Paper short abstract:

The paper based upon recently discovered archive materials centers on the post war Sakhalin history when Karafuto library holdings left after the repatriation of the Japanese population were transferred in 1948 to Leningrad Institute of Oriental Studies.

Paper long abstract:

The St. Petersburg IOM RAS Library contains the biggest collection of Karafuto books that have not survived inside Japan.

The paper is focused on "when, why and how" 50-60 thousand Japanese books from Japanese libraries were gathered and transferred from Sakhalin (Jap. Karafuto) to Leningrad in the post war period when the Southern Sakhalin became the part of the USSR. For a long time this topic was hushed up by the Russian scholars, though the first short publication on the topic appeared in 2006, the concrete details of the book relocation operation came to light due to the recent discovery of the 300 hundred pages file in the IOM RAS archive. It contains documents concerning the legal grounds of the books transportation, the circumstances of their gathering, packing and shipment to Leningrad in 1948.

To a certain degree, this operation can be seen as a "rescue" of the abandoned books that were left after the repatriation of the Japanese population. Violence, disorder and chaos reigned in the first post-war years in the Southern Sakhalin. As is specified in the documents, Soviet soldiers and officers"were not aware" that this region became the part of the USSR and that they were not on the occupied territory. Thus the books were subjected to barbaric extermination. After the establishment of the civil administration the trophy books were put to fire as "politically harmful" editions rejected by the new authorities censorship.

The books have survived by a sheer luck - due to the efforts of the Institute Japanologist D.Goldberg who was recruited to the army during the WW2 and was in the Southern Sakhalin till 1947. Due to his official letter, the Institute sent two scholars to the Southern Sakhalin to bring the books.

The documents from the archive file not only allow us not to trace the book gathering and shipment operation, but provides us with a new insight of the post war Southern Sakhalin political situation.