Metadata: Main Artillery Directorate
Collection
- Country:
- Russia
- Holding institution:
- The Military-Historical Museum of Artillery, Engineering, and Communications Forces
- Holding institution (official language):
- Военно-исторический Музей артиллерии, инженерных войск и войск связи
- Postal address:
- 197198, Russia, St. Petersburg, Aleksandrovskii park, d. 7
- Phone number:
- (812) 610-33-01
- Web address:
- http://www.artillery-museum.ru/collection-fond.html
- Email:
- artillery@yandex.ru
- Reference number:
- F. 6
- Title:
- Main Artillery Directorate
- Title (official language):
- Главное артиллерийское управление
- Creator/accumulator:
- Main Artillery Directorate
- Date(s):
- 1848/1918
- Language:
- Russian
- German
- Swedish
- English
- Extent:
- 40,381 storage units
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Scope and content:
-
The fonds contains annual reports on the state of artillery; lists of enlisted men given commendations; correspondence on the condition of property housed in district artillery warehouses; lists of workers and master craftsmen of the Putilov, Sestroretsk, Shostka, and other factories; plans for fulfilling orders from artillery warehouses and workshops; documents on the issuing of aid to widows of artillery enlisted men, the provision of pensions to various persons, and the implementation of certain new kinds of weapons; service records of various artillery officers; and information on promotions and demotions.
Documents pertaining to the history of Jews in Russia (op. 1, 4-6, and 56) may be provisionally divided into five thematic groups. 1) Files pertaining to Jewish contractors who delivered necessary supplies under contracts with the Main Artillery Directorate; these contain information on the quantity of the goods supplied (firewood, candles, coal), delivery methods, recipients, and service prices; and in particular, there are documents of the contractors I. Kogan and M. Fridliand, who for several years supplied sulfur and construction materials to the Okhta plant, and tried to obtain a contract with the plant for a period of ten years (1869); files pertaining to financial disputes between contractors and the Main Artillery Directorate arising due to nonpayment of amounts stipulated by contracts, and in particular, files pertaining to the operations of the major contractor M. Fridliand, etc. (early 1870s).
2) Materials on Jews residing in the territory of the Shostka gunpowder works, including the problem of overpopulation of the territory of the plant by persons not related to production, and in particular, Jews and their families, with appended data on the size of the Jewish population in Shostka in various years, and a note by the powder works inspector insisting that the Jews be evicted and asserting that “the Shostka settlement is going to be exclusively Jewish due to their rapid birth-rate” (1870s-80s); and a complaint filed by Jews of the town of Shostka with the factory administration, and correspondence between these parties, in connection with the order that Z. Iudkin’s house at the Jewish cemetery, where funeral rites were performed, be demolished (1888).
3) Documents on the religious life of Jews, including an inquiry by the powder works inspector to the War Ministry as to whether Jews should be paid (as was the case with Christians and Muslims) for days when they were absent due to religious observances (1870); as well as correspondence on the allocation of land in the Sestroretsk settlement for the construction of a new synagogue building to replace the previous one, which had been destroyed in a fire (1869). 4) Correspondence between various subdivisions of the Main Artillery Directorate – the factory inspector, district artillery administrations, etc. – regarding the need to pay the one-time monetary benefit to Jews who converted to Russian Orthodoxy; etc. (1862-63).
5) Lists of Jewish workers of various factories and enterprises submitted for commendation for diligence in the production of items for the needs of state defense; these indicate the name and surname of the awardee, their profession, the date of their enlistment, previous decorations or distinctions (if any), ethnicity, religion, work experience, rank, merits, date and place of birth, place of residence, etc. Names of the persons indicated in the lists were submitted in bulk to be awarded the Order of St. Stanislaus (a silver medal on the St. Stanislaus ribbon with the inscription “For diligence”). In all, over sixty Jews of various professions – casters, lathe-operators, metalworkers, riveters, pressmen, welders, electrical engineers, etc. – received the award; among them, “the craftsmen and factory workers I. B. Katsen and R. B. Katsen, who have worked diligently and without cease from the very beginning of the war”; M. L. Levin, inventor of a method of manufacturing cast-iron bombs; the mechanic L. B. Zil’ber, assistant chief engineer of an open-hearth shop; the lathe-operator G. I. Ostrovskii; and others (1914-16).
- Archival history:
- This was established in 1703 by order of Emperor Peter I as the tseikhgaus (from the German Zeughaus, “arsenal”), a storehouse of “memorable and curious” artillery pieces. According to a special decree, the tseikhgaus was to receive the most valuable and interesting exemplars of artillery pieces from all over Russia, and later other types of weapons, uniforms, and banners, including such items taken as war trophies. In 1756 Empress Elizaveta Petrovna decreed that the tseikhgaus reorganise as the Commemorative Hall and be housed at the Foundry (Liteinyi dvor). Since 1868, the military-historical collections have been located at the Kronverk of the Peter and Paul Fortress. From 1903 on, it was called the Artillery History Museum. In the Soviet period, it received the fonds of the Central Historical Military Engineering Museum (1963), and in 1965 the Military Communications Museum became part of it. Since that time, the museum has been called the Military-Historical Museum of Artillery, Engineering, and Communications Forces. The museum includes a document fonds (archive), formed in November 1872 on the initiative of N. E. Brandenburg, the museum’s director. It consists of 130 fonds housing 217,261 storage units on the subjects of artillery, urban planning, geographic discoveries, medicine, and the history of diplomacy. Also housed in the archival files are letters, notebooks, diaries, and autograph manuscripts of statesmen, scientists, military leaders, designers, artists, and architects.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- This was formed in 1862 upon the merger of the Artillery Department and the Staff of the Generalfeldzeugmeister. It was part of the War Ministry, and was the country’s central artillery administration. The Main Artillery Directorate dealt with inspectorial, technical, research, training, and economic aspects of artillery; it was charged with fully providing for the army’s armaments needs. According to a statute of 1863, the Main Artillery Directorate consisted of an artillery committee, a secretariat, eight departments (inspections, naval affairs, artillery, arsenals, gunpowder, armaments, fortresses, and records), and drafting, treasury, executive, logging, and archival units. By 1915, the Directorate had twelve departments, and by May 1917, twenty-one. In 1918, the Main Artillery Directorate and its subordinate institutions were disbanded or transferred to the People’s Commissariat of Military Affairs and the Supreme Economic Council.
- Access points: persons/families:
- Fridliand, M
- Iudkin, Z
- Katsen, I B
- Katsen, R B
- Kogan, I.
- Levin, M L
- Ostrovskii, G I
- Zil’ber, L B
- System of arrangement:
- The fonds includes 179 inventories systematised chronologically.
- Finding aids:
- Inventories are available.
- Yerusha Network member:
- Jewish Theological Seminary
