The Kosior brother who died in Vorkuta as an oppositionist while his brother ruled Ukraine for Stalin
After signing the Declaration of 46 in 1923 he spent fifteen years as an oppositionist, through expulsion, exile, a political isolator, and a camp, until he was shot.
Born in Węgrów in Poland, he joined the RSDLP in 1906. He was the brother of Stanislav Kosior, and while his brother rose to the Politburo and the leadership of the Ukrainian party, he took the road of the oppositions. He was an instructor for the Moscow metalworkers union in 1919, a member of the Revolutionary Military Council of the 12th Army and deputy head of the political department of the 14th Army in 1920, chairman of the All-Ukrainian Council of Trade Unions from 1920 to 1922, and chief editor of the trade-union paper Trud from 1922 to 1924. He belonged to the Democratic Centralist group in 1921, signed the Declaration of 46 in 1923, and worked with the Left Opposition thereafter. Expelled in May 1928, he was exiled to Pokrovsk in the Volga German ASSR, and because he kept up the work in exile he was given three years in a political isolator and then five years of exile in Minusinsk. In July 1936 he was sentenced to five years in the camps and held at Ukhta-Pechlag, was arrested again in December 1937, and was shot at Vorkuta on 30 March 1938.
Activities and affiliations
Career Timeline
- 1906Joined the RSDLP
- 1919Instructor, Moscow metalworkers union
- 1920Member, Revolutionary Military Council, 12th Army; deputy head of political department, 14th Army
- 1920–1922Chairman, All-Ukrainian Council of Trade Unions
- 1922–1924Chief editor, the trade-union paper Trud
- 1923Signed the Declaration of 46
- 1928Expelled from the party, exiled to Pokrovsk
- 1936Five years in the camps, held at Ukhta-Pechlag
- 1938Shot at Vorkuta
Related historical events
- 1918–1922The Civil War and Foreign InterventionMember of the 12th Army Revolutionary Military CouncilIn 1920, he served on the Revolutionary Military Council of the 12th Army.
- 1921–1928The New Economic Policy (NEP)Left Opposition
- 1923–1927The Succession Struggle and the Left OppositionSignatory of the Declaration of the 46 and Left OppositionistHe signed the Declaration of the 46 in 1923 and then worked with the Left Opposition.
- 1937–1938The Great PurgeLeft Opposition targetA Democratic Centralist and Left Oppositionist, he was re-prosecuted during imprisonment and executed in 1938.
The Vorkuta Hunger Strike and the Executions of March 1938
In the summer of 1936 more than three thousand political prisoners arrived at the Vorkuta mine, where the Ukhtpechlag camp of the NKVD stood; the largest group among them were convinced Trotskyists transferred from administrative exile, political isolators and other camps. Balashov's memoir of the Vorkuta tragedy, cited in Rogovin's study of the opposition, names Kosior among the leaders of this group, alongside Sokrat Gevorkyan, Vladimir Ivanov, Melnais and Poznansky, Trotsky's former secretary.
The group first collected signatures to a declaration of "Bolshevik-Leninists" and then, in the autumn of 1936, began a hunger strike. The declaration demanded the annulment of the NKVD's decision to move Trotskyists from administrative exile into the camps and the hearing of political opponents' cases in open court rather than by the Special Conference; an eight-hour working day in the camp; rations independent of output norms, with output encouraged by money rather than by the bread ration; separate housing and work assignments for political prisoners away from criminal offenders; and the transfer of disabled, female and elderly political prisoners out of the polar camps.
The hunger strike began on 27 October 1936 and lasted 132 days, with about a thousand participants, half of them at the mine. Forced feeding saved many from death, but the number of deaths rose, and prisoners in neighbouring camps joined in, threatening the camp's production plans. The strike ended only in March 1937, after a telegram from Moscow announced that all the demands would be met; the participants were then kept on surface work and in office jobs rather than in the shafts, and working hours and rations were adjusted.
The concession did not last. From the winter of 1937 prisoners were gathered secretly at an old brick factory twenty kilometres from the Vorkuta mine, and the executions that followed in March 1938 removed the strike's leadership. The acts signed by the troika of the NKVD of Arkhangelsk oblast record the shooting of 351 prisoners in March 1938, among them Kosior, Poznansky and Radomyslenskaya, Zinoviev's sister. His arrest on 10 December 1937 and his execution at Vorkuta on 30 March 1938 belong to the same suppression of the Vorkuta opposition.