The Fate of the Families of “Enemies of the People”

The declassified case file of Itsik-Leiba Moishe-Ioylevich Breitel, a native of Mohyliv-Podilskyi who was arrested during the “Romanian Operation,” contains a poignant document: an appeal from his wife, Genya Breitel, requesting a review of her husband’s case.

On 27 December 1937, Itsik Breitel was sentenced under Article 54-1, treason against the Motherland, and Article 54-10, anti-Soviet agitation, of the Criminal Code of the Ukrainian SSR to ten years in forced-labour camps. The formal basis for the accusation was that Breitel had illegally crossed the Soviet–Romanian border.

His wife and two daughters remained behind: seven-year-old Fira and one-month-old Sima. They were expelled from Mohyliv-Podilskyi.

In 1940, Genya Breitel appealed to a deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR, asking for her husband’s case to be reviewed. Her letter brings together the tragic circumstances of the family’s life and the obligatory formulas of the Soviet era. Genya Breitel writes that she was able to return home only thanks to Comrade Stalin, who “did not let us perish.” She describes her children, returned from exile and starving, and in the very next sentence refers to the “good, bright, happy life” in the USSR.

The request to review the case was denied. The decision was signed by Merkulov, Deputy People’s Commissar for Internal Affairs of the USSR.

Itsik Breitel died in Siblag in April 1943.

In 1989, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Ukrainian SSR sent a request to the address bureau in Mohyliv-Podilskyi seeking information about Breitel’s wife and daughters. The reply stated that no records of registration or deregistration for the individuals in question had been found.