The journey from the border crossing in Korczowa has been going on for almost two and a half hours. It leads through dozens of villages and towns with visible traces of Polish history: a monument to St. John Paul II by the road, a Latin inscription on a church, and a birch cross with a white and red ribbon in the local cemetery. Through the outskirts of Lviv and other small towns, the road finally leads to the Ivano-Frankivsk region, the former Stanisławów voivodeship. For now, it leads along a very good road for Ukrainian conditions, and that's only because it is a route between oblast cities, one of the most important in this part of the country. However, the real journey will begin soon.

The town of Burshtyn and the huge coal-fired power plant located nearby remind us that we are approaching our destination. They also make us understand that we need to prepare for a really tough ride. After turning left next to the railway crossing, five kilometres after the power plant, the typical Ukrainian surface begins. From here, you have to slalom to avoid holes. Beyond a piece of open field, Bołszowce begins – the seat of the commune authorities and a place with great history. From here, it is “only” 17 kilometres to Dytiatyn…

The small town is dominated by the 17th-century Sanctuary of Our Lady of Bolshevik. It used to be a pilgrimage centre for the entire Eastern Małopolska region. Today, it is a provincial, parish church visited by several dozen believers every day – but as the reality of other churches in the area shows, that is already a lot. Even the best historians lose count of how many times in its history the Bolshevik sanctuary was destroyed by Tatars, Cossacks, Swedes, Germans and Russians. The last time this happened was after the expulsion of the Poles in 1945, after which the House of God served as a warehouse for over fifty years. It was not until 2001 that the Franciscans arrived here and the reconstruction of one of the most magnificent monuments of Baroque architecture in the eastern borderlands began. Pilgrimages are being reactivated and pilgrims from Lviv, Stanisławów and Tarnopol come here year after year, just like in the old days. Who knows, maybe even some of the soldiers from Dytiatyn were there as children, taken by their parents to the church fair at Our Lady of Bolsheviks, not yet knowing that so close they would have to fight the most important battle of their lives?

The Church of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary lies a little to the side; the main road that cuts through Bołszowce runs two hundred meters further, next to the market square, behind the post office. After the center of Bołszowce, the road turns right, passes a school with a newly built gymnasium, and turns left just beyond the Narajówka River, before a roadside chapel. Where the buildings end, it gets even worse. Single pieces of asphalt stick out from the sea of gravel and sand, and from now on, all you can do is try not to fall into at least the largest holes.

The road to Dytiatyn leads past wheat fields and wild meadows, between rows of weeping willows and through the middle of small villages. The first of them is Konkolniki, 6 kilometres from Bołszowce and 11 from Dytiatyn. Just like in Bołszowce, here too there is an extraordinary church – only it was less fortunate, because it was not rebuilt at all. The first Catholic church in Konkolniki could have been built as early as the 15th century, and even Blessed Archbishop Jakub Strzemię had properties in this area. In the still existing, baroque church from the 18th century, successive archbishops of Lviv, who had their summer residence in Konkolniki, celebrated Masses. Unfortunately, today this monument is no longer overgrown with thickets, but with trees. In the summer of 2018, pilgrims from Bołszowce went to Konkolniki in droves to cut down the undergrowth and clean up the church. There was hope for improving the fate of this temple, but unfortunately, no one was found willing to renovate it, and the building is overgrown again.

Just behind Konkolniki begins another village, Zagórze Konkolnickie. It was once considered the hamlet of Konkolnik, but over time it grew enough to become independent. It was in Zagórze Konkolnickie that the Polish Army soldiers were quartered the night before the battle, and from there on the morning of September 16, 1920, they marched towards Dytiatyn. Today, there is a new Orthodox church, a primary school, and a small, stone, ruined church next to it. Driving to Dytiatyn, it is easy to miss it, because it is just around the bend on the left. True, in the early 1990s, basic renovation work was carried out and the roof was secured, but all this is for nothing if there are no Latin rite believers in the area who could take care of the church. After a dozen or so years, the roof collapsed inwards, covering the main nave with sheet metal and rotten wood, where no one had prayed for decades. What also catches the attention of visitors is a quite pleasing to the eye socialist realist mural on a brick bus stop, depicting a pair of Ukrainian peasants in folk costumes welcoming guests with bread and salt.

After Zagórze Konkolnickie, the road is still not very pleasant, and leads through completely desolate areas, where for a distance of several kilometers the only object on the road is a small transformer station. It takes a lot of effort and jumping over potholes to reach the third and last village between Bołszowce and Dytiatyn: Naberezhna. In this village, you have to turn right onto a dirt road. It is less than a kilometer to the border of Dytiatyn. The route now leads steeply upwards and finally you can see a large roadside sign at the entrance to the village. A white board hidden between two stone pillars announces in Ukrainian: "Welcome to Dytiatyn to all who arrive!" It takes almost an hour to cover the 17 kilometers from Bołszowce to this place. This adds up to at least three and a half hours of continuous travel from the border. Only those who really want to get there will get here.

The first mention of the village of Dytiatyn dates back to September 10, 1424. The name appeared in a decree issued by King Władysław Jagiełło in Kraków. It is known that in the late Middle Ages, the surrounding lands were mostly church lands, leased in perpetual lease to the Latin Archdiocese of Lviv. However, apart from a battle during the Polish-Bolshevik War, it is difficult to find any more important events in the history of Dytiatyn. According to data from 2018, the village is currently inhabited by 505 people, of whom 269 are pensioners. The rest are mainly engaged in agriculture.

It is a small, sleepy village, where life moves very slowly. The roads leading out of Dytiatyn lead only to fields cultivated by the locals. You can't get to any other town from there, you can only return the same way to Naberezhna. Well, except on dirt roads. The colloquial saying "to find yourself at the end of the world" fits this place like a glove.

Life in this tiny village revolves mainly around two buildings: the church and the village council building (i.e. the village office) from 1971, which also houses the post office. The village mayor and priest are undoubtedly the most important figures here. The Dytiatyn village includes three villages: in addition to Dytiatyn itself, also Chochołów and Naberezhna. Since 2010, the council has been successfully led by Yevhen Dowżyński: husband, father, grandfather and social activist. He lives in the middle of Dytiatyn in an unremarkable house. He devotes every moment he is free from work to social activities. He drives his twenty-year-old Lada Samara to three villages to supervise investments, with which he tries to improve the lives of his compatriots at least a little. He also does not shy away from providing assistance for the reconstruction of the Polish Military Cemetery and preparing anniversary celebrations of the Battle of Dytiatyn, in which he is a regular participant. He strives for good Polish-Ukrainian relations. Always friendly, hospitable, open and helpful. God and respect for others are his guiding values.

A few dozen meters from the village mayor's house is the church of St. Dmitry, which was completed in 1924. The local parish is administered by Father Mykola Cymbalisty. A young priest, he has many fresh ideas and a zeal for action that many priests serving in large cities could envy. He organizes Bible and prayer groups and goes out into the open air with his parishioners to evangelize in the bosom of nature. As a Greek Catholic priest, he is not subject to mandatory celibacy, so he has a beautiful wife, Krystyna.

And that's all, as far as village life is concerned. The main road in Dytiatyn, which runs from the welcome sign, in front of the village council, the mayor's house and the church, drops down sharply after passing it, crosses a stream and rises again. The drive along a very narrow street between high fences of allotments is coming to an end when you have to turn left, onto an even narrower path. This leads first past an apple orchard and then through an open field, still uphill. When black gravel spills out from under the car wheels, you can already see the outline of the Polish War Cemetery in Dytiatyn on the hillside.

Marcin Więckowski