The documentary evidence of the deportation of Germans from the territory of Stanislav region of Ukraine (1946)

Abstract

The article publishes and analyzes the documents of the Soviet special services on the deportation of the group of Germans from Stanislav region (October–December 1946). Eight documents presented in this article demonstrate the circumstances of the deportation of a large group of Germans from the territory of Stanislav region of Ukrainian SSR in late 1946. These documents are stored in the State Archives of the Security Service of Ukraine. These are official correspondence between the heads of institutions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) at various levels. The first of these documents is the report of one of the executives of the Department of the MIA in Stanislav region, Hrytsenko, on the case of the registration of Germans in Stanislav region who are subject to resettlement. It was reported that 38 German families (34 men, 51 women, 70 children under the age of 16) live in the Dolyna district of Stanislav region – a total of 155 people. They allegedly fled with the German Army as early as 1944, but were intercepted by Red Army and sent home. The Soviet authorities planned to send them to a special settlement in Aktubinsk region of Russia, but temporarily used this group of Germans to build a railway station. The Document № 3 is very important. The telegram was sent from Moscow to Kyiv on November 14, 1946, ordering the German families from Stanislav region of the USSR to be sent to a special settlement in the Mary Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in Russia. They were to be handed over to the Suslonger Forestry, which was a structural part of the “Marybumles” Trust. Personal farms and cattle were allowed to be sold. Employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR were obliged to find the required number of vans for the deportation of Germans. The conditions for organizing the deportation of these German families are disclosed in other documents. In the end, according to L. Pastelnyak, the Deputy Head of the Anti-Banditry Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Stanislav region (document № 8), the echelon with the Germans was sent from the Dolyna station on December 29, 1946. Unfortunately, we do not know the circumstances of transporting the group of Germans to Suslonger railway station, as well as the circumstances of their stay at the special settlements and the subsequent fate after the liquidation of the special settlement system in the 1950-ies. Thus, the published documents reveal some circumstances of the deportation of one and a half hundred people of German nationality from the territory of Dolyna of Stanislav region to Russia at the end of 1946. Of course, the operation carried out by the Soviet repressive authorities should be called deportation, i.e. “forced eviction from the place of permanent residence of a person, group of persons or people”. Documents are published in the original language (Russian) in compliance with the necessary archaeographic requirements.