Fun fact! 3/4 of my Russian grandparents were almost declared enemies of the people
One grandfather went to war against the Finns during ww1 as an 18-17-year-old boy. They captured him, gave him some medical care (cut off his frost-bitten toes), and let him go back home.
He kept it a secret until his deathbed because Russia tended not to treat ex-Pows very well. They were viewed with HIGH suspicion. So he might not have been sent to a camp, but it's likely he would have been, and he definitely should have faced interrogations and predjudice
My great-grandmother just existed as a Jewish girl. At around 19ish, she was part of a small amount of people that got picked by the state to attend a nice summer camp. Well, someone got really jealous and essentially said. “Why did SHE get to go to the fun place and not me? She must secretly be in league with “the jews” and they helped her get in!”
No one defended my great-grandmother, not even her boyfriend at the time, my great-grandfather, except for her best friend. I don’t know the exact words that were said, but from the information I’ve gathered, it went something like this:
“What the fuck is wrong with you, assholes. Why are you complaining about an orphan having something nice? Oh, so she went to summer camp? Where did you go during the summer? To your home? The home that you have? To your loving parents--who are ALIVE? Fuck you.” And the charges were dropped.
My other great-grandfather was sent to make planes during ww2. He wrote to the government SO MANY times asking to be put on the front lines, that they wrote back telling him if he sent ONE more letter, they would declare him an enemy of the people, and sent him to a labor camp
