«I WAS IN JAIL IN THE MOST DIFFICULT TIME AND SUFFERED EVERYTHING»: OLGA KAMENEVA'S PRISON YEARS
Keywords:
L.B. Kamenev, O.D. Kameneva, L.D. Trotsky, the Great Terror, the NKVD, StalinismAbstract
By the mid-1930s, Olga Kameneva, a prominent figure in Soviet cultural construction, had lost most of her former posts. The sister of Leon Trotsky and the wife of Lev Kamenev, two of Joseph Stalin’s biggest opponents, she had practically no chance of avoiding repression, despite the public renunciation of her brother and divorce from her husband. Based on the materials of the investigative cases stored in the Central Archive of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation and introduced into academic circulation for the first time, the article reconstructs Kameneva's path through interrogations, prisons and exile. The repressions started in March 1935 with the arrest of Kameneva in the so-called “Kremlin case”. Kameneva tried to assure the investigator and the leadership of the NKVD of her innocence (she was accused of spreading rumors about the unnatural death of Stalin's wife Nadezhda Alliluyeva) – of course, unsuccessfully. Exiled to Alma-Ata, and then to Gorky (Nizhny Novgorod), two years later (in 1937) she was arrested for the second time. Despite the terrible conditions of interrogations during the “Great Terror” and hints on the part of the investigator about the ability to influence the fate of her youngest son Yuri (also arrested), Kameneva behaved with dignity, admitting neither her guilt, nor of any of those surrounding her, with the exception of her own husband Lev Kamenev, already executed by that time. Although the accusations against her (of anti-Soviet agitation and that she knew but had not reported Lev Kamenev’s “terrorist” activities) were insignificant by the standards of that time, on February 1, 1938, she was sentenced to 25 years in prison, and three years later, in 1941, she was shot extrajudicially.References
Васильева Л.Н. Дети Кремля. М.: Бослен, 2012. 480 с.
Дивногорцев А.Л. О.Д. Каменева – первый председатель ВОКС, ее деятельность в области меж-дународного книгообмена (1920-е гг.) // Библиотека в контексте истории: материалы 7-й Междунар. науч. конф., Москва, 3–4 окт. 2007 г. М.: Пашков дом, 2007. С. 297–305.
Жуков Ю.Н. Иной Сталин. Политические реформы в СССР в 1933–1937 гг. М.: Концептуал, 2017. 368 с.
Ленинградский мартиролог 1937–1938 гг.: книга памяти жертв политических репрессий / под ред. А.Я. Разумова. СПб.: Изд-во Рос. нац. библиотеки, 1999. Т. 4. 734 с.
Петров Н.В., Скоркин К.В. Кто руководил НКВД, 1934–1941: справочник. М.: Звенья, 1999. 504 с.
Фельдман О.М. Семь с половиной месяцев в тюрьме // Дело № 537. Документы следственного дела В.Э. Мейерхольда. М.: Артист. Режиссер. Театр, 2022. С. 8–15.
Фельштинский Ю.Г., Чернявский Г.И. Лев Троцкий. Книга третья. Оппозиционер. 1923–1929 гг. М.: Центрполиграф, 2013. 464 с.
Хаустов В., Самуэльсон Л. Сталин, НКВД и репрессии 1936–1938 гг. М.: Российская политиче-ская энциклопедия (РОССПЭН); Фонд Первого Президента России Б.Н. Ельцина, 2010. 432 с.
Хлевнюк О.В. Хозяин. Сталин и утверждение сталинской диктатуры. М.: Российская политиче-ская энциклопедия (РОССПЭН); Фонд Первого Президента России Б.Н. Ельцина, 2010. 479 с.
Fitzpatrick S. Education and Social Mobility in the Soviet Union, 1921–1934. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. 355 p.
References
Divnogortsev, A.L. (2007) “O.D. Kameneva – the first chairman of VOKS, its activities in the field of international book exchange (1920s)”, in Dvorkina, M.Ya. (ed.), Biblioteka v kontekste istorii: materialy 7-y mezhdunarodnoy nauchnoy konferentsii, M., 3–4 okt. 2007 g. [Library in the context of history: materials of the 7th International Scientific Conference, Moscow, October 3-4, 2007], Pashkov dom, Moscow, Russia, pp. 297–305.
Fel'dman, O.M. (2022), “Seven and a half months in prison”, in Panfilova, N.N. & O.M. Fel'dman (eds.), Delo № 537. Dokumenty sledstvennogo dela V. Je. Meyerhol'da [Case No. 537. Documents of the investigative case of V. E. Meyerhold], Artist. Rezhisser. Teatr, Moscow, Russia, pp. 8–15.
Fel'shtinskiy, Yu.G. & G.I. Chernyavskiy (2013), Lev Trotskiy. Kniga tret'ya. Oppozitsioner. 1923–1929 gg. [Lev Trotsky. Book three. Oppositionist. 1923–1929], Tsentrpoligraf, Moscow, Russia, 464 p.
Fitzpatrick, S. (2002), Education and Social Mobility in the Soviet Union, 1921–1934, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 355 p.
Haustov, V & L. Samuel'son (2010), Stalin, NKVD i repressii 1936–1938 gg. [Stalin, the NKVD and the repressions of 1936-1938], ROSSPEN; Fond Pervogo Prezidenta Rossii B.N. El'tsina, Moscow, Russia, 432 p.
Hlevnyuk, O.V. (2010), Hozyain. Stalin i utverzhdenie stalinskoy diktatury [The Owner. Stalin and the establishment of the Stalinist dictatorship], ROSSPEN; Fond Pervogo Prezidenta Rossii B.N. El'tsina, Moscow, Russia, 479 p.
Petrov, N.V. & K.V. Skorkin (1999), Kto rukovodil NKVD, 1934–1941: Spravochnik [Who led the NKVD, 1934–1941: Handbook], Zvenya, Moscow, Russia, 504 p.
Razumov, A.Ya. (ed.) (1999), Leningradskiy martirolog 1937–1938 gg.: Kniga pamyati zhertv politicheskih repressiy. T. 4 [Leningrad Martyrology 1937–1938: A book of memory of victims of political repression, vol. 4], Izd-vo Ros. nats. biblioteki, St. Petersburg, Russia, 734 p.
Vasil'eva, L.N. (2012), Deti Kremlya [Children of the Kremlin], Boslen, Moscow, Russia, 480 p.
Zhukov, Yu.N. (2017), Inoy Stalin. Politicheskie reformy v SSSR v 1933–1937 gg. [Another Stalin. Political reforms in the USSR in 1933–1937], Kontseptual, Moscow, Russia, 368 p.
