Medical and social aspects of the social care system for orphans before and after 1917 (based on materials of the Tambov Governorate)
Authors: Shikunova Inna A. , Chubarov Aleksei I. , Shcherbinin Pavel P. 
Published: July 2020

We examine the various health, epidemiological, and everyday life realities of the life of children’s social institutions pupils, in particular orphans in imperial Russia and in the first decade of Soviet power. Consideration of these aspects of childhood history in the context of morbidity and mortality in the children’s cohort was carried out on the materials of the Tambov Governorate, which made it possible to clarify and reveal little-known facts and manifestations of social policy and the protection of the health of children and adolescents at the governorate and county levels. A comparison of regional data and the capital’s recommendations on combating child morbidity and mortality showed that the central authorities were completely disconnected from the understanding of the processes and realities of the life of the provincial society, as well as neglect of the needs of children’s institutions outside the capital. This phenomenon was not exceptional, but reflected typical trends of contradictions in the socio-economic and health status of the center and regions. A study of childhood morbidity and mortality in the pre-revolutionary period of Russian history made it possible to confirm the hypothesis that the fate and life of foundling children was the most tragic and traumatic. The mortality rate of such “trouble children”, which reached up to 90 %, began to decline only after the transition of children’s shelters to the control and financing of local governments – county administrations. But the most effective and useful was the transfer of foundling children for upbringing to peasant families. This patriarchal tradition of children’s charity, supported by a little financial support from the counties, helped save and socialize most of the unhappy and ill foundlings who became members of the family of their adoptive parents and received food, shelter and living prospects and professional skills. Appeal to the initial period of everyday life and socialization of children and adolescents in orphanages in the Tambov Governorate through reconstruction and analysis of living conditions, nutrition, morbidity and mortality revealed catastrophic problems of these “flowers of life” of Soviet Russia. The shortage of medical personnel, the almost complete lack of drugs and sanitary facilities, the difficult epidemiological situation, hunger and cold caused a widespread morbidity and mortality rate among male and female pupils of children’s homes and children’s social and educational institutions. Comparison of the charity practices of “trouble children” in pre-revolutionary and Soviet Russia cannot be correct and justified, since the general socio-economic, everyday, legal and socio-cultural conditions of life of such children were not comparable, as well as health care in children’s social institutions. We clarify the possibilities of shelters for foundling children at county hospitals, maternity wards, private patronage. The role of medical workers is revealed, whose reports and surveys of children’s educational social institutions were the most reliable indicators of the real situation with the incidence and mortality of orphans. The historiographic approaches and source study traditions of both domestic and foreign historians are analyzed when studying the charity of orphans in the considered chronological period of Russian history. Attraction of primary archival documents made it possible to evaluate the poorly studied medical and social aspects of children’s everyday life in shelters and orphanages in the Tambov Governorate in the turbulent and crucial years of national statehood. We reveal the regional features of the formation of social protection system for orphans through the prism of medical statistics and medical reports before and after 1917. Attention is drawn to the importance of conducting comparative studies on childhood history in the regional, metropolitan, ethno-confessional and sociocultural dimensions.