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In the 1940s and early 1950s, thousands of Ukrainian women joined the struggle of the nationalist underground of the OUN and UPA in Western Ukraine. According to historians, the share of women actively involved in underground activities was about 10% of the total.
The women's issue in the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists
Іn the interwar period, Ukrainian nationalist political forces (the Ukrainian Military Organization and the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists) were interested in attracting conscious and active women to join these organizations. A symbol of women's dedication and sacrifice for the national idea was the figure of Olha Basarab (1889-1924), a Ukrainian public and political figure, organizer of the first women's unit of the Ukrainian Sich Riflemen Legion in Lviv, member of the main board of the Union of Ukrainian Women, diplomat who collaborated with the Ukrainian Military Organization as an intelligence officer and was Colonel Yevhen Konovalets liaison; she was tortured in a Polish prison. However, no programmatic document would highlight the position of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists on the role and place of women in the national project. Instead, propaganda texts view women through the prism of essentialism, defining motherhood and family responsibilities as the main priorities for women. However, they do not exclude women's political and military participation in the struggle for an independent Ukrainian state. Significant in this sense are the texts by M. Rak, “On the Purpose of the Ukrainian Woman” (undated), and Dariia Rebert, “The Social Role of Women” (1943).
There were different levels of involvement of women in the activities of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army.
- full participation - through membership in the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, entirely at the disposal of the underground, often in another region in an illegal position (deep underground), permanent duties and responsibility for specific areas of work and/or territories;
- partial active participation - certain functions at the place of residence (messengers, couriers, scouts, nurses, guides), in a legal position, at their own risk;
- Occasional periodic assistance (sympathizers) - rear-guard functions: food supplies, support for hiding places, sanitary and logistical services, hiding supplies, and literature.
The leading roles and functions of women in the underground:
- communication and delivery (messengers, couriers);
- intelligence (information gathering, surveillance);
- escort ( Ukrainian Insurgent Army groups in the field);
- medical care (care and transportation of the sick and wounded, herbal medicine);
- hygiene (washing and repair of clothing);
- propaganda (among the local population, recruitment);
- clerical work (secretaries of leaders);
- publishing (typists, editors);
- provisioning (gathering and preparing food, clothing, and supplies);
- military service.
In the deep underground, during extended stays in isolated, cramped hiding places, women and men faced the following difficulties:
- limited hygiene (diseases and parasites);
- asceticism (minimum of belongings);
- limited diet (lack of vitamins);
- health problems (due to immobility, lack of light and air, humidity);
- psychological stress (confined, cramped space, lack of privacy, anxiety, conflicts).
Women were additionally expected to perform reproductive, caregiving, and emotional work.
Given their gender, their predominantly subordinate position in the structures of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, and their numerical minority, women faced the following gendered risks and challenges in the underground:
- Romantic and intimate relationships with insurgents pose a threat to combat capability.
- Marriage and family;
- sexual harassment and violence - women's vulnerability;
- problems of adultery and de facto families;
- (un)possible motherhood;
- Severance of ties with family.
You can learn more about women in the OUN and UPA from the memoirs of underground women and research about them.
Some memoirs of former underground women:
- Мудра Надія. Українська жінка у визвольній боротьбі, 1940–1950 рр.: Біогр. довідник. Т.1-3. Львів, 2004, 2006, 2009
- Maria Savchyn Pyskir. "Thousands of Roads: A Memoir of a Young Woman's Life in the Ukrainian Underground During and After World War II". Translated by Ania Savage
- Коханська Г. З Україною в серці. Спомини / Літопис УПА. Торонто, 2008
- Марія Лабунька. Коли ліс був наш батько. Філадельфія, 2015
- Долаючи тишу. Жіночі історії війни / Марта Гавришко. Харків, 2018
Some studies on women in the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army
- Oksana Kis “A Woman`s question” in the OUN ideology and propaganda
- Oksana Kis National Femininity Used and Contested: Women’s Participation in the Nationalist Underground in Western Ukraine during the 1940s-50s
- Kis Oksana Between the personal and the political: gendered experiences of female participants of the national liberation struggle on Western Ukrainian territories in the 1940–1950s
- Гавришко Марта. Заборонене кохання: фактичні дружини учасників підпілля ОУН та УПА у 1940-1950-х рр. Україна Модерна, 2015 https://uamoderna.com/md/havryshko-de-facto-marriages-upa/
- Онишко Л. “Нам сонце всміхалось крізь ржавії ґрати…” Катерина Зарицька в українському національно,визвольному русі / Літопис УПА Торонто, 2007
The translation from Ukrainian was created with the help of DeepL.
