The Situation of the Roma Deported to Transnistria (based on the materials of holtsky and ochakivo counties).

Abstract

The study is devoted to the situation of Roma in the Goltsky and Ochakovsky districts of the Transnistrian governorate in 1942-1944. It was established that these districts were the places of the greatest concentration of deported Roma from Romania, Bessarabia and Bukovina. The features of the system of organization of labor of the deported Roma by the Romanian occupiers in the << labor camps >> of these counties are highlighted. The authors also descibe the everyday life, the main sources of food for the Roma, strategies of survival in the conditions of the occupation policy. Also the researchers estimate the probable number of Roma in these counties for the period of the end of the Romanian occupation. The research methodology is based on the principles of historicism, objectivity, consistency, and comprehensiveness. Problem-chronological, historical-genetic, structural-functional, statistical scientific methods were applied. It was established that one of the key directions of the Romanian occupation policy towards the Roma was the regulation of the regime of stay and work of deported Roma in Transnistria, regulated by order No. 3149 of the civil governor G. Aleksianu of December 18, 1942. It was concluded that in the Goltsky and Ochakovsky districts the local authorities did not adhere to the established labor regime, which led to mass unemployment of Roma in these counties. As a result, theft of other people's property and escape to Romania became the main survival strategy for the Roma. To prevent these phenomena, a "labor camp for Roma" was established in the city of Golta, whose prisoners worked as forced labor for the Romanian occupation administration, as well as for the Romanian and German armies. It is noted that the massive spread of infectious diseases and low indicators of nutritional norms of the population in the counties led to the death of a large number of Roma. The probable number of Roma in the Goltsky and Ochakovsky districts at the end of the Romanian occupation amounted to about five thousand people. It was proved that the conditions of stay and the working regime of the deported Roma in the territory of these counties did not give them any hope of survival.