Early Soviet Civil Police Photos

[Rick Research]

Soviet civil police ("Militia") unforms underwent perpetual alterations, making it virtually impossible to accurately date undated photos-- and with the consequence that a vast majority of mixed old and new insignia was always being worn.

The only major work on this subject, Police-Major L. Tokar's Russian and English "History of Russian Uniform: Soviet Civil Police 1918-1991," St. Petersburg, 1995 is an excellent effort, but marred by major errors (the imaginary "M1940" Generals cockade, etc) and has the drawback of having only drawings for illustrations. It is still the best and only In Print reference we have.

Here is a photo of an EXTREMELY young looking police cadet (the M1923 rank insignia was extremely ambiguous, but most likely he was a "student at a middle police school" rather than a "deputy company leader" or "director of a prison"!!!), with a dated inscription, which I will show next. Foot police wore green patches, mounted police wore yellow-- both edged black. I can't tell which this may have been, in black and white.

[Rick Research]

The reverse inscription, with well-written calligraphy, reads "For a good beginning on the way to little Oleg from Ya. Yo. Ozoyain 24.XI.24"

[Rick Research]

This is an "identity" file photo of civil police or state security Captain Birshinov (no other names given), dated 16 May 1941 with the stamp of the City of Tyumen Military Commissariat, Omsk Province.

Birshinov-- entirely Scandinavian looking-- is, most peculiarly, wearing the supposed M1936 rank insignia, which may never have been widely introduced, which fell between the M1931 and M1939 varieties which paralleled the military insignia of that period. The badge is for a Shock Worker of the Osoaviakhim, a civil defense umbrella organization. The pullover gimnastyorka is of the "salt and pepper" weave popular in the 1930s.

[Rick Research]

The collar tabs look like mini-M1943 shoulder boards for a Lieutenant Colonel, with two "field officer" style stripes running front to back on the center of the tab. Tokar shows the stars as smaller and worn one on each stripe, whereas Birshinov is wearing his one behind the other in the middle. Tokar also shows the rank level stripes as being metallic, but these are plainly cloth of a color similar to the tab material. Birshinov's rank is written as "Kapitan," and that reflects the two-stripes with stars rank as shown.

This is an extremely rare type of insignia to see.