Letter sent from: Village of Yalyntsi, Kremenchuk raion, Poltava oblast
Letter describes events in 1932-1933 in: Village of Yalyntsi, Hradyzk raion, Kharkiv oblast
Current location name: Village of Yalyntsi, Kremenchuk raion, Poltava oblast
I. Demydenko recalls forced collectivization, dekurkulization and the famine in his native village of
Yalyntsi. He was in school at the time when 7 kolhosps were set up in their village. As a child, he posted a newspaper cutout portrait of Stalin on a wall at home, which possibly saved their family from dekurkulization.
He names various perpetrators and what they did, and calls the famine artificial. Search brigades used
torture to extract information about where grain was hidden.
Some 500 people died in his village. He lists the reasons why their village did not die out completely during the famine, unlike the villages up the Sula River, where, in the steppe, entire villages died out:
1) people could catch fish and other river animals, mussels, water rats, and birds in the Dnipro and adjacent rivers; and
2) kindness and silent opposition to harsh requisitioning methods by some conscientious local activists and leaders who would warn people about upcoming searches and lobbied for the lowering of the requisition quotas.
He also describes the case of a man who lost his mind and killed his own children.
Ukrainian transcription and English translation available.
