KATRUSIA HODYK

Date of birth – 1920 

Place of birth – Stefkowa, Poland [formerly Ukraine]

Place of interview – Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Date of interview - December 4th, 2010

Audio interview

Language – Ukrainian

Interviewer - Grandma, do you remember when you had mom and aunti Oksana and you were holding mom in your hands, and those German officers came to the door? How did that happen? Was there a Jewish family in the house? You told me once that you hid someone in the kitchen.

KS - That was different. I lived in the city.

Interviewer - In what city.

KS - Petryky Dolіshni...the Gestapo was there, and the Jewish woman would come to me. The Gestapo would search for the Jews, and we were not allowed to help them. It was strongly forbidden. But if they came, crying, wanting food, was I supposed to turn them away? Because the Gestapo didn't allow it? I had to feed the hungry. That's what I was taught to do. It was very hard. Once Mykola caught me. The Jew was in the house and I was giving him food, and in front of the Jew Mykola started yelling at me. He said: 'You want to put us all through misery? You know they will destroy us.' He said this all in front of the Jew. 'They will destroy us all because of him, not even just you and me, but the kids too.' The Jewish man never came back. He wanted to kiss my hands, but I didn't let him, I hid them, so he kissed my shoes instead. He knelt down and kissed my shoes.

Interviewer 2 (daughter Oksana) - Do you remember the story you were telling me about when the Gestapo was outside the doors and you had me in your arms...

KS - There was a Jew eating soup in the house and I was standing there with a child in my arms, and I see the Gestapo at the window. They are waving at the children. They asked if I saw a Jew disappear somewhere here. And he was in my kitchen eating soup. I told them I did not see him. But he was in my kitchen the whole time.

Interviewer - Did you pinch the child so she would cry?

KS - Yes. I pinched her so she would cry and she cried so I showed the Gestapo that she was getting her teeth and I need to go calm her down. Then they left.

Interviewer - Did this all happen across the window?

KS - Yes, across the window.

Interviewer - It's good that they didn't enter.

KS - It's good that they didn't enter the house. It would have been the end for me. How can you not give them food when you know...and a minute after that Jew left, his children came to the window. I couldn't even put my children down to sleep because they [the Jewish children] were crying and were not letting my children seep. Orysia was there and Oksana. They were crying so I had to at least throw them a cooked potato. Once they got the potato in their hands they left because they had something to eat. Those same kids. Mykola knew them.

Interviewer 2 - Did he have a lot of children?

KS - 14?

Interviewer - Do you know what happened to him?

KS - I don't know because later I left and they [the Germans] took them. I don't know what happened to them. I'm sure the Germans...they knew that...they sent them somewhere and burned them or something I don't know what they did to them. They went missing and we left. We also had to flee from the same Germans. We fled one way, and they the other.