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Рубльов Олександр - "Herr Hagemeier, Herr Hagemeier! Man hält mich hier fest!": арешт 11 липня 1937 р. співробітниці Генерального консульства Німеччини у Києві Ерни Герндт (2017)

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Rublov Oleksandr

"Herr Hagemeier, Herr Hagemeier! Man hält michhier fest!": the arrest of Erna Gerndt – an employee of the German Consulate General in Kyiv on July 11, 1937.

Section: The person in historical context

Abstract: The purpose of the article is to show the course of Stalin's repressions, directed against German population of the USSR in the framework of so-called "German operation", and to research the complicated process of rehabilitation in the 1950s. The case of Erna Gerndt exemplifies all these processed. Methodology. The principal method used in the survey is the prosopographical method. This method allows to research persons and social groups in historical context, to create 'collective biographies' and to find and trace some patterns. Also, the author used problem-chronological, biographical, cultural-historical, specific-search, historical-genetic and psychological methods.Conclusions. In the biographical essay, the author reconstructs the story of the life of the native Kyiv citizen Erna Gerndt. She was an ethnic German and served as a technical fellow at the Consulate of Germany in Kyiv during for more than two dozen years (1910–1914; 1923–1937). The stress is made on the working conditions of the Consulate (later - Consulate General) stuff of Germany in Kyiv in the times of the Stalin's terror in 1930s. The circumstances of the Erna Gerndt's arrest on June 11, 1937, by the NKVD officers author pictures in details. The author also highlights the reasons for her releasing, further deportation from the USSR, work in the Ministry of International Affairs in Germany during the World War II, and her second arrest in 1946-1947, the "early" release in 1955 and the endless twists and turns of rehabilitation of an innocently convicted person. The author emphasizes on the combination of the campaign of liquidation of foreign consulates in the USSR with mass national operations during the Great Terror in 1937-1938. The real reason for limiting the contacts of Soviet citizens - representatives of national communities - was Stalin's and his surrounding's desire to isolate them from the states with which they had ethnic ties.The study is based on Erna Gerndt's archival criminal case files, which are stored in the State Archives of the Security Service of Ukraine. They are published for the first time.

Keywords: Erna Gerndt, German Consulate (General) in Kyiv, the Great Terror 1937–1938, repressions, Soviet Military Administration (SMAD) in Germany.


Author(s) citation:

Cite:
Rublov Oleksandr (2017). "Herr Hagemeier, Herr Hagemeier! Man hält michhier fest!": the arrest of Erna Gerndt – an employee of the German Consulate General in Kyiv on July 11, 1937.. From archives of VUChK–GPU–NKVD–KGB, ( 2 (48)) 347-439. (In Ukrainian). doi: https://doi.org/10.15407/vuchk2017.02.347

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