1.
Joseph Stalin
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Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the leader of the Soviet Union from the mid-1920s until his death in 1953. Holding the post of the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, he was effectively the dictator of the state. Stalin was one of the seven members of the first Politburo, founded in 1917 in order to manage the Bolshevik Revolution, alongside Lenin, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Trotsky, Sokolnikov, and Bubnov. Among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who took part in the Russian Revolution of 1917 and he managed to consolidate power following the 1924 death of Vladimir Lenin by suppressing Lenins criticisms and expanding the functions of his role, all the while eliminating any opposition. He remained General Secretary until the post was abolished in 1952, the economic changes coincided with the imprisonment of millions of people in Gulag labour camps. The initial upheaval in agriculture disrupted food production and contributed to the catastrophic Soviet famine of 1932–33, major figures in the Communist Party and government, and many Red Army high commanders, were arrested and shot after being convicted of treason in show trials. Stalins invasion of Bukovina in 1940 violated the pact, as it went beyond the Soviet sphere of influence agreed with the Axis, Germany ended the pact when Hitler launched a massive invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941. Despite heavy human and territorial losses, Soviet forces managed to halt the Nazi incursion after the decisive Battles of Moscow, after defeating the Axis powers on the Eastern Front, the Red Army captured Berlin in May 1945, effectively ending the war in Europe for the Allies. The Soviet Union subsequently emerged as one of two recognized world superpowers, the other being the United States, Communist governments loyal to the Soviet Union were established in most countries freed from German occupation by the Red Army, which later constituted the Eastern Bloc. Stalin also had relations with Mao Zedong in China and Kim Il-sung in North Korea. On February 9,1946, Stalin delivered a public speech in which he explained the fundamental incompatibility of communism and capitalism. He stressed that the system needed war for raw materials. The Second World War was but the latest in a chain of conflicts which could be broken only when the economy made the transformation into communism. Stalin led the Soviet Union through its post-war reconstruction phase, which saw a significant rise in tension with the Western world that would later be known as the Cold War, Stalin remains a controversial figure today, with many regarding him as a tyrant. However, popular opinion within the Russian Federation is mixed, the exact number of deaths caused by Stalins regime is still a subject of debate, but it is widely agreed to be in the order of millions. Joseph Stalin was born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili, the Russian-language version of his birth name is Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili. Ioseb was born on 18 December 1878 in the town of Gori, Georgia and his father was Besarion Jughashvili, a cobbler, while his mother was Ekaterine Keke Geladze, a housemaid. As a child, Ioseb was plagued with health issues
2.
Nikolai Yezhov
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Nikolai Ivanovich Yezhov or Ezhov was a Soviet secret police official under Joseph Stalin. He was head of the NKVD from 1936 to 1938, during the most deadly period of Stalins Great Purge and his time in office is known as the Yezhovshchina, a term coined during the de-Stalinization campaign of the 1950s. After presiding over mass arrests and executions during the Great Purge and he was arrested, confessed under torture to a range of anti-Soviet activity, and was executed in 1940. By the beginning of World War II, his status within the Soviet Union became that of a political unperson, Yezhov was born either in Saint Petersburg, according to his official Soviet biography, or in Suwałki Governorate. In a form filled out in 1921, Yezhov claimed some ability to speak Polish and he completed only his elementary education. From 1909 to 1915, he worked as a tailors assistant, from 1915 until 1917, Yezhov served in the Imperial Russian Army. He joined the Bolsheviks on May 5,1917 in Vitebsk, during the Russian Civil War, 1919–1921, he fought in the Red Army. After February 1922, he worked in the system, mostly as a secretary of various regional committees of the Communist Party. In 1927, he was transferred to the Accounting and Distribution Department of the Party where he worked as an instructor, from 1929 to 1930, he was the Deputy Peoples Commissar for Agriculture. In November 1930, he was appointed to the Head of several departments of the Communist Party, department of special affairs, department of personnel and department of industry. In 1934, he was elected to the Central Committee of the Communist Party, from February 1935 to March 1939, he was also the Chairman of the Central Commission for Party Control. I do not doubt that in his childhood Yezhov amused himself in just such a manner, physically, Yezhov was short in stature, standing five feet, and that, combined with his sadistic personality, led to his nickname The Poison Dwarf or The Bloody Dwarf. Yezhov married the educated and sincere Marxist Antonia Titova in 1919, Yezhov and Feigenburg had an adopted daughter, Natalia, an orphan from a childrens home. After the death of Nikolai Yezhov, Natalia was sent back to an orphanage and was forced to relinquish the Yezhov surname. Subsequently, she was known by the name Natalia Khayutina, the turning point in Yezhovs life was the response by Stalin to the murder of the Bolshevik chief of Leningrad, Sergey Kirov. Stalin used the murder as a pretext for further purges, he chose Yezhov for this task, Yezhov oversaw falsified accusations in the Kirov murder case against opposition leaders Kamenev, Zinoviev and their supporters. Yezhovs success in this led to his further promotion. He became Peoples Commissar for Internal Affairs and a member of the Central Committee on September 26,1936, following the dismissal of Genrikh Yagoda
3.
Sergo Ordzhonikidze
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Ordzhonikidze, Stalin and Anastas Mikoyan comprised what was jokingly referred to as the Caucasian Clique. Ordzhonikidze was born in present-day Kharagauli, western Georgia, into a Georgian noble family and he became involved in radical politics in 1903 and took part in the Revolution of 1905-1907. He was arrested for smuggling arms in December 1905, but when released on bail after five months he fled to Germany, in 1907 he returned to the Caucasus and settled in Baku, where he worked as a medical assistant while involved with Stalin and others in Bolshevik activity. Historians have come to believe that Ordzhonikidze played a role in the 1907 assassination of Prince Ilia Chavchavadze, in 1907 he was arrested at a May Day demonstration and served 26 days in prison under the pseudonym Kuchishvili. He later spent 18 months in prison in Sukhumi as a result of his 1905 arrest, Ordzhonikidze participated in the Persian Constitutional Revolution on a mission by the Bolshevik party and stayed in Tehran for a time around 1909. Following the establishment of the Longjumeau Party School in 1911, Ordzhonikidze was sent by Lenin to the Russian Empire to help organise an all party conference. He was arrested for being a member of the Social Democratic Party and deported to Siberia and he returned with Stalin to Saint Petersburg in April 1912, but was again apprehended and sentenced to three years hard labour. During the course of the Russian Civil War, he became a commissar for Ukraine, appointed chairman of Kavbiuro, the Caucasian Bureau of the Russian Communist Party in 1920, he was instrumental in the incorporation of the Caucasus in the nascent Soviet Union. Later, he fought to reduce Georgian autonomy from the Russian SFSR and his brutal treatment of Georgian communists antagonised Lenin who proposed he be expelled from the Communist Party. During the same period, he also aided Mirza Koochak Khan in establishing the short-lived Socialist Republic of Gilan in northern Iran, for a time Ordzhonikidze served for the collegium of the new Cheka. Ordzhonikidze became a member of the Politburo in 1926, but was relieved of his duties the same year. He became a member in 1930. He was appointed Peoples Commissar of Soviet Heavy Industry in 1932, an important role as the Second Five-Year Plan gave priority to the development of heavy industry. However Conquest states that he was dependent on the technical skills and knowledge of his deputy. Conquest reports that he knew the allegations against Pyatakov were false and had Stalin’s assurance that he would not be executed, the depth of Ordzhonikidze’s devotion to Stalin is disputed. Sent to the provinces during the Great Famine he reported correctly that it was a disaster, according to historian Roy Medvedev, Ordzhonikidze also opposed the purges of Stalin, Lazar Kaganovich and Nikolai Yezhov and the arrest of his deputy Pyatakov. However historian Oleg Khlevniuk reports finding no evidence in Soviet archives that Ordzhonikidze disagreed with the Moscow Trials, according to the archives, Ordzhonikidze questioned Pyatakov personally, and was convinced of his guilt. Ordzhonikidze is reported to have suffered an attack in November 1936
4.
Yelninsky District
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Yelninsky District is an administrative and municipal district, one of the twenty-five in Smolensk Oblast, Russia. It is located in the southeast of the oblast, the area of the district is 1,808.15 square kilometers. Its administrative center is the town of Yelnya, the population of Yelnya accounts for 67. 5% of the districts total population. Постановление №261 от30 апреля2008 г, «Об утверждении реестра административно-территориальных единиц и территориальных единиц Смоленской области», в ред. Постановления №464 от27 июня2014 г, «О внесении изменений в реестр административно-территориальных единиц и территориальных единиц Смоленской области». Закон №108-з от20 декабря2004 г, Закона №108-з от23 ноября2011 г. Вступил в силу со дня официального опубликования, Опубликован, Вестник Смоленской областной Думы и Администрации Смоленской области, №13, часть II, стр
5.
Smolensk Governorate
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Smolensk Governorate, together with seven other governorates, was established on December 29,1708, by Tsar Peter the Greats edict. On July 28,1713, Smolensk Governorate was abolished and its territory was divided between Moscow and Riga Governorates, the governorate was re-established in 1726. In 1775, it was included, along parts of Moscow and Belgorod Governorates. The governorate was again restored in 1796, eventually, on January 14,1929, Smolensk Governorate was abolished and its territory was included into Western Oblast. Population by mother tongue according to the Imperial census of 1897, according to the Imperial census of 1897. История Смоленской земли до начала XV столетия
