Grigory Davidovich Ziskin was born in Moscow in 1935. His father, David Ziskin, was arrested on September 3, 1937, accused of having ties with the fascists in Harbin, and executed in Butovo. His mother, Ida Ziskina, was arrested a month after her husband and sent to labor camps. Their son Grigory saw his mother again only 16 years later when she returned from Kolyma.
Ada Milikovskaya, a talented pianist, was born in 1908 in Harbin and studied in the United States. In Moscow, she met Leonid Varpakhovsky, a student of Vsevolod Meyerhold. In 1938, Ada was arrested, accused of espionage for Japan, and executed in Butovo. That same year, her brother, Solomon Milikovsky, was also executed.
David Ziskin and Ada Milikovskaya never knew each other, but their fates became intertwined in a shared tragedy. Among the 20,000 people executed at the Butovo Shooting Range, their names are only a small part of the horrific list of victims of repression. Ida Ziskina never learned the burial site of her husband, just as Leonid Varpakhovsky never knew where his wife had perished. Their lives crossed on Kolyma, and in 1949, their daughter, Anna Varpakhovskaya, was born.
We continue working on the series «GULAG. Witnesses,» striving to preserve the memory of the victims of repression.
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