Former Nazi concentration camp prisoner Borys Romanchenko has died in Kharkiv as a result of Russian shelling.
96-year-old Borys Romanchenko died as a result of a shell hitting an apartment in Northern Saltivka, his grandson Yulia Romanchenko told the Suspilne TV.
“The shell hit the apartment, everything burned down. There were only bones left on the bed, as he lay. He lived in that apartment in Saltivka for over 30 years, and recently left alone. I offered him to evacuate, but he refused. He walked badly, heard badly, he did not agree to go”, Yulia said.
Taking old man’s body out and burying him properly is difficult now. Northern Saltivka is under constant fire. Borys Romanchenko survived the Holodomor and was a prisoner of several concentration camps. Buchenwald and Dora-Mittelbau Memorial wrote about his death on Twitter.
Julia says that her grandfather often told her stories from his past:
“He went to Germany, where he was greeted with honors. There is also a monument in his honor in front of a museum in Germany. He lived in hunger… He was in the Dora concentration camp – he miraculously escaped. And then he found himself in Buchenwald. He also served five years in the army. He told a lot, a lot of stories. There was his manuscript, however, I do not know whether it is preserved by the father or not. My grandfather didn’t plan to publish the book, he just wanted to have some memory left”.
According to the press service of the Kharkiv City Council, mayor Ihor Terekhov ordered to help the family to remove 96-year-old Borys Romanchenko from the Northern Saltivka and bury him at the expense of the city council.