Tag #155300 - Interview #94498 (Evadiy Rubalskiy)

During the period of Stalin’s persecutions in 1936 and afterward I was old enough to remember the details. There was a big brick apartment building to which the shed we lived in belonged. There were many arrests going on. Deputy director of the Opera Theater Linetskiy, who lived in this house was arrested. However, he was released a short time afterward. They must have failed to find evidence against him. Baranov, another neighbor, who worked as assistant to the minister, was also arrested and I never heard about him again. Baranov was a very decent man. Despite his high position he never wanted an office car to pick him up at home. He went to work by trolley-bus. I knew him since I was a child and could never believe that he was an enemy of the people [23]. Many tenants of this house were arrested. Almost every morning we heard that another of our neighbors was arrested. There were many high military and governmental officials living in our street and there seemed to be no end to arrests. Some people committed suicide to avoid arrest. Many members of parliament were executed. They were honest people devoted to the Soviet power. They were rehabilitated later, after the Twentieth Party Congress [24], but for the majority of them this happened posthumously. However, one didn’t necessarily have to be a high military or governmental official to be sent to the GULAG [25]. Some people wrote reports on their neighbors or acquaintances [many common people in the USSR sincerely tried to support the authorities involved in this unprecedented campaign related to struggle against the domestic ‘enemies’, they wanted to contribute into it by identifying and detaining such ‘enemies of the people’, and unconditionally believed in honesty, justice and infallibility of this regime]. A routinely row might have resulted in an arrest. Anybody could be called ‘enemy of the people’ and arrested on false charges. My papa sister Shiva Shkolnik’s husband was arrested. His family could hardly make ends meet, but he was arrested and his arresters demanded that he gave them his money and gold. Of course, he never had any, but they took him to interrogations where they beat him mercilessly. He was released some time later, but not all of those who were arrested were as lucky as him. There were on-going meetings and people demanded to execute all enemies of people calling them traitors. Perhaps many people believed this was true: we were raised to have blind faith in the party and Stalin.