Interview with M. D. Hutsul
Final proofreading on November 23, 2007.
Vasyl Ovsienko: April 17, 2001, Kyiv. Mykola Hutsul, who has come from Horodenka in the Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast to support the government of Viktor Yushchenko. We are speaking with him on the way from the Verkhovna Rada to the river terminal, where the buses from Western Ukraine have stopped. Recorded by Vasyl Ovsienko.
Mykola Hutsul: I am Mykola Dmytrovych Hutsul, born on August 14, 1926, in the village of Hlushkiv, Horodenka Powiat. In 1944, with the second arrival of the Bolsheviks, I had to go into the underground. Three of us went into the underground: myself, my brother Vasyl, and my brother Roman. We were living illegally. On May 10, 1944, they were transferring us to the Carpathians, where we were to join a company. But near Sniatyn, in the village of Kniazhe (where the Trilysky forest is), we were surrounded. We entered Trilysky at dawn and couldn't get out during the day. We had a battle there, which ended with twelve of us boys being captured. Until the occupation of Stanislav, we were held in the Sniatyn prison. The investigation was conducted only at night, with beatings, so we suffered a great deal. On October 4, 1944, the trial took place—it was the Military Tribunal of the Fourth Ukrainian Front. Within an hour, it handed down sentences to all twelve of us. One man, Fedir Holynsky, was given 15 years of hard labor; Fedir Torok—20 years of hard labor; and the ten of us were given the death penalty. After that, we were on death row. Since I was not yet fully eighteen years old (I was just two months short), I and another comrade from Honchariv, Mykhailo Slobodian, were spared the death penalty. Our sentences were commuted to ten years of imprisonment.
With that, I was transported to the Far East. Between Sovetskaya Gavan and Komsomolsk-on-Amur, I received a notification that there had been a retrial in absentia in Moscow, that instead of ten years, I was given 20 years of hard labor, while Yurko Holynsky’s sentence was reduced by ten years, leaving him with five.
I was in the Far East until 1947, and from there, we were transferred to the city of Norilsk, which is in the North. I was there until 1955. In 1953, major strikes broke out in all the camps. The hard-labor camp, called Gorlag, was a “Gosudarstvenny osoby lager” (State Special Camp). The strike lasted from June 4 to August 4, 1953—for two months. An order came from Moscow: take the camp at any cost. And in the camp, black mourning flags were hung, because when they first tried to take the camp, eight of our boys fell, and the second time—many more. I can't say for sure, but they said that around 150 boys were killed. Then they dispersed all of us to different camps. That zone was disbanded, leaving only those people who seemed more reliable to them.
After that, I worked in the mines, in a coal mine, and in 1955, we were released under the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of April 24.
I didn't return home because there was no one there. My mother was also imprisoned. She had been deported, but she escaped. So they held her, thinking that my brother, who was in the underground, would show up. He was killed in 1950.
V.O.: What was your brother's name? And your mother's name too, please.
M.H.: My mother was Maria, and my brother was Roman. When my mother returned home, they sent her back into exile. On my way home, I stopped to see my mother and stayed with her in exile for a little while. My mother said, “You should go, don't stay here with me, because they won't let you leave later.” I left, leaving my mother behind. She returned to Hlushkiv in the Horodenka Raion in 1956. In Hlushkiv, I got married in 1956. My wife's name was Iryna, she was also a Dmytrivna, and her maiden name was Lutchyn. She worked for a while at a distillery. She became disabled after breaking her leg at work. And so we lived on, little by little. Over time, we had three children: our daughter Maria was born on May 7, 1957, Hanna on October 6, 1958, and our son was born on January 17, 1961. My wife passed away last year, on May 29, 2000.
V.O.: What did you do when you returned?
M.H.: I worked at a sugar factory, and meanwhile, I had illegal literature, books that I would give to people to read.
V.O.: What kind of books? From the underground period?
M.H.: Yes, there were also chronicles of the Sich Riflemen from 1920. On March 24, 1974, I was arrested for illegal literature. At that time, Mykola Hamula, Roman Hayduk, and Verezhak were also arrested. But Verezhak—he was their agent...
V.O.: What was that Verezhak's first name?
M.H.: I don't know for sure, I've forgotten.
V.O.: And Oksana Popovych was also arrested then?
M.H.: Oksana Popovych was arrested a little later.* (*October 2, 1974. – V.O.).
V.O.: Yes, yes, she had just had surgery, that's why they took her later. The day after she returned from the hospital on crutches... What were you accused of then?
M.H.: I was accused of having the “Decalogue”—the Ten Commandments of a Ukrainian Nationalist, the Twelve Attributes of a Ukrainian Nationalist, and the Prayer of a Ukrainian Nationalist—in my pocket.
V.O.: And what about the new *samvydav*?
M.H.: They didn't find any *samvydav* on me. But others said they had gotten it from me. There were testimonies. And they confiscated a book by Vynnychenko from me, but they didn't return it because they didn't find anything in it. There were, you know, some words underlined in it.
V.O.: And what *samvydav* did they charge you with?
M.H.: From the *samvydav*—the articles of Valentyn Moroz. They even said, “You are connected with the fascist Moroz.” That's exactly what they said.
V.O.: And when did the trial take place?
M.H.: I don't remember exactly. In August, but I can't tell you the exact date. They gave me six years in a strict-regime camp and three years of exile. I served my sentence in the Mordovian camps. First in the 19th, in the settlement of Lesnoy, where you and I met, then I was transferred to Barashevo, to the third camp. We were moved there in the fall of 1979 because a workshop in the 19th camp burned down. I was in Barashevo until the end. From there, I was taken into exile on March 20, 1980. I served my three years of exile in Kargask (Kargasok) in the Tomsk Oblast.
V.O.: You must have already been of retirement age?
M.H.: No, not yet retirement age. I returned home from there to my wife in Horodenka in 1983. But they wouldn't register my place of residence, so I had to leave the oblast and stayed until 1990 in the Mykolaiv Oblast, Kashtanskyi Raion, in the village of Novooleksandrivka. There I worked on a kolkhoz as a stoker, and I also worked on the farm and at the refrigeration unit. My wife and I returned to Horodenka in 1990, and then they finally registered me, and I began living at the address: 15 Vynnychenka Street, Horodenka, Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast, Mykola Dmytrovych Hutsul, postal code 285100, telephone 2-63-70.
V.O.: Thank you. Let's get closer to the bus, in case it leaves suddenly. Tell me about the conditions of your imprisonment.
M.H.: The conditions in the years 1944–1950s were bad. The food was very poor. Everything was without fat—the fish, the cabbage, the *kasha*, all without fat. But we tried to keep ourselves in check, not to scavenge in the garbage heaps. Although we were young and hungry, we still maintained our self-control. Well, the authorities treated us harshly, but after the strike, it got a little better.
V.O.: Tell me more about the strike.
M.H.: The strike started with us... Come over here. People want to take a picture.
V.O.: I suppose we wouldn't be in the way?
M.H.: Yes, stand with me. In the strike, the main force was the Ukrainians, or as they were called there, the Banderites. A committee was formed on the very first day. The committee included all nationalities, eleven men in total. We didn't let anyone into the zone. They brought food to the zone...
V.O.: And which zone were you in?
M.H.: It was the third zone. The strike began when they brought six guys from the fourth zone to the BUR, and the *zhuliki* wanted to beat them up. The boys defended themselves. The guards didn't manage to close the door in time, the boys broke out, and soldiers from the watchtower started shooting and killed six of our boys. That's how the strike started in our camp. It was June 4, 1953. We held out until August 4. Around the 10th or 15th, a commission from Krasnoyarsk appeared. But the commission refused to show its credentials, so our committee refused to speak with them. Then they cut the barbed wire in several places and shouted, “Whoever wants to, come out of the zone, don't listen to that handful of bandits who are holding you back!” A few came out—mostly Estonians and Latvians. Seeing that no one else was coming out, they closed up the zone. After some time, Vavilov—a Class II Counselor to the Prosecutor General—arrived in the zone. The committee led him around the zone, showed him how the strike had started. And Vavilov asked us to go out to work. The committee said, “We were working peacefully, and they took us off the job. Why did they remove us?” And they also told him about the shooting, the unbearable regime, the food, the numbers, the locks on the barracks.
They took the zone with gunfire. Trucks with soldiers drove in, cut the zone in half, and opened fire from all sides.
V.O.: And were many people killed?
M.H.: Many, more than 100 men were killed. Then they took us out of the zone in groups of a hundred and sorted us there. Their agents, or *suki* as they were called in the camp, were standing there and pointing out who had participated in the strike. Twenty men were taken to prison, and the rest were scattered among different camps, in groups of three or four hundred, and there were about 3,500 of us in total.
V.O.: And when you were in exile after your second imprisonment, were you also forced to do some kind of work?
M.H.: There I worked as a stoker. The KGB bothered me often. There was this KGB man, Dzhuliv, and he says, “I’ve been looking through your case file, so maybe you could tell me those ten commandments of Ukrainian nationalists?” I say, “I’ve already forgotten, I don’t know.” He would say that quite often. And when I was going home on leave for the first time, he was already at the airport, waiting to see who I was connected with, or something.
V.O.: When you were finally registered in Horodenka in 1990, such events were taking place... You obviously took part in them? What organizations were you in?
M.H.: I took part in all the events. I am still a member of the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists.
V.O.: But the KUN (Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists) has only existed since 1992. What about before that?
M.H.: In the Society of Political Prisoners. I've been to Kyiv, I was in Chernivtsi, in Khotyn. I was in Kyiv twice when the Greek Catholic Church came to picket for its recognition and rehabilitation. Even the priests are surprised, they say that wherever there are such events, they always see me there. Both at mass state events and at church events.
V.O.: And today, April 17, 2001, why did you come to Kyiv?
M.H.: We came today in defense of our Prime Minister Yushchenko, to defend our government.
V.O.: Alright, thank you for your story. Perhaps we can recall something else?
M.H.: Maybe about how we celebrated Easter and Christmas in the camps...
V.O.: Yes, that was just the place for celebrating holidays, and nothing else...
M.H.: We couldn't do anything else there.
V.O.: And is it true that your co-defendant Mykola Hamula has died?
M.H.: He died around 1985 or 1986.
V.O.: He was already unwell in the camp, always saying: “Я старенький дід Гамула, що біда мене зігнула.”
M.H.: I'll go to the cemetery and find out when he died, and I'll write to you.
V.O.: Does he have any family left?
M.H.: He has two sons. He lived on Volodymyr Velyky Street, where Roman Hayduk also lives.
V.O.: Have you been rehabilitated?
M.H.: I received rehabilitation, I was rehabilitated in 1992, for both cases.
V.O.: Are there any publications about your case, any documents that could be photocopied?
M.H.: I have my release certificate, nothing else. Except maybe a copy of the search protocol, six pages. I will send you copies.
V.O.: Alright. Thank you. Have a safe trip!
This was former political prisoner Mykola Hutsul from Horodenka in the Ivano-Frankivsk region. On April 17, 2001, he came to support the Yushchenko government. We were walking from the Verkhovna Rada to the river terminal, where the buses from Halychyna had stopped. Recorded by Vasyl Ovsienko.
Photo by V. Ovsienko: Mykola Hutsul near the Verkhovna Rada, April 17, 2001.