Rochdale’s Ukrainian community remembers 88th anniversary of tragic Holodomor genocide

Date published: 29 November 2021

Members of the local Ukrainian community recognised the 88th anniversary of the enforced Ukrainian famine – Holodomor – with a service at the Rochdale Memorial Gardens on Saturday (27 November).

The service, which is held every year in Rochdale, commemorates the millions of men, women and children who were barbarically and systematically starved to death in the manmade famine between 1932 and 1933.

The commemoration began with a requiem service for the victims of the Holodomor, the blessing of the Holodomor Memorial Stone, a minute’s silence and the laying of wreaths.  

The service was opened by Olga Kurtianyk, Chair of the Rochdale branch of the Association of Ukrainians in Great Britain, who welcomed everyone and gave a brief background to the tragic events.

Olga and the Ukrainian community were joined by the Mayor of Rochdale, Councillor Aasim Rashid; Sir Tony Lloyd, MR for Rochdale; Reverend Anne Gilbert, Vicar of Rochdale, and local councillors.

Following the service, participants were invited back to Touchstones to view an exhibition about the Holodomor.

The word Holodomor is a combination of the Ukrainian words for “starvation” and “to inflict death”. Approximately seven to ten million innocent people were brutally starved to death in the Holodomor; at the height of the enforced famine, 17 people died every minute, with 25,000 people dying each day.

Whole villages were wiped out from starvation as Soviet leader Joseph Stalin attempted to force the Ukrainians to adopt Soviet ways.

In 1932, there had been enough grain harvested to adequately feed the Ukrainian population. But under Soviet law, this was to be supplied to the rest of the Soviet Union, forbidding it to be used locally until a quota was met. This led to a serious grain shortage in Ukraine and harsh action was taken against anyone caught hiding or stealing food.

Archive documents uncovered in Ukraine show that Stalin deliberately targeted Ukraine, known as the ‘breadbasket of Europe’, for the harshest treatment, in the full knowledge that millions were starving and dying.

At the time, two British journalists, Malcolm Muggeridge and Gareth Jones, witnessed and wrote about the famine. Jones had kept diaries of the man-made starvation, which were published in March 1933 after leaving the country. He was the first person to bring the famine to the attention of the general population – and the first to blame the Soviet Union for the part they played in causing the famine.

He was later shot dead in Manchukuo, on the eve of his 30th birthday, after being captured by bandits.

There were strong suspicions Jones was murdered as ‘revenge’ for his publications, which did not look favourably upon the Soviets.

The events were documented in a 2012 book titled, ‘Eyewitness to the Holodomor’, the first academic work on Jones, whilst ‘Mr Jones’, a feature film – based on Gareth’s work and starring James Norton in the titular role – was released in 2019.

Read more: Eyewitness to the Holodomor Published: 01 July 2013

Rochdale, which is twinned with the Ukrainian town of Lviv, became the first town in the UK to recognise the Holodomor as genocide in 2008 – a motion yet to be acknowledged and followed by the UK government – and the first town to honour the victims with a memorial stone the following year.

Read more: Rochdale unveils memorial for forgotten victims of ‘Holodomor’Published: 23 November 2009
Historical Day for Holodomor remembrancePublished: 16 October 2008

Worldwide, the Ukrainian population commemorates the horrific genocide each year on the fourth Saturday in November.

The Ukrainian community continues to campaign for the UK government to acknowledge the Holodomor as genocide.