Roman Catholic
St Sigismund parish
05-507 Słomczyn
85 Wiślana Str.
Konstancin deanery
Warsaw archdiocese, Poland
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Martyrology of the clergy — Poland
XX century (1914 – 1989)
personal data
religious status
saint
surname
ZACHARCZUK
forename(s)
Sergius (pl. Sergiusz)
canonisation date
07.06.2003
Saint Council of the Bishops of the Polish Autocephalous Orthodox Churchmore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2019.12.07]
function
presbiter (i.e. iereus)
creed
Eastern Orthodox Church ORmore on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2014.09.21]
diocese / province
Chełm‐Podlachia OR eparchy (Autocephalous Orthodox Church in the Generalgouvernement AOC‐GG)more on
pl.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.08.20]
date and place
of death
06.05.1943
Nabróżtoday: Łaszczów gm., Tomaszów Lubelski pov., Lublin voiv., Poland
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.08.20]
details of death
From 1928, ministered in a parish where an Orthodox–Catholic conflict was simmering, transforming itself in the process into a Ukrainian–Polish conflict. An Orthodox parish had existed in Nabroże for hundreds of years, surviving the Union of Brest in 1596, i.e. the recognition of the Pope as head of the church by some Orthodox Christians and the creation of the Lat. Ecclesia Ruthena unita (Eng. Russian Uniate Church). Significantly strengthened by the Russification policies of the tsarist authorities during the partitions of Poland, it even survived the flight of the Russian partitioning administration, i.e. almost 3 million people, after the Russian defeat in the battle against the Central Powers (Germany and Austria‐Hungary) near Gorlice in 05.1915.
On 09.07.1938, an Orthodox church was destroyed in Nabroże. According to Orthodox sources, c. 136 people converted to Catholicism, which resulted in Catholics becoming the dominant majority in the village. Nabróż was one of the places where the authorities of independent Poland carried out a Polonization and revindication campaign, i.a. in the Chełm region, aimed at limiting Orthodoxy, considered one of the strongholds of Russian and Commie‐Nazi influence in Poland. As a result, up to 127 Orthodox churches were demolished, sometimes desecrated, subjecting priests and faithful to persecution. Polish President Lech Kaczyński said in 2008: „We should express regret for the evil that has been done”.
After the German and Russian invasion of the Poland in 09.1939 and the start of World War II, after start of the German occupation, the Ukrainians openly collaborated with the Germans. The Polish school in Nabróż was closed down by the Germans — instead, a Germ. Ukrainische Schule (Eng. Ukrainian School) was opened, in which a portrait of the genocidal German leader, Adolf Hitler, was placed in one of the rooms, with the Ukrainian title Ukr. „Гітлер — візволіцель” (Eng. „Hitler — Liberator”). In the building of the closed school, an Orthodox chapel was established. Took up residence there.
After the German attack on 22.06.1941 on their erstwhile ally, the Russians, the area became one of the most terrifying places on Earth. In the Germ. Distrikt Lublin (Eng. Lublin District) of the German occupation entity, the Germ. Generalgouvernement (Eng. General Governorate), i.e. GG, where the parish of Nabróż was located, the commander of the German armed police forces, the SS‐ und Polizeiführer (Eng. SS and Police Commander), was an Austrian, genocide perpetrator, Odilo Globočnik. Under his general leadership, on c. 17.03.1942, in Bełżec, c. 35 km from his parish village, VL Belzec, the first extermination camp in the GG, began to operate. As part of the genocidal Germ. «Endlösung der Judenfrage» (Eng. Final Solution of the Jewish Question) plan, implemented under the Germ. «Aktion Reinhardt» (Eng. Operation Reinhardt) codename, the Germans murdered c. 450,000 Jews, mainly from the Germ. GG Distrikt Galizien (Eng. GG District Galicia), i.e. from Eastern Galicia. The guard and execution functions in VL Belzec were performed by the Germ. SS‐Wachmannschaften (Eng. SS Guard Teams), trained in the Germ. SS‐Ausbildungslager Trawniki (Eng. SS Training Camp Trawniki), mainly Ukrainians. And at the same time, the Germans began to implement the Germ. Generalplan Ost (Eng. General Plan Wschodni), i.e. the plan to provide Germ. Lebensraum (Eng. Living space) for the Germ. Herrenvolk (Eng. Master Race), i.e. deportation and Germanization. In the Germ. District Lublin, this took the form of the genocidal Germ. Aktion Zamość (Eng. Action Zamość). The choice of the Lublin region, or more precisely the Chełm region, was not accidental — it prob. constituted the implementation of a long‐standing German plan, which began with the Treaty of Brest‐Litovsk of 09.02.1918, at the end of World War I, when the Germans and Austrians — fully consciously, without any attempt at an consultations with the Poles — concluded an agreement with the Ukrainians, granting them the Polish Chełm region.
The first stage of the Germ. Aktion Zamość was to lead to the displacement of all Poles from the area around Zamość, c. 40 km from Nabróż, and bringing German colonists there. The second, under the German codename Germ. Aktion Werwolf (Eng. Action Werewolf), started in 06.1943, after his death, was to lead to the displacement of Poles and the Ukrainian colonization of the „cleansed area” and the creation of a protection zone for the „German” area around Zamość — after all, Ukrainians collaborated with the Germans.
In 09.1943 situation changed — Nabróż was then home to 464 Poles and 211 Ukrainians. Firstly, in 12.1942, transports to the VL Belzec extermination camp ended and the eradication of the traces of the genocide began. Secondly, in 12.1942 in the Zamość area, Polish partisan units of the AK and Peasant Battalions BCh began attacking villages of German colonizers, brought in there during the first phase of the Germ. Aktion Zamość. Some of these villages were settled by Ukrainians as part of the Germ. „Ukraineraktion” (Eng. „Ukrainian Action”), i.e. attempts to create a protective belt of German colonization, consisting of Ukrainian villages.
Thirdly, in 02.1943, Roman Shukhevych, nom de guerre „Taras Chuprynka”, the main commander of the UPA, 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”.
This was de facto a signal to begin the «Genocidium Atrox» — i.e. the genocide committed by Ukrainians against Poles, known also as „Volyn genocide”.
Immediately thereafter, in 03.1943, the UPA issued an appeal to members of the Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei (Eng. Ukrainian Auxiliary Police), collaborating with Germans, in some regions also referred to as the Germ. Schutzmannschaft (Eng. Protection Battalions), i.e. Schuma, which co‐participated in the German genocidal plan Germ. «Endlösung der Judenfrage» (Eng. Final Solution of the Jewish Question), which in the Germ. Reichskommissariat Ukraine was implemented under the codename Germ. «Aktion Reinhardt» (Eng. Operation Reinhardt), to desert and join the UPA. Perhaps as many as 10,000 Ukrainians did so.
Signals about the new, genocidal strategy of the OUN/UPA must have reached Nabróż, if only because Germ. Ukrainische Hilfspolizei outposts were operating in the area.
Information — unconfirmed though by documents — began to circulate among Poles about his collaboration with the Germans and/or the OUN/UPA. These were, according to contemporary sources, accusations of a general nature, but also more specific charges of collaboration with the Germ. Umsiedlungsausschuss (Eng. Relocation Committee), subordinate to the genocide perpetrator Odilo Globočnik — and prob. Germ. Sonderkommando Zamość – Aussiedlungstab (Eng. Special Zamość Group – Resettlement Staff), i.e. the executive body — i.e. the „resettlement” or deportation commission. Accusations of informing on Polish residents of Nabróż.
Was also accused of causing the arrest and death of several Poles.
Ukrainian witnesses reportedly claimed that: „For a long time before the crime, was threatened and given notes saying «get out»”.
These allegations were to reach the Home Army AK.
Perished on 06.05.1943.
According to Ukrainian historians was murdered during a bandit attack. Allegedly tortured. A contemporary historian writes: „Having knocked the priest off his feet with blows from their rifle butts and turned him on his back, the bandits continued to kick him and beat him with their barrels until he lost consciousness”. Finally killed with a shot the the head. His church — i.e. prob. Orthodox chapel in a former Polish school — was supposed to be desecrated.
Polish sources do not confirm torture. According to them, the Polish Clandestine State issued a death sentence on him, which was carried out by Polish partisans, part of the Polish Clandestine State.
In retaliation, the OUN/UPA — as part of the «Genocidium Atrox» — attacked a Catholic parish on 03.05.1943, murdering a Polish priest, Fr Vladislav Jacniacki.
On 12.10.2007, the genocide perpetrator Roman Shukhevych was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of Ukraine. In several locations, monuments and commemorative plaques have been erected to this Lat. „hostis humani generis”, schools were named after him.
Lat. „O Tempora! O mores!”
cause of death
mass murder
perpetrators
Poles
sites and events
«Aktion Zamość»Click to display the description, «Genocidium Atrox»Click to display the description, GeneralgouvernementClick to display the description, Ribbentrop‐MolotovClick to display the description
date and place
of birth
1915
Szychowicetoday: Mircze gm., Hrubieszów pov., Lublin voiv., Poland
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.08.20]
parents
ZACHARCZUK Nicholas
🞲 ?, ? — 🕆 ?, ?
Mary
🞲 ?, ? — 🕆 ?, ?
presbyter (holy orders)
ordination
1939
Vilniustoday: Vilnius city dist., Vilnius Cou., Lithuania
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2022.01.06]
Descent of the Holy Spirit (Pentecost) OR churchmore on
pl.wikipedia.org
[access: 2023.07.16]
positions held
c. 1939 – 1943
parish priest — Nabróżtoday: Łaszczów gm., Tomaszów Lubelski pov., Lublin voiv., Poland
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.08.20] ⋄ OR chapel — resident at a local school, where there was also a chapel
c. 1939
presbiter (Eng. priest, i.e. iereus) — Vilniustoday: Vilnius city dist., Vilnius Cou., Lithuania
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2022.01.06] ⋄ Polish Autocephalous Orthodox Church PACP ⋄ Descent of the Holy Spirit (Pentecost) OR monastery — priesthood cheirotonia, i.e. ordination
till c. 1939
student — Kremenetstoday: Kremenets urban hrom., Kremenets rai., Ternopil obl., Ukraine
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2020.10.18] ⋄ philosophy and theology, Orthodox Theological Seminary
student — Jabłecznatoday: Sławatycze gm., Biała Podlaska pov., Lublin voiv., Poland
more on
en.wikipedia.org
[access: 2021.12.18] ⋄ School of Conductors and Psalmists ⋄ St Onuphrius OR monastery (stavropegial)
from 1938
married — one daughter
others related
in death
JACNIACKIClick to display biography Vladislav, BAZYLUKClick to display biography James (monk Ignatius), HOLCClick to display biography Nicholas, KOROBCZUKClick to display biography Leo, MARTYSZClick to display biography Basil, OHRYZKOClick to display biography Peter, PERADZEClick to display biography Gregory (Fr Gregory), SZWAJKOClick to display biography Paul
sites and events
descriptions
«Aktion Zamość»: On 11.1942, the Germans began «Aktion Zamość» — a series of forced resettlement, an ethnic cleansing actions of the Polish population and pacification of Polish villages carried out in the Zamość region, in the territory of the Germ. Generalgouvernement (Eng. General Governorate) occupied by Germans, under the Germ. Generalplan Ost GPO (Eng. General Plan East), i.e. the plan of German settlement and Germanization of territories in Central and Eastern Europe. Until 08.1943, it covered a total of 100,000‐110,000 displaced Poles, including 30,000 children (some of them were taken from their parents and semt for a forced Germanization in German families) — most of them passed through the special Germ. UWZ Lager Zamość (Eng. resettlement camp in Zamość), where selection took place, e.g. group IV, children separated from parents. In place of the displaced, it was intended to settle 60,000 German colonists from Bessarabia, Ukraine, Bosnia, Serbia, Slovenia and Russia. In the first phase (28.11.1942‐03.1943) 116 villages were forcibly displaced — the displacements were carried out by Germ. Schutzpolizei units or the gendarmerie, with the help of the Ukrainian Auxiliary Police collaborating with Germany; in the second, as part of the so‐called Aktion Werwolf (06.1943‐08.1943) — 171 villages — the displacements were supervised by Wehrmacht and Waffen‐SS units, supported by the employees of UWZ Lager Zamość. As a result of the actions of the Polish resistance movement — during the so‐called Zamość Uprising, Polish partisans fought several large battles with the overwhelming German forces — 293 villages were displaced out of the 696 planned. In some villages Germans settled resettled Ukrainians — during the so‐called Ukraineraktion — under control of collaborating with Germans Ukrainian Support Committees among others. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2021.08.20], journals.umcs.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2021.08.20])
«Genocidium Atrox»: In 1939‐1947, especially in 1943‐1944, independent Ukrainian units, mainly belonging to genocidal Ukrainian organizations OUN (political arm) and UPA (military arm), supported by local Ukrainian population, murdered — often in extremely brutal way — in Volyn and surrounding regions of pre‐war Poland, from 130,000 to 180,000 Poles, all civilians: men, women, children, old and young. Polish‐Ukrainian conflict that openly emerged during and after World War I (in particular resulting in Polish‐Ukrainian war of 1918‐1919), that survived and even deepened later when western Ukraine became a part Poland, exploded again after the outbreak of the World War II in 09.1939. During Russian occupation of 1939‐1941, when hundreds of thousands of Poles were deported into central Russia, when tens of thousands were murdered (during so‐called Katyń massacres, among others), this open conflict had a limited character, helped by the fact that at that time Ukrainians, Ukrainian nationalists in particular, were also persecuted by the Russians. The worst came after German‐Russian war started on 22.06.1941 and German occupation resulted. Initially Ukrainians supported Germans (Ukrainian police was initiated, Ukrainians co—participated in extermination of the Jews and were joining army units fighting alongside Germans). Later when German ambivalent position towards Ukraine became apparent Ukrainians started acting independently. And in 1943 one of the units of aforementioned Ukrainian OUN/UPA organization, in Volyn, started and perpetrated a genocide of Polish population of this region. In mere few weeks OUN/UPA murdered, with Germans passively watching on the sidelines, more than 40,000 Poles. This strategy was consequently approved and adopted by all OUN/UPA organisations and similar genocides took place in Eastern Lesser Poland (part of Ukraine) where more than 20,000 Poles were slaughtered, meeting however with growing resistance from Polish population. Further west, in Chełm, Rzeszów, etc. regions this genocide turned into an extremely bloody conflict. In general genocide, perpetrated by Ukrainian nationalists, partly collaborating with German occupants, on vulnerable Polish population took part in hundreds of villages and small towns, where virtually all Polish inhabitants were wiped out. More than 200 priests, religious and nuns perished in this holocaust — known as «Genocidium Atrox» (Eng. „savage genocide”) The nature and purpose of genocide is perhaps best reflected in the song sung by the murderers: „We will slaughter the Poles, we will cut down the Jews, we must conquer the great Ukraine” (ukr. „Поляків виріжем, Євреїв видусим, велику Україну здобути мусим”). This holocaust and conflict ended up in total elimination of Polish population and Polish culture from Ukraine, in enforced deportations in 1944‐1945 of remaining Poles from Ukraine and some Ukrainians into Ukraine proper, and finally in deportation of Ukrainians from East‐South to the Western parts of Polish republic prl by Commie‐Nazi Russian controlled Polish security forces („Vistula Action”). (more on: www.swzygmunt.knc.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2021.06.20])
Generalgouvernement: After the Polish defeat in the 09.1939 campaign, which was the result of the Ribbentrop‐Molotov Pact and constituted the first stage of World War II, and the beginning of German occupation in part of Poland (in the other, eastern part of Poland, the Russian occupation began), the Germans divided the occupied Polish territory into five main regions. In two of them new German provinces were created, two other were incorporated into other provinces. However, the fifth part was treated separately, and in a political sense it was supposed to recreate the German idea from 1915 (during World War I, after the defeat of the Russians in the Battle of Gorlice in 05.1915) of creating a Polish enclave within Germany. Illegal in the sense of international law, i.e. Hague Convention, and public law, managed by the Germans according to separate laws — especially established for the Polish Germ. Untermenschen (Eng. subhumans) — till the Russian offensive in 1945 it constituted part of the Germ. Großdeutschland (Eng. Greater Germany). Till 31.07.1940 formally called Germ. Generalgouvernement für die besetzten polnischen Gebiete (Eng. General Government for the occupied Polish lands) — later simply Germ. Generalgouvernement (Eng. General Governorate), as in the years 1915‐1918. From 07.1941, i.e. after the German attack on 22.06.1941 against the erstwhile ally, the Russians, it also included the Galicia district, i.e. the Polish pre‐war south‐eastern voivodeships. A special criminal law was enacted and applied to Poles and Jews, allowing for the arbitrary administration of the death penalty regardless of the age of the „perpetrator”, and sanctioning the use of collective responsibility. After the end of the military conflict of the World War UU, the government of the Germ. Generalgouvernement was recognized as a criminal organization, and its leader, governor Hans Frank, guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity and executed. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2024.12.13])
Ribbentrop‐Molotov: Genocidal Russian‐German alliance pact between Russian leader Joseph Stalin and German leader Adolf Hitler signed on 23.08.1939 in Moscow by respective foreign ministers, Mr. Vyacheslav Molotov for Russia and Joachim von Ribbentrop for Germany. The pact sanctioned and was the direct cause of joint Russian and German invasion of Poland and the outbreak of the World War II in 09.1939. In a political sense, the pact was an attempt to restore the status quo ante before 1914, with one exception, namely the „commercial” exchange of the so‐called „Kingdom of Poland”, which in 1914 was part of the Russian Empire, fore Eastern Galicia (today's western Ukraine), in 1914 belonging to the Austro‐Hungarian Empire. Galicia, including Lviv, was to be taken over by the Russians, the „Kingdom of Poland” — under the name of the General Governorate — Germany. The resultant „war was one of the greatest calamities and dramas of humanity in history, for two atheistic and anti‐Christian ideologies — national and international socialism — rejected God and His fifth Decalogue commandment: Thou shall not kill!” (Abp Stanislav Gądecki, 01.09.2019). The decisions taken — backed up by the betrayal of the formal allies of Poland, France and Germany, which on 12.09.1939, at a joint conference in Abbeville, decided not to provide aid to attacked Poland and not to take military action against Germany (a clear breach of treaty obligations with Poland) — were on 28.09.1939 slightly altered and made more precise when a treaty on „German‐Russian boundaries and friendship” was agreed by the same murderous signatories. One of its findings was establishment of spheres of influence in Central and Eastern Europe and in consequence IV partition of Poland. In one of its secret annexes agreed, that: „the Signatories will not tolerate on its respective territories any Polish propaganda that affects the territory of the other Side. On their respective territories they will suppress all such propaganda and inform each other of the measures taken to accomplish it”. The agreements resulted in a series of meeting between two genocidal organization representing both sides — German Gestapo and Russian NKVD when coordination of efforts to exterminate Polish intelligentsia and Polish leading classes (in Germany called «Intelligenzaktion», in Russia took the form of Katyń massacres) where discussed. Resulted in deaths of hundreds of thousands of Polish intelligentsia, including thousands of priests presented here, and tens of millions of ordinary people,. The results of this Russian‐German pact lasted till 1989 and are still in evidence even today. (more on: en.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2015.09.30])
sources
personal:
prasa.wiara.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.05.19], www.przegladprawoslawny.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.05.19], www.impantokratoros.grClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2013.05.19], pl.wikipedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2020.04.04], roberthorbaczewski.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2026.07.13]
bibliographical:
„Hierachy, clergy and employees of the Orthodox Church in the 19th‐21st centuries within the borders of the Second Polish Republic and post–war Poland”, Fr Gregory Sosna, M. Antonine Troc-Sosna, Warsaw–Bielsk Podlaski 2017
original images:
www.apokryfruski.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2020.09.24], roberthorbaczewski.plClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2014.08.14], www.youtube.comClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2024.03.15], www.impantokratoros.grClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2020.09.24], upload.wikimedia.orgClick to attempt to display webpage
[access: 2020.09.24]
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MARTYROLOGY: ZACHARCZUK Sergius
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