The Gulag Museum is constantly under threat of closure. It’s located in a swanky shopping district spot in central Moscow and is staffed by glorious old Russian ladies who know well and good the dangers of forgetfulness. If you have the chance, DO visit this museum. I’ve transcribed a couple of their amazing captions below.

Left: Beria must have liked the expression on his face in the official portrait because the same head was used again, this time montaged onto civilian dress. Following his execution, his photograph and fawning biography in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia were promptly substituted. Subscribers world-wide were sent a four-page insert carrying a series of photographs and “new information” on the Bering Sea. Whalers were shown harpooning their catch – a fitting metaphor for the fate of Stalin’s blubbery henchman.

Right: Yan Rudzutak, a Latvian from the prerevolutionary underground. Party member since 1905. Spent ten years in tsarist prisons. Supported Stalin’s rise to power. Became candidate member of the Politburo in 1926. Opposed Stalin’s more grandiose proposals during the first Five-Year Plan, but his astute objections were swept aside. He was arrested at a party in May 1937. Among the guests also arrested were four women who were seen, three months later, in the Butyrka prison, still in their bedraggled evening dresses. On July 28, 1937, Yezhov sent Stalin a list of 138 names. Stalin scrawled, “Shoot all 138.” Rudzutak’s name was on the list. The trumped-up charges included “spying for Germany.”

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