Armenian victims of the Great Purge

The Statue of Stalin in Yerevan, removed in 1962 and replaced by Mother Armenia in 1967.

Armenian victims of the Great Purge included Armenian intellectuals, writers, artists, Bolshevik and later Soviet statesmen, military commanders, and religious figures. Orchestrated by Joseph Stalin, the Great Purge was a campaign of political repression and persecution in the Soviet Union against supposed "enemies of the people," including members of the Communist Party, the peasantry, writers and intellectuals, and other unaffiliated persons. The worst period, under NKVD head Nikolay Yezhov, was known as the Yezhovschina ('period of Yezhov'). In the years from 1936 to 1938, thousands of people suffered from Stalinist repressions in Soviet Armenia.

Background

The start of the Great Purge in Armenia is usually dated to 9 July 1936, with the assassination of Armenian First Secretary Aghasi Khanjian by Lavrentiy Beria in Tiflis (Tbilisi). The death was the result of a political struggle between Beria and Khanjian. At first, Beria framed Khanjian's death as "suicide," but soon condemned him for abetting "rabid nationalist elements among the Armenian intelligentsia." ^[1] After Khanjian's death, Beria promoted his loyalists in Armenia, Amatuni Amatuni as Armenian First Secretary and Khachik Mughdusi as chief of the Armenian NKVD. Under the command of Beria's allies, the campaign against "enemies" intensified. Many leading Armenian intellectuals were arrested, including Yeghishe Charents, Axel Bakunts, Vahram Alazan, Gurgen Mahari, Vahan Totovents, Nersik Stepanyan, and others. According to Amatuni in a June 1937 letter to Stalin, 1,365 people were arrested in the ten months after the death of Khanjian, among them 900 "Dashnak-Trotskiites." ^[2] The Armenian leadership of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) also suffered in the repressions. Under Azerbaijani First Secretary Mir Jafar Baghirov, several NKAO leaders were arrested, including local party chairman Suren Badamyan. ^[3]

The death of Sahak Ter-Gabrielyan in August 1937 was a turning point in the repressions in Armenia. While being interrogated by Mughdusi's men, Ter-Gabrielyan "either jumped or was pushed from the third-floor window" of the NKVD building in Yerevan. ^[4] Stalin was angered that Mughdusi and Amatuni neglected to inform him about the incident. In response, in September 1937, he sent Georgy Malenkov, Mikhail Litvin, and later Anastas Mikoyan to oversee a purge of the Communist Party of Armenia. ^[5] During the trip, Mikoyan tried, but failed, to save one individual (Danush Shahverdyan) from the repressions. ^[6] More than a thousand people were arrested and seven of nine members of the Armenian Politburo were sacked from office. ^[7] The trip resulted in the appointment of a new Armenian Party leadership, headed by Grigory Arutinov, who was approved by Beria. ^[8]

The Armenian Apostolic Church was not spared from the repressions. Soviet attacks against the Church under Stalin were known since 1929, but momentarily eased to improve the Soviet Union's relations with the Armenian diaspora. In 1932, Khoren I became Catholicos of All Armenians and assumed the leadership of the church. However, in the late 1930s, the Armenian NKVD, led by Mughdusi and his successor, Viktor Khvorostyan, renewed the attacks against the Church. ^[9] These attacks culminated in the 1938 murder of Khoren and the closing of the Catholicate of Etchmiadzin, an act for which Beria is usually held responsible. ^[10] However, the Church survived and was later revived when Stalin eased restrictions on religion at the end of World War II. ^[9] In addition to the repression of the Church, thousands of Armenians were forcibly exiled to the Altai Krai in 1949. ^{[11] [12]} Many were repatriated Armenians who arrived from the Armenian diaspora. ^[13]

After Stalin's death, Anastas Mikoyan called for the rehabilitation of Charents in a speech in Yerevan on 11 March 1954, beginning de-Stalinization and the Thaw in Armenia. ^[14]

List

Below is the incomplete list of Great Purge victims from the Armenian SSR, or victims of Stalinism of ethnic Armenian origin.

Death date	Name	Photo	Occupation	Rehabilitation
9 July 1936 [1]	Aghasi Khanjian		First Secretary of the Communist Party of Armenia, 1930-1936	17 January 1956 [15]
25 August 1936 [16]	Vagarshak Ter-Vaganyan		Bolshevik revolutionary	13 June 1988 [17]
8 July 1937 [1]	Axel Bakunts		Writer	2 March 1955 [18]
8 July 1937 [1]	Nersik Stepanyan		Soviet economist, statesman	9 June 1956 [15]
21 August 1937 [4]	Sahak Ter-Gabrielyan		Bolshevik revolutionary	26 April 1956 [15]
1937 [19]	Sarkis Kasyan		Bolshevik revolutionary
20 September 1937 [20]	Lev Karakhan		Bolshevik revolutionary
22 November 1937 [21]	Movses Silikyan		Military commander in the Russian and Armenian armies
27 November 1937 [22]	Yeghishe Charents		Poet, "the main Armenian poet of the 20th century" [23]	11 March 1954 (exonerated) [14] 25 May 1955 (rehabilitated) [24]
27 November 1937 [25]	Ruben Rubenov		Politician, First Secretary of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, 1933	17 November 1954 [25]
4 December 1937 [26]	Sargis Lukashin		Politician, the Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of Armenia, 1922-1925	29 February 1956 [26]
10 December 1937 [27]	Christophor Araratov		Military commander in the Russian and Armenian armies
11 December 1937 [28]	Hayk Bzhishkyan		Bolshevik revolutionary, military commander	January 1956 [28]
19 March 1938 [29]	Ashkharbek Kalantar		Archaeologist
6 April 1938 [30] [31]	Khoren I		Head of the Armenian Apostolic Church
21 April 1938 [32]	Suren Shadunts		Politician, First Secretary of the Communist Party of Tajikistan, 1934-1937
18 July 1938 [33] [34]	Vahan Totovents		Writer	29 January 1955 [18]
1 August 1938 [35]	Alexander Bekzadyan		Soviet politician	11 February 1956 [35]
1938 [36]	Hovhannes Katchaznouni		Former Dashnak politician, Prime Minister of Armenia, 1918-1919
26 February 1939 [37]	Levon Mirzoyan		Politician, First Secretary of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, 1926-29; First Secretary of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan, 1937-38
24 October 1941 [6]	Daniel "Danush" Shahverdyan		Soviet statesman	25 September 1954 [38]
1943 [39]	Zabel Yesayan		Novelist

References

1. Shakarian 2025, p. 14.
2. Shakarian 2025, p. 15.
3. Shakarian 2025, pp. 165–166.
4. Shakarian 2025, p. 16.
5. Shakarian 2025, pp. 16–17, 23.
6. Shakarian 2025, pp. 27–28.
7. Tucker 1992, pp. 488–489.
8. Shakarian 2025, pp. 29–30.
9. Matossian 1962, pp. 150, 194.
10. Hayrapetyan 2018, p. 145.
11. Shakarian 2025, p. 43.
12. Polian 2004, p. 333.
13. Laycock 2016, p. 132.
14. Shakarian 2025, pp. 34–35.
15. Shakarian 2025, p. 55.
16. "Советские правители Армении". Noev Kovcheg (in Russian). February 2009. Archived from the original on 13 March 2019. Retrieved 14 September 2013.
17. "Chronicle of Ter-Vaganian's Life". Vagarshak Arutiunovich Ter-Vaganian. 30 March 2006. Retrieved 1 May 2025.
18. Shakarian 2025, p. 64.
19. Adalian 2010, p. 376.
20. Rogovin 2009, p. 112.
21. Sahakyan 2012, pp. 63–74.
22. Shakarian 2025, p. 39.
23. Coene 2010, p. 204.
24. Shakarian 2025, p. 59.
25. Artizov et al. 2000, pp. 181–182.
26. Harutyunyan, Avag Aramaisovich (29 March 2023). "Лукашин Сергей Лукьянович". Большая российская энциклопедия (in Russian). Retrieved 29 July 2025.
27. "Отечество и честь Христофора Араратова". Novoye Vremya (in Russian). 14 January 2012. Archived from the original on 18 November 2015. Retrieved 25 September 2013.
28. "Списки жертв" (in Russian). Memorial. 13 December 2016. Retrieved 18 November 2017.
29. Ter Minassian 2007, p. 44.
30. Payaslian 2007, p. 179.
31. Hewsen 2001, p. 259.
32. "Шадунц Сурен Константинович" (in Russian). Sakharov Center. Retrieved 25 September 2013.
33. "Vahan Totovents". writers.am. Archived from the original on 29 March 2019. Retrieved 21 September 2013.
34. "1938 թ. այս օրը վախճանվեց հայ արձակագիր, դրամատուրգ և բանաստեղծ Վահան Թոթովենցը". 1in.am (in Armenian). 18 July 2012. Archived from the original on 27 September 2013. Retrieved 21 September 2013.
35. "Бекзадян Александр Артемьевич". Открытый список (in Russian). Memorial. Retrieved 29 July 2025.
36. Walker 1990, p. 424.
37. "Мирзоян Левон Исаевич" (in Russian). Sakharov Center. Retrieved 25 September 2013.
38. Shakarian 2025, p. 54.
39. Ruth Bedevian. "Zabel Yessayan Biography". Armenianhouse. Retrieved 10 October 2011.

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