"What kind of hell is there in the soul?"
On June 12, Russia Day and the eve of the feast of St. Anthony of Padua, pilgrims from various regions of Siberia, including the Tomsk region and Kuzbass, arrived in the small Siberian village of Bialystok. They came to reestablish a worship cross destroyed by vandals.
In November 2022, a series of acts of vandalism occurred in the Tomsk region. It all began immediately after Poland's Independence Day, November 11, when a plaque was torn down from the Stone of Grief, erected in memory of Poles who perished in Siberia during the years of repression. This occurred just steps from the NKVD Investigative Prison Museum.
"I was absolutely shocked," recalls Vasily Khanevech, the museum's co-founder and a descendant of Polish immigrants from the village of Białystok. "Almost immediately, a new message arrived about a plaque being torn down from the building of a former orphanage where orphans from Polish families lived—their parents had died here in exile. A few days later, they called from Białystok and said that a memorial complex had been destroyed: a cross had been sawed off with a grinder, and plaques bearing the names of villagers executed in 1937-38 had been torn down. And then another message, this time from the village of Polozovo: a memorial in the local cemetery, built with funds from the Kostetsky family, had been destroyed. A marble slab bearing the names of 33 village residents, also executed during the years of repression, had been torn down. We've filed a report with law enforcement regarding all these incidents. An investigation is underway. But so far, no one has been found."
The Stone of Sorrow in Memory Square: Before and After
Polish Orphanage: Before and After
A memorial at the cemetery in the village of Polozovo: before and after (photo from the NKVD Investigative Prison Museum)
Memorial complex in the village of Bialystok: before and after
"Cutting down the cross and ripping off the plaques requires preparation. You can't do it haphazardly," says Andrey, whose relatives live in the village of Bialystok. "The grinder requires electricity, so you'll need a portable generator."
"The memorial wasn't destroyed in a minute or two. In a small village where everything is in plain sight, people couldn't help but see it. Why didn't they react?"
"Well, yes, when you're working with a grinder, sparks fly everywhere. The thing is, there are almost no indigenous people left here, the descendants of those who founded this village. They're mostly newcomers from other regions. For them, this memorial means practically nothing. They probably thought, 'It's none of my business.' Perhaps some were afraid."
"It's clear this wasn't planned and carried out by our ordinary vandals," says Vasily Khanevich. "This is a retaliatory action by people who have lost their memory, their conscience... who have lost so much in this life. This is their way of expressing their patriotism. But it's stupid. The memorial in Bialystok included both Latvian and Russian names. The memory of the Orthodox priest Karelin Nikolai Maksimovich was immortalized. He lived in Bialystok in exile, working as a school caretaker. And he, too, was executed on trumped-up charges.
Nikolai Maksimovich Karelin, teacher and Orthodox priest. Executed on September 22, 1937. Rehabilitated on July 22, 1960.
"We've never divided people by nationality, and we never will," Vasily Khanevich continues. "Revenge against the dead is impossible. Memory belongs to the living, not the dead. No matter how many plaques are torn down, no matter how many crosses are cut down, people have remembered, remember, and will remember. I don't just remember all my fellow villagers by name; I know their fates, when they were born, when they married, when and why they were executed. And you can't erase that memory with a grinder."
Historical reference. Settlers from the western provinces of the Russian Empire began moving en masse to Siberia even before the Stolypin reforms, in the second half of the 19th century. These people were of various nationalities. They cleared the taiga, building houses, churches, Catholic churches, and mosques. This is how the villages of Lilliengofka, Berezovka, Polozovo, and Belostok emerged.
The first settlers of Bialystok (from the archive of Vasily Khanevich).
In the 30s, during the Great Terror, several "national" cases were instigated. In Siberia, the largest was the "Polish Operation." All victims of that operation were subsequently rehabilitated. And in the Tomsk villages of Polozovo, Bialystok, and elsewhere, memorials with the names of those executed appeared.
"Local authorities worked according to a plan handed down from above. They even staged socialist competitions between departments," says Vasily Khanevich. "When there weren't enough Poles to fulfill the plan, they recruited Belarusians, Russians... anyone who came to hand. That's why this is an international affair. And these memorials are international. No matter how hard these vandals try, they won't succeed in setting us against each other. We have a common history, and it can't be rewritten."
Martyrology of the repressed residents of the village of Belostok: Ioch, Karelin, Mozzherin, Nazaruk, Popov, Khanevich, Shumsky...
Funds for the new cross were raised by parishioners of the Tomsk Catholic Church and the Order of the Sisters of Mother Teresa.
The procession, consecration and installation of the cross
"We consecrate and erect a new cross in place of the one we cut down," says Father Voitek, rector of the Tomsk Catholic community. "We don't do this to show these scoundrels that we've undoen what they did. No. We have a different mission. When we look at this new cross, we won't feel like victors, no. But looking at this cross, we will pray: Lord, remember those who did this, for they know not what they do. And even if they do it again, we will think: what poor people they are. What hell must be in their souls if they do this! What poor people they are, in need of our mercy."
Father Voitek, rector of the Tomsk Catholic community.
