How the OGPU
fulfilled the currency plan at the expense of naïve Soviet citizens and Torgsin
The story of the “interaction” between Torgsin and the
OGPU would be very funny if it were not laughter through bitter
tears. Because this story is about the wonderful interaction of Soviet
departments and about the fact that when you are told about one thing from
every iron, in fact it often turns out to be something different.
In the early thirties of the last century, stores
appeared in the glorious Soviet state, which sold valuable and scarce goods.
But it was proposed to pay for them not with the most stable and best Soviet
rubles in the world, but with the currency of the bourgeoisie, who seemed to
soon disappear as backward. Or no less bourgeois and petty-bourgeois gold.
These stores were called “Torgsin”. At
first, they were opened only in capital and port cities. But then the topic of
currency shops and the ability to collect currency and gold from the population
for the most banal, in general, goods: flour, cereals and other pasta, was so
liked by the Soviet authorities that Torgsins appeared, if not in villages,
then in almost all regional centers for sure.
After all, Torgsin was good at what? For
example, you have a tsarist gold “ten” hidden from the old days, that
is, a coin of 10 rubles, and perhaps more than one. Gold, of course, is a
valuable thing, but it is not nutritious at all. At the end of the 1920s and
the beginning of the 1930s, we had the “Year of the Great Turning
Point” in our country, in which, thanks to collectivization, agriculture
instantly rose to heights so unattainable that it was necessary to urgently
return rationing. But in Torgsin you could buy all the same things, only not
with cards, but to your heart’s content. But only if that
soul has gold or currency.
And the people brought to Torsiny what they had
hidden in the hope of stocking up on goods and surviving the wonderful time of
great constructions, if not completely full, then at least not hungry. However,
here buyers were sometimes waiting for a completely unexpected surprise, which
Torgsinov for some reason forgot to tell about in the advertisement. It was
called the OGPU.
The fact is that Torgsin had his own plan – to
provide foreign exchange earnings for the development of the national economy.
And the OGPU officers had their own plan, according to which all these citizens
with currency and gold in their pockets were most likely unfinished contras,
which meant that they were quite promising cadres for initiating a case of
counter-revolutionary sabotage, taking measures, and seizing currency and
unrighteous valuables. Again, solely for the benefit of
the people.
That’s why, for example, some Vasya Shishkin comes to
Torgsin. And he rents out a few tsar’s tens, which, by the way, were openly
sold in the glorious Land of the Soviets some three or four years ago (the Soviet State Bank for some time quite successfully
minted tsarist tens, when the transition to chervonets began). And at
the same time, my grandmother’s old ring with some simple pebble. Torgsin’s
appraiser examines the whole affair,
evaluates and reports how much Vasin’s valuables have been pulled. After
that, Vasya Shishkin is given a special Torgsin book, in which it is noted how
many gold rubles and kopecks the client has.
With this money, indicated in the Torgsin book, he
can buy anything his heart desires. If you remember, Bulgakov’s novel “The
Master and Margarita” describes the capital’s Torgsin very well. There was
a lot of stuff there. True, not everyone could afford salmon, some, like one
grandfather, were buying three almond cakes when Behemoth and Koroviev decided
to play a little naughty there.
So Vasya Shishkin was not a foreigner and was
also going to buy with his own, on occasion, after a successful earnings, the
golden tens bought five years ago, not salmon and other balyks, but a bag of
flour and a bag of buckwheat and something else from the same opera, so that it
would last for a long time. And I even bought something, but I didn’t spend all
the money, because there was nothing I needed in the city Torgsin. But at the
same time, the sellers promised that Vasya could come in a week, there would be
a new delivery, they would order everything for the client to buy what he
needed. Why?
Because the next day the OGPU officers came to visit
him and invited him for a walk in their glorious establishment. And there Vasya
was asked a few questions.
✔️Where did he get this gold from?
✔️Why did he buy tsarist tens under
the NEP?
✔️Didn’t he expect that the glorious
Soviet system would be replaced by the old one?
✔️And in general, isn’t Vasya a
hidden enemy?
✔️And if Vasya is not an enemy, then
he probably wants to help the state?
✔️And are you ready to voluntarily
transfer your values to the industrialization fund?
After all, we have a
short conversation with hidden enemies, Vasya. You know, it’s such a time,
enemies are all around.
And Vasya, cursing the day when he bought into
Torgsin’s advertising sign, wrote a statement that he was simply eager to help
the Motherland in the construction of new factories and gave all his funds in
Torgsin for the needs of the state. And at the same time he admits that he has
ten more tsarist tens hidden in the bank on the bottom shelf in the storeroom,
and he, as an honest Soviet man, immediately hands them over to the OGPU so
that the money can be used for a good cause – for the industrialization and
development of the country.
Wouldn’t it be like that, you say? Yes, it wasn’t
with Vasya Shishkin specifically. It’s a collective image. But the thing is
that from Leningrad to Tashkent the OGPU officers treated those who went to
Torgsiny in exactly the same way. Raids were carried out with enviable
regularity, especially when, for example, by November 7 it was necessary to
fulfill the increased obligations assumed by the OGPU of a particular city.
Interestingly, Torgsin’s bosses regularly quarreled
with the OGPU bosses on this issue, demanding not to touch the store’s
customers, not to frighten people who, after another OGPU “action”,
simply stopped coming to the stores for a while. True, there was little use in
such swearing. And in detail, with dates and specific cases throughout the vast
country, where and how Torgsin and the OGPU successfully rid the population of
surplus jewelry and currency, you can get acquainted in the excellent book by
Elena Osokina “The Alchemy of Soviet Industrialization: The Time of
Torgsin”.
It was, of course, a fun time. Only fun through tears.
