Mironiuk Saveliy & Oksana

Mironyuk, Saveliy Mironyuk, Oksana Saveliy Mironyuk and his wife, Oksana, were residents of the village of Podhajce, district of Wołyń (today Pidhaytsi, Volyn’ District), and were Baptists. In summer 1943, their co-religionist Ivan Yatsyuk* told the couple about David Prinzental, a young Jew who was hiding in the area and who occasionally stayed with Baptist families. The faithful members of this community saw it as a privilege to host a Jew in their homes because of their religious convictions. Thus, the Mironyuks began to welcome Prinzental into their home for periods of one or two days. In autumn 1943, Prinzental arrived at the Mironyuks’ home with Ignacy Shats, a Jewish youth that had lived in the nearby city of Łuck (Luts’k) before the war. After the liquidation of the ghetto there in August 1942, Shats had gone into hiding with his father and brother in a hideaway in the home of one of the city’s residents. When the Jews suspected that they were no longer secure there, they dispersed among the nearby villages. Shats and his father went to the forester, who was known to be sympathetic to Jews, and there they met Prinzental. Upon his father’s request, young Shats stayed with Prinzental in the forester’s farm while he moved on. When young Shats heard that his father had been turned in to the authorities and murdered, Prinzental took him to his Baptist friends and asked them to hide him. Shats stayed with the Mironyuks and soon became part of the Baptist community. He internalized their beliefs and he even composed prayers and hymns that all the community learned. In late 1943, when Shats was in one of the rooms of the Mironyuks’ home, some German soldiers arrived in the village accompanied by some Ukrainian policemen. When the Mironyuks realized that Shats would not have time to hide, they fell on their knees and began to pray. The Germans, who conducted the search, overlooked their home and Shats was saved. The Mironyuks and all the other Baptists in their community saw this as a miracle and for many years afterwards members of the community told the story. Shats stayed with the Mironyuks until the liberation of the area, on February 2, 1944, and then he joined the Red Army and was killed in combat. Prinzental (later Prital) immigrated to Israel after the war and corresponded with the Mironyuks for many years. On September 13, 1983, Yad Vashem recognized Saveliy and Oksana Mironyuk as Righteous Among the Nations.