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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Which of the following terms was used to describe prisoners just arriving to exile?

2. Who were Zeks?

3. For how long did Stalin use officially capital punishment as a way to "clean out" his overcrowded prisons?

4. Which of the following medical conditions did Lenin suffer from in 1922?

5. In what year was capital punishment abolished in the courts?

Short Essay Questions

1. What was Vlasov put on trial for in the last of Russia's open trials?

2. How did prisoners figure out where they were being relocated, particularly when being sent into exile?

3. What surprises in the camps did prisoners remember that shocked their systems upon arrival?

4. Who was Palchinsky?

5. What was the All-Russian Central Executive Committee?

6. What happened in the trial of Shakhty?

7. What would prisoners drink while being transported?

8. Which prisons in the Gulag network does Solzhenitsyn remember living in as a prisoner?

9. What changed about capital punishment after the revolt of 1952 in the Gulag prisons?

10. What did prisoners eat when they were being transported from one prison to another?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

When the war broke out in the Soviet Union in 1941, many things about camp life in Gulag were changed. First, explain why it took so long for WWII to reach Russia. Next, explain how the onset of war fighting altered the conditions for prisoners within the camp. Why were more prisoners dying during wartime than any other time in Gulag history?

Essay Topic 2

During their interrogation periods, many prisoners were tortured by the guards. First, list at least five ways that prisoners were tortured, and what information guards hoped to elicit from these methods. Then, explain how torture led to false imprisonments and wrongful sentencing.

Essay Topic 3

The years 1937-1938 were considered the "Great Terror" years in Russia. Describe how life changed for the prisoners in the work camps during this era. Explain how Stalin used these two years to promote his own political agenda. What effect did this time have on Stalin's popularity within Russia?

(see the answer keys)

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