Katorga

Abstract

Four thousand Poles were sentenced to the penal labor category of Siberian exile. Chapter Seven details the difficulty St. Petersburg and Siberian administrations had accommodating all of the penal laborers. The dreadful conditions faced by laborers assigned to mines, factories, and road-construction are detailed. Due to rumors about his allegiance to the regime, Eastern Siberia’s governor-general was under especial pressure to assign Polish exiles to hard manual labor. Yet class played a major role within Russian penality. Many Poles from the privileged estates enjoyed salubrious conditions. Some even remembered their exilic sojourns as a Halcyon of intellectual engagement with fellow exiles. For others of less exalted status, confinement in overcrowded prisons and labor camps eroded their health and morality.