Oleksandra Belova

The short life of Oleksandra was difficult but vivid. She was born on February 20, 1902, in Bulgaria. Her father was a Bulgarian railroad worker. Her mother was born in a family of half-German, half-Russian impoverished nobles. Oleksandra orphaned at an early age and ended up in Kharkiv, under the care of her mother’s sister. Oleksandra widowed at an age of 35, after her husband, the correspondent of “Visti” newspaper (the central gazette of Soviet Ukraine) drowned in the Dnipro river in 1937. Soon after that Oleksandra removed to Kyiv where she worked as a head of the department of «Tvarynnytstvo Ukrainy» newspaper («The livestock of Ukraine»). After the beginning of the German-Soviet war, she returned to Kharkiv together with her 11-year-old daughter Ludmyla. The family stayed in the city during the occupation. They moved into the house «Profpratsivnyk» where they lived in the early ‘30s. Their old neighbours and Oleksandra’s cousins also lived there.

In December of 1941 Nazis gathered local Jews in the area of Kharkiv Tractor Plant. Roza Berkovych, Oleksandra’s prewar acquaintance was also there. In January, together with her children, she escaped from the ghetto. At first, she asked for help from her husband’s coworker, but he refused. Then she came to her old house, where she met Oleksandra Belova. Roza asked Oleksandra to save two of her children who were near the Tractor Plant area. Oleksandra agreed and walked 40 kilometers along the frosty streets of the city, towing a sled with Roza’s daughters.  The younger daughter Ira was taken by Roza’s prewar housekeeper Zinaida Lohvynenko. Then Oleksandra brought 11-year old Olena to her cousins. From that moment Oleksandra had to feed her own daughter Ludmyla and Roza’s daughter Olena. Taking into account the terrible starvation in the city, this task was not so easy to fulfill.

Once, Olena glanced thru the window and someone saw her. Oleksandra decided to hide Olena in another place. They came to Roza Berkovich’s prewar coworker Halyna Zozulevych. By that moment there was Halyna’s sister husband Mykola Frankov hiding in her house. He was a member of the underground group. They decided that since now Olena will stay with Halyna, and Mykola with Oleksandra. She even agreed to join the partisan group and became its secretary.

She also managed to get a new passport for Roza Berkovych. This document helped Roza and her daughter to leave the city and survive.

On March 27, 1942, Oleksandra Belova was arrested by Gestapo. She was accused of hiding Jews and supporting partisans. Together with other prisoners, she has been executed in the forest nearby Kharkiv.

Oleksandra’s cousins understood the danger of the situation and escaped to Crimea together with Oleksandra’s daughter Ludmyla. In 1944 girl ended up in the orphanage. In 1947, after she finished her eighth grade, Ludmyla was expelled from the orphanage, as a person who lived under the occupation. She returned to Kharkiv and entered the technical school.

«I was always proud of my mother... I never blame her because of the fact she made me an orphan while saving others…» - from the memoirs of Ludmyla Ovcharenko

Roza Berkovich lived up to 90 years. Her younger daughter Iryna lives in Germany, and her older daughter Olena passed away in 2016 in Kharkiv.  

On September 20, 1995, Yad Vashem posthumously awarded Oleksandra Belova with the title of Righteous Among the Nations. Halyna Zozulevych, Zinaida Lohvynenko, and Oleksandra Hladchenko were also honoured with this award. All materials were sent to Yad Vashem by Kharkiv Holocaust Museum because relations between survivors and Oleksandra’s daughter were quite difficult.

On October 17, 2018, according to the decision of the Kharkiv City Council, the new city street was named after Oleksandra Belova.