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ArcheoBiblioBase: Archives in Russia: B-5

Last update of repository: 3 December 2020

Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Voenno-Morskogo Flota (RGAVMF)


Access & Facilities

Access
All prerevolutionary fonds are now open to researchers. Although most of the documentation of the Soviet period has been declassified (through 1942), some restrictions remain. For the list of fonds, files, and some individual documents that have been declassified through 2010–2012 see the “Database of the declassified files and records of federal state archives”: http://unsecret.rusarchives.ru/.
        The RGAVMF reading room on Millionnaia street (Soviet period records) was reopened 30 September 2008. The reading room in the new building (Serebristyi Boulevard, 24, korp. 1) for pre-1917 records was opened 13 October 2008.
        Researchers may now have access to opisi and records of fonds of the Soviet Navy through 1942 (with the exception of fonds of scientific-technical documentation). Available reference materials (ul. Millionnaia) include the card catalogues of names and ships, and the reference library.
        For fonds of pre-1917 Russian Navy (Serebristyi Boulevard) researchers have access to opisi and the subject catalogue. Currently the holdings of scientific-technical documentation, 18 collections, and 68 fonds of personal papers are closed for further processing. Lists of all fonds temporarily closed to research are available in the reading room.

Working conditions
Documents are normally delivered within 24 hours.

Copy facilities
Xerox and scan facilities are available. Foreign researchers are required to pay in rubles (in dollar equivalent). Copies of documents for commercial purposes require a license agreement.

Reference facilities
The lists of all fonds and opisi are available electronically on: https://rgavmf.ru/fond/.
        Researchers have access to opisi and other unpublished finding aids, many of which are housed in the reading room. The series of inventories published before 1917 are also available in the reading room, including those of the Naval Ministry (1853–1906), General Naval Lists, and collections of documents published by the archive.
        The reference facilities also include indexes to lists of fonds, general inter-fond indexes of opisi and documents (on the history of creating agencies, units and formations of the Soviet Navy, and on naval personnel who were repressed in 1919–1940), internal fond-specific indexes to opisi and documents, 11 thematic surveys, and over 30 summaries of documents. The catalogue system of the archive includes a subject and thematic catalogue (to 1917), a systematic catalogue (1917–1940), a catalogue of ships and naval vessels, an index of officers who emigrated from Russia after 1917, and card files with naval agency histories (post-1918).

Library facilities
The archive has an extensive library (54,300 vols., 18th–1990s) devoted to naval history and shipbuilding, which includes 500 manuscript books and albums dating from the nineteenth century. The holdings contain books from the archive and chancellery of the Naval Ministry, the historical department of the Navy General Staff, and from the personal libraries of Admirals S.O. Makarov, I.F. Likhachev, Grand Duke Cyril (Kirill) Vladimirovich, and others. The library retains a complete collection of prerevolutionary official publications relating to naval affairs, including naval laws and decrees, official orders and circulars of the ministry and other agencies, personnel lists, reports and estimates, and other internal agency publications. There is also a name catalogue and an historical index of naval establishments. Books can be ordered through the archival reading room. See the published bibliography of prerevolutionary naval publications, which is based on the library holdings (b–237). (Hours of reading room: F 10:00–16:00)


ABB ArcheoBiblioBase Archeo Biblio Base Patricia Kennedy Grimsted