Tuesday, December 10, 2013

Translation of NKVD Progress Report on the Deportation of Ethnic Germans from Ukraine

In the last week of September 1941 the Soviet NKVD began the systematic deportation of ethnic Germans from eastern Ukraine to Kazakhstan where they were placed under special settlement restrictions. Below is a progress report on this ethnic cleansing from 1 October 1941.
Top Secret 
Information on Resettled Germans from the Ukrainian SSR
1 October 1941 
In accordance with summary report No. 1 of 30 September 1941 from  Dep. Peoples Commissar Serov in the name of Peoples Commissar Com. Beria subjected to resettlement from the Ukrainian SSR are citizens of German nationality , [of this number from]: 
Zaporozhia obl.     - 53 566 people - 15 985 families
Stalin obl.             -  36 205 >>       - 16 246 >>
Voroshilov obl.    - 12 807 >>       -   3608  >>
Odessa obl.          -   6000>>         -   1800  >>
Dnepropetrov obl. -  3200>>          -  1000  >>
-----------------------------------------------------
                      Total  111 778            38 639
Dep. Chief Section of special settlements
NKVD USSR captain state security          Konradov

Source: N.F. Bugai, (ed.),  "Mobilizovat' nemtsev v rabochie kolonny... I. Stalin": Sbornik dokumentov (1940-e gody) (Moscow: Gotika, 1998),  doc. 11, p. 34. Translated from Russian to English by J. Otto Pohl.




2 comments:

Cossack said...

Hello Otto, I am leaving a comment here because it is important for historians, students and the RG community to understand the difference between an ethnic German and ethnic Russian Germanic colonial..... It is a huge difference and clumps all Ethnically Germanic peoples together.This continues to be a problem for discerning authors and students of our own population and those unaware would in the same manner confuse one history or punishment as an umbrella over all Germanics. A contrasting example given can be the Colonials of America where great honor and commemoration is given to their establishment and historical impact of the American nation. However would they consider themselves Germanic or British? No neither one it would be American, not even British American.This colonial system got the respect they deserved for their pioneering spirit and desire for freedom, however our own folk continue to carry the Germanic ethnic cloak as though they were citizens of Germany. This is far from our historical experience. As long as we use this identifier and as long as Russia receives this identifier of who we are then the respect these Volga and Sea colonists should receive will never come in our lifetime.This sort of common terminology of our population only continues to reinforce the suspected 5th column as feared by the Soviet power.This is my appeal that we come together on a proper identifier and wash away this anti Russian prejudice which was not of Russian, but of internationalist's creation. It is time the real Russian is exempted for the sins of the International revolutionist which also filled the ranks of the NKVD. Concluding here, we must be careful in our selection of words as they are the builders of truth and advancement or weapons of mass destruction! Thank you for this forum!

J. Otto Pohl said...

This is a direct translation of the Soviet document. Citizens of German nationality means Soviet citizens defined as nemets or nemka on line five of their documents indicating natsional'nost. Ethnic German means somebody who is German by culture, heritage, or ancestry, but not a German citizen. The very first mass deportations of ethnic Germans from Ukraine to Siberia occurred under Tsar Nicholas II during World War I.