Yevhen Pobihushchyi-Ren

Yevhen Pavlovych Pobihushchyi-Ren[lower-alpha 1] (né Pobihushchyi[lower-alpha 2]; 15 November 1901 – 28 May 1995) was a Ukrainian military commander and Axis collaborator who served as commander of the Roland Battalion and Schutzmannschaft Battalion 201, and as one of the commanders of 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Galician).

In this name that follows Eastern Slavic naming conventions, the patronymic is Pavlovych and the family name is Pobihushchyi.

Yevhen Pobihushchyi
Pobihushchyi-Ren as a Polish Army officer, 1936
Native name
Євген Побігущий
Nickname(s)
  • Yevhen Pobihushchyi-Ren
  • Yevhen Berkut
Born(1901-11-15)15 November 1901
Postolivka, Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, Austria-Hungary
(now Ukraine)
Died28 May 1995(1995-05-28) (aged 93)
Haar, Bavaria, Germany
Buried
Munich Waldfriedhof
(48.102778°N 11.493611°E / 48.102778; 11.493611)
Allegiance
Service/branch
Years of service
  • 1918–1919
  • 1925–1939
  • 1941–1945
  • 1954–1958
RankMajor
Commands held
Battles/wars
AwardsOrder of St. Sylvester
Alma materAdam Mickiewicz University in Poznań

Early life and career

Yevhen Pavlovych Pobihushchyi was born on 15 November 1901, in the village of Postolivka, in what was then the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria within Austria-Hungary into a family of Ukrainian educators. At the age of 17, he joined the Ukrainian Galician Army following the founding of the West Ukrainian People's Republic, and participated in the Polish–Ukrainian War as an artilleryman. He returned home in May 1920 with the rank of senior corporal.[1]

Following the war, he joined Plast, and was arrested in 1920 for refusing to celebrate Polish independence.[2] Pobihushchyi originally intended to take over his father's school, studying at both the Ukrainian Secret University in Lviv and the Greek Catholic[3] Saint John the Baptist Theological Lyceum in Stanislawów (now Ivano-Frankivsk). However, due to Polish opposition to Ukrainian-language education, he could not get a job and was conscripted into the Polish Armed Forces infantry in 1925. Beginning in 1928, he studied at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, eventually earning a doctorate in political economy. At this time, he also unsuccessfully sought a doctorate from the Ukrainian Free University, being rejected in part due to his alleged ties to the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), a far-right political organisation advocating for Ukrainian independence from Poland.[1]

World War II

Following the invasion of Poland in 1939, Pobihushchyi fought against German forces and served at the Battle of the Bzura, taking over the Third Battalion of the 57th Greater Poland Infantry Division following the death of its commander, major Józef Kewpinski. Shortly before the end of the Battle of the Bzura, Pobihushchyi was captured on 17 September 1939, and interned with other ethnic Ukrainians and Georgians in Luckenwalde's Stalag III-A, near Berlin.[4]

In the spring of 1940,[4] Pobihushchyi, along with other Ukrainian prisoners of war, was released as part of a deal struck between OUN ideologue Dmytro Dontsov and the German government. Following his release, he initially studied the German language in Berlin. At the same time, he joined the Wehrmacht as a translator.[1]

Roland Battalion and Schutzmannschaft Battalion 201

In May 1941, Pobihushchyi moved to Vienna, where he trained soldiers as part of the Ukrainian Nationalist Squadrons.[4] The squadrons were split into two battalions; the Nachtigall Battalion, led by Roman Shukhevych, and the Roland Battalion, under Pobihushchyi. In November 1941, the Nachtigall and Roland Battalions were transformed into Schutzmannschaft Battalion 201, which Pobihushchyi commanded.[5] Schutzmannschaft Battalion 201 was active both in fighting the Belarusian partisans and killings of civilians, including Jews, though the role of the battalion in the Holocaust remains to be studied in depth.[6][7]

Leadership of the 14th Division of the SS

In January 1943, Schutzmannschaft Battalion 201 was disbanded for refusing to renew their contracts, and their leaders were detained in Lviv.[8] While Shukhevych fled, Pobihushchyi remained imprisoned until Easter Saturday 1943, and was to be executed or sent to Majdanek concentration camp until Alfred Bisanz, a Galician German, successfully negotiated his release in return for participation in the creation of the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Galician). Pobihushchyi was among the staff of the division until 1944.[1][4] He later went on to refer to his time in imprisonment as "the worst period in [his] life."[4]

Later life and death

Following the end of World War II, Pobihushchyi found himself in the British occupation zone in Germany, and joined the British Army, overseeing the Ukrainian Guard Hundreds from 1954 to 1958. During this time, he also served as an organisational officer of the Ukrainian Red Cross Society in Germany and taught at Ukrainian displaced persons camps.[4] At this time, he and his wife changed their surname from Pobihushchyi to Pobihushchyi-Ren, likely to avoid extradition to the Soviet Union.[1]

Pobihushchyi-Ren also worked with OUN leader Yaroslav Stetsko as part of the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations and was heavily active both in contributing to Ukrainian publishing and the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church.[1] He served as head of the Ukrainian Christian Movement for a period of ten years and as head in West Germany from 1965 until his death,[4] and was one of the organisers of the construction of the Cathedral of the Intercession of the Mother of God and of St. Andrew, for which he was awarded the Order of St. Sylvester by Pope John Paul II in 1982. The same year, Pobihushchyi-Ren published his memoirs, Mosaic of My Memories (Ukrainian: Мозаїка моїх споминів, romanized: Mozayika moyikh spomyniv) in London, and he also donated a portion of his library to the University of Lviv after Ukraine gained independence from the Soviet Union.[1]

Pobihushchyi-Ren died on 28 May 1995, in Haar, Bavaria, near Munich in Germany.[9]

Notes
  1. Ukrainian: Євген Павлович Побігущий-Рен
    Polish: Jewhen Pawłowycz Pobihuszczy-Ren
  2. Ukrainian: Побігущий
    Polish: Pobihuszczy

References
  1. Mykytsei, Mariia (19 November 2021). "Фігура другої шеренги. Іван Монолатій: У життєписі Євгена Побігущого-Рена, котрий присвятив боротьбі за Українську державу все своє життя, ще чимало білих плям" [Figure of the second row. Ivan Monolatii: In the biography of Yevhen Pobihushchyi-Ren, who devoted his whole life to the struggle for the Ukrainian state, there are still many white spots]. Galicia (in Ukrainian). Archived from the original on 14 October 2022. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
  2. Monolatii, Ivan (10 June 2021). "Молоде життя Євгена Побігущого-Рена" [The Young Life of Yevhen Pobihushchyi-Ren]. Ukrayinska Pravda (in Ukrainian). Archived from the original on 24 June 2021. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
  3. "Об'єкти Архієпархії" [Objects of the Archeparchy]. Ukrainian Catholic Archeparchy of Ivano-Frankivsk (in Ukrainian). Archived from the original on 14 October 2022. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
  4. Pobihushchyi-Ren, Yevhen. Мозаїка моїх споминів [Mosaic of My Memories] (in Ukrainian). Archived from the original on 17 August 2018. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
  5. Rudling, Anders (2016). "The Cult of Roman Shukhevych in Ukraine: Myth Making with Complications" (PDF). Fascism. 5 (1): 26–65. doi:10.1163/22116257-00501003. Archived (PDF) from the original on 12 July 2017. Retrieved 14 October 2022.Rudling, Per A.The Cult of Roman Shukhevych in Ukraine//Fascism: Journal of Comparative Fascist Studies, p. 56 Archived 12 July 2017 at the Wayback Machine
  6. True and False Lessons from the Nachtigall Episode Archived 20 May 2009 at the Wayback Machine Op-Ed by John Paul Himka.
  7. Ivan Katchanovski, Ph.D., Terrorists or National Heroes? Politics of the OUN and the UPA in Ukraine. Archived 8 August 2017 at the Wayback Machine Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, Harvard University. PDF file.
  8. Kentiy, A. Roman Shukhevych Archived 26 February 2019 at the Wayback Machine. Encyclopedia of History of Ukraine. 2013
  9. "Побігущий-Рен Євген Павлович". Ternopilshchyna Regional Information Portal (in Ukrainian). 4 September 2022. Archived from the original on 14 October 2022. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
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