Balder Ex-Libris

Author : Seleshko Mykhailo
Title : Vinnytsia The Katyn of Ukraine A report by an eyewitness
Year : 1980

Link download : Seleshko_Mykhailo_-_Vinnytsia_The_Katyn_of_Ukraine.zip

Toward the end of February, 1944, when I was marking time in a German prison in Potsdam, I was transferred to cell number 20, already occupied by several other prisoners. After a brief acquaintance I learned that one of these was a Ukrainian from the vicinity of Vinnytsia. We came to know each other closely and he told me his life history. At that time he was twenty-three years of age, born and bred in Soviet Ukraine. He had been educated by the Communist party and had been a Communist in the full meaning of the word. Communist ideals were his ideals. He fought on the German/Soviet front. After his capture by the Germans, he was forced into anti-aircraft artillery work for the Germans in Berlin. Because of negligence in line of duty he was thrown into jail. There our paths met. I kept asking him questions about life under the Soviets. He formerly belonged to a civilian border patrol unit. Being a Comsomol, he took his duties seriously and helped track down many foreign intelligence agents who were trying to slip across the border into the Soviet Union. There were others, young Soviet patriots like himself, in the villages and districts. He told me of the steps taken by the Soviets in Ukraine as a preparation for war. In the Communist party at least as early as 1937 it was felt that war against Germany was imminent. Confidential instructions to members of the party and the Comsomol stressed this eventuality. These instructions ordered that the Soviet hinterland in Ukraine be purged of enemies of the people. By the words “enemies of the people” were meant not only all those people who worked actively against the Soviet regime, but also those who were believed to be inclined to hostility toward the government including those whose complete devotion to the regime had not been clearly manifested. A purge of enemies of the population of the Soviet border regions was commenced. Herein lies the story of the Ukrainian tragedy in Vinnytsia, which was revealed to the world in 1943. (Vinnytsia is a Ukrainian city, which was, prior to 1939, approximately 100 miles from the eastern border of Poland.) My young companion is now a Ukrainian patriot, and much about him must not be made public. Everything he said supplemented my own knowledge of the Vinnytsia tragedy and helped to complete the picture I had formed of it during my experiences in Vinnytsia. In the summer of 1943 I was living in Berlin under the close supervision of the Gestapo as a suspected foreigner, an unreliable alien and a Polish citizen. On July 2, 1943, during the noon hour, I was called to the telephone by what the Germans called the Ukrainian Confidence Service. This was a German government agency which registered all Ukrainians in Germany and tried to win their support for German purposes among the Ukrainians. ...