Daily life of the ukrainian people's Republic army servicemen at interned camps on the territory of Poland (1920 - 1924)

Abstract

The Purpose of the Study. In every large-scale armed conflict there is capture of prisoners by opposing sides or their internment at specially established camps. Obviously, there is some difference between prisoners and internees. It consists in their different status, which entails not only legal consequences, but also everyday living conditions. Captivity means a severe restriction of a serviceman's personal freedom by an enemy state in order to deprive him of the opportunity to continue the struggle. Internment is carried out by a state that does not take a direct part in an armed conflict between warring parties. It provides for better conditions of servicemen's detention at specially established internment camps, although they are often far from those that could satisfy servicemen's daily life needs. Therefore, the purpose of the article is to highlight an everyday life of interned soldiers of the Ukrainian People's Republic Army, which at the end of autumn of 1920, after the defeat of the UPR in the war with Soviet Russia, retreated to the territory of the Republic of Poland. The research methodology is based on the principles of historicism, scientific objectivity in analysis of the past, a critical approach to available sources, studies of participants and eyewitnesses. The author has used problem-chronological, logical, deductive and inductive methods. The scientific novelty of the article consists in the fact that at the beginning of the 1920s the issue of functioning of the interned servicemen camps of the UPR Army on the territory of the Polish Republic, although occupied a very important place in the activities of the UPR government-in-exile, its relations with the Polish authorities, however, concerned military political aspects mainly. It was about the prospects of using the camps to preserve the Army structure and continue the fight against the Russian occupiers of Ukraine. Instead, a daily life of the camp residents was highlighted mainly against a background of the military and political activities of the UPR government-in-exile. Meanwhile, actual living conditions and everyday life of the internees significantly influenced realization of the goals set by the government, because it was about mobilizing human resources that remained at its disposal. The Conclusions. The status of the interned UPR Army as the Army of the allied state granted certain privileges to the Ukrainian military, which made better their moral condition after the retreat from Ukraine, and also contributed to the establishment of public, cultural and educational activities at the camps. However, due to a difficult financial situation of the UPR government-in-exile, as well as limited financial capabilities of Poland, it was often impossible to provide daily household needs of the internees at a minimal level at least. As a result, this situation caused the effect of worsening not only the life of camp residents, but also their physical moral and psychological exhaustion, which prompted the Polish authorities, and subsequently the Ukrainian government-in-exile, to agree to their final disbandment in 1924.