Expert: Graham Read - 1/7/2009

Question
I am an Arizona journalist writing a story about a Polish family that was forced
into labor in Germany during World War II. The man I interviewed was four years
old at the time and cannot remember exactly the name or spelling of the village
where he was born. I hope you can help me track it down; I keep hitting dead
ends on my Internet research and during a conversation today with a person at
the Poland embassy in Los Angeles.

Mr. Sakiewicz's birth record says he was born in the village of Tryputni in the
district of Sarny. He believes the village was near the Bug River, near the Ukraine
border.

Can you help me determine where this village was/is located? Did it disappear
because the Germans captured and relocated all its residents?  

Thanks you in advance for your help.
Pam Ashley  

Answer
Hi,
I found a couple of references on the internet to Tryputni in Polish, so it did in exist.
The website Kresy24 (in Polish) researches polish history in the east (the kresy) and this site may be able to help you. Click on the link kontack z nami and you can send them a message, I should think they would understand English.
This is the best reference I found.

http://kresy24.pl/pressReviewShow/review_id/1027/
Polaków mordowano celowo w sposób okrutny, mający budzić przerażenie. Iwan Fiodorow, dowódca operujących na Wołyniu sowieckich partyzantów, daleki od propolskich sympatii, pisał o Ukraińcach: „nie rozstrzeliwują Polaków, ale rżną ich nożami i rąbią siekierami niezależnie od wieku i płci. We wsi Tryputni zarąbali 14 polskich rodzin, następnie zaciągnęli zabitych do domu i podpalili. [...] We wsiach Berezne, Czajkowo, Cechy [...] wyrżnęli całą ludność i spalili ponad 200 zabudowań” (F, 164–165).
It says 14 Polish families were murdered in Tryputni, the homes were burned down with the wounded still inside (the passage seems to be in old Polish, you'd need a native speaker to get a full translation.

As for the village location, it may have been destroyed, or the name could have been changed to Ukrainian.
Your next step may be finding a contact in Ukraine who could help, unfortunately I don't know anyone.

Best of luck
Graham

Hi again,

I found some better stuff after more digging on the internet.

First clue was the name changes due to polish grammer declination, and it should be Tryputnia (in Polish).

This first site showed the Tryputnia on a railway line bewteen Sarny and Kowel or Kovel. There is a link to a larger map on this page.
The same info is also in German in the second link. Useful as it gives place names in Polish and Ukrainian.
http://www.kolej.pl/maron/antonow.htm
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bahnstrecke_Antoniwka%E2%80%93Saritschne

Next I found a great Polish site which has old maps of the area.
I've copied the 3 most useful map links. These show for the Sarny area, the Dabrowica area, just north of Sarny, and finally the Chinocze area, which also includes Tryputnia :)
It was a good feeling linking those together.
http://www.mapywig.org/m/wig100k/P43_S43_SARNY.jpg
http://www.mapywig.org/m/WIG100_300DPI/P42_S43_DABROWICA_300dpi.jpg
http://www.mapywig.org/m/wig100k/P42_S42_CHINOCZE.jpg (Tryputnia is in the bottom right hand side, about 80% of the way down the page)

Satelite images exist of the area, but place names are not listed due to the obscurity of this area.

However, I did go to yahoo Satelite maps. Sarny was clearly visible after a search. 15 miles north of Sarny is Dubrovytsya (Dabrowica in Ukrainian), and just about 5 miles west-south-west, in the middle of a forest is a settlement which is most probably Tryputnia.

Let me know if you need any more help as I thoroughly enjoyed this little piece of detective work.

Cheers,
Graham