Mikhalski Iosif & Mikhalskaya Praskovia ; Daughter: Doroganchuk Lidia (Mikhalskaya)

Mikhalskaya, Vanda Mikhalskiy, Iosif Mikhalskaya, Praskovia Doroganchuk (Mikhalskaya), Lidia Aleksey Kobernik and his Jewish wife Lidia were school teachers, working in the village of Budei, Kodyma County, Odessa District. Aleksey taught physics and mathematics, Lidia – Russian language and literature, also giving private lessons. The couple had one son, Anatoliy, who turned three in 1941. When Germany invaded the Soviet Union, Aleksey was away at a training course in Odessa. By the time he got home, his wife, then pregnant, and their son had been taken to the Gestapo in Kodyma. Lidia and Anatoliy spent the next several weeks in prison and then, together with other Jewish and non-Jewish prisoners, were marched away in an unknown direction. It was a cold rainy day and Lidia was sure that she and her son would not survive the trip. Suddenly some people in the column started running away. The guards rushed after them, shooting and shouting. In the turmoil, Lidia and her son started running in the opposite direction. They ran until they fell on the road in exhaustion. Gaining back her breath, Lidia realized that no one was chasing after them. She reoriented herself and started walking in the direction of her village, a journey that took them many hours. Once back in Budei, she knocked at the door of Vanda Mikhalskaya; Vanda’s husband was a colleague of Lidia, who had been persecuted in 1938 by the Stalinist regime. Vanda let the exhausted escapees inside and alerted Iosif Mikhalskiy, her brother-in-law, who was helping Vanda after her husband’s arrest. Vanda and Praskovia Mikhalskaya, Iosif’s wife, helped the unexpected guests to wash themselves and served them a meal. Lidia and her son stayed at Vanda’s for one month. In the meantime, the rescuers informed Aleksey Kobernik about his wife and son’s whereabouts and he started visiting them secretly. At the end of 1941, he took them home with him where Lidia soon gave birth to twin-daughters, Galya and Lena.Galya lived only two months; Lena lived for two years and died in detention when Lidia was again arrested in January 1943. Both children had succumbed to the lack of nutritious food and proper medical care. By then, Aleksey Kobernik was active in the anti-Fascist underground and had connections with a Soviet partisan group. After Lidia’s second arrest, he left his son Anatoliy with Iosif and Praskovia Mikhalskiy The rescuers’ 15-year-old daughter, Lidia cared for the boy and kept him safe. Anatoliy stayed with the Mikhalskiys until March 1943, when his mother was released from prison thanks to the efforts of her husband’s friends. Just before the liberation of the area in March 1944, Aleksey Kobernik was arrested and shot by the Germans. His wife and son survived the Shoah; four months later Lidia gave birth to a daughter, Tamara. After the war, Lidia went back to working as a school teacher. She felt gratitude towards her rescuers for their support during the hardest years of her life. On June 15, 2009, Yad Vashem recognized Vanda Mikhalskaya, as well as Iosif and Praskovia Mikhalskiy and their daughter Lidia Doroganchuk (Mikhalskaya) as Righteous Among the Nations.