The archival branch of Ukraine from 1917 to 1960 ...
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headed by Petro Kholodnyi ( 1876 – 1930 ) discussed the issue of the repatriation of the Ukrainian archival fonds with the Russian delegation at the peace talks in Brest-Litovsk during May-October 1918 . Ukraine demanded repatriation of archival documents belonging to the Ukrainian people which were kept in the Moscow Archives of the Ministry of Justice , the Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Internal Affairs , the Archives of the Holy Synod and the Senate , in Rumiantsev and Historical museums in Moscow , the Public Library , and the Library of the Academy of Science and so on . The activity of the Ukrainian archival mission in the negotiations with Russia was unsuccessful , but it was the first time when the world community paid attention to the problem of returning the national archival heritage to Ukraine which the Russian colonial authorities had been seizing and appropriating illegally since the sixteenth century 9 . Russia returned only a small amount of captured historical documentary heritage to Ukraine in the 1920s and from the 1930s the transfer of archival fonds from Ukraine to Russia reached such a large quantity that today millions of Ukrainian documents are still kept in the archives of Russia , and Ukraine has no hope of having them returned .
The next draft of the archival reform was submitted to the Government of the Directory by V . Modzalevskyi on January 11 , 1919 . In addition to the previously proposed measures , the new project also dealt with the preservation of landlord and private archives 10 .
On January 6 , 1919 , the Bolsheviks proclaimed the Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic in Kharkiv , and on January 29 , 1919 , they approved the Council of People ’ s Commissars . On February 3 , 1919 , the All-Ukrainian Committee for Ancient Monuments and Arts Protection ( VUKOPYS – in Russian , VUKOPMYS – in Ukrainian transliteration ) was created as a part of the People ’ s Commissariat on Education . The Archival and Library Section which operated under the VUKOPYS was founded on February 8 , 1919 . The famous historian-archivist , a Privatdozent from Kharkiv University Victor Barvinskyi ( 1885 – 1940 ), was the leader of this section untill April 1919 . After the Bolshevik government had moved from Kharkiv to Kyiv , the Archival section was headed by V . Modzalevskyi . On April 1 , 1919 , the Council of People ’ s Commissars vested the People ’ s Commissariat on Education with greater powers in the area of historical monuments and artworks . According to the Decree of the Council of People ’ s Commissars dated April 1 , 1919 , no agencies could destroy their records without the permission of the People ’ s Commissariat
9
С . І . Кот , О . О . Нестуля , Українські культурні цінності в Росії : перша спроба повернення , 1917 – 1918 , Київ 1996 , p . 1 – 300 .
10
TsDAVO of Ukraine , F . 3689 ‘ The Main Administration on Arts and National Culture of Ukrainian People ’ s Republic , 1918 – 1920 ’, Op . 1 , Spr . 17 , Ark . 2 – 3 .