Yasynska (Vlasenko) Lucia, Petrovych Anelia, Vlasenko Oleksandra

Lucia Vlasenko (in a marriage Yasynska) lived in Kyiv. Before the Nazi occupation she was 9 years old. She helped her mother Oleksandra Vlasenko and the married couple Petrovych, Anelia Antonivna and Oleksandr Yosypovych, who rescued the girl Mania and took care of her.

Anelia, her husband Oleksandr and son Anatolii, were friends with the family of Oleksii Hura. He and his Jewish wife Henia gave birth to the girl Mania. When all the Jews were ordered to gather in Syrets [the district in Kyiv close to Babyn Yar] Anelia Petrovych tried to convince Henia Hura to move to Vorsel, where Anelia’s relatives lived. However, she did not want to leave her parents and came to Babyn Yar with her daughter. Oleksii walked them. When they came to the place where the armed soldiers and policemen stood, Henia kissed her husband and daughter and asked them to go.

Oleksii Yukhymovych with Mania went through the crowd. The policemen stopped them, but let them go after seeing he was Ukrainian. The father brought his daughter home and in the evening he learned about the shooting in Babyn Yar. His hair turned white overnight. He fell seriously ill.

His neighbors Anelia Petrovych and Oleksandra Vlasenko took care of the girl and harboured her in the attic of their house on 29 Prozorivska Str. Women brought her food in turn and took Mania to the flat at night. Three months passed. No one of the neighbors knew the child lived in the same house.

Lucia Vlasenko often brought Mania food as well, played with her and kept her presence in secret realizing the danger.

After recovery, Oleksii Yukhymovych moved to Zhdanova Street [current Sagaydachnogo Street] with his daughter. It was necessary to change the residence regularly. He got a job at the sewing workshop at the Brewery No.1 and every morning went to work with his daughter. In the last days of the occupation they hid in the barracks behind the brewery. After the war the girl entered school, lived at the house of Oleksandra Vasylivna, because father worked late.

Anelia Petrovych also helped the Hura family. From January to March 1942 she had been hiding the man’s colleague Naum Kanterman, the chief accountant of the Bakery No.

Oleksandra Vlasenko (posthumously), Anelia Petrovych and Lucia Yasynska (Vlasenko) were recognized as the Righteous Among the Nations, in 1999 – Oleksandra Vasylivna and Anelia Antonivna. In 2010 Lucia Valentynivna was awarded the Order for Courage of the 3rd Class.