Karelian Uprising against the Bolsheviks
Among the nations of today’s Russia are the Karelians, a Finno-Ugric people closely related to the Finns linguistically and culturally. There are several allusions here to the Kalevala, the Finnish-Karelian national epic. During the collapse of the Russian Empire (1917), the Finns and Karelians sought to win their own state, which the Treaty of Tartu granted only to the Finns and Estonians; it promised autonomy to the Karelians, but the Soviet government failed to honor this. Therefore, we bring another translation of a historical article, this time about the Karelians’ last attempt to gain independence from the USSR.
The Karelian Uprising against the Bolsheviks, known as the Itäkarjalaisten kansannousu, broke out on Sunday, November 6, 1921. On the eve, according to Karelian custom, on “Memorial Saturday,” Karelians visited the graves of their ancestors and close friends who had died of hunger caused by crop failure and the seizure of food and grain by the Soviet government. The mourners became victims of gunfire and repression because they did not fit the Marxist-Leninist image of the “poor.” People in Karelia traditionally preferred to live as an extended family, cultivating land together with neighboring homesteads, engaging in fishing, hunting, and trade. They often crossed the Finnish border without problems, which the Soviet occupiers, who imposed the unjust Treaty of Tartu, began to gradually plug. Most of its provisions were not respected; Karelian municipalities did not receive the promised self-government and remained under the control of commissars from the Kremlin.
Centuries-old customs of the Northern peoples collapsed. The transmission of traditions and folk culture to the next generations was lost. The mother tongue was banned as a medium of education and official document circulation. The memory of the loss of loved ones against the backdrop of the Red bacchanalia, gathered to commemorate the four-year anniversary of Soviet power, prompted forest partisans to take action and establish national power in Rugozero (Rukajärvi). Along with the Karelians, the Veps and Pomors, who had suffered dekulakization, joined the fight against the Bolsheviks, as did their brothers-in-arms from Finland and Sweden.
Distinguished sons of the North fought for the rights and traditions of Karelia in the Kegri Uprising. Representatives of the national struggle against Bolshevism have remained forever in the nation’s memory and on the pages of Karelian history and folklore, such as Jalmari Takkinen – Ilmarinen. Vaseli Levonen, also known as Ukki Väinämöinen, contributed to the collection and preservation of Karelian stories. Osipp Borisainen, like Lemminkäinen, contributed his part to the traditions of the Karelian nation. Together with other supporters, they participated in the creation of a Karelian dictionary, which they enriched with the Tunguda dialect.
Most participants in the Karelian Uprising left for Finland with their families. Those who remained in their homelands continued to protect the language and culture. However, those who eventually decided to return later were either crushed by repression or adapted to the doublethink of the Soviet system, which systematically suppressed the national languages of Karelia, erased “unpromising” settlements from memory, ruthlessly cut down unique forests, and dammed rivers, leading to the flooding of villages and the destruction of fish wealth.
And so that time will pass,
Days will flow away and days will come,
Again I will be needed here,
They will wait and look for me here,
So that I may forge the Sampo again,
That many-stringed box,
Return the moon to the sky,
Give freedom to the sun again:
For without the moon and the sun
There will be no joy in the world.
Ingvi-Freyr
Vladislav Nobel-Olejnik
Translated from English and Ukrainian by Pavel Veselský
Translation without additions or edits. The text does not reflect the position of the editorial office.
