Vorkutlag

Perimeter fence and watchtower, Vorkuta Gulag

The Vorkuta Gulag was a Soviet era prison camp located in Vorkuta, in the Komi Republic region of Russia, located 1,200 miles from Moscow and 100 miles above the Arctic Circle. There were approximately 132 sub-camps in the Vorkuta Gulag system during the height of its use in the Soviet prison system. The camp was used to hold German P.O.W.s captured on the Eastern Front in World War II as well as Soviet citizens and those from Soviet occupied countries deemed to be dissidents and enemies of the state during the Soviet era.

Although the camp was closed in 1962 there are still large numbers of Soviet citizens who were former prisoners still living in Vorkuta, originally due to their former status as enemies of the state, then as a result of their poor financial situation. Memorial, a Russian human rights organization that focuses on recording and publicising the human rights violations of the Soviet Union's totalitarian era,estimates that of the 40,000 people collecting state pensions in the Vorkuta area 32,000 are trapped former gulag inmates, or their descendants.

In the Vorkuta uprising July of 1953 inmates at Vorkuta who were forced to work in the region's coal mines went on strike. The mostly passive strike which lasted approximately two weeks was put down on August 1, when camp chief Derevyanko ordered troops to fire at the strikers resulting in the deaths of at least 53 workers, although estimates vary.

American Prisoners

File:Homer Harold Cox Vorkuta Gulag.jpg

Prison mugshot of Homer H. Cox, kidnapped American servicemember held at Vorkuta Gulag (1949)

There were American servicemembers from various eras who were illegally detained in the Soviet gulag system including Vorkuta. Some fell into the hands of the Soviets during the end of World War II and during the Korean War, others were kidnapped from the streets of East Berlin during the Cold War.

Homer Harold Cox, was an American Military Policeman assigned to the 759th Military Police Service Battalion in West Berlin. On September 6th, 1949 he was drugged and arrested while off duty, in the Soviet Sector of East Berlin. He was imprisoned at various Soviet prison camps including Vorkuta Mine No. Four and Vorkuta Mine No. Seven.

On December 29th, 1953, he was returned to U.S. custody in Berlin along with fellow prisoner U. S. Merchant Marine Leland Towers. Cox would die of pneumonia less than a year later on September 27th, 1954 in Lawton, Oklahoma.

Two other illegally detained Americans were Private William Marchuk, of Norristown, Pennsylvania, kidnapped in East Berlin in 1949 and John H. Noble, 31, of Detroit, Michigan who was arrested by the Red Army in Dresden, Germany in 1945. Many Americans were never repatriated.

Notable inmates

Anton Kaindl: commandant, Sachsenhausen concentration camp (1942-1945), died at Vorkuta, 1948. Alex Mason from the American Operation 40 (A CIA Assassination Program, was held there after shooting a double for Cuban President, Fidel Castro. He escaped in 1953, leaving his friend Victor Reznov behind.

In popular culture

• In the 2010 video game Call of Duty: Black Ops, the player, an American named Alex Mason, is imprisoned at Vorkuta and partakes in a prisoner uprising. This was likely an allusion to the real-life uprising that took place in 1953.