Kolosha, Oleksii
Description
- Creators
- Oleksii Kolosha (b.cir 1917-1918), Author
- Volodymyr Maniak, Recipient
- Media Type
- Text
- Item Types
- Correspondence
- Envelopes
- Description
- Letter sent from: Hruzkу, Makariv raion, Kyiv oblast
Letter describes events in 1932-1933 in: unclear, likely the same location as mailing address: Hruzkе, Makariv raion, Kyiv oblast
Current location name: Hruzkе, Fastiv raion, Kyiv oblast
Oleksii Kolosha was the eldest in a family with 6 children. He was 14 and his youngest brother was 2.5 during the Famine. In November 1932, a search brigade took away all their food except potatoes, and their livestock. His parents worked in a nearby German colony. In February 1933, a brigade led by the village council head came again to “collect more taxes.” They tried to take away the remaining small sack of potatoes, the father resisted and the sack fell apart. The son tried to defend his father and both were beaten. The father was taken to the village council and beaten some more. He came back the same night, but was arrested shortly after and sentenced to two years in prison.
In the spring of 1933, the family survived on frozen potatoes found in the field and mock foods. When the potatoes ran out, they decided to go to their relatives in Kyiv. There they survived by buying bread in stores and reselling it at the market. Kolosha claims that sausages made of human meat were sold at Yevbaz, a Kyiv market once located where Ploshcha Peremohy stands today.
Kolosha blames Stalin and his henchman Kaganovich for the starvation deaths of millions of Ukrainians and calls death through hunger the most terrible death. He does not wish for future generations to go through something similar. He apologizes for his illiterate writing, “neither Ukrainian, nor Russian.”
- Notes
- Author's gender: Male
Author's name in Ukrainian: Олексій Якович Колоша
Category: Child; Urban; Semi-literate - Date of Original
- January 28, 1989
- Date Of Event
- 1932-1933
- Subject(s)
- Local identifier
- WF 83
- Collection
- Maniak Collection
- Language of Item
- Ukrainian
- Geographic Coverage
-
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Hruzke, Fastiv raion, Kyiv oblast:
Kyiv, Ukraine
Latitude: 50.29351 Longitude: 29.75757 -
Kyiv City, Ukraine
Latitude: 50.45466 Longitude: 30.5238
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Hruzke, Fastiv raion, Kyiv oblast:
- Copyright Statement
- Copyright status unknown. Responsibility for determining the copyright status and any use rests exclusively with the user.
- Recommended Citation
- Holodomor Research & Education Consortium
