ARKHANGELSK, September 11. /TASS/. Experts of the Laverov Center for Integrated Arctic Studies (the Russian Academy of Sciences' Urals Branch) presented a book about the coast-dwellers' (Pomors) rare wooden ships, built and used on the White Sea in the 19th century, and later on during World War II. The book features rare archival documents, including telegrams, photographs and drawings, the center's press service told TASS.

The book demonstrates documents and tells facts about the difficult working conditions to create such vessels during World War II. At that time, it was mainly teenagers who made yelas. The teenagers were guided by a few workers who were not fit for mobilization due to disabilities. At least 340 yelas were built between 1943 and 1946. The documents include unique drawings and photographs of those ships, built at the Solombala shipyard in the 1940s.

"Within about 18 months, I brought together my old drafts about the yelas' pre-revolutionary history, which I had not published earlier," the press service quoted as saying the book's author, the center's leading researcher, historian Ruslan Davydov. "I have added results of my new research at the State Archive of the Arkhangelsk Region in 2022, concerning the construction of yelas in Solombala during World War II."

Lost archives and ship features

The yela is a small (about 10 meters long) sailing and rowing wooden vessel of Norwegian origin. The crew normally was not bigger than four people. Ruslan Davydov has been involved in yelas' history since the 1990s. In the north of Russia, the vessels were used mainly in fishing off the Murmansk coast. Before the revolution, yelas were used to transport mail, police and officials.

It was an initiative of famous naturalist and philosopher Nikolai Danilevsky to spread yelas in the Russian North in 1860. During an expedition to Russia's North and Norway, he spotted ships of this type in Norway and recommended that the Ministry of State Property encouraged with various awards and money residents of the Arkhangelsk Region to build them.

Just a few years ago the historian had been convinced yelas' construction and use stopped shortly after the (military) intervention and the Civil War in the North, that is in the early 1920s. Further on, experts found the Solombal shipyard's archive. The Pomors Shipbuilding Partnership has been researching and digitizing it. During World War II, several starvation deaths were reported during work on yelas.

"We can say quite confidently that here are earlier unknown, undeservedly forgotten heroes of work during World War II," the author said.