Lazar Iosifovich Kogan (russian: Ла́зарь Ио́сифович Ко́ган) (November 7, 1889 – March 3, 1939) was a

Soviet secret police The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

(

Cheka The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission ( rus, Всероссийская чрезвычайная комиссия, r=Vserossiyskaya chrezvychaynaya komissiya, p=fsʲɪrɐˈsʲijskəjə tɕrʲɪzvɨˈtɕæjnəjə kɐˈmʲisʲɪjə), abbreviated ...

OGPU The Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU; russian: Объединённое государственное политическое управление) was the intelligence and state security service and secret police of the Soviet Union f ...

NKVD The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (russian: Наро́дный комиссариа́т вну́тренних дел, Naródnyy komissariát vnútrennikh del, ), abbreviated NKVD ( ), was the interior ministry of the Soviet Union. ...

) high-ranking functionary, chief of the

Gulag The Gulag, an acronym for , , "chief administration of the camps". The original name given to the system of camps controlled by the GPU was the Main Administration of Corrective Labor Camps (, )., name=, group= was the government agency in ...

(1930–1932) and deputy chief of the Gulag (1932–1936).

Biography

Born in Elovka,

Krasnoyarsk Krai Krasnoyarsk Krai ( rus, Красноя́рский край, r=Krasnoyarskiy kray, p=krəsnɐˈjarskʲɪj ˈkraj) is a federal subject of Russia (a krai), with its administrative center in the city of Krasnoyarsk, the third-largest city in Siber ...

, in the

Yeniseysk Governorate Yeniseysk Governorate (russian: Енисе́йская губе́рния) was a governorate ('' guberniya'') of the Russian Empire and later of the Russian Republic, Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic in 1822-1925. General info ...

of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

, he was the son of a wealthy

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

merchant. His father was a fur trader. An active participant in the revolutionary movement, at first an

anarcho-communist Anarcho-communism, also known as anarchist communism, (or, colloquially, ''ancom'' or ''ancomm'') is a political philosophy and anarchist school of thought that advocates communism. It calls for the abolition of private property but retains resp ...

. In 1908, a

Kiev Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...

military district court sentenced him to death for participating in looting with a gun in his hand. This punishment was then converted into a life sentence. Kogan joined the Russian Communist Party (b) in 1918. His major positions include chief of the

GULAG The Gulag, an acronym for , , "chief administration of the camps". The original name given to the system of camps controlled by the GPU was the Main Administration of Corrective Labor Camps (, )., name=, group= was the government agency in ...

(1930–1932), deputy chief of the GULAG (1932–1936), deputy

Narkom A People's Commissariat (russian: народный комиссариат; Narkomat) was a structure in the Soviet state (in the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, in other union and autonomous republics, in the Soviet Union) from 1917– ...

of Forest Industry (1936–1937). Until August 1936, Kogan was the head of the construction of the Belomorsk Baltic Canal. Measuring and connecting the

Baltic Sea The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden and the North and Central European Plain. The sea stretches from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from ...

with the

White Sea The White Sea (russian: Белое море, ''Béloye móre''; Karelian and fi, Vienanmeri, lit. Dvina Sea; yrk, Сэрако ямʼ, ''Serako yam'') is a southern inlet of the Barents Sea located on the northwest coast of Russia. It is su ...

, the canal was built in 20 months by 170,000 Gulag prisoners. Kogan was a member of the

Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union The All-Union Central Executive Committee (russian: Всесоюзный Центральный исполнительный комитет, Vsesoyuznyy Tsentral'nyy ispolnitel'nyy komitet) was the most authoritative governing body of the USSR d ...

from 1935 to 1937. He is mentioned from this period by

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn. (11 December 1918 – 3 August 2008) was a Russian novelist. One of the most famous Soviet dissidents, Solzhenitsyn was an outspoken critic of communism and helped to raise global awareness of political repress ...

The Gulag Archipelago ''The Gulag Archipelago: An Experiment in Literary Investigation'' (russian: Архипелаг ГУЛАГ, ''Arkhipelag GULAG'') is a three-volume non-fiction text written between 1958 and 1968 by Russian writer and Soviet dissident Aleksandr So ...

: "It is time to put six names on the slopes of this channel – the main helpers of

Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secretar ...

and Yagoda, the main supervisors of Belomor canal, six mercenary killers, after each of them thirty thousand deaths victims: Firin –

Berman Berman is a surname that may be derived from the German and Yiddish phrase ( ‘ bear-man’)https://dbs.anumuseum.org.il/skn/en/c6/e250048/Family_Name/BERMAN or from the Dutch , meaning the same. Notable people with the surname include: * Abba ...

–

Frenkel Frenkel is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Aaron G. Frenkel (born 1957), Israeli entrepreneur and philanthropist * Alexander Frenkel (born 1985), German boxer of Ukrainian origin * (1895–1984), Polish painter * Daan Frenk ...

– Kogan – Rappoport – Zhuk". Kogan was arrested on 31 January 1938. While imprisoned, he wrote several repentance letters to

Nikolay Yezhov Nikolai Ivanovich Yezhov ( rus, Никола́й Ива́нович Ежо́в, p=nʲɪkɐˈɫaj ɪˈvanəvʲɪt͡ɕ (j)ɪˈʐof; 1 May 1895 – 4 February 1940) was a Soviet secret police official under Joseph Stalin who was head of the N ...

, then to

Lavrentiy Beria Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria (; rus, Лавре́нтий Па́влович Бе́рия, Lavréntiy Pávlovich Bériya, p=ˈbʲerʲiə; ka, ლავრენტი ბერია, tr, ; – 23 December 1953) was a Georgian Bolshevik ...

. He was nonetheless sentenced to death and shot on 3 March 1939 at the NKVD's

Kommunarka shooting ground The Kommunarka firing range (russian: Расстрельный полигон «Коммунарка»), former dacha of secret police chief Genrikh Yagoda, was used as a burial ground from 1937 to 1941. Executions may have been carried out th ...

. He was rehabilitated in 1956."Коган Лазарь Иосифович"
at hrono.ru, citing book: В. Абрамов. "Евреи в КГБ. Палачи и жертвы." М., Яуза - Эксмо, 2005

Awards

Order of Lenin The Order of Lenin (russian: Орден Ленина, Orden Lenina, ), named after the leader of the Russian October Revolution, was established by the Central Executive Committee on April 6, 1930. The order was the highest civilian decoration b ...

(1933) *

Order of the Red Banner The Order of the Red Banner (russian: Орден Красного Знамени, Orden Krasnogo Znameni) was the first Soviet military decoration. The Order was established on 16 September 1918, during the Russian Civil War by decree of th ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kogan, Lazar Iosifovich 1889 births 1939 deaths People from Yeniseysk Governorate Russian Jews Bolsheviks Jewish socialists Jewish Soviet politicians NKVD officers Gulag governors Recipients of the Order of Lenin Recipients of the Order of the Red Banner Great Purge perpetrators Great Purge victims from Russia Jews executed by the Soviet Union People executed for treason against the Soviet Union Deaths by firearm in Russia Soviet rehabilitations