A 67-year-old Idaho man who taught in Kyiv and did not flee the country because he needed to care for his ailing partner, a Ukrainian citizen with multiple sclerosis, was killed by Russian gunfire about 100 miles north of the capital on Wednesday.
“My brother Jimmy Hill was killed yesterday in Chernihiv, Ukraine,” Cheryl Hill Gordon wrote on Facebook Thursday afternoon. “He was waiting in a bread line with several other people when they were gunned down by Russian military snipers. His body was found in the street by the local police.”
Ukrainian authorities attributed Hill’s death to a “heavy artillery attack.”
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Hill, a lecturer at Kyiv’s Taras Shevchenko National University, left the city in December for Chernihiv, to help his companion, a woman named Irina, get treated for advanced MS. But when Russia invaded Ukraine in late February, the pair found themselves trapped in the hospital with little electricity, food, or water.
“It's horribly sad hanging on to a hope and a thread and a dream and getting to the hospital,” a friend of Hill’s told the Idaho Falls ABC affiliate earlier this week. “That gives you a little bit of extra hope and then being thrust into literally the middle of hell… It feels just almost surreal… they are being intensely bombed.”
Hill’s death on Wednesday was confirmed by adviser to the Ukrainian Interior Ministry Anton Gerashchenko, whose office posted a photo of Hill’s passport on its Telegram channel. He had reportedly been living in Ukraine for 25 years.
Chernihiv’s 300,000 residents have been under attack since the early days of the invasion, as it is along the Russian military’s route into the country from Belarus.
Hill’s sister Katya, who is speaking on behalf of the family, did not immediately return The Daily Beast’s request for comment on Thursday. Hill’s son, Kai, was unable to be reached.
During his final days, Hill regularly took to Facebook with updates about his and Irina’s situation.
“Power out cold inside hospital staff doing well some food siege here Ukraine army heroes in defending city,” Hill posted on March 11. “I can only get connection near windows its a living nightmare but we are alive bombing throughout day. Helpless feeling.”
Two days later, he wrote, “we are trapped in Chernihiv. They bomb here every night. People discouraged. Food shortages, gas, running water, some electricity..there is a siege here…”
On March 14, Hill said he and Irina were “hanging in there...very coold inside. food portions are reduced..bombing and explosions most of the night..hard to sleep. People getting depressed.”
In what appears to be Hill’s final Facebook post, he wrote, “Intense bombing!still alive. Limited food. Room very cold. ira in intensive care.”
At least 53 people have been killed by Russian attacks in Chernihiv over the past 24 hours, according to the Associated Press. Nine others standing in the same bread line as Hill were killed along with him.
“I will never forgive russians killing my English teacher,” one of Hill’s students posted Thursday on Facebook. “I rarely meet so kind and light people as Jimmy Hill.”
Hill is the second known U.S. citizen to have been killed so far in the conflict. Brent Renaud, a filmmaker from Arkansas, died Sunday near a checkpoint in Irpin, when Russian forces fired on his vehicle.
