Siberia after it was conquered by the Russian Empire, was consider a land of huge wealth, from the priceless furs (a single Ermine pelt was enough to buy a good farm in Russia) to timber and gold, it was also known as the world’s largest prison without a roof. A land where landless free peasants to go to in order to escape the tyranny of the Tsars and to build a new life, it also served as a great dumping ground for all manner of criminals, both political and non-political (one could be sent to Siberia for life long exile for being a vagrant). As the population of Russia grew, and the central government could not provide the services for the population, Siberia became a way for lazy local officials to get rid of those they considered problematic.
The journey to Siberia until the advent of the Trans-Siberian railway was most on foot. Imagine walking, 6 days out of 7, week in, week out, in the Siberian summer and winter for one to two years just to reach your place of exile. And, your term of punishment did not begin until you completed that journey. During that journey you were, unless supported by your family who could provide you funds, at the mercy and budget of the prison system which provided a minimum of food and clothing both during the trek and at your place of exile. The system was so terrible, that some male prisoners would often write their wives telling them to sell everything and come to Siberia where the government was providing each prisoner with land, a cow, horse, house and funds. In reality, nothing was provided and when the wife arrived with children in hand, their husbands would sell them all into prostitution in order to get enough money to live.
After the term of punishment was completed, as the theory went, the ex-prisoners who had been taught discipline and hard work, would stay in Siberia and begin new farms which would colonize the vast land. In reality, the prisoners had been so brutalized by the guards, other prisoners and hard labor, that they turned to the only things they had really learned in exile; stealing, forgery, murder, etc. The large numbers of former prisoners would often wander in bands, laying siege to individual farms and even smaller villages and towns.
Siberia also served as a pressure cooker for political activists, especially after the rebellions in Poland. The Polish prisoners speaking their own language, having a different faith and having a higher level of education, not only managed to keep their spirits up, but also served as teachers who brought ideas of the value of the individual and good government to other prisoners. Like a cancer, these ideas began to take root and helped to create the pre-condition to the next wave of revolutionaries, those who were themselves Russian.
With the advent of the railroad, more prisoners could be shipped faster to Siberia. Among them were what would later to be the leaders of the early Soviet Union including Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky, Dzerzhinsky and many others. Unlike most exiles, individuals such as Lenin did not have to do physical labor in order to survive (his family supported him); instead he spent his time hunting, fishing, reading and writing. In fact, when his time of exile was over, he had actually gained weight and had to pay a large charge for the transportation of his books.
The concept that the exiles in Siberia could form the basis of new colonies fell short due to the dumping of every problem individual to Siberia, as well as the absolute corruption, lack of proper funding and incompetent management that started at the very top of the Tsarist regime.
With the fall of the Tsar, the Communist leadership still saw Siberia as a great land capable of producing wealth, but rather than seeing their exiles are ideally being converted to hard working individuals ready to contribute to society, they simply saw them as slaves to be worked to the greater glory of Communism. Instead of tens of thousands to be exiled, the Communists exiled millions and the end result was a multiplication of misery and death.
This book will give you a good overview of Siberia and the lot of the exiles. It is an interesting read and will make you realize the sheer size the suffering that is Russian history.
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