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UKRAINIAN WOMAN OUR ENGLISH COLUMN TO BE OR NOT TO BE The famous Shakespeare's phrase seems to have become a slogan for the free wor'M of the present day. It appears as a rally ing .cry of men and women alike. Forty years back this slogan stood as a telling momentum be fore the Ukrainian women. This was the beginning of World W ar I ill 1914. The Ukrainian youth had been joining voluntarily the ranks of the newly formed Ukrainian Sich Shooters in Aus trian army. They had been march ing ‘to the war front with the sole thought to win freedom in that war storm for their native liand. The Ukrainian women had like wise been imbued with the same ideals. They realized that it was necessary to exert all their strength in order to succeed in gaining the goal of the Ukrain ian .people. Many a young Ukrain ian girl joined then the Sich Shooters. After a brief training they had already been marching to the battle front and shedding their blood in an uneven encount er,. They were sacrificing their youth, health and life for the •cause of freedom. The celebrated combat on the hill of Makivka, and then marches and many bloody battles. Let us mention merely some of them: Sop/hie Halechko, a student, wounded in battles and awarded a decoration, won an officer’s rank, died tragically in 1918. Hanna Dmiterko, an officer, took part in combats, received a medal of merit after the struggle on Makivka. Olena Stepaniv, a pedagog, dis tinguished herself in the battles, was taken prisoner on Makivka. After the occupation of Ukraine by the bolsheviki, in 1920-22 new waves of resistance were rising in Ukraine, the new attempts to re store freedom of the country through the revolution. Exalted and honored for her deeds was Maria Sokolovska, a chieftain of a detachment of insurgents. Sur rounded in a battle, she did not surrender but died fighting to the bitter end. Likewise renowned as a fighter in tile underground insurgent struggle of that time was a young girl Vera Babenko, who also died in combat with the bollsthevik in vaders. Foil* forty years the ideal of struggle for freedom has been shining for them, hindering them from peaceful home life but driv ing into the storm of war. Yet aflt- er sparkling for a moment with the flash of freedom, the star of liberty was eclipsed. Madam Perle Mesta’s traveling experiences through the Soviet Union resounded far and wide in Ukrainian press here and abroad. The Ukrainian newspapers and magazines in the United States, South America, Western Europe, and Australia have reported on what Madam Mesta 'had observed behind the Iron Curtain, and in Ukraine in particular. These ac counts of her journey, originally published in the New York H er ald, have been of especial interest to Ukrainian women. Madam Mesta, former minister to Luxemburg, looked over the country with open eyes. She was not satisfied to speak to officials only, but conversed with the em ployees and domestics at the ho tel, with the travelers in the train and with workingmen in facto ries. The girl warriors vanished, the Ukrainian woman remained then only in “peaceful life” under So viet rule. Thirty five yeans have elapsed since she has been carry ing on the silenlt war for herself, her children and their soul. “We must endure” this was her slogan, for in any of her actions there is the threat of death. She lives as though on the edge of a sabre. Still there is another anniver sary — 12 yeans went by since the UPA (Ukrainian Insurgent Ar my) has arisen in Ukrame and has taken up the downea sword of freedom. The Ukrainian wom an again took up arm's. Secretly over the mountains, woods and narrow paths these women, the nameless, unknown and not rec ognized heroines, are marching to encounter the occupant of their homeland. There are many of them and their slogan remains the same—to be or not to be. N. P. She noticed that the people in Ukraine were eager to talk to for eigners while those in Moscow were most reluctant. She was able to get more answers ito her ques tions in Ukraine than elsewhere in Soviet Union. Kiev, the capi tal of Ukraine, appeared to her as a most impressive city in the countries under Soviets which she visited. These conclusions show that even the protracted bolshevik regime could not dim the sunny disposition of the people of Uk raine. One of her observations is most eloquent. While visiting a steel mi'll in Zaporizzya, she was inquir ing about all divisions of the work there for being herself a co-own- er of large steel mills in the Unit ed States, she was interested in this line of industry. The foundry had been built there after World PERLE MESTA IN UKRAINE
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