CANADA COURIER: A long-awaited reunion (05/19/96)

CANADA COURIER

by Christopher Guly

A long-awaited reunion

After waiting 54 years, an 89-year-old Ukrainian Orthodox priest met his two sons on March 25.

The Rev. George Pokrowsky, who suffers from advanced Parkinson's disease, caught his first glimpse of his sons, Constantine, 57, and Evigenii, 58, at Montreal's Mirabel Airport. Evigenii was accompanied by his 30-year-old son, Valery. The four immediately left by car for Ottawa, where the Rev. Pokrowsky lives.

A retired Moscow surgeon, Dr. Tamara Vlasova, found the priest's missing children last year after getting a Moscow radio station to broadcast the priest's story and locate his offspring. Dr. Vlasova had met the Rev. Pokrowsky in Ottawa in 1994.

She found not only the two sons, who live in Luhanske, but a daughter, Vitalia, now 64, who lives in the Russian Far East. Evigenii works in natural gas exploration, while Constantine is employed as an auto mechanic.

What followed was a major fund-raising effort by the Ukrainian Orthodox community in Ottawa to reunite the children with their father.

Since the priest's health prevents him from traveling, two of the three made the journey to Canada. Aeroflot helped by reducing airfare, and an Ottawa limousine service sent a car to met the Pokrowsky party at Mirabel and bring them back to Ottawa. The priest's two sons and grandson were to remain in Canada for two months.

The Rev. Pokrowsky hadn't seen either son since 1942, when he was in charge of a railway section in Ukraine. Thirty-five years old at the time, and not yet a priest, the then-engineer was also responsible for a cache of weapons used by Ukrainian partisans during the war.

With the Ukrainian police on his tail, Mr. Pokrowsky fled, but was later picked up by the German Gestapo and sent to a labor camp in the Kiel area, near Denmark. After the British liberated the camp, Mr. Pokrowsky remained and worked on building hydroelectric facilities until 1948. In the meantime, he had no idea what happened to his wife, Natalia, and their three children.

While Mr. Pokrowsky took flight, the four had hidden in the basement of a building destroyed by the Nazis. Soon after, Mrs. Pokrowsky was shot dead by a German soldier.

She had been helping a wounded Soviet soldier who had fallen near the entrance to the family's hiding spot. The children were saved thanks to the efforts of another German soldier who prevented Mrs. Pokrowsky's murderer from harming them.

Mr. Pokrowsky emigrated to Canada in 1948, where he found work on the construction of a dam on the Ottawa River. A decade later, he was ordained a priest in the Orthodox Church of America. He remarried another woman named Natalia, who died in 1993, and served parishes across Canada.

The Rev. Pokrowsky's last assignment was as pastor of Holy Trinity Bukovynian Orthodox Cathedral in Ottawa, which he had built in 1968. He retired in 1983.

"I am very appreciative of everyone who helped bring my children back to me," said the Rev. Pokrowsky. He has now discovered he has two more grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

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