War’s weary faces

Thousands of elderly residents in northeastern Ukraine confront a wrenching choice — again

Luba and Volodymyr Filatov wait at an evacuation transfer point last week in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine. A Russian artillery strike damaged the couple’s home in Bilyi Kolodyaz, trapping them beneath rubble. (c. Martin Kuz)

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The scorched-earth incursion of Russian troops in northeastern Ukraine over the past month has razed villages and displaced more than 12,000 people. Elderly residents make up a large percentage of the evacuees, and many leave only after losing their homes — and nearly their lives.

In recent days, traveling in the northern Kharkiv region in Russia’s shadow, I asked seniors why they struggled with the decision to flee even as their towns burn. Their reasons echoed what other retirees have told me across the country during the war: family bonds, emotional attachment to the land, decades of routine, lack of money, limited mobility, poor health.

But their dilemma differs in an important sense. People here are enduring a second siege after surviving Russia’s initial invasion in early 2022 — when enemy forces swept through northern and eastern Kharkiv with little resistance — and the ensuing occupation of their villages until that September.

The Ukrainian military’s success in pushing out the Russians from most of the region two years ago reassured residents that a gradual return to normal life had begun. The shattering of that fragile sense of safety — that wishful illusion — has intensified their feelings of loss, sorrow and bewilderment.

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Volodymyr and Luba Filatov heard a thunderous crash outside their home before the world turned black. Buried beneath a collapsed interior wall and part of the ceiling, the husband and wife, both 71, cried out to each other as they tried to claw through wood, sheetrock and other rubble. An agonizing hour passed before Ukrainian soldiers unearthed them.

“The Russians say, ‘We are freeing you from Nazism,’” said Volodymyr, a retired farmer. “They are freeing us from our homes, our lives.” The couple lived in the village of Bilyi Kolodyaz, 8 miles from the border, where volunteer rescuers picked them up and brought them south to the town of Staryi Saltiv to await transport to the city of Kharkiv.

At the transfer point, the Filatovs sat on a bench, their bodies slumped with shock and exhaustion. Their dual pensions had sustained a lifestyle that, if modest, offered the warmth of familiarity. Now two blue tote bags held their only belongings. Falling debris had blackened Luba’s right eye and scraped her nose, and as she spoke, tears ran down her face. “Everything has stopped inside me.”

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Katerina and Vladimir Logvinenko have chosen to stay in their home in the village of Zarichne amid Russia’s scorched-earth incursion in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine. (c. Martin Kuz)

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Katerina Logvinenko stood barefoot in her vegetable garden across the dirt road from the house that she and her husband, Vladimir, have shared for half a century. “When I am working here, I don’t think about war.” she said. “I think about life.”

The village of Zarichne lies within 10 miles of Russia, and in recent weeks, the couple and their few remaining neighbors have weathered the daily dread of artillery shells, drones and missiles in the sky above. Vladimir, 74, two years older than his wife, served a mandatory stint in the Soviet military in the late 1960s, and at times, he has felt as if his own army attacked Ukraine.

“I have never had such rage,” he said. “This house belonged to my grandfather. The Russians have already taken so much from my country. I don’t want them to have what is ours.”

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Mikhail Sivchik waits at an evacuation transfer point last week in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine after Russian artillery destroyed his home in the city of Vovchansk. (c. Martin Kuz)

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Mikhail Sivchik lost his childhood home in western Ukraine during World War II as retreating German troops laid waste to the land. Eighty years later, another invading army destroyed his house in Vovchansk, a city 3 miles from the border that Russia has reduced to ashes since early May.

“There is nothing left. Vovchansk is gone,” said Mikhail, 85, who sought refuge in his basement one night last week as the Russians bombarded the city. He crawled out at first light and found much of his home in ruins. A rescue team drove him to Staryi Saltiv, and later in the day, he would join the growing ranks of evacuees at emergency shelters in Kharkiv.

Mikhail’s wife and their son died from covid in the two years before the war. Undaunted by Russia’s assault on Vovchansk or a recent stroke that has numbed his right side, he continued to visit their graves, walking a quarter-mile to the cemetery with the aid of a cane. The infirmities of age and a desire to stay close to his late loved ones kept him from fleeing. “I saw them almost every day,” he said. “Now I don’t know if I ever will again.”

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In the past month, Viktor and Olena Kisil have watched dozens of residents leave their village of Bilyi Kolodyaz in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine as Russia bombards the area. (c. Martin Kuz)

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Olena and Viktor Kisil watched as their next-door neighbors packed up a car and prepared to escape Bilyi Kolodyaz in mid-May. Hundreds of residents had departed since the start of the renewed Russian siege days earlier; others had never returned after the occupation two years ago. The couple exchanged hugs and wept with their friends as they wished them a safe journey south.

“We think about leaving, too,” said Olena, standing beside go bags of clothes, photos and documents stacked inside the front door of their home. She admitted that their three grown daughters, who live in Kharkiv, want mom and dad to evacuate. “We are scared every day. But everywhere in Ukraine is dangerous, and we would rather be in a place we know.”

The Kisils, both in their 60s, grow fruits and vegetables and raise chickens and ducks on their land. Simple chores provide a measure of peace amid the frequent Russian artillery and missile strikes that shake their house and their sanity. “We hope the war will be over soon,” Viktor said. “But, honestly, we are afraid it will never end.”

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Larisa and Valentin Gorlov arrived at an evacuation center in the city of Kharkiv in northeastern Ukraine last week. A Russian artillery blast ignited a fire that destroyed the couple’s home in Vovchansk, where they had lived for 50 years. (c. Martin Kuz)

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Larisa and Valentin Gorlov arrived at the main evacuation center in Kharkiv wearing the same clothes they had slept in a night earlier outside their incinerated home in Vovchansk. An artillery blast had ignited a fire that allowed them only enough time to grab their passports before they shuffled into the forest that borders their property.

“All of a sudden, there were flames around us,” said Larisa, 79, two years younger than her husband. In the dark, they moved slowly through the woods, freezing when they heard the occasional shouts of Russian soldiers. “I have not known this kind of fear.”

The Gorlovs, who built their house in 1974, will celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary later this year. Valentin explained that their reluctance to flee sooner and live with one of their two sons in Kharkiv traces to their longevity as a couple. “We don’t need anybody else,” he said, his booming voice rising from a small, wiry frame. “We’ve had each other for 59 years.”

He hobbled outside the evacuation center to smoke while Larisa sat beside her bed and looked around the unfamiliar space. She let out her breath as her eyes glazed with tears. “I cannot see my future without my home.”