A memorial plaque was unveiled to Colonel of the UPR Army and liberator of Crimea Bolbochan

A memorial plaque in honor of Colonel Petro Bolbochan of the Ukrainian People's Republic Army was unveiled in Kharkiv. The event was timed to coincide with the Day of Unity of Ukraine, and its holding was part of a large-scale patriotic event in the city.

This was reported by the public organization "Decolonization. Ukraine".

The new memorial was installed at 46 Petra Bolbochan Street. Earlier, activists appealed to the Kharkiv City Council to immortalize the name of the city's liberator, and on December 22, the city's toponymic commission officially approved the installation of the plaque.

The unveiling of the plaque is an important step, but not the end. We will consistently work to ensure that a monument to Petro Bolbochan, the liberator of this city, appears in Kharkiv," the NGO representatives noted.

According to the Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance, Petro Bolbochan, a colonel of the UPR Army, was born on October 17, 1883, in the village of Hidzheu (now Yarivka in Bukovyna) to a Moldovan Orthodox priest. He first studied at the seminary, but later chose a military career and in 1905 entered the Chuhuiv Infantry Junker School, where he organized a Ukrainian circle to spread the native language.

Bolbochan took an active part in the First World War, commanding machine-gun units, forming reserve regiments, and receiving a number of military awards. After the February Revolution, he supported the Central Rada and began to create Ukrainian military units. His 1st Ukrainian Republican Regiment and later the Separate Zaporizhzhia Corps played a key role in the liberation of Crimea from the Bolsheviks in 1918.

The operation on the Chongar Isthmus was particularly noteworthy, where a group of 20 Cossacks under Bolbochan 's command quickly neutralized the Red Army and prevented the bridge from being blown up, after which Ukrainian troops successfully captured Dzhankoy and Simferopol. Despite his heroic achievements, the colonel's units were forced to leave Crimea due to Allied pressure, and the colonel himself was the target of two assassination attempts.

In May 1919, he was dismissed from the command, but later arrested on charges of attempting a coup d'état. Not taking advantage of the offer to escape, Bolbochan hoped to defend his honor in court, but a military field tribunal sentenced him to death. On June 28, 1919, the colonel was shot dead at the Balyn station in the Khmelnytskyi region.

Is the memory of civilians who died as a result of Russian war crimes during the first, second, third, and even fourth years of the full-scale war preserved, and how can we talk about it in a way that does not erase the tragedy but also does not cause additional pain?

Last year, Intent analyzed the positions of military administrations, artists and philosophers who work directly with memorialization, as well as the reaction of local residents to these initiatives.

Анна Бальчінос