They were fighting for independent Ukraine

An unveiling ceremony of the memorial plaque to Brotherhood of Taras took place in the village Hlynsk, Sumy oblast; the establishment of the plaque was initiated by the Center of National Revival.

It was in Hlynsk in summer of 1891 that the ground of the unique document, the Program which for the first time set the political goal of obtaining independence of Ukraine, was laid. The participants of the Brotherhood of Taras, a secret student organization, took a vow on the grave of Taras Shevchenko “to do what it takes to popularize the immortal ideas of Great Kobzar among the Ukrainians,” and the most important idea is about free Ukraine.

The founders of the Brotherhood of Taras included Vitalii Borovyk, Borys Hrinchenko, Ivan Lypa, Mykola Mikhnovsky, Volodymyr Shemet. Besides cultural activity (spreading of Ukrainian language in their families, in institutions and schools, teaching Ukrainian reading and writing to children, lectures, and cultivation of Shevchenko’s ideas), the Brotherhood of Taras brought forward the political postulates of freeing the Ukrainian nation from under the Russian domination, get full autonomy for all the nations of the Russian Empire and social justice.

The main theses included independent sovereign Ukraine: united and integral, “from Sian to Kuban, from the Carpathians to the Caucasus, free among the free, equal among the equal, without a master or aggressor, and without class struggle in the future.” Viktor Roh, a public figure, editor-in-chief of the semi-official organ of OUN “Way of Victory,” who put direct efforts to commemorate the Taras Brotherhood Members, reminded the guests of this. To the sounds of the state anthem the national flag was removed from the memorable plaque. A Hlynsk schoolgirl and Viktor Roh had the honor to solemnly unveil the plaque. Since now on this will be a sign of honor for those who devoted their lives to Ukraine. It reminds us, the contemporaries, that we have no right to betray the ideals of Ukrainian statehood.