Telegram from Ivan Nikishov, to NKVD Commissar Beria. Nikishov reports on a visit by US Vice President Henry A. Wallace, who toured the Soviet Far East in May 1944. Nikishov was the Head of Dalstroi, the "Far North Construction Trust," part of the Soviet Gulag system which oversaw mining using forced labor in the Russian Far East. Nikishov quotes a number of positive comments from Wallace, as well as questions he had about Dalstroi's operations, such as the total quantity of gold mined.
May 29, 1944
Telegram from Nikishov to Beria - Henry A. Wallace’s visit to the city of Magadan
This document was made possible with support from Blavatnik Family Foundation
May 29, 1944
Top Secret
From May 24 to 26 inclusive of this year [1944], Vice-President of the USA [Henry] WALLACE, together with three companions and four officers visited the city of Magadan.
In the city he examined the port, the vehicle repair plant, a 10-year [students from 7 years to 16 years old] school, a canteen, a fur storage, the Soviet pig farm [svinosovkhoz] 23 kilometers outside of the city, and the House of Culture.
On the evening of May 25 of this year, [he] attended a concert in Magadan.
In Low Seimchan, [he] examined the settlement of the South Mining Industrial Directorate, as well as examined a school, a canteen, a children’s boarding house, a Party Cabinet [partkabinet] and watched the movie “Two Soldiers” in the club.
In the Western Mining Industrial Directorate, [he] examined the Susuman Soviet farm, a section of the Frunze placer mine, and inspected a gold ore processing machine [prompribor] at the “Komsomolets” placer mine. Free employees are working in both mines. At the Frunze placer mine Wallace talked to the workers.
Dalstroi NKVD Nikishov.
[Translators note: publication does not give the original addressee and no. of the cable.]
Ivan Nikishov reports to NKVD Commissar Beria on Vice President Henry Wallace's activities while visiting Magadan, Siberia in 1944.
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State Archive of the Russian Federation (GA RF), Fond R-9401, Opis’ 2, Delo 65, List 166. Published as Document no. 123 in Kokurin and Morukov, ''Stalinskie stroiki GULAGa 1930-1953'' [Stalin’s Construction Sites of the GULAG] (Moscow: Materik, 2005), 464. Obtained and translated for CWIHP by Vadim J. Birstein.
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2012-06-01
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Telegram
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114331
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Blavatnik Family Foundation and Leon Levy Foundation