22nd of March, 1992
Dear Sirs!
Only yesterday, at an information stand, under the heading of "Publications to be continued", I noticed newspaper clippings containing the names of people, who perished in camps of the Krasnoyarsk region, and ... I was deeply moved again by the martyrdom of mankind, and this did not happen with me for the first time. It is absolutely impossible to get accustomed to these fates or to face them with indifference. I am a member of the Association of Victims of Illegal Reprisals. We also do an extensive active work in all directions. Two anthologies were issued: "Lections on wrath and love" - containing the memories of former prisoners.
My parents disappeared in Norilsk. My father, Boris Semyonovich Medvedovskiy, born in 1900, was arrested ny NKVD organs in Yaroslavl on the 6th/7th of November 1938, in the night (the month of November had a very special meaning in my father's life); previously, he had been sent there from Mocow to work for the war plant, whereby they had transferred him back to an inferior job at the same time, and this was connected with the beginning measures of reprisal. The preliminary proceedings extended over a period of six months. Upon the decision of an NKVD USSR Special Board of the 14th of May 1939 he was sentenced on sections 58-1b and 58-7 to an 8 years deprivation of liberty. The sentence was to be served in a reform labour camp in Norilsk. He was released on parole for being distinguished for model behaviour and an honest attitude towards labour in November 1944.
In his documents it is written that he stayed to work for the Norilsk non-ferrous smelting combine a s a free employee. He did not have the right to move away to any other place. But where should he go, after all? The whole country consisted, in fact, of a sole big camp system with different regimes.
Mum, Klavdia Lvovna Medvedovskaya, my sisters (Tanya and Natasha) and I lived with him in Norilsk in the 1940s and 1950s.
I slightly remember Norilsk and the Krasnoyarsk region: Dudinka with its beautiful wooden buildings, where huge ships were moored in the dark waters of the port and where it was drizzling all the time. Kureyka - the fishermen's settlement, where the pioneers, when visiting Stalin's former place of exile, would rush at the old watchman, who was reported having seen him once in person, circle him and enthusiastically seek information about things which he did not eben know himself. Yenisseysk with its little steamships hauling huge barges, on which all kinds of objects were hung out to dry, where people wildly gesticulated and a shout orang out through the air: " ... tramos cursing fate ..."; and from board the steamship one could see the cities of Igarka in the country, and Turukhansk, Angarsk. "Yenissey, Yenissey, the vastness of the birch woods flows above your mighty waves, Yenissey, Yenissey - you, the brother of the polar sea, golden, native Siberia" - this was one of the songs they sang on the steamer. At that time there were three steamships going there: the "Spartak", the "Josef Stalin" (may the devil remember them) and the "Maria Ulyanova". In the 1950s another one yet appeared on the scene bearing the name of some brave polar captain. I do not remember his name, but it sounded similar to "Lagutin".
While I am writing all this, my heart starts to hurt sweetly and in a kind of dreaminess, as soon as it perceives the name of a Siberian town. May I hopefully not become an old and weak woman too soon; then I would fly away to this beautiful region and stay there "in exile for life". Now I have been living in St. Petersburg for 40 years already, but I am not fond of it. I do not like big towns, there is too much space in them.
Well, our Dad continued to work for the metal works' technical school, teaching electrical energy. And we went to school. We lived there, in Norilsk, for some time, experienced the polar nights, severe frost and snow storms; but we also learned about what was called "black storm". An autobus would then come to school, a huge one, of light blue colour - an American MAK, and they lead us to the entrance by a rope which we had to hold tight, while moving towards the bus. In front of the windows of our house, in the Street of the 1st of October, a short section of the branch line went by, which led from nowhere to nowhere, and a little petrol waggon was running there every now and then. It was ready to be coupled to the train and wheeled forth and back with a rattling noise, sadly bringing its existence to the peoples' attention by producing long-drawn-out whistles into the black air. And now, whenever such a black feeling of grief is coming over me, it takes on the shape of this petrol waggon.
My parents grew ill. You come home from school - the pillows for the head on their bed are disarranged, broken ampoules, neither Dad nor Mum are at home. Variant I: Dad was taken to the hospital and Mum went with him. Variant II: Mum was taken to the hospital and Dad went with her.
The month of November 1950 drew near: Mum died, and our family became deserted. This happened on the 8th of November, and on the 29th Dad was deprived of all civic rights. They took away his passport, removed him from office and completed his "freedom" by putting him under military command. Thus, he was forced to appear for registration and periodic checks before the MGB authorities once a month. This was based on the decision of the MGB USSR Special Board of the 29th of November 1950. It made his heart break and finished him off. All the three of us went to Mum's graveside. Father chose his burial place 50 cm away from where they had intered our Mum and dropped in at the sexton's to discuss the matter. Early in 1952 two graves were laid out in this place, below wooden starlets, not far from Shmitikhoy. Only today, after having found my way to God, it came to my mind that I should have read the burial service for all my relatives, whose graves are scattered about in various parts of the country. And this is what I had done on the 4th of March 1992 in the Church of Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God in St. Petersburg, after I Had symbolically received a handful of earth. May the now find eternal peace. To their immortal memory ...
My father passed away one year earlier than Stalin. He found eternal peace in the permafrost region without having regained his freedom.
I will try to get a document from the Krasnoyarsk regional KGB in which is certified that we, parents and children, lived together in internal exile. I need such an official certificate for the re-calculation of my pension. Due to various, general diseases I am a 2nd grade invalid.
And how do you do at "Memorial"? Is everybody in good health? In case you discover my father's name in the court records, please also add him to the corresponding section, letter "M". He was a kind man, a war engineer, a brave man. Until now we dispose of two organizations which are connected with the fate of political prisoners - "Memorial", where they are more dealing with dissidents and political prisoners of the 1960s and 1970s, and the Association of Victims of Illegal Reprisals (more attending to the former inmates of the Stalinist camps). I am a member of the last-mentioned. We are just having a re-registration "check-up", introducing clarity into all the documents and giving more precise definitions. About 1000 people are concerned. I subscribed to the newspaper "Section 58". I would like to receive a letter from you with reports on the Krasnoayrsk region. I will be waiting for your reply like summer is waiting for the nightingale.
I kiss you all. Be healthy. God bless you!
Tatyana Borisovna Kuznetsova
(Invalid, pensioner, 56 years old, artist and script writer in the past).
Kuznetsova, T.B.