A MEMENTO FOR THE FREE WORLD

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80B01676R003600060084-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 36
• Document Creation Date: December 12, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 15, 2002
• Sequence Number: 84
• Publication Date: January 1, 1960
• Content Type: BOOK

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A
MEMENTO
FOR
THE
FREE
WORLD
T. KUBANSKY
4
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ANWV
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On the cover: the scene of the forced repatriation of Cossacks
and their families carried out on the orders of the British govern-
ment in Lienz, June 1, 1945. (Reproduction from a painting by
S. Korolkov.)
Approved For Release 2002/08/2
A MEMENTO
FOR
THE FREE WORLD
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Approved For Release 2002/08/21
This book has been published by the author at his own expense.
It has not been priced, but any voluntary contribution sent toward
covering the cost of publishing will be greatly appreciated.
Contributions are to be sent to: Mr. Fedor Gorb, P. 0. Box 2943,
Paterson 29, New Jersey, U. S. A.
: CIA-RDP80601676R003600060084-7
THEODOR KUBANSKY
A MEMENTO
FOR
THE FREE WORLD
Paterson, New Jersey, U. S. A.
1 9 6 0
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FOREWORD
TABLE OF CONTENTS
C Copyright 1960
by the Author ON THE ORDERS OF THE RED KREMLIN
(A Historical Sketch)
Printed by Rausen Bros. 142 East 32nd St., New York City
149
A MONUMENT ON THE DRAVA RIVER
(A Historical Sketch)
PUBLISHER'S NOTE
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11'
?cr
co
co
co
FOREWORD
cs)
cs)
A MEMENTO FOR THE FREE WORLD gives a vivid
03 picture of the grim reality of the building of socialism in
co Russia, and of the subsequent developments.
a_
0 This book will be of a particular interest for all those
who deal with the leaders of the USSR as well as for those
ck who are willing to accept the coexistence with the regime
Cr) of the Red Kremlin the final goal of which is, and always
will be, the WORLD COMMUNIST REVOLUTION.
co It is my hope that the book will serve as a reminder oj
the ruthlessness of the rulers of the Red East, and help the
C?1
0 reader to get a better insight into the essence of the Soviet
0
C?1 regime.
cv
The West must remember the atrocities committed by
those in power in Russia, and not for a moment forget the
tactics of the Red Kremlin.
God grant it that the Western World be spared the kind
u_ of socialism described on these pages.
cv
THEODOR KUBANSKY
s_
o_
o_
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ON THE ORDERS OF THE RED KREMLIN
(A Historical Sketch)
. . . The bottom rank masters of people's destinies gath-
ered in a large, square, high ceiling room of the Stanitza*
Council building. The walls in the corridor and other rooms
were adorned with numerous slogans calling for the "liqui-
dation of kulaks as a class", and for the new "socialist offen-
sive in the village".
The meeting of the presidium of the Stanitza Council, in
which politically active poor peasants and farm hands were
invited to participate, was presided over by the chairman,
Ivan Kotelnikov, a fat-faced man of medium height, who was
sitting at the "ataman's" desk. His new coat with an Astra-
khan collar was unbuttoned and hung down from his shoul-
ders showing his fat neck. His small pug nose gave the im-
pression of always sniffing at something. His slightly squint-
ing, unblinking eyes ran up and down a sheet of paper lying
in front of him as he was making some red pencil marks on
it, saying aloud:
"Good. We have two hundred and sixteen of them now.
Petrenko, Mikhail Tarasovitch will make the two hundred
* In the regions settled by Cossacks the term stanitza rather
than deryevnya (village) was used for a Cossack settlement.
9
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and seventeenth one. We won't even discuss this one, he is
a hundred percent kulak".
"Too few, Comrade Kotelnikev," remarked the secretary
of the party cell, Lugansky, who was sitting at another desk.
He stood up, very tall and erect, set right his ill fitting fur
coat, thrust his long-nosed face forward, his eyes restlessly
looking around, and said: "We have received an exact plan:
three hundred kulak families are to be evicted in February.
And what have we done? This is the beginning of February,
and we hardly have two hundred disfranchised people, and
we are getting nowhere for fear of hurting the wealthy white
guards. Comrades poor peasants! You must be more active
in suggesting candidates for eviction, even those will do who
are not altogether kulaks. At this pace we won't break up
the meeting until dawn, for the list must be ready today!"
And he sat down wheezing noisily, scanning expectantly
the faces of the "active poor peasants" who were, as every-
body knew, nothing but toadies, loafers, drunkards, and
card-players.
In a minute Ivan Tzesarsky, one of such "active peas-
ants," got up, and with an effort opening his eyes puffed
up with too much sleep and drink, said:
"And why should we look for somebody such a long time?
How about Mikhail Petrenko's two sons, Pavlo and Alyokha?
You think that if they set up independent households, and
took deeds of division from the Stanitza Council, they have
become poor peasants at once? They come from the same
nest, and should be sent down the same road as their father!"
And this man, a well-known loafer in the stanitza, who spent
summers sitting on the river bank with a fishing rod, or play-
ing cards in the shade of the trees, and who in winter loudly
proclaimed his being a "poor peasant", sat down heavily onto
a wooden bench pleased as a, punch with his speech.
"Right, Comrade Tzesarsky. Such types must be eradi-
cated completely! They are chips of the same old block", said
Kotelnikov hurriedly entering the names of the two sons of
Mikhail Petrenko in the list. But before he finished writing,
he stopped, and looked questioningly at those present.
"But they have not yet been disfranchised. The Rayon
Executive Committee may not approve their eviction, don't
you think so??the Soviet "ataman" asked anxiously. The
gathering fell to thinking what could be done.
Suddenly a tall Cossack in a worn-out sheepskin coat,
who was also present at the meeting, rose up, and, twirling
his long red moustache, said with unconcealed irony:
"Comrade Chairman, you better take the lists of all
peasants in our stanitza, count off as many as you need, and
enter them in the list of the "kulaks" to be evicted. How can
you destroy such husbandmen as Pavlo or Alyokha Petrenko?
What do they have on their farms? A horse, a cow, and a hut
of a house. They are living now all by themselves, they separ-
ated from their father. And if we talk about their father, Mik-
hail Tarasovich : from whom has he ever extorted any-
thing? Whom of those present here has he ever hurt in any
way? And if he worked day and night like an ox to improve
his farm, this is a good lesson for us, fools as we are. . ."
And he would have continued talking in his peculiar
manner interspersing his Kuban (Ukrainian) speech with
Russian words but he was cut short:
"A kulak supporter, a kulak supporter", the gathering
began to murmur.
"Dancing to the kulak's tune, are you?" said Lugansky
angrily to him.
"Such speeches do not become you. Watch out that I do
not hear anything of the kind from you again. Otherwise we
won't spare you either, a poor peasant as you are. We must
carry out the plan on time, do you understand that?"
The peasant sat down in silence with his head bent low
sadly, and did not try to say anything any more.
"Well, comrades poor peasants, who knows some viola-
tions of the Soviet laws on the part of these two sons of
Petrenko ?" insisted the Chairman of the Village Council
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being in a hurry to complete the list of the kulaks to be
evicted.
"Here is what, Comrade Chairman", suggested a tall
short sighted fellow, a certain Yermolay Tarasov, a loafer
and a lout, who came to the stanitza from Central Russia
in the twenties. "Here is what," he said, "last Sunday I was
in Rostov on the market place, and I saw myself how Pavel
Petrenko was selling eggs and dressed chickens. His brother
Aleksey was standing next to him. This looks very much
like black market operations".
"Oh, that's how it is! .. . Selling agricultural products on
the black market! Fine . . . Comrade Matzalo," Kotelnikov
turned to the secretary of the Stanitza Council with anima-
tion, "write the minutes: citizens Petrenko Pavel, and
Petrenko Aleksey are to be disfranchised in accordance with
the article 15, paragraph "3" of the instruction of the VTZIK
RSFSR. Only these minutes should be dated some fifteen
or twenty days back. Date them January 24. And on the basis
of these minutes we shall include the men in the list of those
to be evicted in accordance with the decision of the meeting.
But you yourself know very well how this should be done.. ."
And Matzala did as Kotel'nikov ordered him to. Nobody
raised any objections.
This is an exact description of how a meeting of this kind
was carried on at the Starominskiy Stanitza Council on the
Kuban, on February 12, 1930. The author has not altered
anything. None of the participants has been invented, and
their true names have been given.
II
And what kind of a peasant was the husbandman Mik-
hail Petrenko at that time? Did he have a steam thrashing
machine, did he rent hundreds of hectares of land? Was he
a "kulak-exploiter" who used hired labor, i.e. was he indeed
the kind of a rural "bourgeois" whom the proper authorities
would have liquidated without a moment's hesitation? No,
12
and once more no. It was a common, industrious, simple
Cossack family of fourteen.
Mikhail Tarasovich's three sons Pavel, Aleksey and Ar-
senty married hard working girls, like everybody else in a
Cossack family, and not wishing to split their household,
lived all together in one house, as a single closely bound
family, up to the fall of 1928.
Mikhail Petrenko's exemplary farm made some loafers
and idlers envious. He had four well-fed, well-groomed horses,
three red German cows of high milking qualities, about a
hundred laying hens of Leghorn and Minorka breeds, ten
"Dadanov" type bee hives, a small orchard, and other fowl
and cattle as well. In the latest re-allotment of land his family
received over thirty hectares (two and three tenth hectares
per person). He cultivated the land painstakingly and loving-
ly, rotating the crops in accordance with the agronomist's
instruction, and his crops were always abundant.
This was all what this family of a common Cossack hus-
bandman possessed, and peasants like him formed an over-
whelming majority in the Kuban stanitzas.
He always paid all the taxes fully and on time in accord-
ance with the governmental requirements. Beginning with
1928 Mikhail Petrenko constantly took part in the "red grain
delivery trains" trying hard to fulfill the plans which were
impossible to fulfill. He was one of the first to pay in full for
the Tractorcenter Shares which all peasants were compelled
to buy, and which were just another form of taxation. Later
those shares as well as the Tractor Center were abolished by
the government but nobody received any money for the
shares he owned. Difficult as it was, he still paid in full for
a thousand rubles' worth of shares of the state loan the
"STRENGTHENING OF PEASANTS' FARMING". This loan
was immediately renamed by peasants the "Ruin of Peasants'
Farming" since every farm was forcibly assigned a definite
amount of shares to be bought. The failure to pay the money
required was as bad as the failure to pay the taxes. And
peasants were actually ruined trying to meet the obligations
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thus forced upon them. But the Soviet press called the pur-
chase of these, as well as of all other shares "voluntary".
r.7 Everybody smiled at it but nobody dared to open his mouth
71,3' to say that the failure to pay up the money for the shares re-
suited in the confiscation of horses and other property. Those
cs who failed to meet the obligation would be arrested in the
8 night, and kept in jail until another member of the family
'ell' paid that "voluntary" loan in full.
And still Mikhail Tarasovich found it possible even to
upl:t help his needy neighbors when they asked him for some
help.
(I; In 1928, having a premonition of the coming misfortune
M and wishing to placate the local authorities who frowned
co upon the well-to-do farm (and the farm of a family of four-
?.
p teen could not but be well-to-do), the elder sons of Mikhail
Petrenko, Pavel and Aleksey, split the farm with their father,
?? and moved out with their share of possessions to separate lots
where they had previously built small houses. But even this
c7i did not save the family from the ruin and destruction which
os the communist "progress" during the early years of the "so-
cialist construction" brought for it.
CN1
0 As it was mentioned above Mikhail Tarasovich Petrenko
c`l was first of all disfranchised which served as a "legal" basis
cv
to for the nationalization of his property as that of a kulak and
w for further persecution.
Disfranchisement in the Soviet Union, especially in the
&- thirties of our century, did not mean that citizen so and so
u_ was deprived of the right to take part in elections, i.e. he
13 could not vote. This is what many people in the West think.
> Far from it! A man disfranchised became actually an outlaw.
'EL He was treated the same way lepers were treated in Middle
a Ages. Any good-for-nothing poor peasant or farm hand could
could come to his farm, and take anything he wanted; or,
coming across a disfranchised man on the street, he could
rob him of his money or any other valuables, and be in no
danger of being persecuted for the robbery. It was useless for
a disfranchised man to complain, for the authorities would
14
not even listen to him. It happened once that a bunch of
local "active" peasants broke into the house of a disfran-
chised man, and began looting. When the owner tried to re-
sist them, they took him out into the stable and shot him to
death. His wife and neighbors went to the militia station
with a complaint at once but the militia would not even
investigate the case.
"A kulak has been dispacthed, so what of it? There is
nothing to it," answered the "keepers of order", and even did
not summon the murderers to testify.
Some Komsomol members, attending evening parties
of young people, would attack and rape kulak's daughters.
Even if the girl sometimes tried to complain it was useless
since it was always the "Komsomol word of honor" that was
believed and not a kulak's daughter.
Disfranchisement brought with it a one thousand per-
cent increase in all taxes and insurances plus special taxes
for those who were deprived of vote. It is clear that no one
could possibly pay these taxes, and then all his possessions
were nationalized as a penalty for failing in his obligations
toward the state.
This is what disfranchisement means in the land of
socialism.
Tens and hundreds of thousands of the best husbandmen
of the country were treated like that. Cossack Petrenko of
whom we spoke above was treated in the same way, too.
III
Several days after he had been disfranchised, all Mikhail
Tarasovich's possessions, horses, cattle, fowl, implements, all
the grain, almost all the flour, and the greatest part of the
household effects were confiscated. All this was supposedly
intended for the first large kolkhoz soon to be organized in
the stanitza, but the greatest part of it was pillaged by those
who were in charge of confiscations. But that was not the
greatest misfortune yet.
15
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In the night of February 18, 1930 a member of the Tagan-
rog Operation Section of the OGPU accompanied by a militia-
man and two former red partisans in the Civil War Fedoseev
and Voron, who where local residents but not natives of the
stanitza, broke into the house of Mikhail Petrenko, and in
the name of the party and government ordered savagely:
"Get to hell out of here! Clear the place this very min-
ute!"
On hearing such "greeting", Mikhail Tarasovich felt his
legs give way under him, and a lump rise in his throat. He
half opened his mouth but could not utter a word. The
women began to wail plaintively.
"My dear man," the grey-haired housewife and mother
was wailing kneeling at the feet of the OGPU member,
"where shall we go this cold night? All my children grew
up under this roof, these walls have kept us warm for thirty
years; father himself built them! Why are you driving us
out of our own home? Have mercy on the small children, they
are but innocent angels! Where will they go in this severe
frost, in the deep snow at night?!"
"Shut up!" shouted the OGPU man pushing away the
old woman who was kneeling before him. "Don't compel me
to use arms! You think I would hesitate? Oh, no! In liquidat-
ing counter-revolutionary Cossacks I'll stop at nothing!"
One could see that his threats were not in vain, and that
he was capable to commit any atrocities.
"Moscow does not believe tears", said Fedoseev with a
sneer.
"But how is it," finally said Mikhail Tarasovich, "I have
paid up everything, all the taxes, the insurances, shares,
everything, why do you confiscate my house? What is it
done for?"
"For the building of socialism, citizen Petrenko," said
the militiaman, "and with people like you we cannot build
socialism. Get out, otherwise. . ."
Without exchanging a word, weeping and wailing the
Petrenko family left their home. Silent, his head bent low,
16
Mikhail Tarasovich crossed the threshold of his own house
for the last time. Going out of the court yard, he took off
his cap, crossed himself, kissed the gate covered with hoary
frost, stepped aside toward the poplar trees he himself had
planted along the fence, and began to cry bitterly. This sixty
year old Cossack-husbandman was crying unable to protect
himself against the legalized night robbery.
The peaceful family thrown out of their own home, where
they had lived all their lives, in the name of the Red Kremlin,
stood crowded together on the street near their fence in
silence not knowing what to do next, where to go.
"It's cold here, let's go home!" Five year old Vasya began
to cry. He could not understand why they were standing on
the street in the cold while it was so warm in the house
close by.
This childish prattle brought them out of stupor.
"Let's go over to Pavel's place", said Irina, Vasya's
mother, the wife of the youngest son of Mikhail Tarasovich.
They began to walk in silence.
But coming closer to Pavel's house, they found him in
the same situation: Pavel had been thrown out into the
street an hour before, too, and he with his wife and two
children was walking toward his father's place. What was
to be done?
The whole crowd went to a distant relative of theirs, a
"poor" peasant. The kind hearted man was about to let them
in, and give them shelter, when a group of the Bolshevist
hounds, who were liquidating kulaks that night, happened
to be passing by. Noticing Petrenko's family at the window
of another man's house, they stopped.
"Hey, what assembly is this? You watch out for yourself,
or you'll get into trouble, too! Let them spend the night in
the streets! Don't you know there is an order that forbids
people to give shelter to disfranchised kulaks?" shouted Alek-
sey Mutzkiy, the leader of this local group of toadies and lick-
spittles, well-known in the stanitza for his brutal cruelty in
treating his own fellow Cossacks. In some houses he threw
17
children out of windows right into snow drifts in the middle
of the night. His atrocities astonished even the OGPU men
although he was a non-party man himself. He was assisted
by several bandits and marauders of the same kind who spent
on drinking all they had. But the majority of the Cossacks,
even the so-called "poor ones" did not take part in the bands
of the Bolshevist hounds, and watched with uneasiness that
barbarity of the twentieth century. . . The order forbidding
to give shelter or medical assistance to the families of dis-
possessed kulaks was indeed in existence.
"Well, what can I do," said the man after Mutzkiy's
threats. "Go away, God speed you! I feel for you, I would
be glad to let you into the house but you see yourselves I am
not free to do it". And he shut the door.
Petrenko's family went into the street again. And only
before dawn did they succeed in finding shelter until the
next day in the house of a widow who was living on the out-
skirts of the stanitza. Thus, they (as well as others in the
same position) were left without roof over their heads, and
were forced to seek shelter for a night separately and by
stealth in the house of their friends. . .
People with the past of bandits, with a license for plun-
der, set up by the OGPU men raced all over the stanitza
like hounds, searching houses and robbing disfranchised
kulaks.
In the most atrocious manner they robbed the unfor-
tunate people of their last money, jewelry and other valu-
ables, and even the shares of the state loans. Part of the loot
they kept as a remuneration for their "trouble", the rest they
handed over to the Operation Department of the OGPU.
In a few days after the beginning of nationalization of
kulaks' property the men of all the families that were sub-
ject to eviction were arrested and put into a large public
stable under a heavy guard. Their families were driven
straight to the railroad station, and permitted to take with
them only a very limited amount of food stuffs.
18
IV
Soon afterwards a long freight train crammed full of
women, children, old people under the heavy guard of the
OGPU troops was standing near the station.
Vasya, a five year old grandson of Mikhail Tarasovich,
contracted pneumonia in the terrible conditions and severe
drafts of the freight car. Irina Petrenko, his mother, suc-
ceeded in evading the vigilance of the guards, slipped out of
the car, and rushed with the sick boy to the stanitza dis-
pensary. The patients let her see the doctor without having
to wait for her turn. The doctor, writing down the history of
the case, suddenly stopped, and taking off his glasses, looked
fixedly at Irina.
"You say you are being evicted together with the dis-
possessed kulaks?"
"Yes, yes, they have evicted us. The train my start
soon." IrMa began talking hurredly. "They stuffed us into
freight cars full of holes, no heat, the wind goes clear through.
That's how my little boy has caught cold and fell ill. He has
such a high temperature that I am afraid something bad can
befall him. Be so kind, examine him quickly, help him."
"I cannot help you, citizeness," suddenly said the doctor,
"I have no right. The day before yesterday we received an
exerpt from the order of the People's Commissariat of Health
which clearly states: it is categorically prohibited to give
any medical help to disfranchised people as well as to the
members of the kulak families subject to eviction. . . I under-
stand your position and feel for you deeply but . . . really I
am not free to do as I wish to."
And the doctor apparently embarrassed himself at his
callousness turned away from the moaning child. Weeping
bitterly under this inconceivable insult to a human being,
unable to understand the reason of it, pressing to her bosom
her little son who was delirious and in high fever, Irina re-
turned to her family in the dirty unheated freight car.
In the night Vasya died. Guards came in, wrapped the
19
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body in a bast matt and carried it away. Mother was not even
permitted to bury her own child. Irina cried and raved his-
terically for a long time but she was not allowed to leave
the car.
Even animals show sympathy, and sometimes even ren-
der help to a sick or wounded animal but the super beast,
Stalin, forbade to give medical help to people. The history
of mankind has never known such barbarity. . .
Two days later all men who had been kept under arrest
were brought to the train to join their families. The train
of the evicted was ready to start for the unknown destina-
tion somewhere far away. . .
All along the station buildings, and crowded in the square
stood the stanitza residents of all ages and means who came
to say good-bye to their friends and relatives.
Mikhail Petrenko stood at the open door of the freight
car gazing silently at the faces of his fellow Cossacks whom
he was about to leave, and sorrowfully surveyed the broad
streets of his native stanitza. He felt he was parting from
them for ever. His sad silence concealed many an anxious
thought about the future destiny of his native region. All
people were silent: both those who were evicted forcibly from
their home stanitza, and those who were seeing them off.
And this extraordinary silence was portent of a terrible
frightful force which nedeed only some supernatural shift,
some shock to vent its fury, and to destroy the devilish toils
of the Bolshevist barbarians but the shock did not occur
(for the hour had not struck yet), and the people were . . .
silent. Only the OGPU men were shouting as they scurried
around getting the train ready to depart, and showing their
"heroism" by driving the doomed women, children, and old
people into the freight cars with the butts of their guns.
An elderly Cossack with a red moustache, in a discolored
sheepskin coat made his way through the crowd to the door
of the car, stretched his hands toward those who came to
see them off, and shouted:
"Good-bye, fellow countrymen, good-bye, Cossacks, and
20
all of you who have been living among us in good will these
many years! Don't forget us, don't forget the evil done to us
by strangers, by highway robbers. We have no grudge against
you. Not you are to be blamed for this violence but.. ."
The train began to move, and his last words became in-
audible. The clanking of buffers, and the rumbling of the
wheels drowned his voice. . .
Heart-rending wails, words of farewell, shouts of the
OGPU men, the rumble of springless wheels of the freight
cars?all blended into a terrible din. And this din which
seemed to be coming out of hell, and the wailing of the people
remaining in the stanitza, resounded in the station square
for quite some time until the train disappeared behind the
Kanelovskiy Hill . . .
(This is a description of an administrative eviction in
winter of 1930, in one stanitza only. But the same happened
to the best ploughmen in all the stanitzas on the Don, the
Kuban', the Terek, and in the Ukraine without any excep-
tion).
V
The Starominskiy husbandmen were brought to the
dense forests of Nadezhdinskiy Rayon, Sverdlovskaya Oblast
far removed from any settlements. They were ordered to
leave the train and to march fifteen kilometers into the very
thicket of the pine forest in the deep snow. There all men
were drawn up in one row, given axes and saws, and told:
"Fell the trees! If you don't wanf to freeze to death, and to
let your families freeze to death, begin building houses for
yourselves! Don't expect any other housing from us. You
must be grateful for the axes and saws we have supplied you
with for the purpose.. . Now, go to!"
Women and children were sitting right there on the snow
with their miserable chattel using whatever they had to pro-
tect themselves from the snow storm and the icy wind.
But the toilers of the Kuban' fields did not lose heart!
Even here, in snow storms and below zero temperatures, with-
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out any help whatsoever, they with their inborn energy of
Cossack husbandmen which surprised even the OGPU men,
in a few days built primitive barracks, stuffed the chinks in
the walls with the moss they got from under the snow, thus
providing shelter for their freezing families.
In unheated barracks the Cossack-husbandmen from the
vast steppes of the Kuban' pressed close to each other; they
worked up to their waists in snow felling timber for the Soviet
export in order to earn a daily portion of bread from the
OGPU men.
But soon a misfortune that proved fateful for many of
them drew close to the outcasts. The scant supply of food
stuffs brought along from the stanitza was running out, and
food rations were given only to those who were working at
timber cutting and fulfilled the required norms.
People with large families were the first to feel the bony
hand of famine. More and more frequently was the life of the
doomed people cut short by death. . .
Neither did Mikhail Tarasovich Petrenko live to see his
native stanitza again. Toward the end of May of the same
year this Cossack-husbandman exiled from his native region
to the North through no fault of his own died of cold and
hunger. Soon his wife died of malnutrition, too. Their six-
teen year old daughter Marusya was crushed to death by a
carelessly cut pine tree. Such people were not entitled to
medical help in the "country of socialism" in those years. All
of them were abandoned to their own resources. Many of
them, those who were hardier, began to flee the camp. But
the majority of the fugitives were caught by the OGPU men
who were prowling everywhere. They were beaten almost to
death, and sent to the penal sections of concentration camps
from which hardly anybody ever came back. Only in rare
cases were the fugitives returned to the barracks of the
evicted Cossacks.
VI
. . . The son of the late Mikhail Tarasovich, Aleksey Pet-
renko, together with his wife and a two year old son, Kolya,
22
also fled their place of exile, and after long and dangerous
travels succeeded in reaching his native stanitza.
His brother-in-law, who did not expect to see his sister
again, gave the fugitives from the Ural a warm welcome, and
let them stay in his house in secret.
But the watchful all-seeing eyes of the secret agents of
the OGPU, who were numerous in the stanitza, were vigilant,
and soon the local OGPU organs learned where the runaway
"kulak's son" was hiding. Already a week after Aleksey's re-
turn to stanitza, "guests" from the OGPU surprised his
brother-in-law late at night. Aleksey was arrested and sent
away somewhere. And he was never heard about ever since.
His wife, Olga Petrenko, and his small son, Kolya were
shown unusual mercy for some reason or other, and they
were left alone. Probably the faithful "builders of socialism"
were too busy with other, more important, "enemies of the
people."
Olga was even permitted to enter the kolkhoz and to
work together with others. The Stanitza Council gave her
permission to move into an empty little hut that was stand-
ing on the outskirts of the stanitza. And with her inborn
industry of a Cossack woman she began to work energetic-
ally: not for her own sake but for the sake of the child, her
only son, little Kolya.
VII
Then came the terrible winter of 1932-33. It was terrible
not because of the cold weather or destruction brought about
by a military campaign, but because of an artificail famine
created by the tyrants of the Red Kremlin. The Political
Bureau of the Central Committee of the VKP (B) under the
guidance of Stalin, and with the active participation of
Molotov, Kaganivich, Khrushchev, and others, decided to
destroy several millions of superfluous husbandmen by con-
fiscating all the grain, and thus to achieve two goals: to do
away with all the potential enemies of socialism in rural
areas, and to cause the longed for international economic
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crisis by filling the markets of the West with the Soviet grain,
thus making the world communist revolution imminent.
These were mainly husbandmen from the Cossack regions
of the Kuban, the Don, the Terek, and of the Ukraine who
were subjected to the "extra grain deliveries," i. e. to the
grain confiscation, and death from starvation. The decree of
the Central Committee and SOVNARKOM of August 7,
1932, served as a guidance for that devilish feat. The decree
ordered death before the firing squadron for "plundering the
socialist property". The local authorities answered: "Happy
to please!" and began to liquidate the "plunderers of socialist
property" in batches. Any one could be found guilty under
the provision of the decree. Thus, if a kolkhoznik or anybody
else had plucked an ear of the kolkhoz wheat, a sunflower
head, or a cob of corn, he was sentenced to die before a firing
squadron for those "plunders", and only under highly ex-
tenuating circumstances the death sentence was commuted
to ten years prison term and the confiscation of all the
property.
In every stanitza dozens and hundreds of kolkhoz (and
non-kolkhoz) members were tried every day for the violation
of the law of August 7, 1932. Nobody was spared: neither old
people, nor women, nor the servile toadies-activists, nor the
former red partisans of the Civil War, nor even the local
communists. The cases were not even properly tried, and all
the formality of the "trial comedy" lasted not longer than
five minutes. The judge had before him a testimony of a
kolkhoz inspector regarding the "plunder on the kolkhoz
fields", and a "Stakhanovite" type conclusion by the local
militiaman, an agent of the Criminal Division, or by an
OGPU agent. That was all. The "judges" even did not leave
the room for deliberation before bringing in a verdict as they
used to. But simply sitting at his table, after asking the de-
fendent a question or two, the judge would declare:
. . . "Ivan Ivanov, while sowing wheat, took grain out of
the sowing machine and ate it. In accordance with the testi-
mony of the wisnesses, and his own confession, he ate up
24
about one kilogramm of grain?DEATH BEFORE FIRING
SQUADRON! Maria Marchenko, passing by the kolkhoz
field, plucked two ears of wheat and ate them. Taking intc
consideration her youth, the court sentences her to ten years
in jail, and the confiscation of all her property.. . The next?!"
The judge did not pay the silghtest attention to the two
jurors who were sitting on both sides of him. They were
usually appointed from among half-literate kolkhozniks, and
theirs was the role of dumb performers only. But they even
would be afraid to raise any objections, for the judge could
always sentence them to ten years in jail for insubordination,
and no complaints would help them.
For those who have not lived "over there," who have not
seen, and do not know what is being done in our native
country it is difficult to believe these things. But the writer
of these lines has seen, heard, and gone through all the "at-
tractions" of the socialist advance in those terrible years, and
is ready to testify under oath to the truth of his narrative.
Those atrocities in the South of Russia were committed
by the most faithful stalinists : by Nikita Khrushchev in the
Ukraine, by Lazar M. Kaganovich in the North Caucasus,
together with the secretary of the Kray Committee of VKP
(B) of the North Caucasus, Boris Sheboldayev, with the
chairman of the Kray Executive Committee of the North Cau-
casus, Larin, and the head of the political sector of the MTS
of the North Caucasus, Steingart. All of them met death be-
fore firing squadrons durin "Yezhovshchina" (the Yezhov
purges) without being tried at all, with the exception of
Kaganovich who remained invulnerable, and Khrushchev
who ascended the throne of the Kremlin in place of Stalin.
The worst atrocities were committed by the Kremlin can-
nibals in the stanitzass of the Kuban.
The Kuban stanitzas were depopulated. Many families
died from starvation, and their bodies were lying all around,
in the houses, in the yards, on the doorsteps since there was
no one around who could bury them. In accordance with
Kaganovich's decree the population of three stanitza's, P01-
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tavskaya, Umanskaya, and Urupskaya was exiled to the
North. Nobody was spared: neither old crippled people, nor
women, children, former red partisans, nor even the local
communists and their toadies. The reason was: they did not
work well in the kolkhoz, and some refused to join the kolkhoz
at all. Later Byelorussian Red Amy men and their families
moved into the empty houses, and the stanitzas were re-
named.
Some other stanitzas were put on the so-called "black
list". That meant that all food stuffs and other goods were
to be taken out of the stanitza without any delay; the em-
ployees were deprived of their ration tickets, and no one was
permitted to leave the place. Only special "closed distribution
stores" had all the necessary food and goods for the Kremlin
envoys, OGPU members, and communists. Railway and port
workers as well as tractor drivers were the only ones entitled
to some food rations.
Thus, for instance, stanitza Staroshcherbinovskaya,
Eiskiy Rayon, was put on the "black list" by the Kray Execu-
tive Committee. Immediately all the food stuffs, not only
grain and flour, but also beans, potatoes, red beets, etc. were
confiscated. Domestic animals and fowl had disappeared long
before. No traces were left of even cats and dogs in the stanit-
zas of the Kuban': all of them had been eaten.
After that Staroshcherbinovskaya was surrounded by
the OGPU troops, and they demanded from the starving
population to hand over a tremendous amount of grain pre-
sumably buried in the ground by the "kulak saboteurs". No-
body was permitted to leave the stanitzas for over a month.
Naturally there was no grain hidden in the ground but as a
result all the population was dead. The spring of 1933 began.
Decaying bodies were lying around in houses, on the streets.
Their stench floated over the once wealthy and flourishing
stanitza. Only later, special sanitary brigades arrived from
Rostov, cleared the place of dead bodies, and strew some
powder in the houses and streets to kill the stench.
At the very same time the Kuban grain was loaded for
26
export in the near-by port of Eisk (Staroshcherbinovskaya is
located 35 kilometers away from Eisk) day and night. The
same was going on in the ports of Novorossiysk, Tuapse,
Odessa, and others. The confiscated food products were ex-
ported abroad where they were sold at low prices for the sole
purpose of fulfilling "Stalin's export plan", to stuff the mar-
kets of the West with cheap Soviet grain, to cause an econ-
omic crisis there, and thus to advance the approach of the
international communist revolution. At the same time mil-
lions of the bodies of the starvation victims covered the vil-
lages and stanitzas in the South of their own country.
And nobody protested against that. Nobody raised a voice
against it either abroad or at home, and naturally the famine
has not been mentioned in any Soviet newspaper up to the
present.
As for the Democratic West, it was delighted with the
great "economic prosperity" in Soviet Russia. Never before
had so many food products been exported from "over there".
How could one help being delighted?!
And even before the six million dead bodies of the victims
of red cannibalism were removed from sight, the President
of the USA, F. D. Roosevelt, stretched over the ocean a hand
of "friendship" to the cannibals of the red Kremlin. Im-
mediately after the famine of 1933 the United States of
America recognized the USSR. Up to then there had been
no diplomatic relations between the USA and the USSR.
Maxim Litvinov came over to the USA, and was received by
Roosevelt in the pink room of the White House in the friend-
liest manner possible. It took them little time to come to
terms. The first Soviet political representative, Troyanovskiy,
was welcomed in the port of New York with 17 gun salvos!
Such welcome had not been accorded to any other foreign
ambassador in America before.
This is how the Kremlin cannibals strengthened their
"socialism". No despot in all the history of mankind scored
the heights of such barbarity. But . . . "one can trade even
with cannibals" as Lloyd George said once. So they began
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trading with them, and now the point has been reached when
they do not know how to save mankind from the red world
cannibalism . . . As for those who preach "coexistence," or at
the "Institutes of Chattering" chatter about the possible
revolution within the USSR, they are direct agents of the
cannibals of the red Kremlin. Even a child can see that under
modern dictatorships REVOLUTIONS ARE IMPOSSIBLE!
They cannot be carried out! Even if in communist Russia or
some other communist country somebody really ventured an
open opposition, such group of daring people would be
crushed at the very outset. Even in satellite countries this is
an impossible thing. The 1956 uprising in Hungary is a good
proof of it. As for Soviet Russia, no people's revolution will
ever break out there because under the modern Kremlin dic-
tatorship this is an impossibility. Whatever barbarity, famine,
terror and violence are committed in the country, however
great may be the internal dissatisfaction of every one there,
nobody will raise a dissenting voice for fear of others, in the
belief that nothing will come of it. This is how it has been
over there, and it will continue so until an external shock,
(and only an external one) will wake up the "sleeping bear of
all Russia." Whether we like it or not, only an armed in-
tervention from outside can save mankind from the menace
of communist tyranny. And if this does not happen now, it
will be too late a few years later, mankind may find itself in
the mouth of the red cannibals of the twentieth century.
VIII
In order to complete the picture of a Cossack woman in
the person of Olga Petrenko, we must go back to the thrice
cursed year of 1933.
In those terrible days Olga Petrenko alone with her four
year old son, Kolya was nearing the end of her days. Colza
oil cakes, burdok roots, beet root peels?everything had al-
ready been eaten. She had not heard a word from her hus-
band arrested by the OGPU men. Her only brother, the one
28
who welcomed her so enthusiastically on her return from the
Ural, had already died of starvation together with all his
family.
Kolya, all swollen, was lying in bed without any motion,
and even stopped begging for a "bit of bread". Olga, shadow-
like, kept moving about the room for fear of never getting up
again if she lay down. She stood motionless in front of the
window for hours recollecting her former wealthy, and care-
free life as a girl, her love for young Aleksey, her happy mar-
riage, the joy of the early days of their married life, songs
on June evenings in the vast steppes, the abundance of food,
and . . . looking around she shuddered at the horror of the
present. And now, having attained the final stage of moral
and physical suffering she felt brutal hatred pervade her
soul, hatred for everything and everybody alive.
She sat down in front of the child and stared at him for
a long time. Her look was glassy, fixed. She did not feel any
pity for her child. On the contrary something terrible, un-
natural was disturbing her reason. Jumping up, she, like one
demented, began rushing about the room. She broke the
glass in the windows, tore her threadbare clothes flinging
them all around.
Suddenly a knife lying on the floor caught her eye, and
reason left her completely. She shuddered, picked up the
knife, grasping it tight in her hand, and with a frightfully
distorted face she approached the child's bed. The reason
of this once kind woman forsook her, and she became a beast
of prey. Gnashing her teeth, Olga raised her hand and . . .
stuck the knife in her child's chest. . .
Kolya even did not cry out. He only opened his little
mouth for a second gave his mother an unusual fast fading
look, and closed his eyes for ever. That last look of his ex-
pressed pity and reproach, a mute appeal of dying, and a
farewell. . .
For a minute Olga was looking at the boy's body in
silence, then she gave a wild cry, snatched the knife out of
the deep bloodless wound, pressed her lips to it, and began
29
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kissing it whispering tender words of endearment which only
a mother can think of. But in a few moments her reason fled
again. She suddenly broke out in a savage laughter, and
screwed up her eyes with a mysterious mien. Slowly, with a
calm white, as if turned to stone face, she picked up the knife
from the floor, and as if by chance looked out of the window.
Nobody was in sight. In spite of her extreme weakness from
starvation Olga began moving around quite adroitly. She
made fire in the stove, put a pot with water on it. Moved by
the maddening instinct of hunger, she again picked up the
knife, went up to the body of her child, and. . .
Soon the commission of "twenty five thousand" which
was searching houses one after another looking for presum-
ably hidden grain came into her hut. At that time Olga was
"calmly"standing at the stove over a pot, cooking her "din-
ner" . . . She was arrested. . .
IX
The empty streets of the stanitza covered with tall weeds
and grass that was not mown down any more did not have
a trace of resemblance to their former flourishing appear-
ance. Gates and fences were gone. The dry spring wind was
sweeping through the empty uninhabited houses with their
broken windows and doors thrown ajar, and a few chance
survivers listened to it in sorrow and despondency. The dead
silence at nighttime was frightful: no dog ever barked, no
cat mewed, no cock crowed, as they used to. All of them were
eaten up, and nothing reminded of the gay songs of young
people that used to resound there.
Nevertheless, at that very same time there were well-fed
people in the stanitza as well, the privileged select few of the
"socialist construction". About two hundred party members,
forty militiamen and their families, the OGPU members, and
some others were entitled to buy the necessary food at the
"closed distribution stores". (By the way, in 1913 there had
been only one policeman in the stanitza, while in the thirties
30
there were over forty militiamen, and about ten OGPU mem-
bers).
The dungeons of the OGPU were still filled with dying
martyrs, residents of the stanitza. And the "people's courts"
continued their work like a machine set in motion.
So the families of this privileged society crowded into the
court room the day Olga's "case" was brought up before the
court.
"Here she is, here she is", cried people in the court room.
"I have heard that this woman lost her reason", said one
of the "twenty five thousand" who was standing near the
door. "Such people should not be brought before the court!
I remember in Moscow.. ."
"Oh, stop it! said another voice. We have not been sent
down here to pamper counter-revolutionary Cossacks. Not
all the laws can be applied to them nowadays. In Moscow,
yes, if a man is insane, he cannot be brought up before the
court but . . . here we cannot take it into consideration. We
must destroy all, the sane and the insane, and nobody can
find faults with that, for we are not going to have any medical
examinations in a sabotaging stanitza.. ."
"I just don't see why we need that trial", the first one
retorted. "There were so many cases of cannibalism, and
we did without trials. Actually there was no one that could
be tried: those who were devouring cadavers were not people
any more but insane ugly skeletons who themselves died soon
afterwards. And here, look! A trial before the court, and so
many of our own people were sent to attend!"
"It means it must be done that way. We must give evi-
dence of our being democratic from time to time! Possibly
someone from Rostov or even Moscow will turn up here, so
they want to show that there has been a single case of can-
nibalism, otherwise everything is just fine. . ."
This is how the people of the privileged society sent by
red Moscow to the Kuban to liquidate the "kulak sabotage"
were talking. They lived well even at that time although the
stanitza streets were covered with dead human bodies, the
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bodies of old people, children, and, to a lesser extent, women
because the latter proved to be hardier. The sight of those
unfortunate victims did not disturb the serpent's hearts of
the Bolshevist vampires sent down by the Kremlin. With
complete indifference they would step over the bodies of
women and children sneering or kicking them with their feet
in disgust.
Those who did not have the experience of actual famine
will never understand the psychology of a starving man.
There is nothing surprising in the fact that a man on the
point of death from starvation becomes worse than a beast
no matter how kind hearted he used to be. Insane and dying
people devoured their relatives who were on the verge of
death, and then died themselves.
And this happened not among savage cannibals in the
early times, but in the twentieth century, in the fertile and
once flourishing region of the Kuban, during the first "Stal-
inist Five Year Plan," during the building of socialism in
Russia. . .
Side by side with dying people, swollen with hunger, and
dead bodies of those who had starved to death, the "creators
of socialism" sent down by the Kremlin, and the local au-
thorities, were enjoying life on the stanitza as if nothing
extraordinary were happening . . .
It was they who flocked into the court room when the
"case" of Olga Petrenko was brought up before the court.
Olga followed by two militiamen was slowly approach-
ing the court house. Her long loose hair was hanging down
to her waist, from time to time covering her once beautiful
face. Her eyes had a dry savage gleam in them. She would
often stop, raise her bony arms, and make movements with
them as if she were protecting herself from the attack of
some unseen foe. She would back in horror but pushed by
the militiamen from behind would resume her slow progress.
She looked like a living skelton with just a glimmer of life
left in it. It was a frightful sight to see that pitiful and hor-
rible human ghost maimed by the evil will of the red Kremlin.
32
On entering the room she rested her elbows on the bar,
and swaying back and forth, stood looking around unable
to understand what was happening.
"Olga Petrenko", began judge Vennikov, red-cheeked
and fat like a pig. "You are accused of a crime which has not
even been provided for in the articles of the Criminal Code
of the RSFSR?cannibalism. Do you plead guilty?"
Olga was silent. Vennikov repeated his question.
Suddenly Olga shuddered, waved her hands in a par-
oxysm of despair, her eyes staring fixedly at the corner, and
screamed wildly:
"Aaah! Aaah! Kolya! Ko-o-lya!! I . . ."
And she . . . tumbled down.
A militiaman came up to her, kicked her with his foot,
then pulled her up by the hand but she did not move. Olga
was dead. . .
X
This is a true story of one family only, of the family of
an honest Cossack husbandman Mikhail Tarasovich Petren-
ko. But how many millions of honest toilers of Southern
Russia fell victims to the tyranny of the Kremlin commu-
nism-fascism in the years of the building of "socialism"?
Future historians will tell the world about it sometime, and
for many and many centuries to come the terrible truth of
the facts unknown to the world, like a nightmare, will haunt
the descendents of those who saw "socialism at work".
This is how "socialism" has been built in one sixth part
of our planet (in Russia), this is how it will be built in all the
countries to which communism has already come, or will
come.
Let this true story of the eyewitness serve as a grave
warning to all those who hope to "coexist" with the robber
band from the red Kremlin, and to all those who believe that
communism does not threaten the life of Western states.
Can the peoples of free democracies want to go through
the experiences narrated in this sketch?
Come to your senses before it is too late! . . .
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A MONUMENT ON THE DRAVA RIVER
(A Historical Sketch)
(This is a true story of how in 1945 the Western States
forcibly handed over to the Bolshevists more than 100,000
Cossacks and other irreconciliable fighters against Bol-
shevism.)
(Abridged) .
Deaths of hundreds of thousands of Cossacks before firing
squadrons, in the artificially created famine of 1932-33, the
terrible repressions during the period of the nationalization
of kulaks property and forced collectivization, and other in-
stances of communist lawlessness in the Cossack stanitzas
of the North Caucasus caused the population of these stanit-
zas leave their native country, and follow the German army
into the unknown.
After the break through on the Stalingrad front, when
the Germans began to retreat from the territory of the North
Caucasus at the end of January 1943, Cossacks and their
families left their homes not only in Kubanskaya Oblast but
also in Stavropolskaya Oblast, on the Terek, and in the high-
land republics of the North Caucasus.
In doing that they were motivated by the reasons men-
tioned above.
Dozens of thousands of families left their homes, and,
driving in their own or other people's horse carts, set out for
the unknown together with the retreating German troops.
34
Over one hundred thousand refugees left the North Caucasus
alone, without counting the people from the Don region.
In the Ukraine the evacuated Cossacks were formed into
the regiments of the Kuban Cossacks. In spring 1943 two
Kuban Cossack regiments, mostly of single Cossacks, were
formed in the vicinity of Kherson. Those Cossacks who had
families, and who arrived in thousands of horse carts, set up
their quarters not only around the city of Kherson but also
in other villages and towns of the Ukraine. . .
Besides the two Kuban Cossack regiments, the Don and
the Terek Cossack regiments were formed as well.
Later on, in the town of Mlava (Poland) the first Cossack
division was formed with the regiments that had been formed
before. The division was put under the command of the Ger-
man Colonel Helmut von Pannwitz who was immediately pro-
moted to the rank of general . . .
The Eastern Ministry had a special department Kosaken-
leitstelle for the Cossacks from the Don, the Kuban, and the
Terek, or, rather for all the Cossacks and their families who
had left the North Caucasus at the retreat of the German
army. This organization was located in Berlin and was
headed by Doctor N. Himpel, a German by origin, but born
and educated in Petersburg. Having a perfect command of
the Russian language, he was able to render a considerable
help to the evacuated Cossacks and their families, and en-
couraged old and new Cossack social workers to take part in
that work. He immediately got in touch with General P.
Krasnov, and invited him to take charge of Cossack affairs.
Actually it was Dr. Himpel who organized the Main Admini-
stration of the Cossack Troops which came into being in ac-
cordance with the special order issued by the General of the
volunteer troops of March 31, 1944, which ran:
"BY THE GENERAL OF THE VOLUNTEER TROOPS
The organization of the Main Administration of the Cos-
sack Troops has been approved.
35
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TheMain Administration of the Cossack Troops has been
organized for the purpose of representing Cossacks before
the German Command, and for safeguarding their interests.
It consists of the following persons:
General P. Krasnov, Head of the Administration
General V. Naumenko
Colonel S. Pavlov
Colonel Kulakov
Kestering
March 31, 1944
Cavalry General . . ."
This order is a clear evidence that the Main Administra-
tion was organized not for serving in the German army but.
for safeguarding the Cossack interests before the German
Command, and it was exactly what it did during the time of
its existence. . .
By the end of 1943 all the evacuated Cossacks and their
families were concentrated in Western Byelorussia around
Novogrudki and Baranovichi.
The Unified Cossack Camp was headed by the Campaign
Ataman, Colonel S. Pavlov. The troop senior officer T. I.
Domanov was Chief-of-Staff.
In spring 1944 the Headquarters of the Cossack Camp
was located in the town of Novogrudki, by that time the
majority of people was concentrated there, when a great mis-
fortune suddenly befell the Cossacks: Ataman S. Pavlov was
killed on June 17, 1944. . .
After Pavlov's death his deputy, senior officer Timofey
Ivanovich Domanov, a Cossack from the stanitza of Migulen-
skaya, of the Great Don Army, was appointed the Camp
Ataman.
But the Cossack Camp did not remain in Western Byelo-
russia, around Novogrudki and Baranovichi, long. The Ger-
man army was suffering defeat in the East, and was corn-
36
pelled to retreat fighting all the way. When the Red Army
was approaching Poland, the whole camp had to decamp, and
retreat further west, its file of carts stretching 15 or 20 kilo-
meters long.
In accordance with the agreement between the German
and the Italian governments and a corresponding permission,
the refugees of the Cossack camp, and the Cossack reserve
regiments, occupied the territory of North Italy particularly
badly infested with anti-German partisans.
Since the Cossacks received the permission to settle there
from the German governor of the Trieste region, Obergrup-
penfuehrer Globochnik, the Cossacks were immediately or-
dered to fight against all anti-German partisans: Tito men,
Grribaldi men, Badoglio men, etc.
In accordance with Globochnik's order the residents of
Italian villages, who were considered unreliable politically,
were moved out, and the Cossacks, mainly the Cossacks of
the Don Army, moved into their houses. In the places where
the Cossacks from the Kuban, the Terek, and from Stavropol
were housed, the local residents were not moved out of their
houses but had to make room for the Cossacks in their homes.
Although until then, the Campaign Ataman was under
the orders from the Main Administration of the Cossack
Tr000s, on moving into Italy, he became fully subordinated to
Obergruppenfuehrer Globochnik from whom he now took
orders and received remuneration in money and in kind.
At first the center of the Campaign Ataman was located
in Gemona, later it moved to Tolmezzo, while the Cossack
families stayed where they were: in Oleso, Covazzo, etc.
At the end of April, 1945, the town of Oleso was severely
bombed by British airplanes. Many residents of the defense-
less town, women, children, old people, mostly civilians, were
killed in the air raid. Beginning with that day the "Cossack
Land" in North Italy grew "shaky". Cossack families began
to head North leaving everything behind, without asking
anybody's permission. In short, that air raid of Oleso by
British airplanes started the "Great Exodus" of the Cossack
37
-zr
Co0
0
CD
0
0
0
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0
0
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0
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refugees from North Italy infested with partisans and hostile
to everybody who was under the German flag.. .
They set out at nighttime, jumping out of beds, har-
nessed their horses to carts, and drove away. Those who had
no horses set out on foot, through Tolmezzo, and farther on
into the unknown. They were walking in a downpour. It was
raining heavily day and night at that time, and water was
coming in buckets on the heads of the outcasts. It was especi-
ally hard for those who had no horses, no transportation of
any kind. They not only carried their suitcases, but some
pulled hand-drawn carts, or baby carriages with small child-
ren in them.
All along the road drove and walked the remnants of
Cossack regiments, women, children, old people, crip-
ples, and those wounded who could somehow move on.
III
Thus, at the end of April and the beginning of May, 1945,
the tragic march of the Cossack Camp refugees from North
Italy to Austria had commenced.
. . . All along the winding road from the town of Poluzze
up to the village of Timau, the last one in North Italy there
stretched a file of horse carts and pedestrians of the Cos-
sack Camp, all heading North-East. It was raining heavily all
the time. The sky seemed to have opened its troughs, and
was mercilessly pouring down upon the multitude of the
Cossack families going North for several days without a single
break. A steep ascent of 30-40? began beyond the village of
Timau stretching some 10 kilometers toward the Italian-
Austrian border.
In that pass, two kilometers above the sea level, the rain
changed to snow, the wind began to blow, and a regular snow
storm broke out. On both the sides of the road along which
the refugees were driving and walking, deep snow drifts piled
up alongside of steep ravines. People and horses often fell into
38
those drifts, and many, overpowered by fatigue, did not rise
any more, disappeared in the snow without any traces, and
remained for ever to lie in the strange country, in its moun-
tains.
Later, several weeks afterwards, the Titoist "heroes"
cleared the road of the dead bodies of horses and people lying
along the road that came to sight after the snow had melted.
With disgust they threw the bodies down into the deep ravine.
The people in that long stretching file looked upon every-
thing with complete indifference. Apathy took hold of every-
body. . .
The file was several kilometers long: people were driving
their horse carts or walking, a few pulled hand-drawn carts
or baby carriages with small children in them. All were going
into the unknown, heading toward the Italian-Austrian bor-
der trying to escape the Stalinist-Titoist hords.
Shrieks of despair, moans, the neighing of horses that fell
down exhausted and had to be shot, curses were heard on
that tragic march of the Cossack refugees. At the height of
2500 meters above the sea level, in the midst of the snow
storm, that cold night of May 3, 1945, an unforgettable tragic
scene took place. They were approaching the summit of the
Alpine pass which is a natural boundary between Italy and
Austria. It was close to midnight.
"Oh, Lord! Why art Thou trying us so severely? What
have we broken to deserve such suffering, oh Lord!" wailed
an old Cossack woman from the Kuban.
Suddenly, in the lull in the storm, a loud voice of a Cos-
sack was heard:
"Brothers, but this is Maundy Thursday night!"
Everybody stopped at once as if benumbed. That same
Cossack who had reminded the people of our Lord's Passion
jumped up upon a cart, and taking off his cap began singing
the hymn of the "Wise Robber" in a powerful baritone voice.
All at once two more Cossacks appeared out of the dark-
39
Approved For Release 2002/08/21 : CIA-RDP80601676R003600060084-7
ness, jumped up upon the cart, and joined in the singing.
Their tenor voices echoed the lead of the baritone as he sang
"Make me worthy oh, Lord. . . ""Me, too", sang solo the bari-
tone. "Me, too", repeated the tenors. "Upon the wooden
cross . . ."sobbed the baritone. "Upon the wooden cross . . ."
wept the tenors. "Enlighten me and save me!"
Even the storm subsided as if listening to the singing of
the holy hymn, and only snow flakes were slowly descending
on the bare heads of the people standing there still and silent.
It is difficult to describe this unforgetable scene which
has remained unknown to the rest of the world: several
thousand people, refugees from the Bolshevist butchery in
the Cossack regions, were standing bare-headed in the snow
storm, in the dead of night, high up the Alpine pass,listening
to the singing of the "Wise Robber" which was echoed by a
mountainous stream running somewhere below in the ravine.
At that moment everything was forgotten: the misfor-
tune that befell them, their own suffering, the uncertain
future. Several Cossacks who had been swearing incessantly
became quiet. In that mountain pass, on the snow covered
road, in the darkness of the night there rose before their eyes
He who had done no evil but was crucified and died a tor-
turous death at the hands of ungrateful people.
The hymn the "Wise Robber" was repeated thrice by that
beautiful but unknown trio. Never before had the Alpine
peaks heard such divinely beautiful singing of the holy hymn,
at such a late hour. After a moment's pause the same Chris-
tian warriors sang gently "Glory to Thy long patience, oh,
Lord", and then silently descended from the cart. It began
snowing heavily again. The storm increased in violence.
"Well, in God's name, move on!" said an old man who
was walking on foot. The people, silent, resumed their march
toward the Austrian border.
"Come, old man, get up onto my cart, I'll make room for
you," said to that old man a Cossack who was sitting on a
cart, and who until then had refused to take any one on.
Everything seemed to have transformed. People began
helping those who were pulling their carts, offering a lift to
exhausted women who had to walk, all of their own accord.
Some, doubtful of the strength of their horses, jumped down
from their carts offering room on them to the people who
were walking on foot saying: "I have been sitting long
enough, now you get on the cart, and rest a little!"
They were moving along in almost complete silence now,
their heads bent low. All of them were recollecting other Holy
Nights at home when they, or rather their fathers, would
come home from church carrying lighted candles. Those
would return to their own homes, knowing no fear, no need
to flee. And now these people were on the way to the unknown
Austria, fleeing a merciless foe, but still hoping to see the day
when they would be able to celebrate these holidays again,
but differently?at home, in their own country freed from
red fascism.
That was midnight of May 4, 1945, the Holy Thursday
night of Passion week. A sad night of torment it was for the
refugees from the Cossack regions who had left their homes
of their free will, or against it.
But at that time these people did not expect that the
greatest tragedy to happen to them was yet to come some-
what later, in four weeks.
IV
After the evacuation from North Italy, the people of the
Cossack Camp gathered in the vicinity of the town of Lienz
in the Austrian province of Carinthia. The Cossack regiments
and their transport as well as some units of the North Cau-
casus Mountaineer regiments encamped along the left bank
of the Drava, South-East of Lienz, down up to the town of
Oberdrauburg. Those who had families as well as the em-
ployees, the wounded and the sick were housed in the numer-
ous barracks of the Camp of Peggetz.
40 41
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Approved For Release 2002/08/21 : CIA-RDP80601676R003600060084-7
Over fifteen thousand refugees from the North Caucasus,
Cossacks and their families, as well as non-Cossacks (Cau-
casian Highlanders, Kalmuks, Ukrainians, etc.) were housed
in the Peggetz Camp.
At the outset, up to the second half of May, Cossacks and
their families remained under the authority of their own
Atamans, and lived without any restrictions of their freedom.
But all of a sudden, on May 27, on Sunday, at noon, a
strict order was issued: all officers and others in possession
of firearms had to hand them over without any delay! The
failure to comply with the order carried with it a death sen-
tence. . . This order of the British Command was complied
with incontestably within an hour.
At Domanov's Headquarters it was said that disorderly
conduct of some cutthroats, mainly from among Caucasian
nationals, was the reason for the general disarmament. Other
officers of the Peggetz Camp also took it calmly saying:
"After all we are British prisoners of war. How can a war
prisoner be permitted to run around with a gun at his side?
Who has ever heard such a thing? . ."
And naturally the majority agreed with this reasoning...
Lieutenant-Colonel Andrey Shkuro was taken by the
British on May 26 in an unknown direction for some kind of
"explanation". As it came out later, he was arrested on the
demand of the Soviets. . . But nobody knew about it on the
day of disarmament, and everything was quiet. . .
But on the same day, May 27, Major Davis of the British
General Headquarters, accompanied by his aide, came to see
General Domanov with the request that all the officers of
his Headquarters should assembly in the places of their en-
campment by 1 p.m., on May 28, to be taken for a conference
with the Commander of the British Eighth Army, General
Alexander.
On May 28, about noon, an order was issued by Doma-
nov's Headquarters for the Camp of Peggetz commanding
all officers and military employees to draw up in accordance
42
with their regiments: The Don, the Kuban, and the Terek
regiments, by 1 p.m. to be taken in British trucks to a "con-
ference" which was to take place somewhere about twenty
kilometers South of Lienz. Presumably, the Commander of
the Eighth Army, General Alexander himself, wanted to
speak to the Cossack officers.
When some became doubtful, and asked the officer who
had arrived from the Headquarters whether it would be safe
for all of them to go, he said:
"This is an order: all officers and employees are to go.
Pyotr Nikolayevich himself told our officers that he trusted a
British officer just as he would trust his own self.An officer of
His Majesty, the King of Great Britain could not give his
"word of honor," and then break it. If the British Command
found it necessary to have such conference, then it had to
be so. And one should not spread absurd rumors about dis-
honesty of the British."
Well, if the "old man," as General Pyotr Krasnov was
called by many, said that, then there was no reason for doubt-
ing because many people (and all people from the Don) held
Petr Nikolayevich in a great esteem. . .
Many officers of the Peggetz Camp took the news as a
special honor for themselves, and dressed up in their best.
The officers of the Kuban and the Terek units put on their
Circassian national coats, and tall fur caps long treasured
and carefully packed in their lockers, the officers of the Don
units put on their Cossack uniforms. All were clean shaven
and wore their gala uniforms.
By 1 p.m. all the officers and military employees (that
its almost all of them) formed up on the square of the Camp
Peggetz, and then marched toward the North Gate where
British trucks were waiting for them. The Don officers were
marching at the head, followed by those from the Kuban'
under the command of colonel Lukyanenko. Then came the
Terek Army under the command of Colonel Zimin who was
particularly anxious that his officers should display proper
uniforms and good military bearing.
43
And. . . over two thousand Cossack officers and military
employees got into British military trucks, and under the
escort of British machine guns set out for the "confer-
? ence",.
?zr
co Both the officers who left, and their families, were told
by an English officer that they would be back by nightfall.
But they did not come back either by nightfall, nor in the
night, nor on the next day. Alarming rumors began to spread
in the camp: "The British have betrayed us! It was a trap
? for our officers, not a "conference". . .
A day later it became known that several officers who
went to the "conference," writer Tarussky among them, had
committed suicide.
"But why?" people in the camp asked one another.
co
a_ "They are being handed over to the Bolshevists", was a
0
? surmise.
And that surmise proved to be a terrible reality.
C7) The trucks (over fifty of them) which were taking the
Cossack officers to the "Conference" were stopped fifteen
? kilometers South of Lienz, and surrounded by British light
co
0 tanks. Under the escort of these tanks the officers were
CN1
0 brought to the town of Spital (69 kilometers South-East of
0
CN1 Lienz). In Spital they were driven into barracks surrounded
w by a tall triple fence of barbed wire, and were heavily guarded.
to
co ? Only then did the Cossack officers understand that they had
? been trapped. In the evening a loudspeaker announced in
? Russian: "Tomorrow at six all of you will leave for your
&_
o homeland!"
u_
-a All were terrorstricken. They could not believe such
treachery. At that time none of those who were in the Cos-
? sack Camp knew that their extradition to the Bolshevists
a_
a- had been decided upon already at the Yalta Conference of
? the "Big Three": the United States, Great Britain, and the
1 The author describes here the setting out for the "conference" from
the Camp of Peggetz only. He does not touch upon the departure of officers
from Domanov's Headquarters, and other places.
44
Soviet Union. But as it became known later, even at the Yalta
Conference of the "Big Three," it was decided to repatriate
compulsorily only former Soviet citizens but not "old" emi-
grants who had lived for 25 years in Yugoslavia, France, Bul-
garia, and other countries of Western Europe, and who had
even acquired the citizenship of those countries. So the
British outdid themselves in their attempts to please "Uncle
Joe".
Several officers, while in Spital, made an attempt to get
separated from former Soviet citizens. They wanted to pre-
pare lists of "white emigrants." But Pyotr Krasnov did not
permit it. He placed too much faith in the "word of honor"
of an officer of the British Crown. Even after they had been
put behind the barbed wire in Spital, after all of them had
been searched and placed under a heavy guard, General P.
Krasnov kept saying:
"I can't believe it is a treachery on the part of the Bri-
tish! Don't pay any attention to the rumors spread by panic-
mongers. We had to expect that. The aftermath of the war
and our activity. . . Today at the conference everything will
be explained and settled. .."
But for this firm belief on the part of General Krasnov,
and other generals in the officer of His British Majesty, the
tragedy of the Cossack officers would have been tenfold less.
Had they but said openly that in our time one could not
rely on the "word of honor" of an officer, things would have
been different. But when everything became clear, it was
much too late to do anything. Even P. Krasnov's petition to
"His Majesty," King George VI, written by him in French,
did not do any good.
On May 29, 1945, all of them, "the old" and "the new"
were forced with the butts of the guns into trucks, severely
beaten, and under a heavy guard brought to the location of
the Soviet troops in Judenburg beyond the bridge across the
Mur River. It was on that bridge that the Cossack officers
deceived and betrayed by the "word of honor" of the British
were handed over to the Bolshevists. Among those officers
45
Approved For Release 2002/08/21 : CIA-RDP80601676R003600060084-7
were such well-known anti-Bolshevists as the generals?Pyotr
Krasnov, Semyon Krasnov, Andrey Shkuro, T. Domanov,
Golovko, Tikhotzky, Salamakhin, Vasilyev, and hundreds
of other senior officers of the Cossack regiments. No atten-
tion was paid to the fact that Lieutenant-General Andrey
Shkuro had been decorated with the highest British order by
the King. The Western allies placed more value on the friend-
ship and good will of Stalin than on the decorations received
from the King. Anything, only not to hurt the feelings of the
Kremlin rulers, and damn the rest. . .
While being driven across the bridge several officers suc-
ceeded in jumping out, and dashing themselves to death
against the rocky river bed. Several were accorded the usual
"humane" Bolshevist treatment, and were shot to death
while still in Judenburg. Others were sent to hard labor
camps where the majority of elder officers died of overwork,
starvation, and inhuman maltreatment.
The generals: P. Krasnov, S. Krasnov, T. Domanov, A.
Shkuro, Von Pannvitz, who joined the Cossack officers in
Judenburg, Sultan-Ghirey, Klych, after being tortured for
a long time in the Lubyanka jail in Moscow, were sentenced
to death by hanging. All of them were executed in January,
1947. . .
V
The extradition of the officers of the Cossack Camp was
carried out by the British with the aim of depriving the Cos-
sack Camp of its leadership. It was only the beginning of
their rough justice meted out to all Cossack families and all
the people who had escaped the Bolshevists, and found them-
selves together with the Cossacks.
Two days after the officers had been taken out of the
Camp, on May 30, a large covered truck followed by two light
tanks drove into the Camp of Peggetz, and the loudspeaker
announced the terrible news:
"The day after tomorrow all of you will start for your
homeland! Get your things ready, all of you!
46
All the refugees who heard the announcement shouted
in reply:
"We won't go!"
In a moment all to a man gathered on the Camp square
without any order for it. Unanimously the Camp declared a
hunger strike. The food, when it arrived from the British,
was not accepted, and was piled up near the fence. Black
flags were hoisted on all the barracks, gates, and even on the
pile of food. Slogans in the English language saying some-
thing to the effect: "WE PREFER DEATH TO THE RETURN
TO THE SOVIET UNION!" were put up where they could
be well seen.
New officers were elected instead of those who had left
for the "conference." A young smart Don Cossack, Kuzma
Polunin, was elected temporary deputy of the Ataman.
He called meetings several times a day.
"Brothers, we shall hold our own!" Kuzma would say.
"We will, we will," the Cossacks would answer him in
unison.
"They just want to scare us", he would say. "But don't
let them scare you. The British are civilized people, they
won't hand us over to the Bolshevists against our will! These
are only threats to scare us but later they will be glad we
remained firm, and will thank us for it. Our officers have
also sent us a word from Spital to hold our own, and to re-
main united, and nobody will hand us over. Our officers, too,
can come back now any day. . ."
Did Kuzma mean what he was saying being influenced
by various provocateurs who prowled around the Camp, or
was maybe he carrying out "somebody's" orders? The day
he was saying this all the officers who had been in Spital
were handed over to the Bolshevist inquisitors but no one in
the Camp knew anything about it.
In the large Camp church mass was said day and night.
Thousands received absolution and Holy Communion.
Head of the clergy of the Cossack Camp, archpriest,
Father Vasiliy Grigoriyev said several times from the pulpit:
47
"We have sent a petition to the King of England. Maybe
at this very moment while we are standing here, the King
is reading our petition, and surely he will not disregard our
r? appeal. As you know we have written in it that we are against
?cr those who shot to death a relative of the English King, the
co
0
0 Emperor of All-Russia, Nikolay Aleksandrovich. . . And surely
0 not only the next days but the next hours may bring us a
0 favorable solution of our predicament. . ."
0
co
co) The petition had been read in church before all the peo-
ple. It was written rather well and truthfully, but it is quite
? evident that it never got farther than Lienz, or maybe even
the office of the Camp Peggetz.
And what would it have helped even had the petition
? been indeed forwarded to King George VI in London? At
0
co that time all Western statesmen glorified the "great Uncle
a_
? Joe". Churchill's wife wrote an elegant little booklet in praise
ck of "our great friend", Stalin, and presented him with an
initialed penholder with a golden pen, and wrote to him on
that occasion: "I hope that you, our dear friend, will write
with this pen many a friendly letter to my husband. . ."
co On May 31 Major Davis, the British Commandant, de-
dared officially:
C?1
0 "Tomorrow all of you must leave for your home country!"
0
C4 He did not pay any attention to the loud cries of protest.
cv
to At the Cossack meeting in the evening of May 31, it
w was decided that on June, at 5 a. m. all the inmates of the
111) Camp would gather on the Camp square for a solemn mass.
&- ? Nobody was to stay behind in the barracks: the old and the
u- young, the sick and invalids, all were to appear for the gene-
? ral prayer. Strong Cossacks were to help the cripples and the
8 sick. At that meeting an old Cossack climbed the platform,
t and exclaimed heatedly: "Brothers! Seven hundred years
o.
ago when Tartar hords overran Russia, even they, Tartar con-
querors, did not disturb people at prayers. When they came
to a church where people were praying, they always waited
for the end of the service before they attacked. Can it be that
now, in the twentieth century representatives of the civilized
48
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English nation will be more savage than the Tartars of the
thirteenth century? Can it be that they will disturb our
4 prayers? Never! . ."
co
All were quite certain that the British would never use
violence against peaceful unarmed people only in order to
0 satisfy a bloody tyrant, next in succession to Hitler?Joseph
Dzhugashvili.
0 . . . On June 1, 1945, as early as 6 a. m. church service
was already in progress on the square of the Camp Peggetz.
Two large choirs were singing. Twelve priests led by Father
(7) Vladimir N., and three deacons were officiating. All inmates
of the Camp to the last man gathered around the primitive
platform in the center of which stood a communion table
co
a_ with all the necessary church plate and the Holy Com-
munion upon it. In half an hour columns of unarmed Cos-
ck
sacks from the regiments located with their horses and
carts along the Drava River entered the square from the
South. They came with their regiment priests carrying
pendants with holy images, singing Easter hymns, and
joined the crowd praying on the square.
At 7 a. m. several dozens of military trucks entered
the square and stopped near the crowd at prayer. All un-
derstood that the trucks had come for them. Young Cos-
sacks grasping one another's hands formed a cordon around
cv
Tv the praying crowd to prevent anybody being taken by the
British for repatriation to the USSR. They still believed in
&_
the victory of their firmness. To demonstrate their solid-
arity Cossacks (unarmed) stood guard the whole night on
the bridge across the Drava not to permit any weakling to
&_ slip out into the forest beyond the river, and to be able to
o.
o. show up in force on the Camp square.
At 7.30 a car with the British Commandant, Major
Davis, and Ataman Kuzma in it drove up close to the crowd.
Both looked at the service in silence for a couple of
minutes, and drove away. But apparently Lieutenant-
Colonel Malcholm, head of the Lienz garrison, who was in
charge of the extradition of the Cossack refugees, had a
51
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different order. About ten minutes later after Major Davis
and Ataman Kuzma had left, two platoons of British
soliders armed with machine-guns, automatic rifles and
thick wooden clubs approached the praying crowd from
North-East and North-West, and formed a cordon around
it. They came up at the singing of "Our Father." The
Holy Communion began, and suddenly. . . shrieks, screams,
and groans. The soldiers in the uniforms of His British
Majesty rushed from both the sides upon the defenseless
crowd, and began hitting right and left, women and child-
ren, with their clubs and rifle butts. At the same time ma-
chine-guns placed at the corners of the square began shoot-
ing aiming a little over the heads of the people. The com-
munion table was overturned, the icons and church plate
fell on the ground. The soldiers knocked down men, women,
children that were closest to them, and threw them into
the trucks as if they were logs. One of the deacons, a smallish
man with a red beard, was seized by the legs and thrown
into the truck just as he was in his vestments as if he were
a block of wood, and he was driven away.
The cordon of young Cossacks who had formed a "pro-
tective" wall around the fifteen thousand people was broken
through. Those who would not submit, who tried to resist,
were beaten till they lost their senses, and even bayonetted.
The human avalanche swept toward the Southern fence
which fell down at once under the pressure of the crowd.
Women and children trodden down in the rush were scream-
ing but the running crowd did not pay any attention to
them.*
The roaring Drava was rolling near the Camp. There
was a narrow wooden bridge across it. The crowd made for
the bridge beyond which there was a forest, and farther on,
* The scene of the forced repatriation of Cossacks and their fa-
milies carried out on the orders of the British government in Lienz
on June 1, 1945, as painted by S. Korolkov, is reproduced on the
cover.
52
mountains which could offer asylum. But the way to the
bridge was cut off by the fire of British snipers. And here
hundreds of panic-stricken people began jumping into the
roaring river. The turbid devilish whirlpool of the Drava
overflowing with spring floods swallowed its victims. People
would run up to the steep bank, cross themselves hurriedly,
jump down into the percipitous whirlpool, and disappear
in it in a moment for ever.
These scenes are not to be forgotten: a young woman,
all disheveled, with two small children, came running to
the bank. A hurried hug of the mother, and one of the
girls was hurled into the roaring precipice. The other girl,
clinging to her mother's skirt was crying pitifully: "Mummy,
don't, mummy, I'm scared!"
"Don't be afraid! I am coming with you!" cried the
mother losing her reason. A jerk . . . and the second child
went flying into the swift waves. Then she raised her hand
to cross herself: "Oh, Lord, have mercy on my sinful soul!"
and before her hand touched her left shoulder, she jumped
after the children. And the roaring waves swallowed her at
once . . .
"We prefer death to the return to the Soviet Union!"
This was written not only on posters but in everybody's
heart.
The British soldiers stopped shooting, and watched
those "interesting" for them scenes of suicide in surprise
and bewilderment. An endless number of such scenes can
be described. The Catholic cathedral in Lienz hoisted a black
flag, and a bell began to toll. All at once, as if by a signal,
the bells of all churches began to toll. They were tolling an
alarm . . .
A tank platoon which was driving in a file along the left
bank of the Drava, checked the crowd. The people rushed
back but there were tanks behind them, too (and those
against women and children!). Finding themselves sur-
rounded they stopped not knowing what to do. Somebody
shouted: "On your knees!" in a moment everybody was
53
kneeling. Someone began singing: "Christ is risen. .", and
the whole multi-thousand crowd joined in the singing of
r-r this Easter hymn in a unanimous impulse.
?zr It is impossible to describe that scene: a kneeling crowd
cc)
g of fifteen thousand people surrounded by the British tanks
:13 in an open field between the camp and the roaring river
singing in unison "Christ is risen . . ."
co
This singing and kneeling calmed the people somewhat
g down. The British soldiers, too, stood at some distance,
ci"Ce watching the interesting scene, and did not touch any-
body.
The people did not try to get to the river any more but
M stood still looking with horror around at the tanks with the
co gun muzzles aiming at them.
a_
Nobody knows how many people from the Peggetz Camp
Cc were swallowed by the roaring Drava that day. According
< to some information, about 400 people were drowned, while
Cr)
Austrians insisted that they had picked up over 600 corpses
c7i near another bridge, 5 kilometers South of Peggetz, two days
co after the incident. The corpses were of both sexes, and of
c--q various age.
The crowd remained surrounded by the tanks in the
0
C4 field till 2 p. m. Nobody was permitted to leave till that time.
cv
to The sun was very hot. All were thirsty. Many fainted be-
ns
w cause of thirst and beatings administered to them.
Tv In the afternoon some women succeeded in persuading
&_ the British soldiers to permit them to fetch some water.
u_ ? Some members of medical profession gave first aid to those
v who were in need of is as far as it was possible under the
> ? circumstances. Doctor Vera Petrovna Kasinova-Razuvayeva
t who is now living in Argentina was particularly helpful
a and efficient in attending to the sick.
After 2 p. m. the tanks began leaving one by one. Here
and there the British soldiers were still standing with their
automatic guns but they seemed to be paying no attention
to the people any more, and did not prevent them from leav-
ing the square. And the people began to scatter little by
54
little. Some made for the forest, others for the distant moun-
tains, and some dragged themselves back to their barracks
in the Camp.
The dead bodies, two babies trodden to death under foot
among them, remained lying in the square of the Peggetz
Camp, where the massacre had taken place, up to the even-
ing. The International Red Cross was said not to permit to
bury the bodies while some "investigation" was carried out.
Others said on some authority that it was done on the re-
quest of reporters from some newspapers who wanted to have
interesting snapshots for their papers . . .
The cadets who were staying some distance away from
the Camp of Peggetz were surrounded and repatriated to the
Soviet Union . . .
Those people who went back to their barracks, mostly
refugees from the Soviet Union, were repatriated forcibly to
their "homeland" a few days after the tragedy of the first
of June. The people became so apathetic, so indifferent to
their fate that they showed almost no resistance.
Over fifteen thousand Cossacks, those faithful allies of
the West, were delivered up to the Soviet Union.
And nobody said a word in their defense at that time:
neither Russians living in America and Europe, nor news-
papers, nor any organizations.
At the time when the British soldiers were bayonetting
the defenseless crowd, and were throwing bleeding people
into the freight cars to be delivered up, Churchill was in-
censing before his friend Stalin, praising him to the skies.
Gay parties were given in Dzhugashvili's honor all over Eng-
land, Lady Churchill wrote panegyrics to unforgetable uncle
Joe, and sent him valuable gifts . . .
Even the British people were disgusted with Churchill's
toadyism before the Kremlin, and kicked him out of office,
electing the Labor Party leader ? Attlee. The victor was
rejected by his own people. Why9 9 9
The British treated the Caucasian Highlanders who
were staying a little farther south from Lienz just as cruelly.
55
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With the same mean treachery did the British deliver up the
15th Cavalry Corps (Cossacks) together with its Commander
General von Pannwitz. The latter expressed the wish to share
the fate of the troops he was in charge of, and refused to
take advantage of his being a German national.
And how many Cossacks perished in those days in the
Alps, and near Suvorov's Cross, while escaping from the
pursuit of the British? How many of them committed sui-
cide in the forest? In accordance with the data of the Red
Cross, about a hundred bodies of Cossacks who had hanged
themselves were taken down from the trees.
They preferred death to the return to the Soviet Union!
This was written on posters on the Camp of Peggetz, and
they did as they said. . .
VI
Several months after the butchery described here Rus-
sians who live in the district of Peggetz, with the permission
of the British Commandant, Major Richards, erected the
first modest monument to the victims of June 1, 1945.
Six years later after that horrible misdeed, Cossacks who
remained in Austria, with the help of other refugees from
communism, erected another, more imposing monument.
The golden letters on the monument say:
TO COSSACKS ? VICTIMS OF JUNE 1, 1945
A small orthodox cemetery, in the center of which the
monument stands, is located on the left bank of the Drava,
quite close to the place where the Camp used to be. The
cemetery is a square 14 by 14 meters. In the middle of that
square stands the monument fenced in by a wire enclosure
supported by concrete posts.
Both, the cemetery and monument are kept up in excel-
lent order reminding the world of that criminal mistake
which was committed by the British who cruelly did away
with their best allies in the struggle against communism
56
Monument to the Cossacks and their families,
victims of the forcible repatriation, killed on
June 1, 1945, located in the Orthodox Cemetery
in Lienz (Austria).
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by delivering them forcibly into the hands of the red Krem-
lin
On August 15, 1951, Archbishop Stephen of Austria, now
?zr living in Salzburg, together with the local clergy, at a solemn
co
service, blessed this second monument to the victims of
June 1, 1945 . . .
Thus, the "Valley of Death" in Carinthia claimed new
Cossack victims in our seemingly "civilized" twentieth
century.
* * *
In many other places, not in Austria only but also in
Germany and Italy, and other countries anti-communists
co were delivered up with almost as much force and violence.
a_
0 Members of Vlasov's army were delivered up, Cossacks were
delivered up as well as all those who wanted to put an end
ck
to communism in Russia, those who wanted to destroy the
Kremlin communism-fascism, and thus to rescue mankind
cl; from the menace which is threatening all the world with
CO' destruction. They were delivered up to red Moscow, to their
certain death!
0 Why then those who are guilty of these hideous crimes
0
C?1 have not yet been prosecuted for them? Their names are
known! . . .
to
59
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PUBLISHER'S NOTE
Besides the book A MEMENTO FOR THE FREE WORLD, Theodor
Kubansky (a pen name) has written and published five books in
the Russian language.
The books, as described below, have appeared in the U.S.A., and
are available at present.
1. ON THE FREE STEPPES OF THE KUBAN, New York, 1955,
448 pages.
The novel describes the life of the Kuban Cossacks prior to the
Revolution. The love affair of the story is presented against the
background of the Cossack mores and traditions typical for Cos-
sack-husbandmen in the South of Russia before 1914. Such local
customs as getting acquainted among young people, amusements,
courtship, and wedding ceremonies (which used to last for two
weeks) are treated in detail. The book also gives the picture of
military training at schools (which in those days began in the
second grade when the boys were eight year old, or over, and was
compulsory; it was supervised by experienced officers, and tested
in large-scale annual manoeuvers) as well as of the regular military
service in peacetime. The scenes depicting family life, harvesting
time, folk superstitions and beliefs, the celebrations of religious
holidays (Christmas ? two weeks; Easter ? nine days; Whitsun-
tide ? three days, etc.) are vivid and entertaining. A number of
rare illustrations add to the attraction of the book.
2. THE BLACK TORNADO, New York, 1957, 212 pages.
The book contains three stories which present the Soviet real-
ity as experienced by the author himself.
The first story IN THE MOUNTAINS OF DAGHESTAN narrates
the struggle of the Caucasian mountaineers against the Soviet
rule in 1930-1940. The author, who was himself among the Cau-
casian outlaws, witnessed their fight against Bolshevism in the
USSR.
60
The second story deals with the author's arrest by the NKVD
in 1939. It describes the tortures he was subjected to, Soviet hard
labor camps where perished millions of Poles, Jews, Ukrainians
exiled there from Poland after the division of that country between
Hitler and Stalin. It also presents a vivid picture of the cruel punish-
ment meted out by the NKVD to their own soldiers who managed
to escape from the German POW camps in 1942.
The third story, THE THIRD DAY, deals with the war of
1941-1945 and the post-war years, revealing the causes of the set-
backs of the Soviet Army and its subsequent victories. A particular
attention has been given to the Leningrad and Volkhov fronts. It
also depicts the author's experiences during that period, his capture
by the Germans, his life in the German POW camps, the forcible
repatriation, mass death sentences and executions of those who
were repatriated, the author's life in a Soviet hard labor camp,
his escape from it, and his return to the American zone in Austria.
3. A MEMENTO, New York, 1958, 247 pages.
The book contains seventeen stories and short novels some of
which contain factual information about the inside life of Soviet
Russia. Thus, the story THE INCUBATOR OF INQUISITORS
describes the education of the future members of the Soviet secret
police who were selected from among orphaned children.
IN THE NAME OF THE KREMLIN provides some factual ma-
terial on the building of socialism in Russia, namely, the extermi-
nation of six million peasants in the South of Russia by Khrush-
chev and Kaganovitch; it also makes reference to President Roose-
velt's recognition of the Red Kremlin.
THE MONUMENT ON THE DRAVA RIVER is a detailed ac-
count of the forcible repatriation of Cossacks and their families.
A HEROINE is an episode that took place during the war in the
Balkans in 1942-43.
All the stories deal with the historical events of the recent past,
and contribute to the understanding of the sources of strength
and power of the Soviet Union, and who carries the responsibility
for it.
4. EAGLES OF THEIR NATIVE LAND, Argentina, 1960,
300 pages.
This historical novel is a sequence to the novel ON THE FREE
STEPPES OF THE KUBAN. It follows up the events through the
First World War, 1914-1917, and has such historic personages as
Tsar Nicholas II, Tsarina Alexandra Federovna, their court, Ras-
putin, and others appear on its pages. It also touches upon the
61
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developments of such significance as the February Revolution in
Petersburg, the appointment of the Provisional Government, etc.
5. THOSE STEPPES, VAST AND BLOOD-DRENCHED, New
York, 1960, 300 pages.
Another historic novel of the Civil War of 1917-1920 in Rus-
sia. It deals with the Bolshevist Revolution of 1917, the campaigns
of the Generals Kornilov, Denikin, Vrangel, Yudenitch, Kolchack,
Brusilov, and others. It speaks of the massacre of the Tsar's family
in Yekaterinburg, the causes of the Bolshevist victory, the defeat
of the White Armies, that of Baron Vrangel among them, and
their evacuation from Russia.
The two last books can be compared in their scope to the WAR
AND PEACE by L. Tolstoy except that they deal with the war of
1914-1920 instead of 1812.
Theodore Kubansqy's book the BLACK TORNADO is being pre-
pared for publication in the English language. In this historical
novel the author, who was an eye-witness of the working of the
Soviet tyranny during the period from 1938 up to the present, re-
veals the essence of Bolshevism as he himself experienced it.
62
Publisher.
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A MEMENTO F04 THE FREE WORLD
Th. K
Two stories about Soviet dictato
1. ON THE ORDER OF THE RED KREM
bloody and cannibal activity of Nikit
1. Kaganovitch in the North Caucasus.
banskiy
ship by an eye-witness:
IN - a faithful record of the
Khrushchev in the Ukraine, and
2. THE MONUMENT ON THE DRAVA RIV - the forcible repatriation
of anti-communist fighters to the Soviet Union in 1945-1947.
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STAT
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