Before war broke out between Russia and Ukraine in 2022, Earle Mack, the former U.S. ambassador to Finland, uncovered a haunting chapter of his family’s history. His great-grandfather was killed in a pogrom in western Ukraine in 1893, and when the murderer was caught, it fell to Mack’s great-grandmother to decide his fate.
“If they caught the assassin, they would bring him to the closest relative,” Mack says. “And the closest relative, my great-grandmother, was the only one who could spare his life. She decided to let him live.”
