Rosja - Magadan - Noor Images

Russia, Ola Magadan Region, July 2015 Natasha Khayutina, the adopted daughter of Stalinist secret police chief Nikolai Yezhov, a man responsible for the deaths of many thousands; the last year of his rule, 1938, was known as rasstrelny ??" death-by-firing-squad ??" year, and the following year he met the firing squad himself, as did twenty thousand NKVD agents in Stalin's purges. Natasha became Child 144 in the orphanages, shunned by all, including the man she loved, who left the day he discovered her true identity. Shadowed by the KGB, she made her way to the remotest point of the USSR to escape her father's shadow. Natasha didn't know her own birthday, so she decided to celebrate hers along with her father's. In the 1950s, Natasha visited cousin Josef and his mother in Moscow. There she visited her mother's grave and received an accordion as a gift from her Moscow relatives. The accordion would remain her trademark for the rest of her life. Natasha has spent the rest of her life in the Magadan region. The country learned that the adopted daughter of Nikolai Ezhov was alive in 1998. Natasha had applied to the courts to rehabilitate her father. When the courts denied her request. Natasha realized that her father could never be rehabilitated but she continued to fight for herself. Natasha lives in Ola and her daughter and grandchildren live nearby. Yuri Kozyrev / NOOR