The camp empire's administrator who ran the GULAG through the Great Patriotic War
In his August 1944 report to Beria, Nasedkin noted that 975,000 GULAG prisoners had been transferred to the Red Army over three years of war and that 'five former prisoners were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.'
A Soviet state-security officer who headed the GULAG (Main Directorate of Corrective Labour Camps) from 1941 to 1947. Born in Kherson, the son of a teacher, he joined the Red Army at fifteen and entered the Cheka-OGPU-NKVD apparatus in 1921, rising through its transport and economic directorates. When Germany invaded, he oversaw the evacuation of 27 camps and 210 colonies (750,000 prisoners) from the front-line zone, then mobilised GULAG labour for ammunition, uniforms, and defence production. His August 1944 report to Beria detailed the camp system's wartime output with clinical precision even as mortality soared past 900,000. Promoted to Lieutenant-General of State Security in 1945, he was sidelined to the reserve in 1948 and died two years later.
Career Timeline
- 1920Joined the Red Army as a headquarters clerk
- 1921Began work as a clerk in Cheka organs
- 1931Economic Department, OGPU Plenipotentiary Representation, Moscow Oblast
- 1935Assistant chief of section, Transport (6th) Department, GUGB NKVD
- 1937Joined the VKP(b)
- 1939Deputy chief, Main Economic Directorate, NKVD; chief of 6th Department (fuel industry)
- 1941–1947Head of GULAG, NKVD/MVD USSR
- 1948Transferred to the reserve