Note 1 — CHAPTER NINE The Five Year Plan
Reading edition
A graphic account of this dekurkulization was given in a DP camp by Sh., a former peasant of the district of Kharkiv:
“On May 22, 1929, all my property, tools, cattle, building and clothing were confiscated. I and my family (my wife, six small children and my mother), were left without means of livelihood; we stayed with people like old folks, ate what we were given, although people were forbidden to give to us. On November 27, in spite of the fact that there was snow on the ground and 15 degrees of frost, I and my entire family, without clothes and half-naked, were put out of the house. Until February, 1930 I lived in another house which was half fallen down. On February 28, I, my wife and six children (my mother had disappeared; I do not know where) were arrested and with other dekurkulized persons were sent to the railroad station. There we were packed into freight cars as sardines in a barrel and travelled for 11 days, without knowing our destination. We were fed once every two days. Many perished from cold and exhaustion. We finally reached the station of Makarikha near Kotlas, district of Archangel, and in 40 degrees of frost, we were detrained in the woods in the snow.
“Then all those able to work were driven to forest operations 300 kilometers from Kotlas. They drove us half shod in the intense cold. They fed us on the way 300 grams of bread, 5 grams of barley and 3 grams of salt per person a day. Many died on the way. Many, unable to walk further, were shot on the spot. There we cut wood and they treated us very badly. The norms of work were abnormally high. We lived in huts which were holes we dug ourselves. Of the many thousands of people who came there more than half died of exhaustion, hunger and cold.
“Of the members of the families of kurkuls who remained at the station of Makarikha, more than half froze. Among these were my sons Ivan and Fedir; a third son Hryhory died of exhaustion. Later all the children up to 14, including three of mine, were returned to Ukraine but I have no further news of them. They probably perished. In 1932, first my wife and then I escaped by hiding in cars loaded with wood. I found work in the Don Basin. In 1937 my wife was arrested suddenly and shot in the prison of Artemivsk in the Don Basin. I escaped because I was living under an assumed name. Now I am a DP and living in Germany in an IRO camp.”