Teplyakov Alexey G.,
Candidate of Historical Science, Novosibirsk University of Economics and Management, Novosibirsk, Russia, e-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
M.P. Schrader’s Memories “Life of the Officer of Secret Police” (Part 3)
DOI: 10.31518/2618-9100-2020-1-15
The author publishes the third part of extensive memories of a prominent security officer M.P. Shrader (1902–1978) “Life of the officer of secret police”. This part refers to the period of 1922–1925. Mikhail Shrader worked in many regions of the country, was close to some large security officers. He remembered a set of episodes from concrete work of Cheka–OGPU–NKVD concerning political opponents and criminal elements, as well as everyday life of leadership team of Stalin’s secret police. Other valuable aspect of these memoirs – a large number of portraits of functionaries of state security. Many of them left no traces in the records remaining. Throughout the course of his life M.P. Shrader met, besides security officers, prominent scientists, political and cultural figures. His memoirs are marked bya high degree of objectivity, containing a lot of data on mercenary and office crimes of security officers. At the same time the author quite often criticizes his own acts. Shrader’s memoirs are written in typical Soviet language, but have literary advantages and are deprived of edification. Some episodes from “Life of the officer of secret police” have been confirmed with some latest documentary publications. A rather complete version of memoirs of Shrader will allow to cover in a new way many events of the Soviet era and will be of great help to historians. The third part of the published text relates mainly to the work of Schrader in the apparatus of the Secret Department of the GPU 1922–1925.
Publishing: 28/02/2020
How to cite: Teplyakov A.G. M.P. Schrader’s Memories “Life of the Officer of Secret Police” (Part 3) // Historical Courier, 2020, No. 1 (9), pp. 179–229. [Available online:] http://istkurier.ru/data/2020/ISTKURIER-2020-1-15.pdf
Links: Issue 1 2020
Keywords: Secret departments of GPU; Moscow; Shrader; Dzerzhinsky; Menzhinsky; Deribas