TELEGRAM TO B. S. WEISBROD.
Via direct line
Samara
The Special Commission of the People’s Commissariat of Health to Weisbrod 1
25 November 1919
Remain on the Turkestan Front. Another commission has been dispatched to the Southern Front. [9581]
Order from the Council of People’s Defense, Lenin.
1 B. S. Weisbrod was, in 1919, Chairman of the Extraordinary Sanitary Commission for the Control of Typhus on the Turkestan Front.
153Q9
ORDER TO THE SECRETARY OF C
[25 December 1919]
To Semashko, for submission to the Council [of People’s Defense].
Draft resolution.
1 The Commander of the 8th Army, G. Sokolnikov, reported to Lenin via telegram about the epidemic nature of typhus and requested authorization for the early graduation of fifth-year medical students at Voronezh University, directing that all newly graduated physicians be placed at the disposal of the 8th Army.
*5384
ORDER TO THE SECRETARY.
18/1 [1920]
I request that you contact Markov and inform him that I strongly support Semashko’s request.
Lenin.
1 The People’s Commissar of Health, P. A. Semashko, in a telegraph message addressed to Lenin, urgently requested an order for the more rapid deployment of a highly urgent echelon “led by the Extraordinary Sanitary Commission under Comrade Weisbrod, carrying material resources to the Southern Front and Ukraine for the fight against typhus.” This order was to be issued by S. D. Markov, Deputy People’s Commissar for Health.

V A R I А

4745
EXCHANGE OF NOTES WITH L. B. KAMENEV,
20 JANUARY 1920.
1)011 R O G  K L M E N K V A
Vladimir Ilyich,
I. Have you received Mahno’s telegram?
R E P L Y . 1 E H U H  \ i
V O N ! »  O S K A M E N K V A, 2.
Why do you sign decrees concerning operetta without first consulting local authorities in this important matter—or even without submitting operetta, in general, to the consideration of local bodies? I protest in the name of the 7th Congress. Direct your inquiries to the Small Council, so that it may summon the “interested parties.”
3. I request that you grant Gagarin’s petition. He is an elderly man, quite frail—formerly the director of the Polytechnic Institute, now working under Krassin. He claims that a neighbor of his bears the very same document bearing your signature… Kurapatkin!
Please show respect for this old man.
Congratulations on Rostov.
Reply from L. II. A.
Did I really give the document to Kurapatkin?? That can’t be!!
Who is Gagarin? I have no idea. 2.
1 A. G. Gagarin requested that he be issued the following certificate, the draft of which he himself had prepared: “To the bearer of this document, Engineer Andrey Grigoryevich Gagarin, I hereby permit residence in the Pskov Governorate, Porhovsky District, Shevnitskaya Volost, in the People’s House bearing my name in ‘Kholomki.’ I request that local authorities refrain from disturbing Gagarin, from taking him into custody as a hostage, from requisitioning his belongings, and that they provide him with the necessary quantity of kerosene for his activities, which I consider beneficial to the Republic.”
-
Kamenev’s reply: “I’ll ask Vladimirsky over the phone. But I’m actually writing to you today precisely to laugh at the style of former officials—this is his way of phrasing things.”
Over Kamenev’s reply, Lenin wrote an instruction to the secretary: “Keep safe. Note regarding Kamenev’s letter on Gagarin.”
R E P L Y  L E N I N  A.
NOTES ON KAMENEV’S LETTER.

•4744
NOTE TO L. B. KAMENEV.
[20 January 1920]
If the question is posed in this way, then dictate the following to your secretary: a protest against the Small Council and a draft resolution for the Great Council (since the Small Council should not interfere in local affairs without compelling reasons and is always obliged to consult local Sovdepas—except in cases of extreme urgency). *
1 In his note to Lenin, Kamenev expressed protest against the decision of the Small Council of People’s Commissars to close the Nikitsky Theater’s operetta performances. According to Kamenev, the resolution of this issue fell within the competence not of central, but of local authorities—in this case, the Moscow Department of Public Education.