The Newspaper Partizanskaya Pravda on Birch Bark, 1942

This issue of a partisan newspaper was printed not on paper but on birch bark. Partizanskaya Pravda (Partisan Truth) No. 124 came out on 12 July 1942 in the Dyatkovo partisan region in the Bryansk area, where a mass partisan movement operated in 1941–1943. The issue was threatened by a temporary lack of paper, so it was decided to print it on birch bark.

The newspaper was the organ of the Dyatkovo district committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) and the district Soviet of Working People's Deputies. It appeared from 23 May to 20 December 1942, 154 issues in all, each in a print run of 500 to 1000 copies. It told the partisans about the fighting, the atrocities of the occupiers and events at the fronts; its executive editor was E. Kustov.

The sheet shows the texture of the birch bark, the masthead, the issue number and the date, Sunday, 12 July 1942, and below them a Soviet Information Bureau report from the evening bulletin of 10 July. The text is letterpress printed.