“They took the barge to Palamysh, a step further from it, to Urdoma station. In Urdoma, the party was placed in a barrack with an unfinished roof: while you spend the night somehow, you’ll make a roof tomorrow. in the direction of Tuva. For a while we worked quietly here."

Ugryumov O. How they started to build the North Pechora road / O. Ugryumov // Chronicle of the Northern Highway: from the 19th century to the 21st century. - Yaroslavl, 2008. - S. 142-155, 158-169.

140 years of the Northern Railway

How the construction of the North Pechora Road began

For a long time in the history of our country, the state made extensive use of the labor of prisoners. The so-called "camp" economy produced for the needs of the USSR a significant amount of gross domestic product, capital construction was carried out by the inhabitants of the camps.

The NKVD forced labor camps acquired a particularly significant role in remote from the center, rich in natural resources, but undeveloped parts of the country - in the north and east. The population density in these regions was extremely low, which made it impossible to attract local labor resources. The lack of qualified personnel was especially felt.

Both civilians and prisoners were involved as labor force. The convicts also participated in geological exploration expeditions. Often, the expeditions were even led by former staff members of the NKVD, transferred to the Gulag system for disciplinary violations.

As the Gulag system grew, industrial enterprises were created at the forced labor camps; this is how original production trusts were born, such as, for example, Ukhtpechtrest. The labor force of the Ukhta-Pechora trust were the prisoners of the Ukhtpechlag. Researcher of the history of railway camps O.I. Azarov in his dissertation cites the following data: at the end of 1932, 13,400 prisoners were employed in the extraction of coal and oil, and as of January 1, 1938, already 54,792 people.

Coal mining and the development of transport in the North were closely connected with each other. This was the result of the prevailing economic and geographical conditions of the country's life.

In the Komi region, the railway "vector" of the camp system was not the only one. The labor of prisoners was also used in the mining, oil and gas, and logging industries. The railway camp and production complex occupied a special place in the economic and social life of the northern region.

It was built at the cost of inhuman efforts and exorbitant sacrifices of the North Pechora road ultimately allowed the industrialization of Komi, linking the undeveloped disparate territories of the republic with each other and integrating the Komi economy into the economic complex of the country.

The North Pechora road was given at a very high price - at the cost of many thousands of lives, put in order to cut through the permafrost. One of the builders of the highway called it like this: "The bottomless swamp, where the prisoners threw wheelbarrows with sand" ...

By 1940, 4 mines were laid in Vorkuta, with a total capacity exceeding one million tons of coal per year. In those years, the prisoners of Vorkutlag remained the builders and workers of the Vorkuta mines. Then there were about 15 thousand of them. Intelligent, highly educated people worked in inhuman conditions, and therefore died by the thousands. Much later, in 1951, when the mines started working and the Railway, the city committee of the party appeared in Vorkuta; this was a sign that the city from the category of camps was moving into the category of free ones.

Built in uninhabitable natural conditions and paid for by thousands of human lives, the North Pechora road has become the personification and a kind of monument to the “camp” page of our past. Today it is impossible to forget that forced labor was widely used in the construction of this highway. By order of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD) dated May 10, 1938, the construction of the entire North Pechora Railway was entrusted to Sevzheldorlag, which was given 7 years for all work - from May 1938 to September 1945. Then, according to the decree of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks “On the construction of the North Pechora railway line and the development of the extraction of Vorkuta-Pechora coals” dated May 10, 1940, the production task of Sevzheldorlag was somewhat changed and defined as the construction of only one of the components of the road, railway line Kotlas - Kozhva.

Plots new road put into operation gradually, and immediately used the new lines for their intended purpose, combining the railway and river transport to speed up the work. 20.2 km of railway access roads to the piers were built in 1938-40.

… The road lived and developed extremely quickly. The dates following each other amaze with the intensity of the events crowning all the new stages of hard, but much needed labor for the country.

November 1, 1939 was opened temporary movement on the Aikino - Shezham section, and less than a week after that - temporary working traffic on the Knyazhpogost - Ukhta section (formerly Chibyu). Since that time, oil was shipped from Ukhta to the Vychegda River (Aikino wharf) in railway tanks, and from there on barges. Cargo transportation increased - in the summer up to 200-250 wagons per day went by rail. On a solemn day, the October Revolution holiday on November 7, 1940, the first train from Ukhta passed to Kotlas. By 1940, the Abez - Sivaya Mask section was opened.

On May 15, 1940, the first train with rails for laying arrived at the site of the future Izhma station (now Sosnogorsk). In December 1940, at the Glush station, which is 10 km north of the station. Irael on the border of the Sosnogorsk and Pechora regions, builders met, moving from the south (from Knyazhpogost, Ukhta) and from the north - from the Pechora River, Kozhva station. Passed the docking of the "golden" rails. On December 25, 1940, the first train from Kotlas arrived in Kozhva.

The railway line Konosha - Kotlas with a length of 367 kilometers, which was another component of the North Pechora Railway, was built by Sevdvinlag, organized on September 25, 1940.

Temporary train traffic on the line was scheduled to open by February 1, 1942, while ensuring the throughput of 9 pairs per day.

By February 25, 1942, work was completed on the preparation of the subgrade, and on the night of March 4-5, 1942, the laying of the upper structure of the track was completed. Thus, in a short period of time, from January 1 to March 5, 1942, 130 km of the main track and about 13 km of station tracks were laid by the prisoners. On March 7, 1942, the first through train arrived in Kotlas. In total, in March 1942, 27 transit trains with goods en route to the front were missed.

Continuation of construction

The outbreak of the Great Patriotic War made changes to the schedule for the construction of the North Pechora Railway.

At the very beginning of the war, the invaders occupied Ukraine, where the Donetsk coal basin, the largest in the Union, was located. The country, drawn into the war, was in dire need of fuel, and in the Komi Republic, huge resources lay underground, the use of which could only begin if the railway was built. Therefore, the government demands an accelerated pace of construction of the highway, which has acquired a truly strategic state significance.

The economic policy of the Soviet state in relation to military conditions was formulated in the directive of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks "On the mobilization of all forces and means to defeat the fascist invaders" dated June 29, 1941. Economic changes were carried out in the following main areas: switching to military production practically all branches of industry; a sharp reduction or cessation of the production of civilian products; relocation (evacuation) of productive forces to areas remote from the front.

In accordance with the decision of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, the order of the NKVD "On the plan for capital work for the 3rd quarter of 1941" dated July 11, 1941, a list of shock over-limit construction projects was approved, which included the Konosha-Kotlas and North Pechora railways. Capital investments, building materials, equipment, forced labor from mothballed construction sites were directed to these construction sites. At the beginning of the war, the construction time for the Kozhva-Vorkuta railway line was reduced. According to the decree of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR (July 1941), the line should be put into operation not in October 1945, but much earlier - May 1, 1942. For this, 4 thousand prisoners and equipment were sent additionally. In the resolution of the plenum of the Komi Regional Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks “On the implementation of the plan for the railway construction of the Pechora-Vorkuta line” dated July 14-15, 1941, measures were outlined to ensure the opening of a temporary labor movement as early as December 1941.

Main construction sites	Dates
	Beginning of work	Opening of temporary movement	Putting into permanent operation
Kotlas - r. Vychegda	November 1, 1938	December 1, 1939	October 1, 1941
R. Vychegda - Knyazhpogost	June 1, 1938	May 1, 1939	May 1, 1941
Knyazhpogost - Chibyu	1937	December 1, 1938	November 1, 1941
Chibyu - Kochmes	July 1, 1939	November 1, 1941	November 1, 1941
Kochmes - Abez	July 1, 1939	Navigation 1940	November 1, 1941
Abez — Vorkuta	July 1, 1938	Navigation 1940	November 1, 1941

Under military conditions, the railway was built according to the so-called temporary scheme using simplified technical conditions. Detours were made around all natural barriers and difficult areas. Costs and efforts were kept to a minimum. Lifts and turns of the railway have become critically permissible, excavations and subgrade are minimal, the main structural elements structures were simplified, scarce imported building materials were replaced by local materials, in particular, metal structures - wooden or combined.

By September 1, 1941, the timber industry of the Komi ASSR provided only 58.2% of the demand with sleepers for the construction of the Kozhva-Vorkuta railway line. Therefore, with the technical standards of 1600 sleepers per kilometer of the main track, 700 - 900 sleepers were laid. In the northernmost section, rails and sleepers were laid directly on permafrost and ice without the construction of a subgrade.

Former Secretary of the Komi Regional Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks for Transport P.D. Korolev recalled: “Winter came to the rescue. Such a severe winter, which stood out in 1941, I, perhaps, will not remember again. In the Vorkuta River, the thickness of the ice reached 1 meter 60 centimeters ... And now, given such a harsh winter, we increased the distance between the sleepers. And the frost really helped us out. Fell this road, and we got out of the situation. And as the sleepers came to us, we quietly added them in between. With the calculation managed to spring. Detours were made around natural obstacles, including large lakes, marshes and cuts. According to the memoirs of the deputy head of the camp administration A.I. Borovitsky: “... due to the tight deadlines, they were forced to go through separate recesses in narrow trenches in which the train had just passed. Once, a landslide occurred in such a trench and a locomotive with several platforms fell asleep. I had to leave the train underground, and make a detour next to it. Time was the most important thing."

Thus, the temporary scheme used in the construction of the railway turned out to be not only a forced technological innovation, but also a method of forced railway construction.

Vorkuta miners also worked on the verge of human capabilities. A coal mining order during the war years meant the same thing as a military order. 2-3 norms per shift have become a common, everyday work situation. After all, Vorkuta coal not only warmed the besieged Leningrad, but also became the main fuel for the entire North of the country.

On December 28, 1941, the first echelon with coal was sent from Vorkuta, driven by engineer Dunaev. Weak, according to our modern ideas, the steam locomotive of the OV series No. 5831 (the famous, now perceived as a touching, almost living creature, “sheep”) pulled two two-axle platforms and several wagons with gifts for Red Army.

In February 1942, this train passed through the Izhma and Ukhta stations. The long time spent on the road is explained by constant delays due to snow drifts, and also by the fact that the embankment was unreliable due to subsidence, divergence of paths - as we remember, the rails and sleepers were hastily laid directly on the frozen soil of the embankment, otherwise and on ice.

The work done was impressive: in two and a half years, about 120 thousand free and "forced" builders of Sevzheldorlag, Pejheldorlag, at the cost of titanic efforts, achieved that the 1600 km long railway, counting from Konosha, was laid through rivers, taiga, swamps to the polar, coal-rich Vorkuta. A reliable path connected the Far North with the center of the country, on the territory of which the Great Patriotic War blazed for more than six months.

However, what is there to hide? The operation of the road with the involuntarily low quality of construction work led to frequent accidents and train wrecks and interruptions in traffic. So, on February 15, 1942, on the stretch Pyshor - Oshvor, due to the skew of the track, the train No. 707 crashed, 7 cars were broken, in August 1942, on the stretch Khanovei - Arctic Fox, due to the shift of the upper structure of the track, the train No. 716 crashed, 20 wagons were destroyed.

Road work gradually returned to normal. By the Decree of the State Committee of Defense of the USSR of June 4, 1942, the Administration of the North Pechora Railway was organized with the location of the administration in the city of Kotlas.

And now the weekdays have already begun - despite extreme conditions construction and organization of movement, the same, super-heavy conditions of wartime. During these weekdays, the main task of the road was to provide communication between the northern regions and the center of the country. From the north came, first of all, coal, oil, oil products and timber. Passenger traffic was carried out in a limited amount and had a local character.

The Road Administration was created to organize the operation of the newly built Kotlas - Vorkuta road and the Kotlas - Konosha line under construction.

The railway line included: the railway line Kotlas - Kozhva with a length of 728 km; the railway section under construction Konosha - Kotlas with a length of 363 km; a section of the Gorky railway Kotlas - Kirov with a length of 370 km.

The boundaries of the road were established: Kozhva (including), Kirov (including), Konosha (excluding). The road was divided into 5 traffic sections:

DN-1 - Konosha (excluding) - Kizema (including) with the location of the branch at st. Kuloy

DN-2 - from st. Kizema (excluding) to st. Madmas (excluding) and from Art. Kotlas to the Zaovrazhye junction (including) with the location of the branch at the Kotlas station. But there was no room in Kotlas, so the department was temporarily located at Cheremukha station.

DN-3 - From Kirov - Kotlas (excluding) according to Art. Zavrazhye (excluding) with the location of the branch at Murashi station.

DN-4 - from st. Madmas (including) to Izhma station (excluding) with the location of the branch at the Knyazh-Pogost station.

DN-5 - from the Izhva station (including) to the Kozhva station (including) with the location of the branch at the Izhva station, the office was temporarily located at the Ira-Iol station.

The North Pechora Railway, built according to a temporary scheme, needed further large and lengthy construction work to complete it to design standards. The administration of Sevzheldorlag characterized the quality of the construction of the Kotlas-Kozhva railway line as follows: “Despite the opening of working traffic on the Kotlas-Kozhva section on December 29, 1940, the entire length of the track needed major and very significant improvements. The subgrade, laid along wet and clay excavations or backfilled with an incomplete profile over swampy areas, was deformed in a number of places and did not guarantee either continuity or an acceptable speed of train movement. Bridges were erected on numerous detours. Station development was negligible and did not meet the growing needs of traffic and freight turnover. There were no permanent industrial and residential buildings at most stations and hauls. The water supply of steam locomotives was carried out on the simplest and temporary structures. Even before the war, the need for uninterrupted traffic in 1941 and the insufficiency of large bridges with metal trusses required the construction of temporary combined bridges.

After the commissioning of the entire railway line from Konosha to Vorkuta, list approved urgent work to ensure bandwidth 12 pairs of trains per day, which included adding soil to the subgrade, ballasting the track, eliminating detours, arranging the water supply system, building station structures and housing and amenity premises.

Movement - in spite of all obstacles

The Fourth Five-Year Plan, adopted after the war, mainly focused on the demilitarization of the economy and, in particular, the further development of industry and railway transport. During the Great Patriotic War, 31,850 industrial enterprises were destroyed in the Soviet Union, including metallurgical plants that produced about 60% of steel, mines that produced more than 60% of coal. The production of heavy industry was 74.9% of the pre-war level. 4100 were destroyed railway stations, 65 thousand km of railway tracks.

In the Pechora Basin, coal production was to be increased by 2.5 times, and in the Ukhta oil-producing region, oil production by 2.3 times. All this urgently required a further increase in the capacity of the Pechora railway.

The camp system, entrenched in Komi during the war years, was undergoing changes. Having existed for six years, having fulfilled the task assigned to it at the cost of the super-intensive use of forced labor and great human losses (10,584 prisoners died in 1940-1945), Sevdvinlag was liquidated by order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of September 4, 1946.

In the post-war period, the Sevzheldorlag increased the throughput and technical equipment of the Kotlas-Kozhva line, after the liquidation of the Sevdvinlag, completed the construction of the Konosha-Kotlas line. At Pechorzheldorlag, construction work was carried out to bring the Kozhva-Vorkuta railway line up to project standards, for which it was necessary to carry out earthworks in the amount of 4.5 million cubic meters. m, to increase the capacity of trains to 20 pairs per day. Plans 1946 - 1947 were performed by Pechorzheldorlag for construction by 100.4%, for coal transportation by 101%. The 1948 plan provided for a further increase in the capacity of trains, the construction of new railway lines to the Oleniy and Zapadnaya stations, and the creation of normal sanitary conditions for prisoners. As a result of these works, the Pechora Railway, as recorded in official documents, "... sharply approached the design technical equipment", for example, all shifts and most bypasses were eliminated. The capacity of trains on January 1, 1949 was 19.4 pairs of trains per day (on January 1, 1948 - 15.9). The excavation plan was successfully completed, the track laying plan was completed ahead of schedule: to st. Western - in June 1948, to the station. Deer - by November 7, 1948.

According to the 1949 plan, it was necessary to prepare the Pechora Railway for commissioning the Ministry of Railways, for which it was necessary to remove another 571 thousand cubic meters. m of land, build permanent water supply points for steam locomotives, replace wooden bridges reinforced concrete. In 1949, the capacity of the railway was significantly increased, which contributed to an increase in freight traffic. In total, 6338 thousand tons of coal were transported (according to the plan - 6359 thousand tons), while in 1948 - 5029 thousand tons of coal (according to the plan - 5010 thousand tons).

The railway line Pechora - Vorkuta by the time the Ministry of Railways was put into permanent operation (on September 1, 1949) was a complex transport enterprise with a length of 462.26 kilometers. Erected earth embankments accounted for 405.07 km, or 88% of the entire length of the line, earth excavations - 57.19 km, or 12%. The line was "snow-dependent" for 158 km, and therefore 134 thousand portable shields and a permanent fence 2865 meters long were built for the fence. In total, 490 artificial structures were built on this line, including 4 title, 12 large, 6 medium, 84 wooden bridges, 16 wooden trays, 200 reinforced concrete and 168 wooden pipes with a length of 5543 meters.

But - technology is technology, and people, their way of life, everyday life, family interests were also in the field of view of those who developed railway transport in the north. In the post-war period, the development of the social infrastructure of the railway continued, two-story wooden and cinder block 8-apartment, one-story wooden 4-, 3-, 2-apartment houses with a total area of ​​91.4 thousand square meters were built. meters.

The Pechora-Vorkuta railway line was put into permanent operation in accordance with the Decree of the Council of Ministers of the USSR of June 29, 1950 and the order of the Ministry of Railways of July 3, 1950. On July 10, 1950, the line was included in the Pechora Railway. On August 1, 1950, the state commission accepted the line into permanent operation with a "good" rating.

Road merging

During the ten years after the war, important events took place in the life of the road. Its boundaries changed, construction continued.

On June 17, 1946, the North Pechora Railway was renamed Pechora. On July 3, 1950, the Kozhva-Vorkuta railway line, 462 km long, put into permanent operation, was included in the Pechora Railway. In order to improve transport connection with the capital of the Komi Republic, in 1958 the construction of the Mikun - Syktyvkar line began.

In July 1959, the Pechora Railway was transferred to the Northern Railway (order of the Ministry of Railways No. 42 / Ts dated 14.07.59).

By the time of the unification of the Pechora road with the Northern one, new railway lines were built on it. So, next to the existing lightweight line, the Konosha-Velsk line (104 km) was built. The Chum-Labytnangi line was built with a length of 195 km, it cut the Polar Urals, going to the Gulf of Ob. The Pechora road was connected with the port of Salekhard, and between Salekhard and Labytnangi a ferry crossing. The second tracks were built on the section Kotlas - Sosnogorsk.

The construction of the railway noticeably revived the region of the Far North. Three distinct industrial regions have been identified: Vorkuta - coal, Ukhta - oil refining and Syktyvkar - timber processing.

Along the route under construction, the industry of the Komi Republic itself began to develop.

The population of the Komi ASSR as a whole doubled compared to 1939, and urban population over the same period increased by more than 11 times. The Komi ASSR has become an industrial region of the country with developed agriculture.

1930-40s became for the USSR the time of a new round of intensive industrialization. The record speed of construction of the North Pechora Railway was a direct result of the use of extreme measures. The average daily construction speed reached 1.9 km. For comparison: on Turksib - 1.1 km, on the Central Siberian Railway - 0.9 km.

In a book on the history of the SZD, published in 1968, the birth of this line is mentioned in passing, although the heroism of the builders who accomplished a great deed in a short time is noted. Today, many pages of the history of the development of the North, due new life construction of steel highways are perceived in a new way, leaving no one indifferent.

PERSONS

The names of prominent entrepreneurs, engineers, specialists who explored minerals, builders and workers of various specialties associated with the movement of trains remained in the history of the Northern Railway.

But among the people who played their role in the history of the North, there were a lot of people whose dramatic fates were repeated many times in the fates of other people, and whose names say practically nothing to our contemporaries. These are all those who worked for the good of the country, being forced in the North, in camps, in prison. Their story about themselves is an incomparable page in the history of SZD.

Today, we are told about the events of those years when the North Pechora Railway was being built, which appeared not so long ago, based on open archival data on the life of the camps. There is another source of knowledge about that page of our history - these are the memories of eyewitnesses and participants in those events.

Zosima Vasilyevich Panev

(Party worker of the Komi ASSR, since 1972 - Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Komi ASSR)

“At the end of September 1941, a group of comrades and I visited one of the construction sites - in the Kochmes area, north of the city Pechory. The 10-kilometer section is divided into 500-meter pickets, each of which employs 160-200 people, depending on the complexity of the section. On a board nailed to two posts, we read: "We will hand over picket 57 by September 28." The head of the detachment, noticing our doubts, confirmed: yes, the work will be completed. Many bonfires were burning everywhere, but not a single person was near them, everyone was working. People, as if in an anthill, were moving non-stop along the embankment: some were pushing wheelbarrows, others were laying sleepers, others were carrying rails, others were hammering crutches... impossible.

We are with the secretary of the regional committee S.A. Ignatov, the head of the camp, the head of the camp department and the leader of the detachment approached a group of workers. Hello. When asked how things were going, no one answered. The stern, gloomy looks of the workers seemed to say: don't you see? One of them waved his hand towards the fading fire. There, on the ground, lay five people motionless. What is this? The head of the detachment reluctantly grunted: "They have already given up." There was nothing more to ask. We went through the pickets of four detachments: the picture was the same everywhere. Hardly, without noise, people did their job. The slogans “We will die, but we will win” were in every detachment. We didn't hear any complaints. Only one of the workers asked: “Too little grub, we can’t stand it for a long time. Is it possible to add two hundred grams of bread? Yes, the food was bad. The physical load was huge - 16-18 hours a day. Many, exhausted to the limit, fell and did not rise again. There were especially many losses in the last ten days: 30-40 people died in the camp every day.

(According to: Way to victory. Yaroslavl, 2000)

"I built this road"

“…But before you start asking, I will ask you one question myself. Just one question: why are you only now remembering us?

The tape recorder, prepared for a long conversation, carefully paused. What could I answer the former convict? Didn't they know, didn't believe that all this: camps, barbed wire and hard labor could happen here too? Like thousands of other boys, I used to memorize the bright history of our country, darkened only by the war. Like everyone else, sometimes more than once a day I stepped over the sparkling railroad tracks to Vorkuta, not thinking that I was stepping over the greatest monument of sorrow and lawlessness for our places.

And only much later, when in the diversity of published memoirs, diaries, testimonies of Gulag prisoners flashed once and again such a familiar name for this road, I realized one thing: that terrible and cruel, in the existence of which I did not want to believe, happened here too.

But it is difficult to find even now, in our tatty area, a building more grandiose than this road. Tall earth embankments, bridges, all this gives such inviolability, as if there are no swamps, streams, rivers and rivers on the way. Yes, but it’s not like a museum, you won’t find a truthful display of the history of its construction. What kind of museum is there - the documents and those are reliably lost. What remains are only rare witnesses of that construction. Such as Nikolai Gennadievich Arbatov.

They arrested him at the very beginning of the thirty-seventh year. The guilt of the young NKVD escort really turned out to be “serious”: accompanying “enemies of the people” in railway cars from Chelyabinsk to Moscow, he, completely forgetting about “class intransigence”, sometimes talked with them.

It is now that we almost habitually perceive the stories of what befell that generation. But just imagine for a moment the shock of a member of the Komsomol, not so much on a ticket, but on the soul, who, under escort, is led through the whole city. Past life: Moscow, where he lived, school, study at the FZU, graduated with honors from the evening technical school, all this remained beyond the distant, distant line.

Court. Another judgment. Final sentence: seven years. First he ended up in the Chelyabinsk prison. In the thirty-eighth, Arbatov was sent to the North.

The construction of a railway line from the distant coal-mining Vorkuta to Kotlas had just begun. The road only reached Vezdino. A lot of labor was required, camps in the taiga, among the swamps, grew like mushrooms: numbers 36, 37, 38 ... Stages of prisoners came here one after another.

They gave us some kind of scow, I mean a chopped wooden barge - Arbatov now and then flavors his story with the tart smoke of a cheap Prima - such a strong one. Luke, through him all there, down. We were packed like herring in a barrel. They took me to Aikino. There was a church on the shore, I don’t know if it’s still standing now. Here, a barge landed at that church, they took us out, and then, on foot, onto the highway.

Arbatov fell ill during the Kotlas transfer. And he fell seriously ill, the Chelyabinsk cell affected. In a wooden barge, taking a place in a sweaty crowd, I realized that something even more terrible was ahead. And, it is true, that stage from Aikino to the camp was the last for many: after long days in prison, everyone had little strength left. The convoy dealt with the fallen convoy briefly: a shot, the column, without stopping, marches on. If it weren’t for his comrades in prison, who didn’t let him fall, forced him to go, he would not have overcome this road either.

The new batch of labor in the camp was immediately assigned to their places. To whom in the hands of an iron wheelbarrow and on the route: a quarry - an embankment. Anyone who could not only keep the wheelbarrow, but also kept himself on his feet with difficulty, fell into the “weak power”. And from there there are two ways: either you get better, get stronger, or ...

Only it is easy to say: "You will get stronger." These were hard workers, and even then they were given six hundred grams of bread for fulfilling the norm. Here (that the goners should be fed for nothing) was supposed to be half as much.

In the camp, an iron wheelbarrow was too much for him. Defined in "weak power". In the barracks there is a barrel of fuel, one side of it is knocked out for firewood. Firewood without escorts will be brought directly by longitude. So they put it in, there was no saw, no axes, but what an ax the prisoner has! Both day and night they warmed themselves, saved themselves by that stove.

Many died, no one kept count. Each such barrack had its own funeral team, the peasants did not sit without work. They will even take off their underwear and bury them naked.

Then I felt: I couldn’t stand it for so long, something had to be done. He had a watch: an ordinary lady's medallion in a silver case. For the convenience of the handle, the watchmaker attached it to the strap. During the arrest, the soldier, while searching, ran it over his arm, but the sweater was thick, he did not feel it. Then, in prison, they hid these watches with the whole cell, cherished them like the apple of their eye. They got to the point where they stopped walking. And then he carried them through all the prisons and stages. Wherever he didn’t hide it: he would put it in bread, then in soap. It felt like it would fit.

I went up to one person, those hours showed:

- Tell me how to eat them.

- And you give them to the captain.

There was such a person good location sat, let go of the bread-groats from the scales.

- Only you do not bargain with him, give it like that. And he will figure out how to help you.

And so he did.

At first, the captain supported him in pieces: either he would put a crust of bread, or a piece of sugar. Then, either tired, or, on the contrary, regretted, he says:

- You don't go to me anymore, I won't give you pieces. I will do better for you. They bring frozen potatoes to the track, so they will put you on guard. Eat there.

By that time, a narrow-gauge railway had already been laid along the highway, and everything was brought to the camp along it, including potatoes. The bags were dumped right under the open shed.

The companion in the gatehouse looked at the goner and only shook his head in doubt:

- Eat more. Either you will get stronger, if your stomach can stand it, or you will completely weaken.

... Arbatov made a long pause in his story, asked to turn off the tape recorder. He sat, resting, then went to the kitchen. He returned with a new pack of Prima. He lit a cigarette, nodded his head to me: turn it on.

- At first I fell on the potatoes - I have diarrhea. And the partner is all his own: eat more. Either pan or gone. That's what I ate. After a while the diarrhea stopped. I began to recover, even once I came up to unload the bags. The men were carrying sacks, and I set my back. They put a sack on me and I fell right there.

- No, - they say, - you are not good enough yet.

Survived. But you have to work, give the norm. On the embankment - like an anthill in the early morning: some carry heavy sand on carts, others load it, and still others count the carts. There is also work for the elite: they indicate where to unload the cart.

No matter how little strength the prisoner has, but in the cold, work is the main salvation. Yes, and there was an incentive: you deliver the norm on a wheelbarrow - you will get 600 grams of bread. Overfulfilled - also a makeweight is attached. If you can’t cope, the rations will be cut in half, there will be nothing to receive at all.

He approached one foreman, the thief was also a Muscovite, from Maryina Roshcha: take him to your brigade.

- I'll take it, - he answers, - if you promise that you will do the norm. Or at least close to normal, then I will help.

Then Arbatov understood what it means to help a person if he almost fulfills the norm. She lacks ten or fifteen percent, the foreman will add. But, adding extra carts of soil, he has to take them away from someone. Not from the one who himself overfulfilled the norm, and, therefore, he secured an additional ration for himself. They take away from someone who is doomed to non-fulfillment in advance because of his weakness. He doesn't care what to get an incomplete ration for.

The norm was great. Of course, there were healthy men, they had carts - almost a cubic meter of sand was included in this. But most were given the norm with great difficulty. Before the red circles before his eyes, he also rested, thinking only of one thing: to survive.

Many years after the liberation, the same cart was still rusting in the barn for a long time, sometimes he carried firewood into the yard on it. The employees of the local history museum became interested: if only the exhibit was valuable. Nikolai Gennadievich only spread his hands: she is gone.

There were Chinese, a whole brigade. The workers are excellent, hardworking, well, like ants - my interlocutor is in a hurry to say something, as if he is afraid to forget the most important thing, and then he falls silent, resting from the surging memories. - They are small, but everyone is being driven, driven, they won’t stand up, they won’t rest. And they fell, so no one survived. What ruined? And hunger and cold. Terrible frosts. Such a saying existed among us: a frost of forty-five degrees is not terrible for us, much worse when forty-one in the yard. Why? At forty-five they were left in the barracks, they were not driven to work, but at forty-one - go ...

That first winter of 1938-1939 turned out to be fierce, it became fatal for many. Wadded trousers and wadded padded jackets were given to convicts, the rest was all their own. Instead of boots on the feet - tyuni. Local craftsmen made them like this: you bring them sleeves from a padded jacket, they sew rubber tops - that's the shoes.

In the summer, tracklayers, the same kind of prisoners, came to the embankment.

- They sent us on. This time we loaded them into calf wagons and, along the path that we had covered, but not yet balanced, they took us back to Vezdino. But there were far fewer of us. If half survived - and that's good.

Again brought to the river, there is waiting for a barge. Team: landing, one at a time. The convoy ran, fussed.

How did the guards treat you?

- There were no special bullying. Yes, there was discipline. He has a gun, if you like it or not, you will become obedient. He did not like something in us: lie down. So you throw yourself headlong into the snow. You lie down: citizen chief, we are already tired. - Well, look ... By the way, when they moved here, to Urdoma, there were practically no deaths.

They took us by barge to Palamysh, a stage further from it, to the Urdoma station.

In Urdom, the party was placed in a barrack with an unfinished roof: while you spend the night somehow, you will make a roof tomorrow. We spent the night, and the next morning early to work.

They built a stage from Urdoma towards Tyva. We've been working here quietly for some time. As I remember now, I even managed to receive two parcels from home. I handed over these parcels for fidelity to the capter, only on faith. And the capter has changed, they often changed like gloves. What are you, - he is surprised, - what a package, you didn’t give me anything, back off. That's all. My father kept sending me the so-called hard-smoked sausage, it was black and dry.

The bridge was erected, the road was cut. The bypass road was first built there, it was not built so carefully: the slopes, the rises could not be maintained. They made a roof on the barracks. Instead of a bed, there is moss, and it was here in those years such that as you step, so the leg will fail. As soon as they settled down, they got involved in the work, they brought new prisoners to the habitable place: Polish prisoners of war.

Those left to finish building the road, the camp is being rented further, to Tuva. On foot, okay that's still close. We spent the first night on the ground, only then hastily began to build for ourselves something similar to housing.

From life in Tyva, I remember one incident. The finger on the hand was swollen, it hurt somewhere. A messenger comes to the barracks: the boss is calling you. And the new chief settled outside the zone, when he arrived, they cut down a new house for him.

Came.

“Why aren’t you at work?” he asks.

- I can't work. The redness has gone, - Arbatov put his finger forward as proof.

- Well, well, okay. We will check this.

He sat down opposite himself, sat next to him and asked the question:

- And where are all the others that went through the case with you, - and he gives the names of those with whom Arbatov went through the court.

He named those with whom he had a chance to go through the stages together. The chief heard:

- I have no more questions for you.

And he let go.

Here Arbatov had questions: how does the new boss know all the circumstances of his case? He met the foreman, who lived in the house with the chief, approached him:

- Well, tell me, how does he know everything about me, about my classmates?

He laughs:

- He knows you as flaky, he knows you better than you know yourself, because all your affairs passed through his hands. He was the People's Commissar of the NKVD in Bashkiria, and Chelyabinsk also belonged to Bashkiria, to Ufa. So he sat you down and sat down himself.

How much they worked there, in Tuva, then the new boss somehow disappeared unnoticed. But in the end, he did a good deed for Arbatov, put him on a thieves' job: to carry bread.

- Kapter only teases: you eat, eat, that you bring whole loaves. And honesty torments me so much that I can’t even break off the crust. I will bring everything and hand it over to him by weight. He scolds me later. He sees that I'm afraid to take it, he will break off a chunk: here, go to the barracks, cover yourself with a blanket and eat it.

On Tyva, they barely had time to make an embankment, they drove on - to Tyla-Yol. The station was deserted, there was nothing but a birch forest. I didn’t go with a wheelbarrow any more, they put it as a rater.

One day, the head of the works, the second person after the head of the camp, appeared on the embankment. Arbatov decided on a desperate act: he stopped him and blurted out quickly:

- I am an electrician, a good electrician, from Moscow. He graduated from the FZU, evening technical school, worked a lot. If you need me, please remember.

He pulled out a notebook from his pocket.

- Full Name?

Recorded. A month passes, the second.

Called to watch:

- Arbatov, pack your things, you'll go to another place.

And what should the convict collect, what things? A piece of half-eaten bread, a spoon, a bowl from a tin can. They issued an escort - a young soldier, so we went.

“I’m ahead, he’s a little behind,” Arbatov even seems ridiculous to present this picture himself right now, “he’s not particularly afraid of me, he walks in five steps. When he also gets into his pocket, he will get a piece, chew it.

So we came to the Protoka, a large camp on the very bank of the Vychegda. They appointed Arbatov as an electrician. There he was given a pass for unescorted transport and the task was explained:

- You will provide the excavator with water and electric light. There is an engine, there is a pump, but we still need to do something to make them work.

Here he lived both the summer and the winter of 1939-1940. Here I almost gave up, having been ill with malaria. I saw how the bridge across the Vychegda was being built, how the embankment was brought up to it. The road was built hastily: the country, living in anticipation of an imminent war, needed Vorkuta coal. The command of the camp urged on: faster, faster, neither the forces of the prisoners, nor their lives are spared. There was even a Stakhanovite movement in the camp: for exceeding the norm - reinforced rations.

Spring forty-first passed, summer. On the twenty-second of June there was turmoil in the camp, it swept among the prisoners: war. Big changes, however, did not happen after that. The convoy was strengthened: they recruited old people from the villages, put rifles in their hands. Even before the war they did not see good food: only potatoes, they suffered very much because of the lack of salt. Shag was also terribly expensive. After June 1941 the food became even worse.

They were taken to the front and from the camp, but, of course, not the 58th - political - article. They took criminals, called them to the watch:

- Will you go to the front?

- I'll go.

The first train on the road passed on November 7, 1941, quite a bit late for the start of the war. Everyone in the camp already knew: both the authorities and the prisoners that there would be a train. It was small: one two-axle trailer is cool, the rest are ordinary, calf ones. In one of the cars they carried a power station, it worked, the whole train was decorated with garlands of light bulbs. It was getting late, and he was walking in a halo of lights past Madmas station, where the whole camp was lined up.

The train passed, but there was still a lot of work on the road. Construction trailers went along its only track, coal and other cargo went. Arbatov was soon again transferred to Urdoma, to the camp on the Column. There he remained an electrician.

Knowledge of electrical work saved me from many troubles. Like what, I'm claws on the shoulders and - go where you want: I'm a man in the line of duty. But there was also responsibility. One day they report: a big boss is coming. The authorities did not go alone, with him deputies for energy, communications and other issues. While the trailer will stand in a dead end, it is necessary to make lighting in it. I say I will. How to do it? The power plant was at the station. The current station in Urdom is already the third in a row, and the oldest, the first, was more like a hut. And the power plant, where the stone bath is now, stood.

They took a large-section wire, unwound the coil, pulled it up to the arrow. And deal in December, frosts. The wire was dragged under the rails, attached to the trailer. We tried to turn it on - there is light. It's scary: the wire is bare right on the snow, you step in - it will kill you. But the light in the trailer was on all night.

Arbatov sat at the power plant all that night. He asked the peasants working on it one thing: do not let me down, the light will go out - it will not be good for everyone. It worked out.

In the winter of 1944, his sentence ended, but for another five years after that he had a loss of rights: he did not have voting rights, he could not be a member of a trade union ... Once every three months he had to report to the district commandant's office, so that the Yaren roads had to be trampled a lot.

There was nothing to think about returning to Moscow, the capital was closed to him. When he was rehabilitated in the fifty-eighth, by that time there was a family, five children. Here, in Urdom, I first bought an old house, like firewood. Then he set up his house, not far from the road, you can hear through the windows the noise of passing trains. The road did not seem to let him go, like an all-powerful mistress, linking his fate with her own.

In the mid-fifties, some kind of imperceptible, quiet reorganization took place: Pecherlag was renamed Pecherstroy, towers began to be demolished, reinforced concrete insulators were blown up, and they were so strong, they say that they didn’t even take explosions.

Nikolai Gennadievich does not complain about life and does not blame anyone for his twisted fate. No matter what happens, from those thirties and forties he still had a starting point that allowed him to endure all hardships with firmness: “It happened worse.”

He worked until retirement, as before, as an electrician. And although he didn’t have a chance to study anymore, he reached everything by self-taught. He was considered a classy specialist, it happened that even certified Arkhangelsk engineers found errors in projects.

The house, though old, but its own. Children with grandchildren often come. Everything is fine, it just started to get sick often. Everything is fine. But still…

The most important holiday in Urdom, Victory Day, has recently died down. On such a day, almost the entire village gathers for a rally, war veterans are honored as heroes, and they deserve such respect. But on this holiday, I suddenly clearly imagined how lonely a former prisoner was standing at the gate of a small old house, who had devoted the most and most difficult part of his life to the construction of the road. How silently they look from the windows at peers surrounded by honor, people like him, people with a broken fate and illnesses acquired by hard work. What did they do wrong to you, Pobeda?

Oleg Gloomy (According to the materials of the text submitted to the competition dedicated to the history of the Northern Railway)

Kotlas centralized library system:

Type of document: Article from the collection (single volume)

Title: How the construction of the North Pechora Road began

Place of publication: Chronicle of the Northern Railway: from the 19th century to the 21st century. - Yaroslavl, 2008. - S.142-155, 158-169.

On May 10, 1938, People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR L.P. Beria issued order No. 090 "On the division of the Ukhtpechtrest camps." On its basis, the Northern railway camp of the NKVD was organized, among other things. Sevzheldorlag was subordinate to Gulzheldor. He received the letter designation "ITL YaYa or" p / box 219 ". Corps engineer Naftaly Aronovich Frenkel was appointed head of this department. It is to him that the camp rumor ascribes the words that became the ideology of the Gulag: "You need to take everything from the prisoners in the first three months, and then they are no longer needed." “For the fulfillment of the government task for the construction of the Kotlas-Kozhva railway line”, he was awarded the Orders of Lenin and the Badge of Honor, received the rank of Major General ... The camp administration primarily paid attention to solving production issues to the detriment of the organization of the camp itself, the arrangement of life and life prisoners. For example, “camp No. 55 is a 1938-type camp: solid bunks, lice is 50 percent. Prisoners don’t wash their faces in the morning, they don’t give tea in the morning, but only boiled water.”

PECHORSTROY

HISTORY OF CREATION

1940-2000

"Pechorstroy". History of creation. 1940-2000. - Publishing house "Pechora time", 2000. - 120 pages.

The book offered to readers is dedicated to the 60-year activity of Pechora Construction OJSC, the largest organization of transport builders in the Komi Republic. Based on historical research, memoirs of veterans, publications in the media, archival materials, the history of the creation of Pechorstroy, its role in the development of the transport network of the European North, in helping the front, in industrial and civil construction on the territory of the Komi Republic is shown.

The book tells about the construction of the main highway North of Konosha - Vorkuta, the second tracks of the railway lines, thanks to which access to oil, gas, and timber was obtained. A whole gallery of names will pass before readers - these are the heroes of construction sites, people whose work is worth bending the knee.

© Pechora Time Publishing House, 2000

The quality of the illustrations corresponds to the printing quality of this publication (note by the site admin)

PARTING

We part, we are with you

say goodbye.

How many roads together

we passed!

From Pechorstroy dear

outskirts -

To the Syktyvkar capital

earth.

Ile did not love you here

are we royal?

Or the blizzards here are evil

broke?

What lured you

Syktyvkar

And they took their native from Pechora?

We're breaking up. But we

We do not say goodbye.

We are all Pechora forever.

We will touch each other with our hearts

Through the kilometers and through the years!

Vera Murashova.

"PECHORSTROY" - 6O YEARS.

PAST PRESENT FUTURE

Born in 1940 in the bowels of the NKVD - GULAG, the team of transport builders of the Komi Republic survived several socio-economic formations: the Stalinist dictatorship (40-50s), the economy of "developed" socialism (60-70s), perestroika and transitional period from the economy of socialism to a market economy (80-90s).

The collective lived differently during these years. 40-50s - military and post-war years, heroic and tragic. A huge number of people worked on the construction of the railway from the Kozhva station to Vorkuta: only the civilian population, except for prisoners, worked 30 thousand people. At the cost of many lives, at the cost of enormous suffering and deprivation in the conditions of the Arctic, this section of 460 kilometers was laid in one year. From 1941 to 1950, the movement of trains with coal from Vorkuta was carried out under the conditions of temporary operation of the railway. This book tells about the conditions in which people worked and how much courage, will, and organizational abilities the construction managers of that time needed to show in order to organize the work of tens of thousands of people and achieve their goal. I bow to the blessed memory of the leaders of those years: Vasily Arsentievich Baranov, who led until 1947, Abraham Izrailevich Borovitsky (1947-1950), Boris Petrovich Grabovsky (1950-1972). It was they who created and educated, one might say, raised a team of transport builders in our republic, a team of courageous, seasoned, easy-going professional builders. With their labor, 3.5 thousand kilometers of railways, 121 railway stations, more than 2 million square meters of housing, schools, kindergartens, hospitals and much more have been built in the republic.

If in the war and post-war years "Pechorzheldorstroy" built mainly railways and facilities adjacent to them, then in the 60-70s the volume of general construction work increased sharply. I consider the 60-70s and the beginning of the 80s to be the best period of Pechorstroy. Its leaders at that time were Efim Vladimirovich Basin, Vladimir Alexandrovich Linnik, Igor Evdokimovich Merkul. With the increased needs in industrial and civil construction in these years, the management of Pechorstroy obtained from the Ministry of Transport Construction and customers the necessary capital investments to expand their own base in Pechora. As a result, a reinforced concrete plant, a motor depot, and a mechanization department were built. Due to the introduction of new technologies, the widespread use of small-scale mechanization, labor productivity has risen. Party and trade union organizations played their part in carrying out measures to organize socialist competition among brigades, sections and subdivisions. A considerable merit in this is Nikolai Mikhailovich Klepcha, who worked for many years as the chairman of the Pechorstroy post-committee.

During these years, many well-known people in Pechorstroy worked heroically at construction sites. They are also mentioned in this book. Many have been awarded orders and medals for their work. Among them are Nikolai Ivanovich Chepurnykh - Hero of Socialist Labor, Eduard Alexandrovich Petrashevsky, Ivan Trofimovich Trofimov, Nikolai Mikhailovich Vernigor, Nadezhda Davydovna Kirichenko, Nikolai Stepanovich Drozd, Nelly Alexandrovna Savelyeva, Franz Friedrichovich Eret and others. During these years, the financial situation of people also stabilized, many received comfortable apartments, wages increased, and working conditions improved.

In the last 15 years, the volume of railway construction has declined sharply, although there was no shortage of industrial and civil construction until 1993. Nevertheless, the loss of one of the most profitable and productive fronts of activity could not but affect the results of the work of Pechorstroy. A sharp drop in volumes has been observed since 1993, it coincided with the beginning of reforms and the general crisis in Russia. I will give statistical data for these years on the volume of construction and installation works performed in 1991 prices in thousand rubles: 1991 - 42023, 1992 - 40942, 1993 - 31627, 1994 - 24750, 1995 - 21944, 1995 - 16303, 1997 - 8042, 1998 - 7948, 1999 - 13814. With the loss of volumes, the number of employees decreased. In 1998, it amounted to less than a thousand people. Under these conditions, it was not possible to acquire or renew anything, but still managed to maintain fixed assets and avoid bankruptcy.

In 1999, the volumes increased, the construction of the Vendinga-Karpogory railway began, work was completed on the transshipment fleet for loading bauxite at the Chinyavoryk station, and volumes appeared for the overhaul of the access roads of the Syktyvkar CPP. In 2000, a subcontract agreement was concluded with the Transstroy Corporation for the construction of the railway station Chinyavoryk - Mine with a length of 160 kilometers. In addition, the scope of work for other customers increased compared to 1999. All this insures us against unemployment.

But our task is not only to increase the volume of work. We understand that we have entered a different era, a different world with different values. If 15 years ago "the party and the government" still thought for us, today we must think about ourselves. To think and decide how to preserve and increase the prestige and image of the company's team, and the well-being of employees will depend on this. We understand the challenges we face. The main ones are the quality of the product we create and its competitiveness. We understand that the railroads end sooner or later, but we need to continue to work, to find other points of application of forces. In my opinion, today in Pechorstroy there are grounds and opportunities for improvement. First of all, these are the people working in this team. We have preserved footage of those years, these are our veterans who say: "If necessary, we will do it." I am the same age as Pechorstroy, but I think it is deeply wrong to think that a person of retirement age is necessarily a retrograde, a conservative. We have many veterans, and this is just as good and important as the influx of fresh, young forces. Vasily Tarasovich Novikov has been working next to me (or I'm next to him) for 15 years now, a veteran who brought up more than one generation of Pechorstroy workers in Vorkuta. SMP-242, where he is always remembered with a kind word by both workers and engineering and technical workers. Even now, with his work, he shows young people an example of organization, diligence and efficiency.

Undoubtedly, younger and more experienced personnel are needed, and they are available. This is Chief Engineer Alexander Richardovich Potapov, Deputy CEO in Economics and Finance Sergei Pavlovich Markovsky, who graduated from the presidential program. Valery Petrovich Kucherin, Nikolai Nikolaevich Mokhov, Valentin Viktorovich Shavlovsky, Nikolai Fedorovich Perfilyev and a number of other leaders who are quite well versed in the theory of market economy and practical work are young and full of energy.

We have a program of action for the next two years, approved by the board of directors of OAO Pechorstroy. There is great confidence that, despite the big financial problems, we will preserve and increase the glorious labor traditions of Pechorstroy.

Eternal memory to those veterans of Pechorstroy who are no longer alive today. A deep bow and great gratitude to the veterans of Pechorstroy, who are on a well-deserved rest. Health to you and longevity! I congratulate all the veterans of Pechorstroy, all those working today on the 60th anniversary of Pechorstroy, I wish you further success in work and well-being, health and happiness in your personal life.

Nikolai POTEMKIN, General Director of OAO Pechora Construction.

DEAR PECHORSTROY EMPLOYEES AND VETERANS!

You are holding in your hands a book dedicated to the glorious labor history of your enterprise, Pechora Construction Joint-Stock Company.

Sixty years ago, in May 1940, for the construction of the North Pechora Railway on the Kozhva - Vorkuta section, the NKVD trust "Pechorzheldorstroy" was organized. Already in December 1941, during the difficult days of the Great Patriotic War, the railway to Vorkuta was built in record time, and in 1950 it was put into permanent operation. The first pages of the history of "Pechorstroy" reflected the complex and controversial history of our country in the 30-50s. The construction of the railway, the industrial development of the wealth of the Pechora coal basin in those early years was carried out by the hands of prisoners and was accompanied by great sacrifices.

The entire working biography of Pechorstroy is closely connected with our republic. In the 1960s and 1980s, your enterprise became a leader in the transport construction industry. The labor collective of the Pechorstroyers has made a great contribution to the socio-economic development of not only our republic, but the entire European North of the country. You have built more than 3,000 kilometers of railways to the storehouses of coal, oil and gas, carried out large-scale industrial and civil construction in Pechora, Vorkuta, Inta, Usinsk, Sosnogorsk, Ukhta, Syktyvkar.

But the main pride of "Pechorstroy" has always been the transport builders themselves, who with their labor laid steel lines and built new cities. Heroes of Socialist Labor Nikolay Chepurny and Efim Vasin, honored builder of the RSFSR Galina Sandratskaya and many, many other Pechorstroy workers are well known and respected in our republic.

I am sure that Pechorstroy has a great future. On October 5, 1999, the silver crutch of the new railway, Belkomur, was completed, which will become a steel bridge between the White Sea and the Urals, and will give an additional impetus to the development of all regions of the European North. This railway will also be built by Pechorstroy.

On the day of the anniversary of your enterprise, I wish you good health, personal happiness and well-being, new successes in work for the benefit of the Komi Republic!

Head of the Komi Republic Yuri SPIRIDONOV

DEAR TRANSPORT BUILDERS!

Many of us who have gone through the Pechorstroy school of life remain grateful to this wonderful team, with whom fate has connected. Here, hundreds of workers received recognition of their merits, dozens of specialists grew into leaders of the republican and Russian scale. My working biography began 32 years ago at the repair and rolling base of Pechorstroy. Work hardening, the first experience of the leader, I got it there. A special bow to the veterans of Pechorstroy, who are the golden fund of the joint-stock company. Among them are Sergey Fedorovich Sokolov, holder of the Order of Lenin, honorary transport builders - bricklayer Angelina Petrovna Rocheva, plasterer Maria Fedorovna Ovchinnikova, honored builder of the RSFSR Dzhemma Alexandrovna Vasilyeva, holder of the Order of the Red Banner of Labor carpenter Valery Vasilyevich Shemshin.

The history of Pechorstroy is the history of the creation of transport builders on the land of Komi and neighboring regions. They created transport network republics, provided conditions for economic development European North of the country.

I sincerely congratulate you on the 60th anniversary of Pechorstroy and wish the transport builders not to grow old in spirit, to remain indispensable to people, the republic, and Russia. Good health, happiness!

CHAPTER I

ON THE TUNDRA, ON THE RAILWAY…

“You go out to the embankment - a thin yellow thread stretches against the colorful background of the summer tundra, and on both sides of it there is such an untouched mysterious wilderness, such an uninhabited space that you involuntarily hold on to this thread with your whole being, connecting you with life, with the past and with timid hopes for the future."

Lazar Shereshevsky,

writer,

participant in the construction of the North-Pechora railway.

Many years have already passed, and the song, the words of which are placed in the title, is sung and sung by everyone - even young people. Maybe because of the romantic motive on which the "zek" text is based. Or maybe it's all about memory. The memory of deeds so great in scale and tragedy that it has already become almost genetic. Although for nature, which is responsible for heredity, those 50-60 years that have passed since the construction of the North Pechora Railway is not a period.

This is the memory of the Komi ASSR, which, along with Kolyma, Magadan, Norilsk and Karaganda, was in those years one of the largest islands of the Gulag Archipelago. The memory of prisoners, prisoners of war, soldiers and officers, Komsomol members and civilian specialists, voluntarily or forcibly brought to the construction camps of the NKVD, whose hands in the 30s - mid-50s began the industrial development of the north of the republic - mining, construction of iron roads, laying of coal mines and oil wells, construction of cities and workers' settlements. Overwork, polar nights, frosts and a four-week summer fell to their lot.

FIRST RAILS

The idea of ​​building a railway in the Komi region, necessary for the industrial development of the European North-East of the country, arose in the years civil war when Donbass coal and Baku oil were in the hands of the Whites. As early as the end of 1918, the Supreme Council of National Economy organized preliminary surveys on the Moscow-Ukhta line. In 1918-1922, reconnaissance survey work was carried out in the areas of Koposh - Kozhva, Kostroma - Pinyug - Ust-Sysolsk. And in 1925, such surveys were carried out by the People's Commissariat of Railways and the Ivanovo-Voznesensk Provincial Executive Committee along the Moscow - Yuryevets - Sheksna - Pinyug - Ust-Sysolsk highway. According to the decree of the State Planning Committee of the USSR of June 8, 1929, with the help of two thousand prisoners of the Northern Camp, which was part of the USEVLON (Administration of the Northern Special Purpose Camps) of the OPTU of the USSR, the construction of the Pinyug - Ust-Sysolsk road with a length of 296 kilometers began. But in 1931, work was suspended, and the builders-prisoners were transferred to the construction of the White Sea-Baltic Canal.

In June 1932, the Executive Committee of the Komi region made a decision to continue construction. The embankment of the railway was raised practically by hand throughout the entire future route, and wooden bridges were built. However, on March 7, 1933, by order of the People's Commissariat of Railways of the USSR, all work at the construction site was curtailed. The hard work of thousands of prisoners was in vain.

After the discovery of the reserves of the Pechora coal basin and the Ukhta gas-bearing province, the question arose of exporting the mined minerals. The first tons of oil were produced in 1931 at the Chibyu field. In 1934, the first barge with Vorkuta coal was sent. Initially, preference was given to the waterway to Arkhangelsk along the rivers Vorkuta, Usa and Pechora, or through the Yugorsky Shar Strait, for which in 1932-1934 surveys of the Vorkuta Yugorsky Shar railway line were carried out and the construction of a large seaport was planned. This idea was reflected in the Decree of the Council of Labor and Defense of the USSR dated August 8, 1936 No. 308-73-S, which provided for the construction of two "island" (closed) railway lines Ust-Vym - Chibyu with a length of 250 kilometers and Ust Usa - Vorkuta with a length of 450 kilometers.

In 1936-1937, relevant surveys were carried out, after which the technical project was approved on January 28, 1938 by the People's Commissar of Railways L.M. Kaganovich. However, in the course of further development of the project, it turned out that it requires large financial costs and does not solve the problem of coal export, since navigation in these areas is too short.

"THE WAYS SHOWN BY OUR LEADER..."

For the industrial development of the natural reserves of the north of the Komi Territory, by the Decree of the Council of Labor and Defense of November 16, 1932 No. 1423/423, the Ukhto-Pechora Trust of the OGPU (Ukhtpechlag) was organized. This decree determined the main tasks of the trust, including the exploration and exploitation of minerals of industrial importance in the Pechora basin, the construction of railways and dirt roads. In particular, it was supposed to complete already in 1933 the preparations for the construction of the Vorkuta-Yugorsky Shar railway and to build a narrow-gauge railway from Vorkuta to the pier on the Usa River with a length of 70 km. The general scheme of work of the Ukhtpechlag of the NKVD for the second five-year plan (1933-1937), developed by the planning department of the camp administration, provided for the construction of the Northern railway Arkhangelsk - Kozhva - Vorkuta - the coast of the Arctic Ocean, as well as the foundation of a research institute in the new socialist the city of Krasnopechorsk, the construction of the Kozhva - Chibyo - Ust-Vym oil pipeline, four oil refineries, two shipyards, radium and helium plants, three power plants and other industrial facilities.

The construction of the southern section of the Vorkuta - Yugorsky Shar railway never began. The northern section of this road was to be built by the Vaigach expedition of the NKVD. This project was not implemented either in the 30s or later.

The industrialization of the country caused an increase in the demand for coal and oil. On August 7, 1936, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks adopted a special resolution "On the industrial development of Ukhta, Pechora and Vorkuta", which determined the main directions for the development of the Pechora coal basin and the Ukhta gas-bearing province. In accordance with this resolution, the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR N.I. On August 13, 1936, Yezhov issued Order No. 342 "On the production program for the Ukhta-Pechora trust for 1937-1939 and changing the structure of the trust apparatus." This order set new tasks in the field of railway construction:

a) build a railway of normal gauge from Rudnik on Vorkuta to the village of Ust-Usa with a length of 450 km with a deadline for completion by July 1, 1939;

b) build a railway of normal gauge from Chibyu to the village of Ust-Vym with a length of 275 km with a deadline for completion of work by October 1, 1938.

To solve these problems, a special Transport Department was organized in the structure of Ukhtpechlag with a center in the village of Knyazhpogost under the leadership of V.N. Gendenreich.

The local party and Soviet leadership directly connected the further socio-economic development of Pechora with the production activities of the NKVD Ukhtpechlag. Much was said about this at the 1st Pechora District Congress of Soviets in November 1936: “Ukhtpechtrest, organized on the initiative of Comrade Stalin, covered the territory of the district with its significant, wide scope of work. Exploration work for oil, coal, precious metals, gold and other minerals showed the presence of exceptional natural resources in the bowels of the Pechora district.

The ways of economic development of the district are indicated by our Leader, Comrade Stalin: to give more oil, more coal. In this direction, under the leadership of the district party organization, we must deploy the Soviets to this work and ensure the successful development of the coal and oil industries of Ukhtpechtrest.

On August 12, 1937, the Pechora Okrug Executive Committee allocated an area of ​​160 hectares for a “temporary base and berths for transport and storage operations for the construction of the railway and station facilities (station, workshops, warehouses, depots, residential buildings, railway tracks, sidings) on the banks of the Usa River above air and radio stations of Ukhtpechlag”. Already in August 1937, the First Branch of the Ukhtpechlag began the construction of the Ust-Usa-Vorkuta railway, which was subsequently stopped as unpromising.

Throughout 1937, the issue of the construction site of the industrial and transport complex on the Pechora River was actively discussed in the Pechora District Executive Committee and the administration of the Ukhtpechlag of the NKVD. The district party and Soviet leadership spoke out sharply against its construction near the village of Ust-Kozhva: “since the plant, designed to meet the needs of the district, and, above all, the district center, built in Kozhva, cannot meet the needs of the ongoing construction, and the delivery of lumber and other cargoes from Kozhva is possible only in navigation for two or three months. The Presidium of the District Executive Committee decides to ask the Regional Executive Committee of the Komi ASSR to resolve the issue of building a plant closer to the village of Ust-Usa, which will positively solve all the problems outlined.

As a result of the calculations, the indisputable advantage of the Kotlas and Kozhvinsky options for the construction of the railway was clarified and the main direction of the projected line was determined, which was the basis for the corresponding government decree.

A.I. Solzhenitsyn mentions this railway in The Gulag Archipelago: “The development of such a vast northern roadless region required the construction of a railway from Kotlas through Knyazhpogost to Vorkuta. This caused the need for two more independent camps, already railway ones - Sevzheldorlag (from Kotlas to the Pechora River) and Pechorzheldorlag (from Pechora to Vorkuta).

"GIVE OUTPUT TO VORKUTA COAL"

On October 28, 1937, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopted Decree No. 1952-343 on the construction of the North Pechora Railway through the settlements of Konosha - Velsk - Kotlas - Knyazhpogost - Chibyu - Kozhva - Vorkuta. Its significance was defined in the report “Construction of the Kotlas-Kozhva Railway Line” as follows: “For the national economy of our country, the importance of the Kotlas-Vorkuta railway can hardly be overestimated. Through the impenetrable taiga and tundra, through the permafrost regions, it opens up access to the enormous wealth hidden in the bowels of the far North. With the opening of traffic along the North Pechora Mainline, there is no need to import Donetsk coal, Baku oil and oil products to the northern and northwestern industrial centers and ports of the Baltic, Barents and White Seas.

To the heart of the country, to Leningrad, to the ports of the northern seas, trains with timber, coal, oil and other minerals will go by rail.

For the Komi ASSR, the North Pechora Mainline is fraught with huge opportunities further development industry, agriculture, railway and water transport which will create even greater prerequisites for the industrial and cultural development of the rich Northern Territory. The use of the richest subsoil, the maximum export of coal and oil along the North Pechora Mainline to the industrial centers of the country are the top priority today.

The planned railway had a length of 1560 kilometers, including sections:

Vorkuta - Kozhva - 462 km,

Kozhva - Kotlas - 728 km,

Kotlas - Konosha - 370 km.

Simultaneously with the North Pechora Mainline, a long-term plan for the development of railway lines was scheduled for the construction of railways Vorkuta - Khabarovo, Koposha - Volkhovstroy, Arkhangelsk or Mezen - Ukhta, Izhma - Solikamsk, Abez - Salekhard (through the Ural Range), Kotlas - Kostroma, Shiyes - Syktyvkar .

“There is no doubt that the ongoing movement of the metalworking industry from the European part of the USSR to the regions of the Urals and the huge demand for coking coal presented in connection with this will make it necessary to supply the Ural plants with Vorkuta coal - the construction of the Ural line from the Izhma station of the North Pechora Railway through Krutoy district - to Solikamsk, - it was noted in the same report. The railway line Izhma - Solikamsk, in addition to transit significance, will also be of great local importance, contributing to the development of the productive forces of the Krutoy region, thus turning it into a powerful hub for the oil, gas and asphalt industry.

According to the new direction established by the government in 1938-1939, technical surveys were carried out and technical projects were drawn up.

START

On July 7, 1938, the Economic Council of the USSR in its resolution determined the calendar dates for construction:

Kotlas - r. Vychegda: 11/1/1938, 12/1/1939, 10/1/1941.

Vychegda - Knyazhpogost: 06/1/1938, 05/1/1939, 05/1/1941.

Knyazhpogost - Chibyu: 1937, 12/1/1938, 11/1/1941.

Chibyu - Kochmes: 1.07.1939, 1.11.1941, 1.11.1942.

Kochmes - Abez: 07/1/1939, navigation. 40, 1.11.1942.

Abez - Vorkuta: 1.07.1938, navigation. 40, 1.11.1942.

Subsequently, these dates were postponed, construction was delayed. The question of conservation of the Abez-Vorkuta and Chibyu-Kozhva sections was raised more than once. Institutes Hartransproekt (Kharkov) and Lentransproekt (Leningrad) revised technical projects several times.

The railway line Kotlas - Kozhva was sought and designed by the Kharkov branch of Soyuztransproekt. On the Knyazhpogost - Ukhta section, 200 kilometers long, surveys were carried out from September 1936 to February 1937 under the leadership of the head of the expedition, engineer V.I. Levin. On the Kotlas - Knyazhpogost section, 280 kilometers long, from December 1937 to May 1938, under the leadership of the head of the expedition, engineer P.N. Yeshchenko. And on the 250-kilometer section Ukhta - Kozhva - from March 1938 to August 1939, under the leadership of the head of the expedition, engineer V.I. Petrov.

Each expedition included several geological and exploration parties, evenly spaced along the line. As the prospectors found out, the North Pechora Mainline had to be built in extremely difficult natural and climatic conditions. There were noted very low population density in the areas where the route passed, continuous forest cover and swampiness of the territory (deep swamps occupied about 20 percent of the length of the projected line), the almost complete absence of roadways, freezing of the soil in winter up to 1.4 meters. Among the largest swamps, the prospectors attributed the Madmas swamp, the swamp in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bSordyu station, the length of which reaches 3 kilometers and the depth - up to 3 meters, the Mezhogskoe - about a kilometer long and 1.5 meters deep and the Shezhamskoe swamp with a length of about a kilometer and a depth of more meters, as well as Kozhvinskoe and Intinskoe.

Local soils turned out to be unsuitable for backfilling the subgrade. Therefore, millions of cubic meters of soil had to be mined in quarries and delivered to the place of dumping at a distance of tens of kilometers.

Research has been carried out mainly in winter time. And this helped the surveyors to note that “winter in the Komi ASSR is characterized by deep snow cover, the total height of which in the area is Kotlas - Knyazhpogost about 80-100 centimeters, on the section Knyazhpogost - Mesyu - 100-130 centimeters, on the section Ukhta - Kozhva more than 100 centimeters.

Freezing of soils covered with snow reaches 120 centimeters, not covered with snow - up to 200-220 centimeters.

A negative phenomenon of winter is also a short daylight hours, which is 4 hours 40 minutes in Kotlas, 3 hours 30 minutes in Ukhta, and 2 hours in Kozhva. The lack of lighting is exacerbated by the predominance of cloudy days and low clouds ... "

The main principles of the work carried out were the desire to lay the future route as close as possible to the overhead line, to reduce curves and detours of wetlands as much as possible.

In the Komi ASSR, there were almost no locally qualified cadres of civil engineers, railroad workers, and workers. The party and state leadership of the country found an effective way out of this situation: to build a railway with the hands of prisoners, to organize construction camps in the north of the Komi ASSR.

The construction of the highway began in the Knyazhpogost area 15,000 prisoners of the Transport Department of the Ukhtpechlag of the NKVD. For this, three construction sites were organized. In December 1936, the prisoners cut through the first clearing in the taiga, in April 1937 they began to build an earth embankment, in January 1938 they laid the first rails to the Ropcha station, and in October of the same year to the Chinyavoryk station. All earthworks in 1937 were carried out with a gross violation of specifications.

On May 12, 1937, on the left bank of the Vym River, near Knyazhpogost, on a specially built coastal two-tiered pier, two steam locomotives of the OD series No. 724 and No. 2228, as well as 63 platforms and 5 old covered wagons brought from the Volga - Moscow canal. The next day, the steam locomotive OD No. 724 was assembled and refueled, and on May 14, 1937, traffic began on the North Pechora Mainline.

During the entire first year of construction, every morning at 5 o'clock, the first steam locomotive set off from Knyazhpogost, pushing platforms loaded with sleepers and rails in front of it. This laying train ran to the end of the finished track. At 6 o'clock, the second steam locomotive with the platforms on which the workers were located departed and reached the place of laying the canvas.

In September 1937, a special railway section was organized, the headquarters of which was in Knyazhpogost, and on December 12, 1937, the first passenger train, which delivered voters to the polling station for elections to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.

In the winter of 1937/1938, several more steam locomotives were transferred disassembled along the route from Ust-Vymy to Knyazhpogost. At the same time, one passenger, two covered and one service cars were built in the Knyazhpogost depot.

FROM STRAANDER TO LIEUTENANT GENERAL

By the end of the 1930s, in the system of the Main Directorate of Correctional Labor Camps, Labor Settlements and Places of Detention (GULAG) of the NKVD, several specialized branch headquarters were organized that led various sectors of the camp economy, including the Main Directorate of Camps for the Mining and Metallurgical Industry (GULGMP ), General Directorate of Forest Industry Camps (GULLP), General Directorate of Highways (GUSHos-Dor).

January 4, 1940 by order of the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR L.P. Beria, the Main Directorate of Railway Construction Camps (GULZhDS) was organized, under whose jurisdiction 9 railway camps were transferred. By the beginning of 1941, their number increased to 13. The main specialization of the new head office of the Gulag was the construction of railways in the Far East, in North of the European part of the USSR and in the Caucasus. The number of prisoners in the GULZhDS camps was 397,994 as of January 1, 1940, 421,412 as of January 1, 1941, and 355,123 as of January 1, 1942.

On May 10, 1938, People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR L.P. Beria issued order No. 090 "On the division of the Ukhtpechtrest camps." On its basis, Ukhtizhemlag, Vorkutpechlag, Ustvymlag and Northern railway camp of the NKVD. The Sevzheldorlag of the NKVD was organized on the basis of the Transport Department of the Ukhtpechlag. The new camp was subordinate to Gulzheldor. Each new camp, in accordance with industry specifics, was entrusted with the fulfillment of planned tasks previously carried out by the Ukhtpechlag of the NKVD. He received the letter designation "ITL YAYA or"".

Corps engineer Naftaly Aronovich Frenkel was appointed head of this department. Born in 1883 in Odessa in the family of a tradesman, from the age of fifteen he began working in various commercial firms in Odessa and Nikolaev. In 1918 he was actively engaged commercial activities, exchange operations in Odessa. During the years of NEP, he organized a private trading company that served as a cover for smuggling.

In 1924, Frenkel was arrested by the OGPU and sentenced to death penalty, which at the last moment was replaced by ten years in prison in the Solovetsky camps. While in custody, N.A. Frenkel showed organizational and commercial skills and in 1927 he was released ahead of schedule, then he was appointed head of the production department of the Administration of the Solovetsky Special Purpose Camps. On Solovki, he turned to the leadership of the OGPU with a proposal to involve prisoners in labor. It is to him that the camp rumor ascribes the words that became the ideology of the Gulag: "You need to take everything from the prisoners in the first three months, and then they are no longer needed."

ON THE. Frenkel developed a project for the organization of a new type of camps, in which an educational and labor system for keeping prisoners was organized. This idea of ​​his then became the basis for the functioning of the entire Soviet penitentiary system. The prisoners began to cut wood, lay mines, build factories and plants, and lay rails.

In 1931-1933 N.A. Frenkel is one of the leaders in the construction of the White Sea-Baltic Canal, serves as the head of the construction department of the White Sea-Baltic Waterway. In 1932, "for success in socialist construction" he was awarded the Order of Lenin.

In August 1933, N.A. Frenkel is appointed head of the Bamlag (Baikal-Amur forced labor camp) department of the GULAG of the OGPU of the USSR. In 1934, prisoners who built the White Sea Canal were brought to this construction site. Here I.L. Frenkel organizes the construction of the Baikal-Lmur Mainline, which was supposed to connect Taishet on the Trans-Siberian Railway with Komsomolsk-on-Amur. In 1936, he received the title of divisional quartermaster.

In May 1938, N.A. Frenkel is appointed head of the huge Railway Construction Directorate GULLG of the NKVD in the Far East and at the same time - head of the Amur railway camp. In this capacity, he directs all railway construction in the Far East of the country. In 1940, but on the personal order of the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs L.P. Beria received the title of a corps engineer and became the first head of the Main Directorate of the GULLG railway construction camps of the NKVD of the USSR, was awarded the second Order of Lenin.

Frenkel spent months at the construction of the North Pechora Railway and directly reported to the USSR State Defense Committee on its progress. In October 1943, he was awarded the rank of lieutenant general of the engineering and technical service, and was awarded the third Order of Lenin. In April 1947, he retired from the post of permanent head of the GULZhDS.

He died in 1960 at the age of 77.

"EXCEPTIONALLY FEELING FRIEND"

Tamara Vladimirovna Petkevich, who was serving her sentence in Sevzheldorlag, in her memoirs “Life is an unpaired boot”, drew a collective portrait of the camp administration as follows: “Camp officials in good ironed overcoats, polished squeaky boots.”

The chiefs of the Sevzheldorlag department in the 40s were career officers of the NKVD Semyon Ivanovich Shemena, Iosif Ilyich Klyuchkin, Alexander Evstigneev, the father of the famous Soviet actor Evgeny Evstigneev, worked as deputy chief, Philip Mikhailovich Gartsunov worked as assistant chief. The chief engineers of the construction were Khaidurov, Novoselov, Perekresten, the heads of the political department were lieutenant of state security Alexei Mikhailovich Malgin, Nikolai Vasilyevich Shtanko, and the head of the operational security department Gnedkov.

For most of these people, being sent to the Komi ASSR was an obvious demotion, exile, and disgrace. Chekist cadres for the northern camps were mainly recruited from the employees of the central apparatus of the OGPU-NKVD or other regions of the country who were guilty of something. All the heads of the camps in the Komi ASSR were career officers of the NKVD and had a long Gulag biography behind them. They were often transferred from one construction site to another, so they managed to serve both in the Komi ASSR, and in the Far East, on the Kola Peninsula, on Sakhalin, and in Mongolia. The fate of these people, as well as the fate of the prisoners, reflected the difficult and controversial years in the history of the country.

In the central office of the NKVD of the USSR in Moscow, S.I. also worked at one time. Shemen, who, perhaps, can be called the most famous head of Sevzheldorlag. T. Petkevich writes about him like this: good man who knew how to see people in prisoners. Appointment to this position meant exile and punishment for him after his Polish wife was arrested in 1937 and he did not refuse her. Prior to this, S.I. Shemena was the military representative of the Soviet Union in Czechoslovakia.

In fact, he was never a military attaché of the USSR. But otherwise, this beautiful legend has a basis.

Semyon Ivanovich was born on February 26, 1903 in the village of Novaya Osota near Kharkov, into a poor peasant family. He graduated from a higher primary school, and in 1920 - a road-building technical school, a district party school. He worked on his own farm. Since 1920, he served in the bodies of the Cheka-OGPU-NKVD in Ukraine (counterintelligence). “For active participation in the fight against. counter-revolution" was awarded the badge "Honorary Chekist", and in 1929 - military weapons. In January 1930, he was admitted to the party by the Zhuravlevsky district committee of the Communist Party (b) of the city of Kharkov (party card No. 1257526). In 1937 he worked as the head of the department of the GUGB of the NKVD of the USSR in Moscow.

In February 1938, the party committee of the GUGB NKVD issued S.I. Shemene "a severe reprimand with a warning for dulling the KGB and party vigilance." This is due precisely to the fact that in 1937 the wife of S.I. Shemena Gavrilov in the case of her first husband Brezovsky (Brenzovsky).

“In June 1937, my wife was arrested in connection with the case of her first husband Brezovsky,” S.I. himself later explained at one of the party meetings. Shemena. Why my husband was arrested is unknown to me. For Gavrilova, with whom I lived for four years, I did not notice anything bad, and there is no fault in her ex-husband's actions. After Gavrilova's arrest, I submitted an application to the party committee and administration to find out my position. I was told that "You have nothing to do with the arrest of your wife, continue to work as you worked." But after some time, the question was raised at the party committee of the UG15 NKVD of the USSR, where I was accused of having to study it in four years. I was severely reprimanded with a warning for dulling the KGB vigilance.”

About the meeting with S.I. Shemenoy in his book “NKVD from the inside. Notes of a Chekist ”says NKVD worker M.P. Schreider: “Once his former colleague and comrade Semyon Ivanovich Shemena came to visit him for one day, whom Nikolai Ivanovich Dobroditsky introduced. From Dobroditsky, I learned that at that time Shemena's wife was allegedly arrested as a spy, and he himself was in the reserve and did not yet know where fate would throw him.

At the beginning of 1938, the captain of state security S.I. Shemena was transferred to work as deputy head of the 3rd department of the NKVD of the city of Rybinsk, then, on May 10, 1938, he was appointed first head of the newly organized Sevzheldorlag NKVD.

According to the communists, S.I. Shemena “restored discipline in our camp, improved work, brought the camp out of the breakthrough. An exceptionally sensitive comrade, a good leader.

“In the camp, Comrade Shemena showed himself as a communist: he is disciplined, politically mature, possesses organizational skills as a leader, and takes an active part in party political work. He is a member of the Party Bureau, a deputy of the District Council. The production plan for railway construction was completed in 1939 by 102 percent. Having stated this, the party commission under the political department of the SZHDL NKVD in February 1940 decided: “the party penalty - a strict reprimand with a warning - to be removed.”

Having worked as the head of the Sevzheldorlag until January 1944, he was recalled to Moscow to work in the Main Directorate for Prisoners of War and Internees of the NKVD of the USSR, and then sent for further service in the Far East. In 1949 - 1951, General S.I. Shemena was the head of the Western ITL of Dalstroy in the village of Susuman, Magadan Region, which was engaged in the development of gold mines and tin mines in the Kolyma. In 1952-1954, he was the head of the ITL and the construction of the Krasnoyarsk-Yeniseysk railway, and in the mid-50s, he was the head of the Krasnogorsk ITL in the city of Sverdlovsk, which is conducting large-scale industrial construction in the Urals.

“For the fulfillment of the government task for the construction of the Kotlas-Kozhva railway line,” he was awarded the Orders of Lenin and the Badge of Honor, and received the rank of major general.

“… TOTALLY EXECUTE

ORDER OF COMRADE BERIA…”

The main task of the Sevzheldorlag in the order of the NKVD of the USSR was the construction of the Kotlas-Vorkuta railway.

“If you could look at the construction site from a bird's eye view, it would resemble an anthill stretching for hundreds of kilometers. Some of the builders cut down the forest, uproot stumps, some in wheelbarrows take aside unsuitable soil, peat and marsh slurry, some blow up mountains and fill up ravines. The work went on around the clock, in two shifts. In the daytime - in the light of the sun, if it was, and at night the firemen from the weak team provided light, ”- this is how its participant E. Vaza describes the construction of the railway.

The production plan of 1938-1939 provided for the priority construction of two large sections of the Chibyu - Knyazhpogost - Aikino (268 kilometers) and Kochmes - Vorkuta highways at once (by the forces of the Abezsky construction area).

To solve the problem, about 30 thousand prisoners were concentrated on the highway in 58 camps and four construction departments were organized:

the first - on the section Kotlas - Chibyu,

the second - from Chibyu to Kozhva,

the third - from Kozhva to Abezi,

the fourth - from Abezi to Vorkuta.

In the future, the number of branches and their locations changed as the construction plan was implemented.

The number of prisoners in the new camp was: October 1, 1938 - 25199 people,

January 1, 1939 - 29405,

January 1, 1940 - 26310,

July 1, 1941 - 66926,

January 1, 1942 - 53344,

January 1, 1943 - 27,741

When dividing the material base and technical equipment of Ukhtpechtrest, the new camp received only two excavators, 17 motor vehicles and two steam locomotives in a very worn condition. The mechanization of work at the construction site amounted to 11.7 percent. More than half - 64.4 percent - of all earthworks were carried out manually.

The highway was being built at an accelerated pace. Construction camp departments covered short sections of the route of 20-30 kilometers. They had to build an earthen embankment and lay the rails as quickly as possible, after which they immediately transferred through several departments ahead along the autolane road to a new section of the route. The rest of the work was carried out by stationary construction departments.

Construction of the railway on the section Knyazhpogost - Chibyu, cut off from the railway and waterways, was difficult. For the first three years, equipment and tools had to be delivered exclusively by water along the Vychegda River, and then by road along the highway from Ust-Vymy, Kotlas, and even from Murashi station through Syktyvkar. So, for example, steam locomotives in Ust-Vym, where a supply base was created, were transported in disassembled form in motor vehicles or large sledges in 1936 in winter. Subsequently, the base was moved to Aikino.

At the same time, an auto-lezhnevka was being built along the future railway track. It was a single-track, with sidings every one or two kilometers. It made it possible to transport the necessary building materials and food in a timely manner.

In 1939, construction work began along the entire length of the section from Kotlas to Chibyu. By the summer of 1939, the degree of readiness of the road sections for operation was on the sections:

Kotlas - Mezhozh - 20%,

Mezhozh - Knyazhpogost - 25.6%,

Knyazhpogost - Chibyu - 35.5%,

Abez - Vorkuta - 24.5%.

According to the plan of 1939, it was planned to commission 310 kilometers of the route, in fact, 268 kilometers were commissioned. According to the results of the labor competition between the construction camps of the NKVD, Sevzheldorlag moved this year from 23rd place to a more honorable eleventh.

The camp administration, first of all, paid attention to the solution of production issues to the detriment of the organization of the camp itself, the arrangement of life and life of prisoners. For example, “camp No. 55 is a 1938-type camp: solid bunks, lice is 50 percent. Prisoners do not wash themselves in the morning, they do not give tea in the morning, but only boiling water, ”one of the reports on the progress of construction indicated. At a party meeting in September 1939, S.I. Shemena said: “Comrade Uralov suggested using prisoners for 18 hours. This question is of great fundamental importance, and the communist needs to think about it. The question is, what will happen in three days from such productivity? Comrade Uralov underestimates the issue of labor force retention. The same goes for days off for prisoners.” In 1939, four thousand people suffered from scurvy in the camp.

On November 1, 1939, train traffic was opened on the Aikino - Knyazhpogost section.

On May 27, 1940, the party and economic asset of Sevzheldorstroy discussed the resolution of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR of May 10, 1940 "On Forced High-Speed ​​Construction". Speaking at this meeting, C’.II. Shemena outlined the main construction prospects as follows: “The People's Commissar of Internal Affairs, Comrade Beria ita Sevzheldorlag, assigned the following tasks:

1. Lay 130 kilometers of track on the Kotlas - Chibyo section.

2. On the section Chibyu - Kozhva with a length of 252 kilometers, open working traffic.

3. Start building big bridge on the river Vychegda.

The decision of this party activist said: "The team of builders of Sevzheldorlag will honor the high trust placed in him, solve this most important task in a Bolshevik way and ensure the opening of temporary train traffic from Kotlas to Ukhta-Kozhva by the specified date." The party and economic activist noted that the tasks of high-speed construction require a quick and decisive restructuring of the work of all links of the administrative apparatus, subdivisions, party, Komsomol and trade union organizations and outlined a number of practical measures.

At the same time, the construction was assisted by the Komi Regional Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the Komi ASSR, allocating forest, allocating land for agricultural enterprises, by sending workers to the construction site and establishing a challenge banner of the Presidium of the Komi Supreme Soviet.

However, the new stages of prisoners sent to the construction site were insufficiently provided with tools. One of the reports on the progress of construction noted "an intensive influx of labor, not provided with tools, household goods, in the absence of horses and insufficient food supply." So, on June 15, 1940, less than 11 percent of the newly arrived builders-prisoners were provided with axes and saws.

In the summer of 1940, the 6th Kozhvinsky construction department was organized, which began to build an auto-lane road from the north, which made it possible already on September 8, 1940 to establish a transport connection between Ukhta and Kozhva. “The Kozhvin branch, in turn, threw people and equipment forward along the Kozhva and Chikshina rivers, organizing strongholds for setting up bases and expanding the scope of work.

By September 1940, a stable production and organizational structure of Sevzheldorlag had basically taken shape. It included 11 construction departments, which were divided into steps, several dozen columns, which included several hundred brigades. The brigades, in turn, were divided into units.

The first (Aikinskoe) branch built a railway from Kotlas to the Vychegda River.

The second (Izhemskoye) was stationed from the Shies station to the Mezhozh station of the Ust-Vymsky region.

The third (Mikunskoye) led the construction to the Mikun station.

The fourth, fifth and sixth departments were building a route to the Knyazhpogost station.

Seventh and eighth - from Knyazhpogost to Yosser station.

The ninth, tenth and eleventh - from Yosser to Ust-Kozhza.

In total, from Koryazhma to Ust-Kozhva, along the future railway route, there were 27 construction and installation, logging, agricultural, and hospital separate camp sites.

In August-September 1940, to strengthen the operational management of construction, the Northern Headquarters was organized under the leadership of the head of the camp, captain of state security S.I. Shemeny and the Southern Headquarters of the Directorate, headed by the Deputy Head of the Directorate, Captain of State Security I.I. Klyuchkin.

October 6, 1940 at the 103rd kilometer was held an all-camp rally of builders-drummers. On this day, the laying of the track was brought to the hundredth kilometer.

In the autumn of 1940, the leadership of the camp was faced with the problem of preparing for the winter. At a meeting in the political department in October 1940, it was said: “The camp is completely unprepared for winter. The construction of civil and camp structures is disgracefully disrupted. The onset of frost captured in many departments both civilians and prisoners, in summer tents. This is also the case in the village of Zheleznodorozhny.”

Let's go back to the report “Construction of the Kotlas-Kozhva Railway Line”: “The main line was built by the entire civilian team. The fighters and political staff of the VOKhR of many units after a hard day changed their rifle for a shovel, stood in the face and did not leave the track until the day's task was completed. Administrative and technical staff, wives, family members of construction workers helped organize meals, living conditions and cultural service campers. The Leninist-Stalinist Komsomol brought many enthusiasts to the construction site, who captivated those around them with their example. Hundreds of examples speak of exceptional enthusiasm, of a huge upsurge among construction workers ...

November and December 1940 passed in an exceptionally tense atmosphere, where every day and hour was accounted for. Along with the decisive issues of transferring rails from south to north, eliminating bottlenecks in the 6th department, it was necessary to simultaneously speed up the construction of large bridges, urgent issues of arranging station tracks and premises, transferring labor force to Pechorstroy and Sevdvinstroy and a number of other issues ... "

Train traffic was opened on the section from Kotlas to Knyazhpogost, and on December 25, 1940, on the entire section of Kotlas - Kozhva. “Thanks to the stubborn energy of the builders of Sevzheldorstroy, who gave their word to Comrade Beria, Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR, to open temporary train traffic within the time period set by the Government, the laying of the last picket on the Kotlas Kozhva line, 728 kilometers long, was completed on December 25 at 15:00.”

From November 1940 to May 1941, 135 thousand tons of goods were transported by the new railway. In January 1941, the technical management of the construction was changed. P.P. Perekrestov was appointed chief engineer and deputy head of the camp administration.

The entire route was in need of a major overhaul. The roadbed laid across the swampy areas was deformed in many areas during the thaw, which posed a threat to the continuity and speed of train traffic. On bypasses were built wooden temporary bridges that needed strengthening. The built railway did not have long-distance communication, signaling. At most stations and hauls, there were no permanent passenger, residential, utility and industrial buildings. Water supply steam locomotives were carried out on the simplest and temporary structures. The elimination of all these shortcomings was planned for 1941.

By the end of 1941, 45 bypasses were eliminated, including the most difficult ones, most stations were expanded, embankments were filled up on Vandysh, Green and Pechora swamps, an embankment was raised on the Shezham swamp. As a result of these works, the approaches to big bridges and ensured the continuity of traffic in the most difficult spring period.

The tasks of 1942 were to connect the Kotlas - Kozhva railway line along the axis of the main track to the Kotlas - Konosha and Kozhva - Vorkuta lines and to increase the throughput of the entire line for the intensive export of Vorkuta coal, oil and timber. In connection with this plan, the construction of combined bridges across the Northern Dvina and Pechora rivers, as well as the construction of the Kotlas railway junction, was envisaged.

According to the order of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR dated June 29, 1942 No. 12111 PC "On the transfer of the constructed section of the North Pechora Mainline from Kotlas to Kozhva into permanent operation by the services of the NKPS of the USSR", the NKVD transferred the object to the railway workers.

From July 15 to August 21, 1942, a government commission worked on the Kotlas-Kozhva railway under the leadership of N.A. Nefedov, deputy chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the Komi ASSR. The commission included representatives of the central apparatus of the NKPS, the apparatus of the GULZhDS of the NKVD, and the administration of Sevzheldorstroy of the NKVD. Having studied how the condition of the road corresponds to the technical standards of the NKPS of the USSR, the commission accepted the road into operation.

After the organization of an independent Pechorzheldorlag, the Northern Railway Camp continued to complete the construction of the Kotlas-Kozhva railway, and on September 1, 1946, it took over the Konosha-Kotlas construction site from the liquidated Sevdvinlag of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs.

On September 15, 1943, the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR “On rewarding the builders of the North Pechora Railway” was issued, on September 16, the Decree was published in the Pravda newspaper, and on September 18 - in the republican newspaper “For the New North”. Government awards were received by many engineering and technical workers of construction, including the chief engineers of construction departments A.N. Belyavsky. M.M.Zotkin, P.V.Zhemchuzhnikov, M.D.Krasheninnikov, I.M.Podorovsky, civil engineers S.A.Volovich, A.A.Georgievsky, A.M.Glukhov, L.V.Moroz , I.I. Livanov, I.L. Rivkin, bridge engineers L.V. Kim, O.V. Shchekin, railway engineers A.S. Bugov, I.S. Gurgenidze, geologists A.V. Kazarov, I.M.Kanukov, B.G.Konovalov, N.V. Shmelev, engineers N.I.Berezovsky, O.F.Berzon, L.G.Blinova, A.I.Boykov, V.T.Dmitrievsky, A .V.Dobrovolsky, E.F. Linde, foremen A.I. Balashov, S.M. Kolobov.

The Pechora Railway is one of the four Great Northern Railways of Russia, along with the older Murmansk Railway (built before the revolution) and the later Yugorskaya and Baikal-Amur Railways. It was built in the very Stalinist era, partly during the Great Patriotic War, and since 1942 it has been supplying Moscow and Leningrad with Vorkuta coal.

Unlike the old and settled, mostly sawmill South Komi, the Middle Komi is a remote taiga region where oil is extracted. Here, the darkest page of Komi history, camps and prisons, is best preserved. The center of the region is the second largest city of Ukhta in the republic. We will travel by train Knyazhpogost, Ukhta, Sosnogorsk and stop at the taiga station Irael.

An hour from Mikuni, the train reaches the Knyazhpogost station, behind which the town of Yemva (14,000 inhabitants) is hidden:

Yemva is the Komi name of the Vym River, at the mouth of which stands the ancient village of Ust-Vym. The village of Knyazhpogost up the river has been known since 1490, and probably the residence of the Zyrian prince was here. In 1941, the village of Zheleznodorozhny was founded on the other side, by 1985 it had grown so much that it received the status of a city.

Local architectural landmark - vocational school in the style of wooden constructivism:

Abandoned sawmill. Pay attention to the graffiti - remember, was there such a party in the 1990s?

People on the platform:

Due to warming, the snow turned gray and shrank from the rain. Hence the endless gloom. The picture was supplemented by a paddy wagon:

Transfer of prisoners in Knyazhpogost from train to van:

Sindor station is an hour and a half from Knyazhpogost - many stations on the Pechora highway are made in a similar style:

Most of the Stalinist stations of the Pechora Mainline are wooden (Tobys station):

From Mikun to Ukhta - almost 7 hours. Half an hour before the last one, a black waste heap suddenly grows out of the taiga:

This is Yarega - a place much more interesting than it seems. Here is the only OIL MINE in the world. The super-heavy oil of the Yaregskoye field is more like bitumen; it is very difficult to pump it from a well with a pump. True, it lies shallow - only 200 meters. It is even more interesting that the deposit is not just oil, but petrotitanium - that is, titanium ore is also mined along with viscous oil.

At the station - one of the few authentic Stalinist stations that have been preserved at the small stations of the Pechora Mainline.

The train enters Ukhta, which stretches along the river of the same name (in the Komi language - Ukva) at the foot of the Timan Ridge:

In modern Komi, Ukhta is the second largest (117 thousand inhabitants), over the past 20 years it has almost doubled the deserted Vorkuta. It was founded in 1929 as the village of Chibyu, which since 1933 became the center of Ukhtpechlag (Ukhta-Pechora camp), which was especially gloomy for the “Kashketian executions” - in 1937-38, during the suppression of unrest among the convicts, more than 2500 people were shot . The head of the camp, Efim Kashketin, used a very effective method: the suicide bombers were led through the taiga, allegedly to another camp, and in a certain place, without warning, they were shot from a machine gun - while those who remained in the camp did not even know about it ...

However, as time went on, the village located in the center of the republic grew, and in 1938 it was withdrawn from the Gulag, receiving the status of an urban-type settlement and the name Ukhta. In 1939-41, there were plans to move the capital of the Komi ASSR there (due to a much more adequate location).

The train station at Ukhta station is almost the same in Inta and Vorkuta:

The station is located in a deep lowland, about a kilometer from the city center - but the way there lies through the industrial zone and the bridge, so it's better to take a minibus. Behind the railway there are high and very steep hills of the Timan Ridge:

One of them, Mount Vetlasyan, is crowned by Electric Lenin ... more precisely, it has long been no longer electric, but remains one of the symbols of Ukhta:

The Ukhta oil refinery is perfectly visible from the trains - small by all-Russian standards, but the only one in the Komi Republic. Oil has been known here since the 15th century, but then people simply did not know what to do with this muck. In 1745-67, the explorer Fyodor Pryadunov was mining it - oil was leaking from the springs, and he somehow collected it from the water film. Already 3.5 tons were mined! From Ukhta, oil was sent to Moscow, where it was processed. The next well was drilled a hundred years later (1868), and at the end of the 19th century, Ukhta oil was used to refuel ships on the Barents Sea, going down the Pechora. And the first oil refinery on this site operated in 1914-24.

The highway runs parallel to the Ukhta River. Vetlasyan station, again within the city:

Half an hour by train from Ukhta - and here is the Sosnogorsk station:

The suburb of Ukhta (27 thousand inhabitants) is already on Izhma, at the mouth of the Ukhta River. Actually, it grew out of the Izhma station founded in 1939. From here the mustache branches off to Troitsko-Pechorsk, but this is not the main thing: for highway Sosnogorsk is the End of the Earth. Then there is a winter road to Pechora, and in summer time it's a dead end. Cargoes are reloaded from cars to trains, and the cars themselves are transported on railway platforms. In general, this is probably why Sosnogorsk is perhaps the largest station in Komi:

The city of Sosnogorsk itself is quite distinctive:

The private sector of the Soviet era:

Tint the house and the fence - and you get a picture for a New Year's card.

And one of the strangest features of the Middle Komi is the fences with barbed wire. Most likely - this is protection from animals, and most likely not only dogs.

Wooden churches of Sosnogorsk:

The Sosnogorsk gas processing plant, founded in the late 1940s as a technical carbon black plant, impresses with its harsh post-apocalyptic nature:

Between Izhma and Pechora there is a remote taiga region, where you can’t see large villages along the railway, only small station settlements. Therefore, we will finish the trip at the Irael station, 2.5 hours from Ukhta.

The fact is that Irael is the “gate” of two distant taiga regions at once. Closer is Izhma, inhabited by the most unusual and close-knit Komi subethnos. Away - Pomeranian Old Believer Ust-Tsilma, which is considered to be one of the last strongholds of the reserved Russian North. From the Irael station to Izhma, for all 100 kilometers along the road there are no signs of habitation - only a deaf taiga.

Such a harsh and brutally beautiful region can be observed from the train window. It is interesting, of course, to get to know the North better. After all, the most interesting begins there, away from the highway.

What does Russia look like from the train window? It is this question that I reveal for you in this photo project. On its pages we travel to the most interesting and picturesque corners of our Motherland.

The roads are far from mainline, there is no velvety track, the car sways to the good old "tyn-dynts, tyn-dynts", the diesel locomotive sets the atmosphere with smoke, hot tea with a park in the cup holder freezes on the table, a spoon tinkles in a glass to the beat of wheel rattles, and Russia floats outside the window!

Today we travel along the Northern Railway and the Komi Republic from Mikun station to Vorkuta. Let's go to the Arctic! Are we on the way? Take a seat by the windows and...

The Pechora railway was built from 1937 to 1941, mainly by prisoners of the Gulag to the new storerooms natural resources: timber, coal, oil and played a big role during the Great Patriotic War, supplying the country with Vorkuta coal.

3. Junction station Mikun-1 for 4 directions: Vorkuta, Syktyvkar, Koslan and Kotlas.

4. Honorary steam worker.

5. On the way to the Arctic Circle!

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7. Ukhta after the rain.

8. Station Ukhta and Mount Vetlosyan.

9. Orange metal structures are visible on the mountain, first you think about their technical purpose, but when you get closer you see nothing more than the outline of Lenin's head.

10. And next to the railway, the Ukhta River.

12. Sunset catches us on the way next to the Ukhta-Pechora-Naryan-Mar highway. Chikshinka river

13. Pechora-Great Northern River, stretching from the Northern Urals for almost 1,800 km!

14. And in the morning, landscapes beyond the windows acquire a harsh northern character.

Surprisingly, the 21st century, Moscow is building tens of kilometers underground tunnels metro, most high skyscrapers in Europe, but there is still no road to Vorkuta! It would seem that at least there should be a gravel road, but no ... There is no road to Vorkuta ... You can look at road atlases, maps, but you will not find the road to Vorkuta ... There are only two ways to get to Vorkuta - by air: by airplanes and helicopters or by rail, which is the most important link between the city and the country.

What about people who want to come by car to Vorkuta or go on a trip from Vorkuta? It's possible! From Sosnogorsk to Vorkuta, a train with auto platforms periodically runs, but sometimes not everything is going smoothly there. At the time of the trip, the lessee of the wagons and the carrier did not share something, and the Vorkuta residents were stuck in Sosnogorsk for several days without any conditions ...

It is precisely because of the lack of a highway that Vorkuta is a godsend for cinema. There are a lot of old Soviet cars in the city. The car, once having got to Vorkuta, most likely will remain there forever ...

15. It seems that the excavators, which in a fantastic way ended up in the tundra, move through impassable mud to Vorkuta, leaning on buckets ...

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17. Periodically, shift camps flash past the window ...

18. Some settlements there is not here for many tens and even hundreds of kilometers ... Only the forest-tundra ...

19. On the horizon in the haze, the outlines of the Polar Urals appear.

20. Small and quiet Shore station waiting for rare passenger trains...

21. The outlines of the mountains of the Polar Urals become clearer, but the mountains remain aloof...

22. The weather here can change in just 15 minutes...

23. Silence... Silent rare silence...

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26. The driver's face is reflected in the mirror of the diesel locomotive, the locomotive, occasionally puffing in smoke, pulls us along the tundra.

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29. The Arctic Circle behind and outside the window is the endless tundra and cold ...

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31. Arrow Seyda and Mustache.

32. There is an unpleasant drizzle outside the window, it's time to warm up with a glass of hot tea in a shiny glass holder ^__^

33. The deserted station of Khanovei, consonant with Khanyme on Yamal on the Sverdlovsk Railway ... Not much to Vorkuta ...

34. A rare house near the station will flash past the window... All along the way, among the living souls, there are only railroad workers...

35. Our TEP70-0448 pulled us with the fast train No. 90/89 Nizhny Novgorod-Vorkuta to the far north all our journey.

36. Here is Vorkuta. The train won't move on...


Here we end our journey to the land of the endless tundra along the Pechora road :)

Photos taken from train No. 89/90 Nizhny Novgorod-Vorkuta

previous parts :)