The "Torgsin"
One Soviet institution peculiar to the 1930s was the Torgsin network of hard currency stores that were active from 1931 to 1936. Established by decree of the Council of People's Commissars chair Vyacheslav Molotov, the name is an acronym of the Russian phrase "torgovlia s inostrantsami" ("trade with foreigners").
As the name implies, the Torgsins were initially intended to be exclusively for selling goods to foreigners, such as foreign delegations, tourists, sailors, and western engineers brought in during Stalin's First Five-year Plan.
But starting in January 1932, policies was modified so that Torgsin stores could receive payment in gold, hard currency, and jewelry from Soviet citizens. In exchange, they provided scarce and critically needed goods, including flour and other foodstuffs. They often did so at inflated prices and/or at disadvantageous exchange rates compared to the world market. The goal was to extract any valuables that the population may have still had despite prior expropriations, and to encourage the remittance of hard currency by families or friends living abroad.
A first-hand account of the role that the Torgsin played during the Holodomor can be seen in two letters in the Oleksii Balabas papers at the UHEC archives. In 1933, Balabas was living as a refugee in Prague. He was a descendant of Ukrainians who had migrated to the Kuban region of the northern Caucasus in the late 18th century, and was expelled from there by Russian ultra-nationalists in 1919. In the 1930s he reestablished contact with his sister who was living in Krasnodar.
In one letter, she describes in a chillingly matter-of-fact way the difficulties of obtaining food even in the city, of how she wishes that their mother had died earlier so that she wouldn't have to live through the current conditions, and about the Torgsin. She asks Oleksii to send Czechoslovak money so that she can buy food, and mentions in passing that Liza (apparently her and Oleksii's sister) had a gold tooth removed so that she could use it as "currency" in the Torgsin.
"And now, Alyosha, I’m writing to you if you can send us [Czech] money. There's this store here where they have everything short of bird’s milk. It's called the Torgsin. But they only sell things for gold and foreign money. There is corn meal for [the equivalent of] 2 rubles 60 kopeks in your money, but in the bazaar it's 250 [rubles]. You can’t buy wheat flour anywhere."
"Many survive only [on food] from the Torgsin... Liza had a [gold] tooth pulled out and took it [to buy] flour, but we don't have anything [that we can sell]."
Her brother obliged. On June 21 he remitted 94 Czech korunas payable to the Torgsin through the "Czech-Russian Association in Prague for Mutual Credit, Purchase, and Sale" on Vodičkova street, the receipt for which is in the Balabas papers at the UHEC Archives.
It's hard to say how much this would be in today's money. In 1933, 94 korunas could have purchased about 4.5 grams of gold, which in spring 2023 would have been worth approximately US$280. But it's not clear if this is the appropriate calculation.
On July 31, his sister wrote again. She reported that she and her family were overjoyed by the receipt of the money, and that she was able to by 20 kilograms (!) of flour at the Torgsin.
"Alyoshenka! Dear one! We finally received the money you sent. I received it on July 29, 1933, and that very day I got 20 kilograms of flour (not white, of course)."
"Oh dear Alyoshenka, Zhenya, and little Lilia! You can’t imagine how much joy there was in the whole house. Zhenya hit the roof when he saw varennyky on the table. We cooked varennyky with cherries that same day."
"It’s been exactly two years since we’ve seen anything made of dough."
