War Ministry of the Ukrainian People’s Republic; Kiev

Collection

Holding institution:: Central State Archives of Supreme Bodies of Power and Government of Ukraine

Holding institution (official language):: Центральний державний архів вищих органів влади і управління України

Title (official language):: Военное министерство Украинской Народной Республики, г. Киев

Scope and content:: Materials housed in the fond include an order of the Ukrainian Military-Revolutionary HQ of the Western Front in which the Bolsheviks’ policies toward Ukrainians are compared to Nicholas II’s policies toward Jews (1917); an informational summary on a pogrom in Poltava (December 1917); a draft of the Regulation on the Anti-Pogrom Squadron of the Union of Jewish Combatants of the Kiev Military Area (January 1918); a letter of I. Khurgin, UNR deputy people’s minister of Jewish affairs, to Kiev Military Area commander N. Shinkar’ with information on the Jewish Ministry’s formation of a special anti-pogrom unit [kuren’], and requesting that this division be provided quarters and weaponry (1918); the text of a universal [decree] (which in fact appeared in May 1919, i.e., outside the inclusive dates of the activities of the collection creator) of M. O. Grigor’ev, “ataman of the partisans of the Kherson and Tavriia regions,” describing Soviet power as Russian-Jewish in nature, and proposing that national-proportional representation be introduced in councils, with a quota of 80% Ukrainians, 5% Jews, and 15% other nationalities.

Administrative/biographical history:: The Secretariat (General Secretariat) of Military Affairs first arose as one of the structures of the General Secretariat (the executive body of the Ukrainian Central Rada) formed 28 June 1917. (The first general secretary of military affairs was S. V. Petliura.) When the Central Rada’s Fourth Universal [decree] of 22 January 1918 proclaimed the independence of the Ukrainian People’s Republic (UNR), the General Secretariat was reorganized as the Council of People’s Ministers, and the General Secretariat of Military Affairs as the UNR War Ministry. The Central Rada’s General Secretariat of Military Affairs and the UNR War Ministry presided over Ukrainianised military units, and then over units of the newly-established Ukrainian Army, acting in conjunction with non-governmental military structures, particularly the All-Ukrainian Council of Military Deputies, the Free Cossacks [Vil’ne kozatstvo], and the Union of Jewish Warriors of the Kiev Military Area. The people’s ministries of the UNR ceased to exist after the coup of 29 April 1918 that initiated the Ukrainian State [Ukrains’ka derzhava] headed by Hetman P. P. Skoropads’kii; UNR ministries were restored later the same year in the government of the Directorate.

Subject terms:: Antisemitism; Communism; Communism--Communist parties and organisations; Jewish quota; Military; Pogroms; Revolutions

System of arrangement:: The fond includes three inventories systematised according to the structural-chronological principle.