Fedir Ernst: The Executed Savior of Historical Monuments

Thanks to Fedir Ernst, Ukrainian museums have received thousands of art objects, with hundreds of Ukrainian monuments being returned from Russia. As a result, we now possess a deeper understanding of the architectural masterpieces that were destroyed by the Bolsheviks.

Fedir Liudvihovych Ernst was born in 1891 in Kyiv into the family of a German colonist. Perhaps his interest in historical monuments began during his studies at the Hlukhiv Gymnasium. Hlukhiv has its history dating back to the times of Rus and was a hetman capital, with many ancient temples located there.

Later, his uncle provided Fedir Ernst with funds for studying in Berlin. The future researcher chose the Department of Art History at the local university. According to Ernst's memories, the German capital seemed rather uninteresting and boring to him. Within a year, he transferred to Kyiv University and continued his studies in art history.

During this period, Fedir Ernst visited museums and attended lectures of Stara Hromada, the center of Ukrainian intelligentsia. He got acquainted with the authoritative researchers Mykola Biliashivskyi and Danylo Shcherbakivskyi, with whom he later collaborated a lot.

Ernst's works immediately caught attention at the university – he was awarded a gold medal for his research on Kyiv architecture of the XVII-XVIII centuries.

During World War I, Fedir Ernst was exiled to Siberia as an "unreliable" person because he was German by birth. Ernst returned from exile at the end of 1917 and soon became actively involved in the preservation of monuments and science.

In 1922, Fedir Ernst joined the predecessor of the National Museum of the History of Ukraine (MIST), namely the First State Museum, which in 1924 became the Taras Shevchenko All-Ukrainian Historical Museum. Ernst found many like-minded individuals in the museum, and the director of the museum Mykola Biliashivskyi, Danylo Shcherbakivskyi worked there as well.

The researcher went on business trips, inspecting large private and monastic collections. Fedir Ernst's efforts ensured that the monuments from these collections made their way to the museum, rather than being taken abroad by the Bolsheviks.

Fedir Ernst organized the first exhibition at the All-Ukrainian Historical Museum in 1925. The project was dedicated to the Ukrainian portrait. The exhibition featured portraits of hetmans that Ernst brought back from Russia, as well as images of the Polish nobility and Russian emperors. The curator collected works by famous artists, such as Ilya Repin, Mykhailo Vrubel, Oleksandr Murashko, Heorhiy Narbut, Taras Shevchenko, and many others.

In the 1920s, the Bolsheviks confiscated cultural values for sale abroad. Initially, they did it under the pretext of aiding the hungry and later for other reasons. Fedir Ernst documented the items taken by the Soviet authorities from Kyiv churches and monasteries. These records revealed what had been confiscated. Ernst then attempted to trace where these items ended up. Many artifacts were lost, but some of them were recovered.

In the 1920s, there was also an anti-religious campaign, during which the Bolsheviks closed and destroyed monasteries. The famous XIX century Kyiv-Mezhyhirya faience factory was located within the territory of one of them.

Fedir Ernst became one of the co-founders of the Museum Town on the territory of the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra. The monastery could have been closed and destroyed, but thanks to individuals like Ernst, it was preserved as a museum.

At the end of the 1920s, Fedir Ernst was losing like-minded people and facing increasing opposition. The Soviet authorities aimed to build a new world where there would be no place for the past, so the attitude towards antiquarians grew progressively worse. The researcher lived under the constant threat of arrest and endeavored to save as many historical artifacts as possible. Ernst continued to organize exhibitions, went on trips to various regions of Ukraine, and wrote articles and reports.

In 1933, Fedir Ernst was arrested in connection with this case and was soon sentenced to three years of corrective labor on the White Sea-Baltic Canal. 

This structure was a source of pride for the Soviet authorities. It was mostly built by so-called "enemies of the people" who labored under dreadful conditions.

Even in exile, Fedir Ernst remained dedicated to museum work: he established the Museum of the History of the White Sea-Baltic Canal in the city of Poventsi and served as the head of the Museum of the Construction of the "Moscow-Volga" Canal in the city of Dmitrov.

After his release, Fedir Ernst lived in Kazakhstan and led the work on the establishment of the Kazakh Art Gallery in Almaty. His conviction was not lifted, and such individuals were forbidden to live in the European part of the Soviet Union.

In 1941, Ernst was arrested for the third time, falsely accused of being a German spy (once again, his German heritage played a role). On October 28, 1942, he was executed by a firing squad. His family was not informed about Fedir Ernst's execution. His wife, Tamara Ernst, appealed to the authorities to find out what had happened to her husband. She was told that he died of an illness in 1946. Only in the late 1950s did the true circumstances and timing of the researcher's death become known.

His name was rehabilitated in 1989. Documents related to Fedir Ernst were preserved in the archives, but only specialists had access to them. Scientific works about him began to emerge after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

The main array of monuments saved by Fedir Ernst is kept in several institutions: the National Art Museum of Ukraine, the National Museum of Taras Shevchenko, the National Museum of Ukrainian Folk Decorative Art, the Museum of the History of the City of Kyiv, the National Museum "Kyiv Art Gallery," and the National Museum of the History of Ukraine.

During Ukraine's independence, museum workers restored information about these monuments, particularly the fact that they were obtained thanks to Fedir Ernst. Just as the researcher once rescued thousands of artifacts from oblivion, now museum professionals are preserving his name for future generations.