19th camp, they caught him and took him to Volodymyr prison. He didn’t really join our group; he found his own circle there. Our Banderites were indignant that he didn’t lean much toward us.
V.V. Ovsiienko: Well, he’s a rather distinctive man.
H.M. Moskalenko: Do you know him?
V.V. Ovsiienko: I know him a little. I wasn’t imprisoned with him, but I’ve heard a lot about him.
H.M. Moskalenko: A dark-haired fellow. So he’s gone abroad somewhere?
V.V. Ovsiienko: Yes, he’s somewhere abroad now.
H.M. Moskalenko: So those were the guys. There was also Volodymyr Kalynychenko—have you heard of him? He had a beard. They said that he was once a KGB informer, but then he rebelled, and they threw him in solitary confinement, in a psychiatric hospital. He told us all about it.
V.V. Ovsiienko: So, Volodymyr—what’s his last name?
H.M. Moskalenko: Kalynychenko. They gave him “a ten-spot.”
V.V. Ovsiienko: And what was his age?
H.M. Moskalenko: Maybe a couple of years younger than me.
V.V. Ovsiienko: So that might be Vitaliy Kalynychenko?
H.M. Moskalenko: Or Vitaliy...
V.V. Ovsiienko: From Vasylkivka, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, imprisoned for attempting to cross the border with Finland. The second time, he was imprisoned with me in Kuchino in the Urals—for membership in the Ukrainian Helsinki Group.
H.M. Moskalenko: Maybe I’ve forgotten—it could have been something like that. He had a beard.
V.V. Ovsiienko: On the special-regimen, you couldn’t have a beard anymore. He was born around 1938—is that right?
H.M. Moskalenko: Could be.
V.V. Ovsiienko: Then it’s Vitaliy. If it was for crossing the border, then it’s Vitaliy. And were there any attempts at resistance against the administration during your time, any strikes or protests?
H.M. Moskalenko: There, in the camp? There were. A man died there, and we believed he was killed with various injections and other things. We carried him to the checkpoint for burial.
V.V. Ovsiienko: You don’t remember his last name?
H.M. Moskalenko: I’ve forgotten, I can’t say. Then—I don’t know if this happened in your time or not—we would gather in the evenings and learn Sich Riflemen songs.
V.V. Ovsiienko: Yes, yes, that happened. But there were fewer insurgents in my time.
H.M. Moskalenko: And the guards would come up: “Disperse! Disperse!” We would gather at the stadium; there were two or three brass bands and a pop orchestra. Although our upkeep was 44 kopecks a day—that was the norm on the strict-regimen, I have documents about the upkeep—we would gather and sing at the stadium, not Sich Riflemen songs, but folk songs. The Mordovians would gather behind the fence and listen. There were Ukrainians among the guards, too, and they seemed to like it. But they would chase us away for the Sich Riflemen songs. We would learn the anthem, hiding somewhere behind logs or strolling around the stadium in twos and threes. Information came in—from the Baltics, ours came from Poland and Czechoslovakia. Those newspapers described Ukrainian life, the years of the OUN struggle, how General Pieracki was killed. By the way, Dmytro Besarab, if you’ve heard of him, was in the company that executed Pieracki. The Poles were talking on the radio in French. But the guys knew; they overheard a telephone conversation and set up a good ambush. This was also in a Polish newspaper that came later; we read it. And Dmytro had one of those German MG-42s. He says: “Our company was called a ‘sotnia’ (a hundred), but there were only fifty of us in it, and every third man had a German machine gun.” It was a good ambush... No, Pieracki was the Minister of Internal Affairs of Poland before the war, and this was General Karol Świerczewski, who took part in the war in Spain. So they set up an ambush for Świerczewski…
V.V. Ovsiienko: Yes, Minister of Internal Affairs Pieracki was killed back in 1934, and Świerczewski was in the post-war period.
H.M. Moskalenko: Yes, it was forty-five or forty-six. So, he says, they had mortars firing there, too. It was a proper ambush. They were traveling with bodyguards, and this general, if you please, jumped out in his confederate cap and started giving orders. And that Besarab, he says, let loose a burst that practically cut him in two. Why wasn’t he executed? Because he was completely illiterate, this Dmytro Besarab. He considered himself a victim, that he had been dragged into this affair. He was from Lemkivshchyna, by the way. He told us what it was like there. They wiped out Świerczewski’s entire column. Then whole regiments were sent after them in pursuit. And there were two companies of them in the ambush. Many died; few from those two companies managed to escape. He told a tragic story about how a mine blew his comrade apart, spilling out all his intestines, and he asked Dmytro to finish him off because he didn’t want to fall into the hands of the Muscovites to be tortured. And he was forced to finish off his comrade.
This was about whom we met in the concentration camp. Maybe I’ve remembered everyone, maybe I haven’t. After serving my sentence, I returned to Kyiv.
V.V. Ovsiienko: And what was the return procedure? Were you released directly from Mordovia, or perhaps transported to Kyiv as part of a prisoner transport?
H.M. Moskalenko: The return procedure was like this. When I arrived at the 19th concentration camp...
V.V. Ovsiienko: You said you were in the 11th. And then you were transferred to the 19th—when was that?
H.M. Moskalenko: Probably in 1969, we were transferred to the 19th concentration camp, 30 kilometers from the 11th. They took us by train. They brought us to a camp that had previously been occupied by criminal offenders. We tidied it up. There, I worked again in a construction brigade.
V.V. Ovsiienko: And what did you do in the 11th?
H.M. Moskalenko: I did plumbing work there, and in the 19th as well. The profession was in short supply; it was needed there too. In fact, it’s probably a needed profession all over the world. So I always worked; I have a character reference.
I was released from there. Specifically for each person being released, they would send a “voronok” (a prison van) from Potma, put you in it with a guard, and take you to the transit prison, for dispatch home. There, they gave you the money you had earned during that period, gave you your documents, and a Mordovian passport. Later, it was exchanged for a Soviet one...
V.V. Ovsiienko: They even issued you a passport?
H.M. Moskalenko: Yes, a Mordovian passport, in three languages. Russian… In Mordovia, there are two languages—Erzya and Moksha—so, in three languages. By the way, I met a Mordovian in Poltava Oblast, and he was happy to chat with me, that I had seen his homeland. They gave me a passport, money, and I returned to Kyiv. Back in Potma, they gave us everything after that “voronok” ride, in which I felt like I was in a barrel—it was terrifying to travel over those potholes. I went to Moscow, had a transfer there, and went on to Kyiv, to my construction organization. To make a long story short, they made me a foreman. At first, they hired me as a third-category worker, even though I was a fifth-category.
V.V. Ovsiienko: And where was this?
H.M. Moskalenko: On Vyborgska Street, in Kyiv.
V.V. Ovsiienko: What is the name of that institution?
H.M. Moskalenko: KSU-521, Kyiv Specialized Directorate No. 521. Of course, the administration there looked at me askance, and I constantly felt under surveillance—as if to say, understand, man, we can send you back there at any time. By the way, I communicated with Martyniuk. When they wouldn’t register my residence, I went to the KGB and said, “If you think I’m no longer needed, if I have committed a crime, then allow me, in accordance with the Declaration of Human Rights, to go abroad. I will work there and not be your enemy. I will work in any country in the world—let me leave.” They told me, “Instead of going anywhere, you’ll go back there.” So, leaving was not allowed.
Probably taking into account that I knew my job well, I quickly rose from that third category back to my higher one. I became a brigade leader again, then a foreman again; they entrusted me with people. And then I was a site superintendent, working on state defense facilities, at the “Arsenal” plant, at the Bila Tserkva tire factory, at the Brovary powder metallurgy plant, at the missile factory in Boyarka. I worked and I don’t know why there were no obstacles for me. After three years, I even got an apartment—that’s some credit to that work administration because they valued me as a worker and put in a good word with the district committees, and they gave me an apartment. I got it, but of course, not in Kyiv, but in Bucha—a suburb of Kyiv. I didn’t want to be in Kyiv myself: rather than getting a place in Obolon, it’s better somewhere in Irpin or Bucha.
V.V. Ovsiienko: And were you single or married? You haven’t mentioned that anywhere.
H.M. Moskalenko: I got married after my return. When I got the apartment, I already had two children.
V.V. Ovsiienko: Name your wife.
H.M. Moskalenko: My wife’s name is Vira Hryhorivna Mateiko, from Chernihiv Oblast, Nizhyn Raion, three years younger than me, born in 1941.
V.V. Ovsiienko: You said you have children? Name them and their years of birth.
H.M. Moskalenko: One son—Oleh, born in 1966, that was before my imprisonment. The second—Roman, born in 1972. Then a third boy, born in 1973—that’s Sashko. Now, some are working, some are not.
Then what—I retired.
V.V. Ovsiienko: Did the authorities have any complaints against you? Were the KGB agents interested in you? Did you notice, perhaps, any surveillance?
H.M. Moskalenko: There was. My neighbors told me—Russians, the Protopopovs, by the way (maybe I shouldn’t have named them): “They came by, Zhora, they’re very interested in who visits you, who comes over. So be careful.” I said, “Thank you for the information. I feel fine, thank you for telling me.” Because it was the wife who came and told me. When I inquired about not having finished my fifth year of university, about reenrolling in the fifth year to finish, the KGB operational department told me: “Help us with our work; you have authority among the camp inmates, you can do a lot for us; we are interested in where literature from the West comes from, who distributes it, and our KGB chairman for Kyiv is a deputy of the Kyiv City Council, he will reinstate you so you can finish your fifth year and get your diploma.” I said, “Thank you, but I cannot cooperate with you—it’s not in my nature to inform on my comrades. I’d rather not finish my fifth year. I cannot be an informer on my comrades and report on their activities and cooperate in this way with the KGB.” “Well, in that case, you won’t finish your fifth year.” They gave me an academic transcript, it’s here somewhere, for completing four years. Here it is: I didn’t finish the fifth year. I already had my thesis work done for the fifth year by February.
V.V. Ovsiienko: So you still don’t have a diploma?
H.M. Moskalenko: Well, I probably don’t need it anymore. I’m retired now. I finished the fourth year, but not the fifth.
V.V. Ovsiienko: But there was still a lot going on in the seventies—the Ukrainian Helsinki Group was formed...
H.M. Moskalenko: I listened to all of that on Radio Liberty, Deutsche Welle, Voice of America—I heard it all. By the way, I heard your name there more than once. I heard that my comrades had gone back to the concentration camp—Ivan Hel, Yaroslav Lesiv too, I think...
V.V. Ovsiienko: Yaroslav Lesiv, too. He was a member of the Helsinki Group. They fabricated drug charges against him.
H.M. Moskalenko: He was a short fellow, very outspoken, acted with a lot of energy.
V.V. Ovsiienko: He was quite a personality, yes. And when did you say you retired?
H.M. Moskalenko: I retired in connection with Chornobyl, in 1994.
V.V. Ovsiienko: I see, and before that, things were already getting freer, public and political organizations were being created—did you take part in the work of any organizations?
H.M. Moskalenko: Absolutely! I participated in organizations, I went to all the rallies, went to demonstrations. I bought up the symbols when they appeared, the tridents—it all started here at the stadium. Then, when I went to the Baltics in 1987, on a tour to Trakai, our symbols were being sold there, little flags. The Baltics helped Ukraine a lot in this—as you know, they were our allies from the concentration camp, they were always with us.
Then I met my comrades at the Second Congress of the URP (Ukrainian Republican Party) in the House of Cinema. I met Bohdan Rebryk—maybe you’ve heard of him...
V.V. Ovsiienko: Of course, I know Bohdan Rebryk well.
H.M. Moskalenko: He’s from Ivano-Frankivsk, a good friend of mine and, I believe, born in the same year as me, 1938. I met Bohdan Horyn there; we were glad to see each other. I even have a delegate’s pass from the Second URP Congress somewhere.
V.V. Ovsiienko: So you were in the URP, then?
H.M. Moskalenko: The guys gave me a pass so I could get into the session. Levko Lukianenko spoke there, as did Avhustyn Voloshyn’s bodyguard. Lukianenko presided. There were many other comrades there who had been imprisoned. Later, at rallies, I saw Sich Riflemen in uniform, and I marched with them all the way to “Prosvita.” The “Prosvita” society, I think, is still located there.
V.V. Ovsiienko: At 8 Muzeinyi Lane.
H.M. Moskalenko: It was interesting to me then, so I marched behind them with my boys; the girls and boys were dressed in uniforms, and it was moving for me to see all of it.
V.V. Ovsiienko: But were you a member of any organizations?
H.M. Moskalenko: I was not.
V.V. Ovsiienko: The Society of the Repressed, for instance...
H.M. Moskalenko: They said Yevhen Proniuk now has an office in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs building. My comrade Viktor Kuksa was there and said that they didn’t always pay attention to him there. So he left and doesn’t go anymore. I met with Slava Stetsko a couple of times; she asked about camp life. My comrade Yakubiak—he’s a Banderite, so that interested her. Stepan Mamchur interested them. They were more interested in the Galicians—what they said, how they behaved, and so on. Then the URP started sending me party newspapers at home. Pavlovskyi, I think, from the OUN, who was near the “Arsenal” plant (he also left for a while, and now he’s back in Ukraine). I think it’s the OUN named after Olzhych—there, on Sichnevoho Povstannia Street.
V.V. Ovsiienko: That’s where the Olena Teliha Publishing House is; they publish Oleh Olzhych.
H.M. Moskalenko: There’s a Pavlovskyi there. Why was I at his place?
V.V. Ovsiienko: Ah, perhaps Pavlo Dorozhynskyi?
H.M. Moskalenko: Maybe Dorozhynskyi. He was in Munich, and now he has returned to Ukraine. Are you acquainted?
V.V. Ovsiienko: Yes, yes.
H.M. Moskalenko: Why was I at his place? Because I was from the concentration camp. The Banderites gave me a photo of Yosyp Slipyj—you know he’s the successor to Sheptytsky. An actual photo from the camp. He didn’t want to be photographed, but they persuaded him. I didn’t know at the time that Slava Stetsko had returned; she had an office on Khreshchatyk. I thought it was the only OUN, but then I found out they had renamed themselves the KUN (Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists)—and those are the Banderites, while the others are the Melnykites, and there have been disagreements between them since ancient times. But I don’t know if it reached him, that camp photo. I thought it would have been important for history. I gave it to the secretary, but whether she gave it to this Dorozhynskyi or not, I can’t say.
V.V. Ovsiienko: That’s a different organization—one is Banderites, the other is Melnykites; they haven’t been on friendly terms since 1940.
H.M. Moskalenko: But in the camp, they were friends.
V.V. Ovsiienko: They had to be there.
I noticed that when you mentioned your year of birth, 1938, you didn’t give the date.
H.M. Moskalenko: July 24th.
V.V. Ovsiienko: And one more thing. You attended secondary school—when did you graduate?
H.M. Moskalenko: In 1962. It was in Sviatoshyn, an evening school, an ShRM—school for working youth. I’ve forgotten the number. It was affiliated with the machine tool plant.
V.V. Ovsiienko: You said you served in the army—in what years?
H.M. Moskalenko: From 1957 to 1960.
V.V. Ovsiienko: And when did you begin your studies at that institute?
H.M. Moskalenko: From 1962, after graduating from evening school.
V.V. Ovsiienko: I needed to clarify these dates. Please give your address and phone number—let’s have it here.
H.M. Moskalenko: Of course. After I received my apartment and retired, I have been living in the urban-type settlement of Bucha, Kyiv Oblast. It’s near Irpin. Home phone number is 26-115, the area code for Bucha is 297. My work phone at the headquarters of the Democratic Party of Ukraine (I’m working here temporarily) is 229-20-66.
V.V. Ovsiienko: So you are a member of this party? I see you have a pin.
H.M. Moskalenko: As you can see. Since 1998.
V.V. Ovsiienko: And your postal address in Bucha?
H.M. Moskalenko: Postal address: 13 Nova Shose Street, Apt. 100. Postal code is 08292.
V.V. Ovsiienko: Is that considered Kyiv-Sviatoshyn Raion?
H.M. Moskalenko: It used to be written that way, but now when I go for some official business, they say we are in Irpin Raion, but I hadn’t heard of that.
V.V. Ovsiienko: I haven’t heard of that either. And how can I find your colleague Viktor Kuksa?
H.M. Moskalenko: Of course, one moment. My friend from the concentration camp, Viktor Ivanovych Kuksa, now lives in Kyiv, in Borshchahivka, home phone 472-48-10. Work phone: 444-05-63, the Institute of Oil, in Novobilychi.
V.V. Ovsiienko: This recording was made on March 18, 2002, in the premises of the regional organization of the Democratic Party of Ukraine (DemPU) in Podil, at 3-B Yaroslavskyi Lane. Recorded by Vasyl Ovsiienko.
