The Chechens
In 1944 Stalin was worried about the Chechens uprising while the German army was invading Russia. On February 23, 1944 the Chechens in Russia were ordered to report to deportation centers in Siberia and Kazakhstan. Anyone who was against it was shot to death. Over the course of the deportation an estimated 78,000 Chechens died on the transport trains. The trains were packed with hundreds of people standing up against each other. There were no stops for food or to bathe, and many died from suffocation. The deportees that made it to the centers struggled to survive in harsh living conditions; many died from starvation and disease.