republic · Poland, Lithuania and Russia

Kholodny Yar Republic

1919 CE – 1922 CE · capital Motronyn Monastery

A partisan self-governing district in the forests of central Ukraine, which held out against Whites and Bolsheviks from 1919 to 1922.

Origins

Kholodny Yar is a forested ravine area near Chyhyryn, rich in memories of the Cossack Hetmanate and the 18th-century haidamaka rebels. In 1919 villagers around the Motronynskyi Monastery formed a self-defence force under Vasyl Chuchupak, which took control of some twenty villages and declared loyalty to the Ukrainian People's Republic.

Rule and society

The district was governed by village councils and its partisan otamans, with the monastery as headquarters. The insurgents fought Denikin's Whites and then the Red Army, raiding railways and Soviet detachments, and kept contact with the exiled government of the Ukrainian People's Republic. Its forces numbered from a few hundred to several thousand fighters.

Decline and legacy

Vasyl Chuchupak was killed in 1920, and Soviet campaigns slowly broke the resistance. In 1922 the Cheka lured several leading otamans to a fake meeting and arrested them, ending organised resistance. The story was later told in Yuri Horlis-Horsky's memoir Kholodny Yar.

Few sources survive for this state; details are uncertain.

Connections (2)

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Cite this page
APA
The Epoch Institute. (2026). Kholodny Yar Republic. In The Epoch Institute States Register. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/kholodny-yar-republic
MLA
“Kholodny Yar Republic.” The Epoch Institute States Register, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/kholodny-yar-republic. Accessed .
Chicago
The Epoch Institute. “Kholodny Yar Republic.” The Epoch Institute States Register. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/kholodny-yar-republic.
Harvard
The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Kholodny Yar Republic’, The Epoch Institute States Register. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/kholodny-yar-republic (Accessed: ).

Last reviewed October 2026Random state ↻