The Ust-Mozharka settlement was set up in January 1933 as part of the Mozharka labour colony and came under the Olkhovskaya commandant of the Siblag directorate. The first forced settlers reached Ust-Mozharka in February that year and by June there were 153 families of dekulakized peasants (560 people) in the settlement. In July 1933 a further 536 people joined them. Epidemics of dysentery and typhus led to a high mortality. The men, women and children who died were buried in a cemetery 300 metres from the settlement. Their numbers are not known; a list of 18 names has been compiled from archival information.

In 1947 the unofficial agricultural cooperative was turned into the Chkalov collective farm and the special commandant’s office for the labour colonies was abolished. The forced settlers could only leave, however, after 1954. In the 1970s the settlement was closed; the graveyard was abandoned and taken over by the forest. Today Mozharka is being brought back to life by a community of the church of the “Last Testament” (followers of Vissarion).                          

On 6 July 2012 Nadezhda Chernykh (Bakhmetyeva) and Ivan Cheremisin, descendants of those sent to Mozharka, erected a memorial cross in the graveyard on Mount Badanka. The cross was made from a small tree trunk. The black marble plaque fixed to it reads: “In memory of our native village Ust-Mozharka, an OGPU labour colony of Siblag, 1933-1980 (approx.). Memory returns the past to us so that we may consider, mourn and understand what happened”.