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The system of interconnecting canals, rivers, and lakes that we passed through during this trip is very impressive. Much of it was constructed during Stalin's time with forced labor and large numbers of people were dispossessed of their property and homes in the process. Whole villages were inundated and enormous reservoirs were created. One tower that we passed was in reality the steeple of a cathedral in a town that had been flooded. Our ship passed directly over the town square.
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Following the 1917 Revolution, the Soviet Government continued the monarchy's use of corrective detention camps in it's penal system, but in the early period did not compel inmates to work. During the Stalin period, however, things changed. Between 1929 and 1953, thousands of forced labor camps were organized into hundreds of penal colonies. It is estimated that more than 18 million people passed through the Stalinist "Administration of Corrective Labor Camps and Colonies" (acronym "GULAG"). This was the period in which the Soviet government was engaged in a massive mobilization of all of it's resources to industrialize the country. Each prison camp was assigned specific economic tasks and prison discipline was harsh. During WWII large numbers of prisoners were conscripted into the army and the overall population of the Gulag declined, but following the war it rose again. Stalin died in 1953 and his successors declared an amnesty which freed large numbers of Gulag prisoners.
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