XIII Международная студенческая научная конференция Студенческий научный форум - 2021

Abstract: the life of a homeless child during the Civil War in children's institutions of the Vladimir gubernia on the basis of archival sources of the State Archive of the Vladimir region is analyzed in the article. The author studies the living conditions of inmates of orphanages, the degree of equipping children's institutions with food and household goods. The process of children’s upbringing which was carried out through the labor education and daily routine is considered.

Keywords: orphanage, homeless, reasons of homelessness, labor education, workshops, daily routines, living conditions.

Problems of young people, their health, education, socializing, life conditions have increased in modern Russia.

The concern of the Russian authorities is caused by the growing number of street children who, for various reasons, found themselves “on the street”. The activities of the state system regarding the prevention of homelessness among children and adolescents are ineffective.

The purpose of the article is to identify methods for re-educating children and to study the features of living conditions in orphanages during the Civil War in the Vladimir guberniya.

The historical, descriptive and comparative methods as well as the analysis were used in this work.

The main sources of this study were archival documents of the Department of Public Education of the Vladimir uyezd, stored in the State Archives of the Vladimir region.

The research topic can help in solving the growing problems of contemporary Russia – homelessness.

Homelessness is a negative phenomenon. It is not a product of modernity. Homelessness as a phenomenon also existed in pre-revolutionary Russia, but in the 1920s and 1930s assumed tangible dimensions. In 1921 the number of homeless children in Russia was about 4.5 million, and in 1922 – about 7 million [3].

The reasons of child homelessness in Russia during the Civil War include political and economic factors: World War I, February and October revolutions, intervention, the Civil War , the collapse of the economic system, etc.

All these reasons had a strong influence on the formation of the characteristics of homeless children. It is quite easy to distinguish a homeless child from a “home” one due to the psychophysical state of a child, which has been formed during his homeless life. These children have emotional excitability, which develops a habit of artificial excitations: alcohol, drugs, gambling and so on [11]. Numerous observations show that a homeless child is withdrawn and reserved [4, p. 234].

Homelessness in the early 1920s became a state and public problem. Various shelters, barracks and canteens were scattered throughout the country. Children of 8 – 14 years old constituted the main group of people there [11].

In orphanages the main point was the upbringing of children. Infants were sent to orphanages because of the loss of their parents, poor attitude of their parents or the inability of parents to feed and clothe their children, etc.

Upbringing in orphanages was directly connected with the introduction of children to work rather than with punishment.  For example, in Kadyevskom children’s home of the Vladimir uyezd children from May to October had been working in the garden or kitchen, carrying water, etc. [7, sh. 7, 8].

Besides, workshops were organized in children's homes, in which children could master the skills of any profession: carpentry, shoemaking, sewing and so on . In the report on the activities of the carpentry workshop at Bogolyubovo orphanage for the first half of March 1921, it is reported that the finishing of two tables and 20 stools had been completed [6, p. 38].

The main purposes of these workshops were to provide orphanages with household items because local government departments often could not provide children's institution with all the necessary goods.

Another method of re-education of adolescents was the daily routine which the pupils had to obey. The daily routine in the Golovinsky children's home was the following: at 8:30 a.m. a teacher wakes up children ; at 9 o'clock children drink tea; at 9:30 a.m. children go to school; at one o'clock in the afternoon children return from school and have lunch; from 2 to 4 p.m. they have a rest; from four o'clock children do their homework; at 6-7 p.m. - general walk, reading and conversations; at half past seven in the evening children have supper; until nine in the evening - they play, dance, sing; and at 9 p.m. children go to bed [9, sh. 23] .

In archival documents you can see different information about the daily routine in orphanages because there was no clear regulation of childcare facilities. Each orphanage had its own daily routine, convenient for a particular institution.

The daily routine has become one of the best methods for re-educating children. Boys became more disciplined, learned to manage their personal time.

The scheme of combating homelessness was simple: a child from the street - a children's reception center - an orphanage. But this order very soon led to overcrowding of orphanages, which the state was unable to maintain. It was decided to transfer the management of children's institutions to local authorities. However, the local budget was also not ready for such spending [10].

The State Archive of the Vladimir region  has information about the state of orphanages in the Vladimir uyezd in 1919. Special questionnaires were drawn up, which contained information about the property, additional buildings, the number of rooms, a hospital, etc. For example, the children's house “Arbuzovsky” at the Koloksha station of the Vorshinskaya volost had wooden buildings, the main building had seven rooms, which were illuminated by kerosene lamps. The orphanage did not have bathrooms, the toilets were cold, there were no sewers and garbage cesspools [2, sh. 18, 20]. 

The orphanage “Quarantine” in Vladimir on the Spasskaya Street had outbuildings (a barn, a cellar), garbage cesspools, a water supply system, two latrines, one bathroom and a laundry room. The orphanage building was made of wood and contained twelve rooms. The lighting was electric and the room itself was dry (“if it was heated”) [2, sh. 31].

It can be clearly seen, based on the questionnaires on the condition of houses, that urban orphanages, in contrast to rural ones, were better equipped and more prepared to accept children.

Inspectors came to orphanages to assess the living conditions of children in orphanages which often were not satisfied for children’s living.

In the children’s house “Quarantine” inspector conducted inspection of the rooms and it was found that the shelter toilets are in poor condition; the sewer pipes have deteriorated “as a result of which the sewage flows”; liquid from the second restroom seeps through the floor and protrudes on the ceiling of the lower room; the cesspool is full; the Russian stove is small and therefore it is cold in the room [1, sh. 53].

Overcrowding, poor condition of the building and premises, broken water pipes and canals, unheated premises are the conditions in which children had to live.

It should be noted that children's institutions during the years of the Civil War were actually self-sufficient. Food was mostly obtained from vegetable gardens, orchards and forests. The workshops made necessities: chairs, tables, etc. In addition, having received the fabric, they also sewed linen and clothes in the workshops. 

It goes without saying that financing of children's institutions should have been carried out by the state. The People's Commissars for Food and Health, with the participation of the Children's Commission developed standards. Then, the Children's Commission based on the data received, made applications for the provision of children's institutions. It should be noted that the workers, based on the real economic situation, deliberately underestimated the budget for the maintenance of children in state institutions. However, the main reason for the insufficient supply of childcare facilities was that the approved estimates existed only on paper.  The state did not have the opportunity to correct the situation with the provision of orphanages. One of the main reasons of poor equipment of children’s homes was orphanages heads’ negligent attitude towards their work [12, p. 22, 24].

Homelessness is a negative phenomenon that affects all aspects of social life.

State and public forces tried to conduct educational work with children. The main method of re-education of children was labor work and daily routine in children's institutions. However, poor living conditions, overcrowding of children’s houses negatively affected the upbringing of children. The plight of the orphanages meant that the responsibilities assigned to the orphanages could not be fully implemented.

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