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FAMILY NAME : Unknown
GIVEN NAME, DURING THE WAR, IN ORPHANAGE: Subbota
GIVEN NAME, AFTER THE WAR, BY ADOPTIVE PARENTS: Galina
BIRTHDATE: Estimated 1940
BIRTH PLACE: Probably in or around Lviv / Lvov / Lwow , now in the Ukraine
FATHER'S NAME: Unknown
MOTHER'S NAME: Unknown
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Galina 's story
In the summer of 1944, the German Army retreated from the area around Lwow/Lviv.
Soldiers from the Red Army, moving westwards, arrived at an orphanage in this area.
One of the Red Army officers, who was Jewish, noticed a little girl among the children, a little girl he thought looked Jewish.
The staff at the orphanage had named the little girl Subbota, because she had once been found in the forest on a shabat.
The officer decided to adopt the little girl.
In 1945 he was able to bring her back to his wife in Moscow .
The adoptive parents decided to name their daughter Galina.
The basic questions
Who was this little girl?
When and where was she born?
What had happened to her parents?
Who were her biological parents?
Exactly where and when was she found and brought to the orphanage?
Where was this orphanage located?
After the war, from the summer of 1944 to 1945, did the little girl continue to stay in the same orphanage till she was adopted?
There is one official adoption paper in Galina's possesiom. Will there be any additonal documents in archives in Lviv or Moscow concerning this adoption?
Possibilities, theories, thoughts
Age
 photo from 1944 with father
Based on this photo that was probably taken in the orphanage in the summer of 1944, how old do you estimate that Galina was at the time? We think she was around four years old.
 photo from 1944 with mother
Based on this second photo taken in Moscow in 1945, with her hair very short, we estimate Galina is around five years old.
If these two assumptions are right, Galina was probably born in this area at the time of the Soviet occupation between the end of September 1939 to the end of June 1941. Where are the Lwow birth registers for this period located, if they still exist?
The place of the orphanage
According to the text on the backside of the photo from the orphanage, a place named Sjehovizi is mentioned.
(Some read the place as Bjehovizi, though we have not found any place with this name, till now.)
Using the different tools available, we wonder if Sjehovizi is a place now called Chaykovichi, and before the war Czajkovice.
This place is around 50 km SW of Lviv.
In 1929 it had 2577 residents and two Greek catholic churches.
Before the Holocaust around 49 Jews lived in Czajkovice.
If indeed Galina's orphanage was located in Chaykovichit is not very likely that Galina's family, if the family was Jewish, would have been able to place her in the orphanage. Also, according to the story, she had been found in the forest on a Saturday, so it is more likely her family had lived elsewhere. Perhaps in Lviv/Lwow?
Family likeness
Galina's hope is that her face, as it has been photographed at different stages in her life, perhaps can help her find her biological roots - her own name and those of her biological parents.
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