A HISTORICAL WAY OF THE UKRAINIAN STATE MILITARY MUSEUM (1917 – 1920)

Abstract

The article is devoted to the analysis of the activities of the Ukrainian state military museum during 1917 – 1920. The author considers and highlights the prerequisites for the creation, functioning, achievement, and destiny of the specified museum in the specified chronological frames.

The activity of the museum, materials, and documents covering the work of the museum and its figures – A. D. Blagodir and M. Y. Obidny were analyzed, namely the definition of the main ideas of these statesmen to improve the museum work of Ukrainian military historical institutions on the example of the state military museum. The activity of the military museum was investigated during the influence of state power in the period between the domination of the territory of Ukraine by the authorities of the Central Rada and Soviet Russia and the arrival of bolshevik troops to Kiev.

The origins of the concept for the collection of historical material and scientific activity of the military historical museum are revealed. The author established that the period of the Ukrainian liberation movement became a time of the cultural revival of the Ukrainian people when certain advances in the museum sphere were achieved.

In a complex military-political situation, scientific and public memorial conservation organizations, together with state institutions established during the Ukrainian revolution, focused on protecting and preserving monuments of Ukraine's military history. But at the same time, the research of museum items and collections, the holding of exposition works did not have a planned character, they were conducted selectively because in the complex military and political conditions the main task of the Ukrainian state military museum was to preserve the monuments from destruction and robbery.

The author notes that the activity of the museum was to collect and protect the monuments of the revolution, much attention was paid to preserving the monuments of antiquity on the ground, saving archives, in particular the archive of the First world war, valuable documents and materials of the Kiev department of the Russian military historical society. In the era of the Hetmanate, the Ministry of Public Education and Arts provided financial assistance to the museum institution, and the left part of the Mariinsky Palace was allocated for the placement of the exhibition. In the summer of 1918, the museum suffered a tragic fate, when due to a misunderstanding between officials of different ranks over the museum collections an act of vandalism was committed.

According to the results of archival materials of the Central state archives of the supreme bodies of power and government in Ukraine (F. 3179, Op. 1, 16 cases), which occupies the period 1919 – 1922 and the personal fund in the archives of M. Y. Obidny (F. 3504, Op. 1, 12 cases) established that M. Obidny, after the termination of the Ukrainian military historical museum, in 1920 created a new museum education – the Main military historical museum-archive at the General Staff of the Ukrainian People's Republic.