German minority in Russia and the Soviet Union
From Wikinfo
The German minority in Russia and the Soviet Union arose both from annexations by Russia, especially of the Baltic Republics, Baltic Germans, and immigration of ethnic Germans into Russia which began in the 18th century and continued until 1914. Most Germans who lived in Russia lived in German communities continuing to speak German, practicing German culture, for example the Volga Germans where there was a concentrated community. A few assimilated into Russian culture and played a role in the life of Russia and the Soviet Union, see German-Russians.
Deportation to the east
Following the German attack on June 22, 1941, Operation Barbarossa, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet on August 28, 1941, citing the possibility of sabotage and espionage by Volga Germans and other Germans, issued a decree providing for their deportation to Siberia and Kazakhstan. The decree cites humanitarian concerns, pointing out that the entire population would be blamed should collaboration occur.
The Soviet census of 1939 showed 1,427,000 Germans lived in the Soviet Union with about 370,000 in the Volga Republic, 390,000 in the Ukraine with substantial numbers in or near Saratov, Stalingrad, Voronezh, Moscow, and Leningrad; in the Northern Caucasus, in or near Krasnodar, Ordzhonikidze and Stavropol; the Crimea and Georgia. The first decree provided for deportation of the Volga Germans and Germans from the Saratov and Stalingrad areas to Siberia and Kazakhstan. About 450,000 Germans were transported in September, 1941 to Omsk, Novosibirsk, Barnaul and Kasnoyarsk in Siberia in 230 convoys of 50 trucks each, each truck carrying 40 deportees. The journey took up to 8 weeks.
Exact figures are not available on the loss of life during the transfer, but it was substantial. The authorities at the destinations were informed only at the last minute of the expected arrival of the large number of deportees and were consequently unprepared. Housed at first in stables or barns or simply outside the deportees were eventually put to work on collective farms, and in factories.
Plans to transport the Germans and Finns of Leningrad were only partially carried out due to German advances, only 11,000 of the intended 132,000 were deported. Further deportations were carried out in Moscow, 9,640 on September 15, 1941; Tula, 2,700 on September 21; Gorky, 3,162 on September 14; Rostov, 38,288 10-20 September; Zaporizhzhia, 31,320 25 September to 10 October; Krasnodar, 38,136 on September 15 and 77,570 from Ordzhonikidze on September 20. In October, 1941 100,000 Germans of Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Northern Caucasus and the Crimea were deported. Together with later deportations in 1942 a total of 1,209,430 were deported or a little over 80%.
Most Germans who were serving in the Red Army at the outbreak of war were removed from their units and sent to work camps at Vorkuta, Kotlas, Kemerovo and Chelyabinsk.
Those Germans who remained in western regions of the Soviet Union often welcomed the arrival of the advancing German armies and temporary relief from Communist demands. The retreating German forces evacuated over 100,000 Germans from the Ukraine and Bessarabia in the spring of 1944, but most of those evacuated were returned by the Allies under the terms of the Yalta Agreement to the Soviet Union after the end of the war. Those repatriated to the Soviet Union were incarcerated in the Gulag with those who had been drafted or served in the German army receiving severe treatment such as prison terms of 25 years.
Further Reading
- Karl Stumpp, German-Russians: Two Centuries of Pioneering, American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, June, 1978, ISBN 0914222031
- Karl Stumpp, Emigration from Germany to Russia in Years, 1763-1862/With Maps, American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, June, 1978, hardcover, ISBN 0914222007
- Books available from the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia
- On-line store American Historical Society of Germans from Russia (non-members)
