Procyk, Oksana, Leonid Heretz, James E. Mace. Famine in the Soviet Union, 1932-1933: A

Memorial Exhibition. Foreword by Yen-Tsai Feng (Roy E. Larsen Librarian of Harvard College). Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Widener Library of Harvard University, 1986. xi + 83 pp. Source List for Illustrations, Bibliography, Black-and-white Illustrations including portraits and photographs, News clippings, Art and Propaganda Posters, Map. ISBN: 0674294262 (pbk.)

Library exhibition marking the 50^th Anniversary of the Famine.

Especially relevant chapters include:

“Stalin’s Seizure of Power: Purges, Collectivization, and Industrialization” (21-30)

“Scenes of the Ukrainian Farm, 1932-1933” (31-37)

“The Famine in Contemporary Western Press” (38-47)

Includes newspaper headlines and pictures of the famine victims

“The Famine in Memoirs and Published Eyewitness Accounts” (48-54)

“Famine in Literature,” and “Scholarship on the Famine and its Historical Context” preceed a concluding Commemorative section honoring the 50^th Anniversary of the Holodomor.

Samdero, Irwin T., ed. Collectivization in Eastern Europe. Papers of the Conference on

Collectivization in Eastern Europe, April 14-16, 1955, I. T. Sandero, Director. Foreword by Martin M. White. Lexington, Kentucky: University of Kentucky Press, 1958. vii + 214 pp. Mape, Tables, Appendices. LCCN: 57-11381.

This book is helpful in making comparisons between the Ukrainian experience and that of post-World War II Poland, Hungary, Romania, and Yugoslavia.

Appendix A: “Marxist Population Doctrine,” by J. Allen Beegle and Ray E. Wakeley

Appendix B: “Mechanization of Agriculture in the Balkans,” by Brando M. Peselj

Appendix C: “Peasantisms,” by Ray E. Wakeley

Relevant Chapter:

“Collectivization of Agriculture in Soviet Strategy,” by Philip E. Moseley (49-66)

Serbyn, Roman and Bohdan Krawchenko, ed. Famine in Ukraine, 1932-1933. Edmonton:

Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, University of Alberta, 1986. Selected papers from a conference at the Univesite due Quebec a Montreal, 1983. x + 192 pp. ISBN: 0-92862-43-8.

Papers include:

“The Man-made Famine in Soviet Ukraine and Collectivization in Soviet Ukraine,” by Bohdan Krawchenko (15-26).

In the “Man-made Famine,” Krawchenko provides us the percentages of Ukrainian deaths resulting from the various cataclysms after the Civil War (1/2 of the male, and 1/4 of the female population died). He concludes, “In summing up the 1930’s, it is no exaggeration to say that the Ukrainians’greatest achivement during that decade was that they outlasted it” (23).

The words “kulak” or “kurkul” generally are accepted to denote the so-called, “rich” peasants. However, after the initial round-up of the more prosperous farmers, the definition was stretched to include even the poorest as suited political convenience in the process of de-Ukrainianization. Bohdan Krawchuk explains:

When the ‘dekulakization campaign was started, the Soviet regime was at a loss for a definition of what constituted a ‘kulak.’ A haphazard set of criteria were produced. For example, a household owning a motor of any kind were classified as belonging to the ‘kulak category.’ [Krawchuk also points out that most of the people] employing labour in the countryside were invalids of the First World War and the Revolution, widows and familes with few children (17).

James Mace: “The Famine of 1933: A Survey of Sources” (45-65).

Table One: Population Changes in Ukraine 1927-1938 (in thousands) (38)

Table Two: Population Loss in Ukraine as a Proportion of Population Size

In 1926 anda s a Proportion of Total Mortality in 1927-1938 (in percent) (39)

Table Three: Possible Errors in the Estimates of Population Loss in Ukraine (in thousands) (40)

Marco Carrynyk: “Making the News Fit to Print: Walter Duranty, The New York Times, and the Ukrainian Famine of 1933,” (67-94)

Andre Liebich: “Russian Mensheviks and the Famine of 1933,” (97-108)

Émigré Russian Menshevik press accounts of Famine shown to be more accurate than western press accounts.

Marco Carynnyk: “Blind Eye to Murder: Britain, the United States and the Ukrainian Famine of 1933,” (109-138)

Wsewolod W. Isajiw: “The Inpact of the Man-made Famine on the Structure of Ukrainian Society,” (139-146)

Frank Chalk and Kurt Jonassohn: “Conceptualizations of Genocide and Ethnocide,” (179-190).

Roman Serbyn: “The Famine of 1921-1923: A Model for 1932-1933?” Serbyn writes regarding the relationship between the earlier famine of 1921-23, and the Holodomor of 1933, (147-178)

Siegelbaum, Lewis and Andrei Sokolov, et al, ed. Stalinism as a Way of Life: A

Narrative in Documents. Translated from the Russian by Thomas Hoisington and

Steven Shabad. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000. vi + 460 pp. Notes on Transliteration, Terminology, and Documents. Glossary, Abbreviations, Notes, Index of Documents, General Index, Black-and-white Photographic illustrations, Drawings.

ISBN: 0-300-08480-3.

A collection of documents translated into English and contextualizing explanation.

Documents are dated from December 1929-1940, including famine letters of appeal.

Simush, Petr. The Soviet Collective Farm (A Sociological Study). Translated from the

Russian by G. Ivanov-Mumjiev. Edited by L. Kolenikov. Moscow: Progress

Publishers, 1971. ix + 147. Black-and-white Photographic Illustrations. LCCN: 72-181850.

Describes the Rossiya Collective Farm in Novo-Alesandryovsky District, Stavropol Territory, Grigoripoliss Kaya Stanitsa, River Kuban, between 1962-1967. The book is a very Soviet view of the collective farm system, the battle against the kulaks, the struggles of the State, the benefits of collectivization. This book provides a startling contrast in its description of the history of collectivization from which one learns to read between the lines to learn what is being said, and, more significantly, what is not being said and how. The photos show smiling, well-fed peasants in the fields, agricultural class pictures, the outside of buildings, a lady selecting a television set from a collective farm store. It is an excellent example of Soviet propaganda, but it teaches how the memories of the Famine years and the dekulakization/forced collectivization was perceived in later Soviet years.

Chapters include:

“Why and How This Book Was Written”

“Break-up of the Old Way of Life in the Countryside”

“The Peasant and His Environment”

“Economic Principles of Collective Farming”

“Man in the Sphere of Labour”

“Distribution of Incomes”

“Collective Farm Democracy”

“Family and Communal Life Today”

“The Peasant’s Personal Liberty and Aspirations”

Soloviy, Dmytro, compiler. The Golgotha of Ukraine: Eyewitness Accounts of the Famine in

Ukraine Instigated and Fostered by the Kremlin in an Attempt to Quell Ukrainian Resistance to Soviet Russian National and Social Enslavement of the Ukrainian People. Translated and Edited by Stephen Shumeyko. Foreword by Luke Myshuha. New York: Ukrainian Congress Committee of America, 1953.

i + 47 pp. Includes black-and-white photographic illustrations, List of Famine Victims, Chart. LCCN: 57-43858.

“Beginning of Collectivization” (8-12)

“Further Collectivization and Banishment of the Expropriated to Archangel” (12-13)

“Banishment to Krycha—then to the Urals (‘Second Expropriate Group’)” (13-15)

“Peter Blokha and the ‘Insurgent Organization’” (15-17)

Details interrogation procedures, and sentencing—including that of the “snitch,” who attempted suicide after orders were given for him to be shot.

“Escape to Donbas” (17-20)

“Further Flight to Kuban” (20-23)

Moreover, the kolhosps had to yield even much of the grain usually reserved for seeding. It was explained to them that the authorities needed it for ‘storage purposes.’ They promised to return it in the spring of 1933. It appears that already then they anticipated a famine and were storing up reserves (22).

“Back Home and The Famine” (22-24)

But whatever amount of bread they received, it was very small… and what was worse, it was not made of flour but of beet seed. Naturally, it was not edible. The expected happened. … Maksym sank rapidly and died. Within two weeks, his wife, Palazhka (Chubiw) who used to be so beautiful and vivacious, also died of starvation. Soon afterward, their four children died, one after the other, from starvation (24).

“The Horror of the Famine in 1933” (24-36)

Details episodes of murder, cannibalism, eating of carrion, etc., which took place as a result of the appallingly desperate situation. This affadavit was written on March 11, 1949, by Ivan Klymko, and is “notarized by the director of the Lysenko Camp in Hannover (British Zone in Germany), W. Krawchuk, with his own signature and with the seal of the Governing Body of the Camp.”

“Testimony of W. Krivetsky about the Weeders from Kharkhiv who Worked on the Farms of the Blahodatna Village, Kharkhiv District” (37-39”

Testimony of a student from the city sent to work on the farms when the peasants had become to weak to do so:

Shocked by their appearance [starving children] we began to dole out what we had. In the act, we began to converse with them. Immediately they were ordered not to do any talking with us, and we were ordered to cease giving food to them (37).

[Having left, and traveled to Batalnahynsk in the Caucasus, he found} There on the tables were clean napkins, menus, and plenty of food, mostly meat. We had not seen this in Ukraine for a long, long time! …At at time when in Ukraine it was impossible to get anything without a ration card… here in the Caucasus I could purchase all the food—and good food at that—and at a very low price” (38-39).

“An Excerpt from the Memoirs of Kh. Riabokin” (39-41)

“List of the Peasants of the Village of Bodionivky, Poltava Region, Who Died of Starvation During the Soviet Planned Famine in Ukraine During 1932-33” (41-43)

Chart:

“Social Status of the Villagers of Bodionivky who Perished During the Famine” (42).

Sorokin, Pitirim A. A. Hunger as a Factor in Human Affairs. Translated and Prologue by

Elena P. Sorokin. Edited and Introduction by T. Lynn Smith. Gainesville, Florida: University Press of Florida, 1975, 1995. xxxix + 319. Black-and-white Photographic Illustrations, Charts, Notes, Illustration List. ISBN: 0-8130-0519-1.

Describes the Famine of 1919-1921, and was prepared for publication in Leningrad in 1922, but was censored, and the authors banished from the USSR. Germane chapters include:

“Changes in the Structure of Physiological and Psychological Processes of the Organism Connected with Variations in the Quantity and Quality of Food Consumed (and Absorbed) During Starvation” (37-88).

Charts:

Male and Female Statistics, Economic Factors, Mental and Physical Manifestations (46-60, 66-67, 87)

“Changes in Human Behavior During Starvation,” (88-150)

Charts:

United States and Russia compared (89, 96-97, 99, 104)

Percentage of Income Required for Food (99)

Suicides (104)

“The Basic Effects of Mass Starvation: Nutrition as a Determinant and Its Social Effects and Their Forms” (153-164)

“Hunger and the Exportation and Importation of Food Products” (175-183)

“Hunger and the Movement of Criminality” (225-233)

Stalin, Joseph. Marxism and the National Question: Selected Writings and Speeches.

Translation of Marksyzm i Natsionalnyi Vopros. New York: International Publishers

Co., Inc., 1942. xviii + 224 pp. Notes. LCCN: 42-18649.

This source enables the researcher to chart the progression of Stalin’s opinions about the National Question from January 1913-November 1936. Selected chapters of interest are:

October 10, 1920: “The Policy of the Soviet Government on the National Question in Russia”

March 10, 1921: “Theses on the Immediate Tasks of the Party in Connection with the National Problem”

November 7, 1923: “The October Revolution and the Problem of the Middle Strata”

June 27, 1930: “Deviations on the National Question”

January 26, 1934: “Deviations towards Nationalism”

“Many think that Skrypnyk’s fall was an individual case, an exception to the rule. This is not true. The fall of Skrypnyk in the Ukraine is not an exception. Similar ‘dislocations’ are observed among certain comrades in other republics as well” (215).

Stenko, Slava, ed., et al. On the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Ukrainian Holocaust. A

Special Commemorative Edition on the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33. The Ukrainian Review. 31:2 (Summer, 1983) London: Ukrainian Publishers, Ltd. xii + 96. Bibliographic list, black-and-white photographic illustrations of the London Commemorative Demonstration and of the London Monument to Famine Victims at the Ukrainian Autocephalus Orthodox Church (May 29, 1983).

Articles include:

“The Great Man-made Famine in Ukraine, 1932-33,” by Stephen Oleskiw.

“On the Fiftieth Anniversary,” describes a Soviet Famine poster: “It showed a picture of a mother in distress, with a swollen child at her feet, and over the picture was the inscription, ‘EATING OF DEAD CHILDREN IS BARBARISM.’ A Soviet official explained to me: ‘We distributed such posters in hundreds of villages, especially in Ukraine. We had to,’” quoting Harry Lang in the New York Evening Journal, April 15, 1935 (3).

“Collectivization was then primarily a means of fighting and controlling the largest segment of the Ukrainian population, and was directly aimed at the decrease of their prosperity to insure the Soviet Russian government of additional capital” (10-11). This article credits city dwellers and workers, as well as the peasantry, with feeling righteous resentment of these policies (11).

Quoting Viktor Kravchenko, who, “came across a store of unused grain ‘at a local railway station in the autumn of 1933. It remained untouched despite the fact that half of the people living in his village died of starvation the previous winter (13-14).” Kravchenko stated that such reserves existed “in many other parts of the country, while peasants in those regions starved to death” (14).

Malcolm Muggeridge is quoted noting the fact that new construction of factories, power stations, other buildings continued unabated despite the starving population nearby, while “food [was] being exported from Odessa” (17).

“Deliberate Famine in Ukraine: The Horror and The Challenge,” by Fred E.

Dohrs.

“Gleaning, that ancient and accepted right of the poor to follow the harvesters and pick up the few grains not taken by the threshers—gleaning became a capital crime in Ukraine by Stalin’s Edict in 1931” (20).

Stalin’s justification of Famine deaths to Churchill (20).

Ukrainian political prisoners greatest percentage of GULag population (21).

Stuart, Robert C. The Collective Farm in Soviet Agriculture. Lexington, Massachusetts: D.

C. Heath and Co., 1972. ix + 255 pp. Tables, Figures, Glossary of Translated Russian Agricultural Terms, Bibliography, Index. ISBN: 0-669-81265-X.

Stuart provides collective farm data from the 1950’s and 1960’s. His discussion of the development of collectivization notes that it was “rapid and costly” (3). Loss of human life estimated at 5 million. He states that animal stocks were not recovered until 1950 (3-4).

“Standard Charter of an Agricultural Artel,” dated February 17, 1935 (199-210)

Subtelny, Orest. Ukraine: A History. Toronto: University of Toronto Press and Canadian

Institute of Ukrainian Studies, 1988. xxiix + 666 pp. Black-and-white Photographs, and Drawings, Maps, Abbreviations, Glossary, Notes, Bibliography, Index. ISBN: 0-8020-5809-6 (cloth) and 0-8020-6775-1 (pbk.).

Map of Soviet Ukraine during the Inter-war years (382)

Part Five: 20^th Century Ukraine

Soviet Ukraine: The Innovative 20’s (380)

Soviet Ukraine: The Traumatic 30’s (403)

The Famine (413-416)

Subtelny discusses the lack of humanitarian response by western governments:

Although western governments knew about the famine, their attitude in this regard were similar to the one expressed in the British Foreign Office document:

‘The truth of the matter is, of course, that we have a certain amount of information about the famine conditions in the south of Russia [sic], similar to that which has appeared in the press. . . We do not want to make it public, however, because the Soviet government would resent it and our relations with them would be prejudiced’ (Subtelny, 416, quoted from Carrynyk, Luciuk, and Kordan, The Foreign Office and the Famine: British Documents on Ukraine and the Great Famine of 1932-33, 397).

Subtelny also cites Robert Conquest, “The scandal is not that they justified Soviet actions…but that they refused to face the evidence” (Conquest, Harvest of Sorrow, 321, quoted by Subtelny, 416).