The electronic library of historical documents has digitized instructions for food detachments. It was approved by the People’s Commissar of Food Alexander Tsyurupa on August 20, 1918.
RIA Novosti
Members of the food brigades confiscated excess bread from the kulaks.
According to the instructions, each food detachment had to consist of at least 75 people with 2-3 machine guns. Each detachment was headed by a chief appointed by the Chief Commissioner for the formation of food detachments.
In addition, a political commissar was appointed, approved by the People’s Commissariat for Food. The head of the detachment was responsible for the military-technical and economic part. The duties of the political commissar included organizing local Committees of the Village Poor.
He also had to “monitor that the detachment stood at the height of its position, was imbued with a consciousness of revolutionary duty and responsibility, and satisfied all the requirements of revolutionary discipline.”
It was the commissioner who was obliged to take all measures to eliminate the conditions conducive to the emergence of looting, drunkenness and other manifestations of disorganization and moral decay among the members of the detachment.
At the head of all detachments operating in one district was the district military commander, and above him was the provincial military commander. The development of a general plan for the alienation of grain was in charge of the heads of requisition departments.
Food detachments obeyed only their commanders. In the districts they were located so that in the shortest possible time 2-3 detachments could be united together. The instructions provided for constant cavalry communication between detachments. Members of each detachment were obliged to submit to military revolutionary discipline.
“Any violation of this leads to immediate expulsion from the detachment and trial,” the instructions said. “Those guilty of theft, extortion, looting, bribery and other similar crimes are arrested and sent to the disposal of the provincial extraordinary commission for combating counter-revolution, caught in the act are shot.”
It is important to emphasize that the instructions also contained the following instruction: “All products necessary for the needs of the detachment are purchased at established prices and for cash.”
The requisition procedure was also prescribed. According to him, the political commissar, having come with a detachment to the village, gathered a meeting of the village poor and explained to them the essence of the decree on the organization of the poorest strata of the village.
He also had to explain the role of village kulaks in the Russian counter-revolution, after which he proposed that the poor elect “a Committee to collect grain from the kulaks and to manage the distribution of bread, agricultural implements and other essentials among the needy.”
The number of members of such a committee, the election procedure, rights and responsibilities were determined by special instructions. The committee ordered the population to surrender all existing firearms. “All machine guns and hand grenades are certainly being confiscated, since they are necessary for the army,” the document said.
Then the food agents began to take a census of everyone’s grain reserves, not excluding the poor. After calculating the surplus, part of it was transferred to the poor, who did not have a supply of grain until the new harvest. Moreover, it was not transferred immediately, but was issued monthly from the nearest dumping points and government warehouses.
“Anyone found in obvious opposition to the law on grain monopoly, selling bread to bag smugglers, or wasting grain reserves on moonshine is arrested and sent to the disposal of the provincial commission for combating counter-revolution,” the instructions demanded.
The detachment was allowed to leave the village only after all the surplus grain had been removed.
Source: rodina-history.ru
