Revealing the Horror of 'Cannibal Island', Where Prisoners Are Forced to Eat Each Other
- There is a remote piece of land in the middle of a Siberian river called Nazino Island.
Far from civilization, this place is currently deserted.
Example of an internal passport of the USSR. (Our Passport/X)
But this island has a dark past.
Formerly known as 'Cannibal Island'. In May 1933, more than 6,000 Soviet prisoners were sent to the island to establish settlements as part of Joseph Stalin's gulag network.
Because the island was overcrowded – it was less than two miles long and about 2,000 feet wide – and without shelter, food, or equipment, the prisoners were forced to resort to extreme and violent measures to survive.
Within three days, many began to turn to cannibalism. Disease and starvation aside, only 2,000 prisoners remained alive when the Soviet closed the island in July.
Although reports of what happened on Nazino Island were initially hidden from the public, the horrors that occurred there eventually came to light.
Sending Soviet Prisoners to Nazino Island The story of how Nazino Island came to be known as Cannibal Island starts with Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.
After he took power following the death of Vladimir Lenin, Stalin expanded the network of Soviet gulags, forced labor camps to which his government could send anyone deemed “undesirable.”
These camps served a dual purpose. Not only did they remove “undesirables” from Soviet society, but in theory, they could also create self-sustaining communities in remote corners of the Soviet Union.
Reporting from allthatsinteresting, Nazino Island is a remote area chosen for settlement. The only problem is finding people to fill them.
The people sent to Nazino Island were a mix of criminals, the unemployed, and innocent civilians arrested for not having the necessary documents, such as domestic passports.
“I didn't do anything,” one prisoner told Radio Free Europe. “I was a student in Moscow. On weekends, I go to visit my aunt who lives in Moscow. I reached his apartment and knocked on the door, but before he opened the door, they immediately arrested me. I was arrested because I didn't have my passport with me.”
In May 1933, the first ship containing Soviet prisoners arrived at Nazino Island.
Although about two dozen people died during the journey, about 3,000 survived. They were dumped on the island's beaches with no food, no equipment, and no shelter to sleep. Even so, the boats kept coming. And the island's population soon swelled to more than 6,000. Huddled together, the prisoners immediately take extreme measures to survive. How Nazino Island Became a Cannibal Island
It didn't take long for despair to flare up among the prisoners on Nazino Island. They have nothing to eat. Atlas Obscura reported that, without shelter, nearly 300 people did not survive that first frigid night.
And the flour given to the prisoners by the Soviet guards only made matters worse.
The prisoners had no ovens or equipment so some mixed it with dirty river water and died of dysentery. Others ate it raw – and died of suffocation from the powder.
“Every fourth or fifth day, a certain amount of rye flour was brought to the island and distributed to the settlers, several hundred grams each,” wrote Soviet official Vasily Velichko in a report on conditions on Nazino Island that was kept secret until 1994.
After getting the rations, the men ran to the water and mixed it with flour in their hats and ate it.
Many people just eat the flour as it is, and because it is in powder form, many suffocate from inhaling it.
Within days, the prisoners began to turn to cannibalism.
“I only ate hearts and livers,” one surviving prisoner told Soviet officials. “It's very simple. Just like shashlik… I choose the ones that are not quite alive, but not quite dead. It was clear that they were going to leave – in a day or two, they would give up. So it's easier for them that way.”
However, others were less sympathetic to the victims.
Radio Free Europe reported that female prisoners were tied to trees and had their breasts, calves and other body parts cut off.
“They did that to me on Death Island,” one woman, who managed to survive after her fellow prisoners cut off her calf, told nearby villagers afterwards.
Another story describes how a different woman, who was the lover of a camp guard named Kostia, was gruesomely murdered and eaten by prisoners on Cannibal Island.
“The people grabbed the girl, tied her to a poplar tree, cut off her breasts, her muscles, everything they could eat, everything, everything,” recalled one witness according to the History Collection. “They are hungry… they have to eat. When Kostia returned, he was still alive. He tried to save him, but he lost too much blood.” Many tried to escape from Cannibal Island.
But only a few succeed in achieving it. If their crude raft does not sink into the river soon, they will be shot by the guards who hunt them for sport.
And even if they make it to the other shore, they will have to survive the harsh Siberian wilderness alone.
Of the more than 6,000 people sent to Nazino Island, only about 2,000 were still alive when the island was evacuated in July.
That month, the victims were sent to another forced labor camp.
But only a handful of them are in working condition, and almost all of them have physical and psychological injuries. The Bloody Legacy of Cannibal Island
Every June, a ceremony is held on the island and in a nearby town to commemorate the victims who died on Cannibal Island. (NKVD Investigation Prison Memorial Museum)
After Cannibal Island was evacuated and closed, Soviet official Vasily Velichko interviewed dozens of people and sent his report to his superiors.
“People started dying,” Velichko's report read in part. “They were burned to death while sleeping near the fire. They died of exhaustion and cold.” Radio Free Europe reported that Velichko's report caused great concern among Moscow officials, who then investigated the shocking allegations and found that most of them were true.
Some of the Nazino Island camp guards were briefly imprisoned, but the truth about the island was hidden from the public for decades. Even Velichko remained silent about it. The horrors that occurred on Cannibal Island were finally revealed in 1994.
Today, a group of local residents travel to the island to lay flowers at the base of the wooden cross every year. They hope to honor the memory of those who violently lost their lives on the island in 1933. Nearly a hundred years after the first “settler” boats arrived, Nazino Island looks like a deserted place. Apart from the wooden cross, there are no signs of the horrors that occurred on its shores.