Semeniuk Domna ; Daughter: Loseva Nadezhda (Semeniuk)

Semenyuk, Domna Loseva (Semenyuk), Nadezhda During the war, Domna Semenyuk was a farmer living with her ill husband, Ivan, and five children, in the village of Studzianka, Wołyń (today Studyanka, Rivne District). One night in September 1942, Semenyuk went out to the yard of her home to find out why her dog was barking and, to her surprise, she discovered two Jewish acquaintances – Nesya Horovich and her 15-year-old niece Frida Goldberg – standing there. Horovich had worked as a nurse and had treated Semenyuk’s husband on several occasions. From May until August of that year, the two had been incarcerated in a labor camp for Jews in Studzianka. As Semenyuk approached the two women, they said nothing but it was clear to Semenyuk what they wanted. After some deliberation, Semenyuk invited them into her home, where she hid them in the barn loft. That night, the two Jews were also given a good meal, the best they had eaten for many months. They ended up staying there for 20 months. During the days, they lay stationary in some hay, covered with blankets. Every morning, Semenyuk’s 14-year-old daughter Nadezhda took them food hidden in the bucket of chicken feed. In the evenings, after darkness had fallen, the two women came down from their hideaway to eat a meal in the Semenyuks’ home. In early 1943, Ivan’s health deteriorated and he died in the spring of that year. As well as suffering from the grief of losing her husband, Semenyuk was also becoming more frightened about hiding Jews because it endangered the lives of her children. However, this fear did not drive her to removing Horovich and Goldberg but rather encouraged her to construct a safer hiding place for them. Semenyuk and her daughters dug a pit for them to hide in, and the two Jews remained in it until the liberation, on March 17, 1944. A short time after the war, the survivors moved to Poland, from where they immigrated to Israel. Semenyuk and her children left Studzianka and moved to eastern Ukraine.The Semenyuks and their wartime wards maintained contact for many years thereafter. On July 16, 1963, Yad Vashem recognized Domna Semenyuk as Righteous Among the Nations. On November 12, 1995, Yad Vashem recognized Nadezhda Loseva (née Semenyuk) as Righteous Among the Nations.