Nationalities in 1926 and 1937
Nationalities of the Union and Autonomous Republics of the USSR, according to the Censuses of 1926 and 1937. August 26, 1939
This statistical comparison of the 1926 and 1937 censuses spotlighted a politically explosive question in the late Stalin era: who lived in the Soviet Union, and in what numbers. By setting nationalities side by side across the two counts, it registered real demographic change while hinting at the violence behind it, from collectivization and famine to deportations, border policing, and the tightening of official categories. It also helps explain why the 1937 census became “lost”: its findings clashed with triumphalist claims and were quickly suppressed.
Original Source: Perepis' 1939 goda: Dokumental'nye istochniki Tsentral'nogo gosudarstvennogo arkhiva narodnogo khoziaistva (TSGANKh) SSSR (Materialy k serii "Narody Sovetskogo Soiuza"). Moscow: Institut etnologii i etnicheskoi antropologii AN SSS, 1990), pp. 966-968.
Top Secret
To the Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars Comrade Viacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov:
The Central Administration of Economic Statistics of USSR Gosplan reports information on the national composition of the USSR by nationality, according to the censuses of 1926 and 1937.
In 1937 the ten most numerous nationalities in each republic, krai, and oblast were listed separately, and the other nationalities within each were included in the category "other nationalities."
Thus the all-Union summary data from 1937 about the numerical size of some nationalities are not complete, for they do not include data from those oblasts where the given nationality was not among the ten most numerous.
Head of the Central Administration of Economic Statistics under the USSR Gosplan (I. Sautin)
Completely Secret Nationalities of the Union and Autonomous Republics of the USSR, According to the Censuses of 1926 and 1937
| Nationality | 1926 | 1937 |
|---|---|---|
| Russian | 77,791,124 | 93,933,065 |
| Ukrainian | 31,194,976 | 26,421,212 |
| Belorussian | 4,738,923 | 4,874,061 |
| Kazakh | 3,968,289 | 2,862,458 |
| Uzbek | 3,955,938 | 4,550,532 |
| Tatar | 3,029,995 | 3,793,413 |
| Jew | 2,672,499 | 2,715,106 |
| Georgian | 1,821,184 | 2,097,069 |
| Azerbaijani | 1,706,605 | 2,134,648 |
| Armenian | 1,568,197 | 1,968,721 |
| Mordovian | 1,340,415 | 1,248,867 |
| German | 1,238,549 | 1,151,601 |
| Chuvash | 1,117,419 | 1,167,817 |
| Tadzhik | 978,680 | 1,137,995 |
| Turkmen | 763,940 | 747,723 |
| Kirghiz | 762,736 | 846,503 |
| Bashkir | 713,693 | 757,935 |
| Peoples of Daghestan | 660,459 | 770,624 |
| Udmurt | 504,187 | 568,268 |
| Mari | 428,192 | 401,092 |
| Chechen-Ingush | 392,619 | 436,076 |
| Komi | 375,871 | 384,508 |
| Moldavian | 278,905 | 223,848 |
| Ossetian | 272,272 | 319,350 |
| Karelian | 248,120 | 233,006 |
| Yakut | 241,365 | 239,307 |
| Buriat-Mongol | 238,060 | 218,597 |
| Karakalpak | 146,317 | 179,292 |
| Kabardin | 139,925 | 150,690 |
| Kalmyk | 129,321 | 127,423 |
| Cherkess | 65,270 | 78,733 |
| Abkhaz | 56,957 | 55,561 |
| Oirot | 45,925 | 46,508 |
| Khakass | 45,608 | 48,334 |
| Other Nationalities … | 3,406,080 | 5,149,537 |
| Total | 147,037,915 | 162,039,470 |
(Signature illegible August 26, 1939.)
Source: Journal of Soviet Nationalities (Durham, N.C.: The Center, 1990-), Vol. I (Winter 1990-1991), p. 4.