The Romanian Golgotha Memorial Portal – “Fântâna Albă” has been dedicated to the sacrifice made by Romanians from all times and from all corners of the world, who gave their lives for freedom, independence, and national dignity. It is especially dedicated to the Romanians who were killed in the Fântâna Albă Massacre, in northern Bukovina, on April 1, 1941, for the sole guilt of having loved their people, their faith, and their homeland.
Following the secret additional protocol of the Ribbentrop–Molotov Pact of 1939, signed between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union on June 28, 1940, the USSR forcibly occupied Bessarabia, northern Bukovina, and the Herța region—an occupation that tore away nearly a third of the country's territory. In the following period, countless Romanians attempted to cross into free Romania, most of them being slain in their flight to freedom. The most brutal and well-known massacres took place at Lunca, on February 6–7, 1941, where approximately 600 Romanians were killed, and at Fântâna Albă, on April 1, 1941.
On April 1, 1941, around 3,000 northern-Bukovina Romanians from the villages along the Siret Valley—Pătrăuții de Sus, Pătrăuții de Jos, Igești, Crasna, Ciudei, Budineț, Cireșul, Crăsnișoara Veche, Crăsnișoara Nouă, Bănila Moldovenească, Dăvideni, Carapciu, Cupca, Trestiana, Suceveni, Iordănești—set out for Romania, choosing rather to die than to continue living under Soviet rule. Those leading the procession carried three crosses, icons, and white flags as signs of peace and of their intention not to harm, but only to seek freedom. They told the Soviet authorities they wished to leave without taking anything with them, leaving behind all their belongings. Upon reaching the border area near Fântâna Albă, they were met with machine gun fire. After the shooting ceased, the wounded who remained alive were thrown into mass graves along with the dead. Those who managed to flee were hunted down in the surrounding forests. Very few survived.
Two months later, on June 13, 1941, around 13,000 families from the villages of those who had attempted to cross into Romania were deported to Siberia and Kazakhstan. Only some 10% of those deported would survive.
In 2011, the Parliament of Romania declared April 1 the National Day of Remembrance for the Romanian Victims of the Fântâna Albă Massacre and of the Deportations, Famine, and Other Forms of Repression Orchestrated by the Soviet Totalitarian Regime in the Herța Region, Northern Bukovina, and All of Bessarabia. In the same year, the Department for Romanians Abroad, together with the Putna Monastery Abbacy, raised a wooden Trinity at the entrance of the monastery, in memory of the Romanians who perished at Fântâna Albă, thus creating a memorial space.
Given the ever-growing desire of Romanians to have a place of commemoration for these heroes—and since the clearing from Fântâna Albă is difficult to access, being situated beyond the national border, in Ukraine, with the blessing of His Eminence Pimen, Archbishop of Suceava and Rădăuți at the time, the memorial space was reorganized and named Romanian Golgotha Memorial Portal – “Fântâna Albă”.
