Figure 1.--This Americamn press photograph in 1929 was captioned, "Making good little Communists out of waifs: Above, teaching the rudiments of radio to stray youngsters picked up in the streets of Moscow. The Government maintains a large schoolwhere such boys are fed, clothed and educated."

We do not have much information on Soviet orphanages. We do not fully understand the numbers of children cared for in Soviet orphanafges or the quality of faclities and care. We know that the Soviet authorities had a huge problem with abandoned childen after the Revolution (1917) and Civil War (1918-21). We have little informations on how Soviet authorities addressed the problem and know do not have information on Soviet orphanages. We note stree children picked up and put into orphanages during 1928. We are not entirely sure what happened to the children involved in the Ukranian famine. The collectivization progrm must have also created many displaced and orphaned children. Many seem to have died rather than being put into orphanages. Even so there miust have been a great strain on the orphanage system. Apparently some of the Pioneer Camps being built around the country were used for the influx of children whose parents weee arrested. Records were kept about the children's parents. The fact that their parents were arrested on political charges affected their treatment. And Stalin even had many of the children arrested as adults after World War II. The impact of the millions of adults arrested and committed to the Gulag is difficult to assess. Often only one parent was arrested and thus the children would have been cared for by family. But sometimes both parents were arrested or the single parent (usually but not always the mother) would have had difficulty raising children on her own. Some wives were subsequently arrested just for having been married to an individual arrested for political crimes. One such child, Al'dona Volynskaia, describes her experiences. Some of these orphanage children after they grew up were caughtup in the Vengeful Children Campaign. Stalin after Wotld War Ii apparently started thinking about the children of those arrested in the purges. He thought that they were a potential danger as they might seek revenge. This was not one of his largest campaigns, but it did occur. This campaign was more selective. He seemed particularly concerned with the children od the military commanders purged before the War. For some reason the children of Trotskites were untouched. Stalin ordered the NKVD to track down the children and arrest them. This included bothteen agers and the adult children. [Solzhenitsyn, p. 90.] And of course there are the normal events such as accidents or illnesses or child abuse that can lead to children bring abandoned or turned ver to the state. Of course after World War II there would have been large numbers of displaced children. A reader tells us that one Russian image on HBC was taken in an orphange during the 1970s.

Dimension

We do not have much information on Soviet orphanages. We do not fully understand the numbers of children cared for in Soviet orphanages.

Nature

Nor do we much about the quality of faclities and care.

Chronology

We know that the Soviet authorities had a huge problem with abandoned childen after the Revolution (1917) and Civil War (1918-21). We have little informations on how Soviet authorities addressed the problem and know do not have information on Soviet orphanages. We note stree children picked up and put into orphanages during 1928. We are not entirely sure what happened to the children involved in the Ukranian famine. The collectivization progrm must have also created many displaced and orphaned children. Many seem to have died rather than being put into orphanages. Even so there miust have been a great strain on the orphanage system. Apparently some of the Pioneer Camps being built around the country were used for the influx of children whose parents weee arrested. Records were kept about the children's parents. The fact that their parents were arrested on political charges affected their treatment. And Stalin even had many of the children arrested as adults after World War II. The impact of the millions of adults arrested and committed to the Gulag is difficult to assess. Often only one parent was arrested and thus the children would have been cared for by family. But sometimes both parents were arrested or the single parent (usually but not always the mother) would have had difficulty raising children on her own. Some wives were subsequently arrested just for having been married to an individual arrested for political crimes. One such child, Al'dona Volynskaia, describes her experiences. World War II was a catasteophe for the Soviet people. And the bulk of the casualties were not in the miltary, but Soviet civilians, both by NAZI atricities, unitentional actions, anfamine. There is no way of knowing the nmber of any certainty. The numbr we see most commonly is about 25 million people, although we see numbers as high as 45 million. What ever the number, it is clear that millions of children were left without theur parents and even more with just one parent. Thus the orphanage system had to be expanded. We do not have details on just what the Soviets did to care for all these children. We note one Lenningerad (St. Petersburg) orphanage, a city that sugffered through a devistating 900-day NAZI seige. Some of the children orphaned by Stalin's purges after they grew up were caughtup in the Vengeful Children Campaign. Stalin after Wotld War II apparently started thinking about the children of those arrested in the purges. He thought that they were a potential danger as they might seek revenge. This was not one of his largest campaigns, but it did occur. This campaign was more selective. He seemed particularly concerned with the children of the military commanders purged before the War. For some reason the children of Trotskites were untouched. Stalin ordered the NKVD to track down the children and arrest them. This included both teenagers and the adult children. [Solzhenitsyn, p. 90.] And of course there are the normal events such as accidents or illnesses or child abuse that can lead to children bring abandoned or turned over to the state. Of course after World War II there would have been large numbers of displaced children. A reader tells us that one Russian image on HBC was taken in an orphange during the 1970s. The economic decline during the 1980s created more orphans. And the Chernobyl disaster created enirmous problems affecting families and children (1986). The released radiation was 200 times greater than that released by both atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This is a problem post-Soviet states are still dealing with.

Sources

Solzhenitsyn, Alexander. The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-56 (Harper & Row: New York, 1974), 660p.

Created: 4:48 AM 11/26/2007
Last updated: 4:23 AM 2/20/2019