Roman Shukhevych - Rescue of Irene Reichenberg

Rescue of Irene Reichenberg

According to Volodymyr Vyatrovych, a historian specializing in UPA, Natalia Shukhevych, wife of the UPA Head Commander Roman Shukhevych, sheltered a Jewish girl, Irene Reichenberg (or Reisinberg, Reitenberg), the daughter of a neighbor from September 1942 until February 1943. According to Yuri Shukhevych, at the beginning of World War II their family lived in Lviv on Queen Yadvyga Street, where their neighbors, Wolf and Ruzha Reichenberg owned a textile shop. The elder daughter, Irma Reichenberg, was shot by the Nazis in the street in 1942. Her younger sister Irene lived with Shukhevych family for a certain period of time while preparing for school.

Roman Shukhevych used his connections to provide the girl with new documents in the Ukrainian name of Iryna Vasylivna Ryzhko. Girl's actual birth year was changed from 1936 to 1937. In her new documents "Iryna" was listed as the daughter of a Red Army officer killed early in the war.

After the arrest of Natalia Shukhevych in 1943 by the Gestapo, Roman Shukhevych took Irene to the orphan shelter at the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Convent of Vasilianky in the village of Phylypove, near the township of Kulykiv in 30 kilometres from Lviv, where Irene remained until the end of World War II surviving German occupation and Holocaust. In 1956 Irene sent a letter with her picture to the prioress of the monastery. After the war Irene remained in Ukraine and died in 2007 in Kiev, aged 72. Her son Vladimir lives in Kiev. Yuri Shukhevych met with him after his mother's death. The Reichenberg family is mentioned in the list of victims of the Nazis at the Yad Vashem memorial in Israel.

According to Ukrainian historian and former UPA soldier Lev Shankovsky, immediately upon assuming the position of commander of UPA Shukhevych issued an order banning participation in anti-Jewish activities. No written record of this order, however, has been found.