CORINNA KUHR

CHILDREN OF "ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE' AS VICTIMS OF THE GREAT PURGES*

Vladimir Moroz was born into a Jewish family, and both of his parents were active members of the Bolshevik party.1 The family — Vladimir had two brothers — lived in a well-known building on the banks of the Moskva River, the so-called "dom na naberezhnoi." In October 1937, the parents were arrested as enemies of the people. The eldest brother Samuel was arrested just a few weeks later and accused of organizing a youth counter-revolutionary group. After the arrest of his parents, Vladimir and his younger brother were brought to the gathering-point for homeless children in Moscow, the "Danilovskii detipriemnik." There the NKVD staff took photographs of Vladimir. For easier registration, a sign with a number was hung around his neck. A thumb-print completed the humiliation and the feeling of being treated like a young criminal. Vladimir was sent to a home for orphans located far from Moscow on the Volga River. He could not accept what had happened and, in contrast to many children in the same situation, started to fight for justice and his freedom. He did this by writing very critical letters to his brother in which he called the children's home a place of banishment. He accused the teachers and the educational staff of trying to silence him. In his diary, he analyzed the political situation of the Soviet Union, wrote about the fact that the best politicians and specialists were arrested, and called the new Bolshevik leaders hypocrites and corrupt people. He did not try to hide his convictions and spoke frankly about his opinions in the children's home. It took only a few months before he was arrested and accused of counter-revolutionary activity. At that time, he was only 1 5 years old. In theory it was not allowed to put children under the age of 16 on trial for political opposition. In his case, however, the local NKVD received special permission from Moscow and was in fact entitled to sentence him to three years in a labor camp for counter-revolutionary activity. On his way to the camp, Vladimir died of tuberculosis at the age of 16 in a prison.

Vladimir was one of many children whose parents were victims of the Great Purges in the years 1 936- 1 938. In this period, thousands of people — party members, specialists, army officers, as well as workers and peasants — were shot or interned in labor camps. We do not know exactly how many people were victims of these repressive measures. According to latest estimates 2,5 million people were arrested and 700,000 of them shot.2 These figures are based on reliable archival materials that give us information about the age, profession and sex of the arrested people, but

Cahiers du Monde russe, 39 (1-2). janvier-juin 1998, pp. 209-220.