“Demetrius of Thessaloniki” Church, the year 1831. Patrimony number 1380-if. Monument of local value. It is located in Halych city, Dmytro Vitovski Street.
The date of the erection of the church is mentioned on a commemorative stone at the entrance, on the left side. The church is an object of cultural heritage that has practically not changed its original appearance and has not known all kinds of interventions and “improvements”. The old front door, the wooden windows and the corresponding roof have been preserved. Austrian and Russian soldiers are buried near the church, who lost their lives in the nearby battles during the First World War.
Under its original appearance, the chapel existed until the Great War, when it was partially destroyed, then restored in the 1920s. During the German occupation of 1941-1944, the church bells were taken down from the bell tower. What their fate was next is unknown. In 1989, the roof, the façade and the interior walls were repaired, some details of the interior were restored. Above the pilasters behind the iconostasis, the paintings with the faces of Saints Peter and Paul have been partially restored. Masterfully executed paintings replaced the frescoes “Mother of God with Jesus”, “Saint Nicholas”, “Saint Demetrius of Thessaloniki” and “Communion of Saint Onufriy”, which had been destroyed. Probably, the frescoes were made in the year of the church’s construction because on one of them, under the layer of paint, the date “1831” was discovered. The original and the replica of the icon of “Saint Demetrius of Thessaloniki” are currently preserved in the church.
The building has neo-Romanesque and neo-Gothic features. The walls and the foundation are made of stone, and the construction rests on the housing. The high gabled roof is embellished above the central part of the aisle with a “blind” lantern and a small hexahedron dome, the shape of which resulted from further reconstruction.
