In 1939, ministered, together with his parish priest, Fr Joseph Bieńko, in the large village of Kovalivka, then in Buchach County in the Ternopil Voivodeship, c. 6 km north of Monastyryska. It had a population of c. 1,800, including c. 69% Roman Catholic Poles, c. 30% Greek Catholic Ukrainians, and a dozen or so Jews. Meanwhile, in the rural communal settlements of Buchach County, c. 61% were Greek Catholics, c. 35% Roman Catholics, and c. 3.5% Jews. Kovalivka was thus a kind of Polish enclave in an area inhabited mainly by Ukrainians (outside of the towns, where Poles constituted the majority).

Following the German and Russian attack on Poland in 09.1939, World War II began. According to the agreement between the two allies, ratified by the genocidal Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of 23.08.1939, the Ternopil Voivodeship fell to the Russians. The Russian occupation began. In the fall of 1939, arrests of the intelligentsia, teachers, doctors, landowners, government officials, and the families of Polish military personnel began. In 1940‐1941, many other Poles fell victim to four large waves of deportations „to Siberia”. In addition, 150,000–200,000 men were conscripted into the Russian army, and c. 100,000 were forced to work for Russian industry, mainly in the mines of the Donets Basin, in heavy industry plants in the Urals and in Siberia. Then the surveillance of priests and monks began. High taxes were imposed on the clergy.

The fate of the inhabitants of Kovalivka reflected this Polish fate. On 10.02.1940, during the first great deportation of Poles, together with Fr Bieńko, holding a cross in their hands, said farewell to the Poles gathered in front of the church in Kovalivka — old and young, mothers and small children — who were being driven by the Russians to the railway station in Monastyryska and deported to Siberia.

On 22.06.1941 Germany attacked its erstwhile ally, the Russians, and the German occupation began. Kovalivka became part of the Germ. Kreishauptmannschaft Tschortkiw (Eng. Chortkiv County), which was part of the Germ. Distrikt Galizien (Eng. Galicia District), in German‐occupied and run quasi‐state called the Germ. Generalgouvernement (Eng. General Governorate), i.e. GG.

The period 1941‐1943 was marked in particular by the extermination of Jews. From the beginning of 1942, the Germans implemented the genocidal plan Germ. «Endlösung der Judenfrage» (Eng. Final Solution of the Jewish Question), which in the GG was codenamed Germ. «Aktion Reinhardt» (Eng. Operation Reinhardt). Significant participation in it was taken by units of the Ukrainian, collaborative Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei (Eng. Ukrainian Auxiliary Police), also operating as the Germ. Schutzmannschaft (Eng. Protection Battalions), i.e. Schuma, as well as the Germ. Jüdischer Ordnungsdienst (Eng. Jewish Order Service), particularly active e.g. in the ghetto in Buchach — Jewish sources state that the local „Jewish police robbed and killed, worse than the Germans”.

Jews from Kovalivka, prob. in 1942, were brought to an open ghetto in Monastyryska. On 08.10.1942, the majority of them — in 1939, c. 1,500 Jews lived in Monastyryska — were transported by the Germans, with the participation of the Germ. Ukrainian Hilfspolizei, to the Germ. Vernichtungslager (Eng. Extermination Camp) VL Belzec, where they were murdered. The rest were transported to the ghetto in Buchach, c. 16 km east of Monastyryska. The Jews from Buchach, on the other hand, were murdered in four so‐called Germ. Aktion (Eng. operation). The first two batches of Jews on 15‐17.10.1942 and in 11.1942 were also transported to VL Belzec. The last Jews in Buchach were murdered in 02.1943 (c. 2,000 people) and 04.1943 (c. 4,000 victims). In both of these Germ. Aktion, the Germans, with the participation of the Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei, executed the Jews over previously dug pits near the so‐called Mount Fedora in Buchach — the name comes from an Italian daredevil, Fedorini from Florence, who, prob. in the 19th century, climbed the mountain and, on a flying machine he had built, resembling a hang glider, jumped down, took off from the top of the mountain and after a dozen or so meters of smooth flight, fell down, dying instantly. Jewish sources state that during the Germ. Aktion in 02.1943, „the bloodletting [of the victims] was so massive that the town's water supply was polluted”.

In 05.1943, the German authorities were able to declare that Buchach and the surrounding area were Germ. „Judenfrei” (Eng. „free of Jews”).

This was however only partially true. Jewish sources describe the situation that followed the liquidation of the Buchach ghetto as follows: „The hunt for hidden Jews continued with the assistance of local denouncers. A certain dynamic developed in this last phase whereby Jews "hiding among the peasants paid high sums for the shelters, and the simple‐minded peasants went to town and bought whatever they desired". Consequently, "the Ukrainian murderers […] began following these peasants and found Jews in attics, cellars, and so on […] [and] shot them on the spot". This in turn unleashed "large‐scale denunciations", and "the peasants themselves began to kill the Jews or evict them"”.

And it was then, in 02.1943, that Roman Shukhevych, nom de guerre „Taras Chuprynka”, the chief commander of the Ukrainian, genocidal OUN/UPA organisation, who in 1941 was a member of the Ukrainian Germ. Sondergruppe Nachtigall (Eng. Special Group Nightingale) — a unit of the Germ. Wehrmacht (Eng. Armed Forces) that took part in the German attack on Russians in 1941, accused of participating in the Jewish pogrom in Lviv in 1941 — and later a member of the Germ. Schutzmannschaftsbataillon 201 (Eng. 201st Protection team Battalion) — responsible for the murder of Jews and civilians in the territory of Belarus — issued an order: „The extermination operation should be carried out according to the following principles: Polish villages are to be burned, and their populations massacred. Attacks on towns will take place in broad daylight, not at night. In mixed villages, the Polish population alone should be liquidated, and farmsteads should be burned only if they are 15 meters away and when there is no risk of the fire spreading to neighboring Ukrainian buildings. The Ukrainian population will receive instructions as to where to gather during the attack […] For every Ukrainian murdered, whether by Poles or Germans, 100 (one hundred) Poles will be executed”.

It was the de facto signal for the commencement of the «Genocidium Atrox» — i.e. the genocide perpetrated by Ukrainians, known as „Volyn genocide”.

Immediately thereafter, in 03.1943, the UPA issued an appeal to members of the Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei and the Schuma to desert and join the UPA. Perhaps as many as 10,000 Ukrainians did so.

Volyn was drenched in Polish blood. Tens of thousands of Poles were murdered by the Ukrainians — with German passivity — in an extremely barbaric manner. Hundreds of villages were burned.

In 1943, the UPA formally operated only in Volyn, on the territory of the Germ. Reichskommissariat Ukraine (Eng. Reich Commissariat of Ukraine), so Shukhevych's order did not cover — it would seem — the Ternopil region, which was located in the GG. However, Shukhevych — in order not to „annoy” the Germans — founded a group in the GG operating under the euphemistic Ukrainian name Ukr. Українська Народна Самооборона (Eng. Ukrainian National Self–Defense), i.e. UNS, reinforced by deserters from the Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei and Schuma, seasoned in the genocide of Jews. Its main goal, like the OUN/UPA, was the extermination of the Polish population, although its internal documentation and reports ostentatiously stated „defense against the terror of the German authorities”. The position of UNS commander was entrusted to the génocidaire Alexander Lutsky, nom de guerre „Andriyenko”. In 08.1943, another genocide perpetrator, Vasyl Sydor, nom de guerre „Shelest”, became the commander of the Lviv Oblast, which included the Ternopil region. „Shelest” ordered „to strike Poles relentlessly until they are exterminated to the last living soul from these lands”. Both of these „outstanding” Ukrainians followed a similar path of honing their genocidal craft — from the Germ. Sondergruppe Nachtigall, through the Germ. Schutzmannschaftsbataillon 201, to «Genocidium Atrox».

Initially, however — according to Ukrainian and Russian sources — the UNS was supposed to be established to oppose the so‐called Kovpak raid. Sidor Kovpak, a Ukrainian communist, at the behest of the Russians, after a skirmish with the Germans near Bryansk in the area of the historic Seversky region, near the border between Ukrainian and Belarusian lands, set off westward with 2,000 Russian partisans. After over 600 km, reached Volyn — i.a. on 12.06.1943, passing through Miloshevichi in Belarus — where it turned south and reached the area of Ternopil in the GG, practically unmolested. There it began a sabotage operations and e.g. blew up a railway viaduct on the Ternopil‐Volochyskroute, east of Ternopil, on the most important railway line for armaments supplies to the German army, which was then fighting in the decisive battle of World War II in the east, the tank battle of Kursk, disrupting and weakening the German military effort for several weeks. In total, Kovpak's unit traveled over 2,000 km, destroying 19 German rail transports and 51 warehouses, and blowing up 52 bridges.

UNS not only failed to achieve their objective of opposing Kovpak, but in several cases even allowed the partisans to move without a fight. The Ukrainian population in many villages supported the Russian action. The Germans, on the other hand, responded with large forces, pursuing the moving unit, attacking it, e.g. with aircraft, and in several places surrounding it. Each time, the partisans managed to break through the encirclement. In 07.1943, Kovpak's unit broke through from the vicinity of Skalat, c. 30 km east of Ternopil, to Halych on the Dniester. It is not known which route the partisans took along this c. 100 km long stretch, but the area around Kovalivka lies more or less on a straight line connecting the two places.

And it was then, on 15/17.11.1943, or earlier, in 08.1943 — sources are inconsistent — that the Germ. Geheime Staatspolizei (Eng. Secret State Police), i.e. the Gestapo, arrested him, along with his parish priest, Fr Bieńko, in Kovalivka, which had a population of c. 1,680 in 1943.

Sources indicate that the arrest was prompted by a Ukrainian denunciation — it is unclear whether it was from one of the functionaries of the collaborative Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei who did not desert at the call of the genocidal leader Shukhevych, or perhaps from one of the Ukrainian villagers. The denunciation concerned collaboration with Polish partisans and the Polish resistance movement (part of the Polish Clandestine State), as well as hiding partisans.

The resistance Home Army AK operated in the vicinity of Kovalivka. The village belonged to the AK Monastyryska 2nd Circuit, which was part of the AK Buchach District of the AK Chortkiv Inspectorate, which was part of the AK Ternopil Region. The commander of the AK Buchach District, residing in Monastyryska, was Stanislav Ignatowicz, nom de guerre „Markotny”. The AK, apart from defending Polish villages against the genocidal Ukrainians, training, cutting communication lines, i.e. destroying telegraph poles, sabotaging railway rolling stock, e.g. by pouring grinding powder (carborundum) into axle boxes, etc., was attacking German railway transport — e.g. on 15‐16.09.1943, the railway tracks on the Khodoriv‐Ternopil line were dismantled.

Sources indicate that the rectory in Karolówka was the AK contact point, and probable a radio station and weapons were hidden there. Possession of an unregistered radio receiver — called Pl. „radiopajęczarstwo” (Eng. „radio spidering”) — not to mention radio stations, was illegal in the GG. A regulation of 30.06.1940 was in force, under which only the Germ. Deutsche Post Osten (Eng. East German Post) could issue permits for the use of radio equipment. The penalty for „radio spidering”, as well as for simply listening to foreign radio stations, was „imprisonment for a period of not less than 6 months, unless other regulations provide for […] a higher penalty”. And these „other regulations” included i.a. the regulation of 31.10.1939. The following paragraphs were key: „§3 Whoever incites or encourages disobedience to regulations or orders of the German authorities shall be subject to the death penalty”; „§8 Whoever agrees to commit a crime specified in §§1‐5, whoever for this purpose enters into a serious agreement with others, whoever offers himself to commit such a crime or accepts such an offer, shall be subject to the death penalty”; finally, „§6 The instigator and accomplice shall be punished as the perpetrator, an attempted act shall be punished as a completed act”.

Clandestine education of Polish children was also carried out in the rectory (part of the activities of the Polish Clandestine State). A German instruction from 1939 was in force for Poles, stating that „Only primary schools should be permitted, and these should teach only the most primitive subjects: arithmetic, reading and writing. Education in nationally important fields such as geography, history, history of literature and gymnastics must be prohibited”. Even religious education at a level higher than elementary became illegal.

Both priests were transported to the prison in Chortkiv.

Both were prob. tortured (there are reports that Fr Perucki was tortured and fell into madness).

Soon perished in prison. Sources state was shot along with several other prisoners.

After the arrest of the priests, local Ukrainians plundered and vandalized the rectory where they lived.

The aforementioned commander of the AK Buchach District, Stanislav Ignatowicz, was kidnapped on 12/19.02.1944, by four unknown men in German uniforms. Handcuffed, taken away on a sleigh from Monastyryska. Further fate is unknown.

On 12.10.2007, the génocidaire Roman Shukhevych was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of Ukraine. On 10.12.2017, on behalf of the „Coordination Council for the Commemoration of Decorated Knights of the OUN and UPA”, génocidaire Vasyl Sydor was posthumously awarded in Lviv the Silver Cross of Military Merit of the UPA, 1st Class (No. 009). In several locations, monuments and commemorative plaques have been erected to these Lat. „hostis humani generis”, the schools were named after them — also after the génocidaire Alexander Lutsky.

Lat. „O Tempora! O mores!”

According to some sources, perished in prison in Stanislaviv.