The crush at Stalin's funeral, how many people died? Stalin's funeral and other terrible crush in the USSR Foreign guests at the burial of Stalin.

Grigory Rosenberg, preschooler:
My grandfather, a former member of the former Society of Former Political Prisoners, an old Bolshevik, in whose illegal apartment Khalturin himself was hiding, the brother of some former bigwig in the State Bank of the USSR, sighed heavily and said very sadly:

Mom was so shocked by this sacrilege that at first she was simply numb. And then, without looking back, through clenched teeth she ordered me to leave the room. Of course, I went out, but I remember my grandfather's words very well.

Vladimir Sperantov, student: The conversations of the first days were like this: whoever speaks the eulogy will be. Then everyone noted: Beria was talking! After the mausoleum, when there was the actual funeral; this was discussed at home. But Malenkov was the official successor, not a party one, and then, after a few days, they somehow began to tell that Malenkov at the very first meeting of the Central Committee or Politburo, when everyone clapped, said: no, I’m not a ballerina, please was no more. And we realized that the style began to change.

The recently opened archives of the Security Service of Ukraine contain non-public and previously unknown testimonies of contemporaries about Stalin's death, captured by employees of the USSR Ministry of State Security:
Worker of the Kharkov breeding station Krivoshey, 67 years old, non-partisan; Deputy secretary of the Glavelektrosbyt party organization in Kharkov Kaganovich, 60, and doctor of the Zhytomyr regional hospital Guzman, nervously shocked by the news of Comrade Stalin's death, suddenly died while speaking at rallies.

On the night of March 7 with. in with. Ostashevtsy, Zborivsky district, Ternopil region, two flags and a portrait of Comrade Stalin were stolen from the building of the school and the store, which were found by the task force with traces of mockery at them. The perpetrators are local residents Kvasnitsky, born in 1935, works in a construction brigade on the railway, and Popovich, born in 1934, who were detained and confessed to the crime. An investigation is underway.

On March 6, at 20 hours 40 minutes, a 2nd year student of the Odessa Naval Medical School Fedorov, born in 1934, after criticizing him for reading a book at a memorial meeting, stating that "I am not indifferent and not an enemy", ran out into the street and, despite the measures taken, threw himself under a passing tram and was killed.

On March 6, 7th grade student of Lviv secondary school No. 50 Ogorinskaya, a Jew, during the preparation for the mourning rally, in response to the regret expressed by the student Kiyashko about the untimely death of Comrade Stalin, said: "There he is dear." Outraged by this statement, a group of students in the class beat Ogorinskaya.

Agent "Rabochiy", citizen Terekhova N.Ye. reported that a worker of the plant No. 446 Berenko Aleksey Mitrofanovich came to her apartment and asked Terekhova if she cried when she heard about the death of Comrade Stalin, and when Terekhova, in turn, asked Berenko if he was crying, Berenko replied:

"Yes, I cried when I went to bed, because he / Stalin / had not died before."

The director of a store in Stanislav Kotlyarsky, a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, a Jew, at the end of his speech at the mourning meeting of the city-organizer workers said: "Our beloved dear enemy."

At the funeral meeting in the Kherson city hospital No. 2, the secretary of the party organization Rosenblat ended his speech with a shout of "Hurray."

On March 9, 1953, the funeral of Joseph Stalin, General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, took place in Moscow. It would not be an exaggeration to say that this was the most important funeral in the history of the Soviet Union. Lenin died too quickly, Khrushchev was buried without special honors, Andropov and Chernenko were in power for only a few months, they did not have time to get used to them. Only Brezhnev's funeral could be compared with Stalin's. But Brezhnev ruled for only 18 years, while Stalin was almost 30. Those who were born at the beginning of his reign became adults. Those who were in adulthood had time to grow old. Stalin's rule was an era, a significant part of the life of the Soviet people passed under him. Therefore, it is not surprising that the funeral of the Soviet leader was unprecedented in its scope at that time and caused a huge confluence of people, which ended in a stampede with numerous deaths. Life found out how the leader of the Soviet Union was buried 65 years ago.

Preparation

Joseph Stalin, after the strike that occurred on March 1, lived for several more days, but could not speak and was partially paralyzed. On March 5, at 9.50 pm, doctors pronounced the death of the Secretary General. By this time, his closest associates had already managed to divide state and party posts among themselves and managed to return to the Blizhnyaya dacha just by the time the leader gave up his ghost.

After his death, they began to go about their business, appointing Nikita Khrushchev responsible for organizing the funeral, who formed a commission for organizing the funeral with the participation of Shvernik, Kaganovich and several other party leaders.

From right to left: Anastas Mikoyan, Lazar Kaganovich, Nikita Khrushchev, Nikolai Bulganin on guard of honor at the coffin with the body of Joseph Stalin in the Column Hall of the House of Unions.

It was decided to start a nationwide farewell to the Generalissimo the very next day, so that as many people as possible had time to say goodbye to him. Therefore, a number of procedures were forced. For example, almost immediately after his death, Stalin's body was taken away for a posthumous autopsy. Already six hours after death, a whole group of pathologists worked with the body of the deceased. Before the autopsy procedure, the death mask was removed from the deceased's face. The famous sculptor Manizer was engaged in this.

The chief's brain was recovered and deposited at the Brain Institute. In those days, the brains of members of the Politburo, prominent scientists and scientists were obligatorily transferred for storage to this institute, where scientists examined them for differences from the brains of ordinary people.

While doctors were working with Stalin's body, his favorite uniform was sent to the dry-cleaner, patched up, and the Generalissimo's shoulder straps and gold buttons were sewn to it, since it was decided to bury him in it. At the same time, the architect Posokhin was given the task of sketching a new inscription on the Mausoleum as quickly as possible, since it was decided to bury the deceased leader without much controversy there, next to Lenin.

It was decided to hold the farewell ceremony in the Column Hall of the House of the Unions. Nikolai Bespalov, Chairman of the Committee for Arts under the Council of Ministers of the USSR, supervised the decoration of the interior of the hall for the ceremony. The search for the coffin for the body of the leader was carried out by Dmitry Krupin, Administrator of the Central Committee of the CPSU. The guard of the farewell ceremony was entrusted to the MGB.

Immediately after the autopsy, preparations began for the temporary embalming of Stalin's body, which was carried out in the laboratory of the Lenin Mausoleum. Experts even managed to somewhat "improve" the face of the deceased, lightening the "mountain ash" from smallpox and age spots. Already on the afternoon of March 6, the body was delivered to the Hall of Columns, and at 4 pm the farewell ceremony began.

By this time, the hall was decorated with portraits of Stalin, and velvet panels with the coats of arms of the Union republics were hung on the columns. There were 16 of them in total. The coffin stood in the center, on a high pedestal, and was literally drowned in flowers. The banner of the Soviet Union hung at the head of the bed. On the satin fabric in front of the coffin lay the awards of the Generalissimo. The chandeliers hanging in the hall were covered with black cloth.

The hall was attended by an orchestra playing funeral melodies of various classical composers. In the guard of honor at the coffin, the new leaders of the Soviet state stood in turn. A military escort was also present.

Soviet citizens learned about Stalin's death only on March 6, when it was announced on the radio and published in newspapers. On the occasion of his death, a three-day mourning period was declared. Cinemas and other entertainment establishments did not work, and any entertainment events in the country were canceled.

On the same day, the construction of a pantheon was announced, in which Stalin would eventually be reburied. This decision was carried out through the Central Committee and the Council of Ministers. It was planned to build a pantheon in Moscow, which would become a resting place not only for the dead leaders - Lenin and Stalin, as well as some major figures buried in the Kremlin wall, but also for the future leaders of the USSR. The decree on the creation of the Moscow pantheon was published in newspapers on March 7, and an open competition for projects was also announced. However, the pantheon was quickly forgotten in the heat of the struggle for power, and this topic was no longer brought up.

Parting

People reached out to say goodbye to the deceased leader. Mostly from Moscow, but some also came from other cities, mainly as delegates from enterprises. Since the entrance to Moscow for the period of the events was limited, the trains were checked, ordinary passengers were not allowed into the city, with the exception of delegates from workers' collectives and traveling on a business trip.

The Column Hall of the House of Unions was literally buried in wreaths, there were not even hundreds, but thousands. All large enterprises and departments sent a funeral wreath without fail.

Foreign delegations who began to arrive in Moscow did not stand aside either. These were mainly representatives of countries where a socialist regime had already been established. A Chinese delegation was present, led by Zhou Enlai, Mao Zedong's right-hand man (Mao sent a personal wreath, separate from the Chinese Communist Party). The leaders of the countries of "people's democracy" were present - Gottwald, Georgiu-Dej, Ulbricht, Bierut, Rakosi and others.

The leaders of the communist parties from the capitalist countries arrived - the Englishman Pollit, the Italian Togliatti, the Finn Pessi, the Austrian Koplenig, etc. All of them had a chance to stand on the guard of honor at the coffin along with the Soviet leaders.

Workers of the Dynamo plant listen to the news of the death of Joseph Stalin. Photo: © RIA Novosti

Many kilometers of queues spread from Bolshaya Dmitrovka, consisting of people who wanted to see the leader at parting at least once. Some believe that hundreds of thousands of those who came to say goodbye to the deceased leader is evidence of the great love and gratitude of Soviet citizens. Others are sure that this is due to the totalitarian state in which these people grew up and formed.

But do not forget one more important fact. Stalin did not travel around the country very often, several people all over the USSR had televisions then, so for most people the farewell ceremony was the only opportunity to see the leader live, even if he died. Everyone understood that this was a historical moment, and they wanted to witness it. Therefore, in the huge queues were those who idolized Stalin, and those who hated him, but realized the historicity of the moment, and those who went “because everyone went,” and those who wanted to brag to friends and colleagues.

Places in the queues have been occupied since the night. Even taking into account the limited entry to the capital, a lot of people gathered. Nobody counted the exact number of participants in mourning ceremonies.

Crush

These days, another event took place, which has become an integral part of this funeral forever. We are talking about a serious crush in the Trubnaya Square area, as a result of which there were numerous casualties. Although the stampede is usually associated with Stalin's funeral, it happened during the farewell ceremony on March 6. On the first day when Stalin's death was announced, crowds of people rushed chaotically to the House of Unions.

People tried to get to Bolshaya Dmitrovka and decided that the easiest way to get there would be through Trubnaya Square, but it was blocked in advance by trucks. The crush happened on the descent from Rozhdestvensky Boulevard to the square, the front rows were stopped by trucks, and from behind from the descent, human waves continued to roll on them one after another. As a result, those who stood in front were literally crushed and trampled by those who were pushing from behind. The exact number of victims of the stampede has not yet been established. In various sources, they are estimated in the range from several tens to several thousand people.

Funeral

Late in the evening of March 8, the farewell ceremony was completed. The doors of the House of Unions were closed. After midnight, the removal of the wreaths began. Since there were not many funeral wreaths, but very, very many, it was decided to take them to the Mausoleum and lay them out near it. The most important wreaths (about a hundred pieces) from Soviet leaders, leaders of other states, leaders of large foreign communist parties and relatives of the deceased were sorted out for participation in the burial ceremony. They were carried behind the coffin.

Late at night, assembly points were opened for delegations of workers, who were to be present in Red Square during the day. Whoever got into these delegations was not allowed, all delegates received special passes. They met at these assembly points, after which they proceeded in an organized manner to Red Square, in order to be there by morning. A few hours before the start of the funeral, at 9:30 in the morning, the entrance for delegates to Red Square was closed.

On the morning of the funeral, traffic within the Garden Ring was completely closed. The only exceptions were special vehicles that had passes.

At 7 in the morning, a cordon was lined up along the route of the funeral cortege. At the same time, the formation of troops and representatives of workers' delegations took place on Red Square. In total, 4,400 military personnel and about 12 thousand delegates were stationed on the square.

At about 10 o'clock in the morning from the House of Unions began to take out funeral wreaths and Stalin's awards. At 10:15 am, the closest associates (Beria, Khrushchev, Mikoyan, Kaganovich, Molotov, Bulganin, Malenkov and Voroshilov) took the coffin in their arms and carried it to the exit from the building. At 10:23 am it was installed on an artillery gun carriage covered with kumach.

The funeral delegation lined up in accordance with an unspoken hierarchy. The first were members of the Presidium of the Central Committee (as the Politburo was called at that time), followed by Stalin's relatives, then members of the Central Committee, deputies of the Supreme Soviet, delegates from foreign communist parties and, finally, an honorary military escort.

On special satin pillows, Stalin's awards were carried by marshals, army generals, as well as several colonel generals and lieutenant generals. Marshal Budyonny carried the Marshal's Star. Marshal Zhukov, who was then in disgrace, was not present at the ceremony. After the war, he was sent to command the secondary Ural military district.

The procession set off to the accompaniment of Chopin's funeral march (Lenin was buried accompanied by discordant singing "We fell a victim in a fatal struggle"). The ceremony was broadcast live on the radio, the announcer was the famous Levitan.

The ceremony was scheduled by the minute. At 10:45 am, the procession reached the mausoleum. The coffin was moved from the gun carriage to a special pedestal. Three minutes later, the funeral meeting began. From a political point of view, this part of the ceremony was the most important. Formally, the comrades-in-arms paid tribute to the memory of the departed leader. Informally, each of them in his speech talked about his vision of the future in the post-Stalin era. In addition, the order of speakers at the mourning rally revealed the tacit hierarchy of the new government.

The meeting was opened by Khrushchev, who acted as the funeral director. However, he did not give a speech and invited Malenkov to the microphone, who, after Stalin's death, headed the Council of Ministers and was considered the leader of the country. In his speech, the Prime Minister not only paid tribute to the memory of the deceased, but also outlined a new direction in which the country will develop. According to Malenkov, it turned out that, first of all, the country should solve pressing economic problems and improve the standard of living of Soviet workers, who received very little good during the long Stalin era. Malenkov also expressed confidence in the possibility of the peaceful existence of two systems - capitalist and socialist. The new head of state acted like a dove.

The next was Beria in the role of "hawk". He immediately tried to stake out the position of the main Stalinist successor and successor to his line, stating the need to maximize military potential and rally the entire country against the intrigues of internal and external enemies.

The last to speak was Molotov, who also declared the need to continue the Stalinist policy.

At 11:54 the meeting ended and the Stalinist comrades-in-arms in the same composition in which they carried the coffin to the mausoleum, lifted it up and carried it inside the building, the name of which had already been changed. Above the entrance was now written: "Lenin - Stalin."

At 12 o'clock, an artillery salute was given over the Kremlin. At the same moment, all factories, factories, ships, etc. they gave long beeps. And at all workplaces, where it was possible, a five-minute silence was announced. A funeral march sounded, which was replaced by the anthem of the Soviet Union.

At 12:10, troops began to pass by the mausoleum. Airplanes flew in the sky. The state flag at half-mast was raised over the Kremlin again.

The funeral ceremony went smoothly. The participants did not deviate for a minute from the pre-scheduled schedule. The almost 30-year Stalinist era is over. The struggle of his closest associates for power began.

It is not known exactly how many people came to say goodbye to Stalin on March 9, 1953. Tens or even hundreds of thousands of Soviet citizens flocked to the Column Hall of the House of the Unions, where his body was exhibited for parting. Their faces expressed real grief. Many came and went in tears.

Documentary footage of the funeral of Joseph Vissarionovich was shown on television. The event received wide coverage. The only thing that was hushed up then was the terrible crush around the House of the Union, due to which from several hundred to 2-3 thousand people died (different sources mention different numbers).

How it was

The fact that Stalin's funeral caused many deaths, the official authorities preferred to keep silent. The exact number of those killed in the crowd of farewells is classified. Witnesses to the events told terrible things. Literary critic Elena Pasternak later recalled that a real pandemonium was happening on Trubnaya Street in Moscow.

Muscovites living in neighboring houses were blocked in their apartments, because a dense endless column of people was moving along the roadway. The crush was terrible. The inhabitants of the lower floors heard not only the screams of the crushed, but also some kind of grinding, crunching of bones, from which the hair stood on end. When the crowd began to thin out, they began to take out heaps of clothes, someone's galoshes and, worst of all, pieces of people on wheelbarrows. The janitors worked all night long. [C-BLOCK]

Another Muscovite, political scientist Yuri Bartko personally took part in cordoning off Trubnaya. Subsequently, he told what happened there and how security was ensured these days. On March 6, his relative Anatoly was killed in a stampede. A strong 30-year-old man was pressed so hard by his chest to the bars of a cast-iron grate that his bones could not stand it. The ribcage was literally crumbled.

The family learned about his death on March 7. When they came to the morgue for the body, several dozen people were already waiting at the doors of this institution. In order not to advertise the death toll, the authorities ordered the morgues to issue fake certificates, which indicated the fake reasons for the death.

Security measures

The authorities were not ready for such a tragic turn of events. Security measures have been provided. And yet, the crowd of people wishing to say goodbye to the leader turned out to be many times larger than one might have expected. The situation is out of control. Since the morning of March 6, military formations have settled in Moscow. Parts of the soldiers were thrown there, but this was done in secret. As explained to the Muscovites living in these areas, "the military solved their problems."

By the end of the day, a ring began to be created in the area of ​​Trubnaya Square and some other streets, which was supposed to stop the flow of farewell and stop the murderous crush. The soldiers stood in dense rows. The front ranks experienced the main pressure, so the servicemen in them were constantly changed.

Funeral

Farewell to Stalin lasted from 4 pm on March 6 until his funeral on March 9. All these days the deceased lay in a coffin in his favorite grayish-green uniform. Above him burned chandeliers covered with funeral crepe. Citizens passed by the coffin in a continuous river, shedding tears. On the morning of March 9, about 2 tens of thousands of people in the mourning procession were lined up on Red Square. All of Moscow was buried in flowers.

In such a situation, Stalin's coffin was brought into the Mausoleum. After the mourning rally at 12:00, an artillery fireworks thundered over the Kremlin. Then 5 minutes of silence were announced. In front of the Mausoleum, detachments of the military marched, and Soviet planes flew in rows in the sky. So the country said goodbye to its leader. On the first day of this farewell alone, about 400 people were crushed.

The crush at Stalin's funeral still raises many questions, how many were killed, and why did this happen? Was it possible to avoid the tragedy, or was it intended? Lovers of mysticism say that Stalin could not leave without collecting another "harvest".

On March 6, 1953, in the morning it was announced on the radio that the leader of the world proletariat had died. For many, it was a shock. To some, Stalin seemed a terrible demon, to others he was a deity, but his death was a shock for both. People could not believe that he was no longer there.

In the USSR, mourning and farewell to the leader were declared. Factories, factories, all departments and shops, everything was closed due to mourning.

Entry to Moscow was banned, but people walked on foot in order to see Stalin with at least one eye. Someone wanted to make sure that the "mustachioed shoe polish" had passed away, someone sincerely grieved, and someone just walked, because everyone was walking.

Stalin's funeral: how many people died in a stampede?

Stalin's body was exhibited for parting in the Column Hall of the House of Unions on Pushkinskaya. All police squads, cadets and military units were urgently raised, but the organizers did not expect that there would be so many people wishing to say goodbye to the leader.

A dense ring of cadets and trucks was organized around Trubnaya Square, and this cordon was supposed to streamline and direct the flow of people in the right direction.

But the crowd is scary. The distraught people pushed and crushed each other, climbed over their heads, losing shoes and clothes along the way. The cadets pulled out the suffocating people right from the sides of the trucks, trying to save them. Having rested, some again rushed into the crowd to reach the House of Unions.

Thousands of people were looking for an exit to the blocked area, streams of people crossed, changed direction, fear, despair and panic forced them to persistently move forward, and many survivors now cannot explain what it was.

The crushed bodies were thrown onto a truck and taken away. Someone said that they were taken out of the city, and simply dumped into a common grave, and no one kept track of them. And now there is no official data how many died at Stalin's funeral in a stampede.

For many days after Stalin's funeral, people were looking for their relatives who did not return home. Most often they were in hospitals or morgues. Sometimes, it was possible to identify a person only by his clothes, but completely different reasons for death were indicated in the death certificate.

During the days of mourning in the country, there were many who died from heart attacks, strokes and nervous shocks. People were shocked to the core, and Stalin's death was the end of the world for them.

According to unofficial data, the stampede at Stalin's funeral carried away from 2 to 3 thousand people. These are terrible numbers also because no one counted people. At that time, the authorities were only thinking about who would take Stalin's place, and the people as such were not interested.

Photos from that time have survived to this day, but they do not reflect the scale of the tragedy. They show only the people who say goodbye to the father of nations, how the country is grieving, and how many wreaths the grateful people brought to their beloved leader.

More about Stalin's death

Farewell to the leader
The funeral of Iosif Vissarionovich Stalin, Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR and Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, who died on March 5, 1953, took place four days later, on March 9

Died March 5, 1953 Joseph Stalin... Thousands of people came to say goodbye to the leader, whose body was at first in the House of Unions, and then in the Mausoleum. What the newspapers wrote about and how the witnesses of the events remember the farewell days - in the Kommersant photo gallery. On this topic:

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Joseph Stalin, the leader of the Soviet people, died on the evening of March 5, 1953. The coffin with his remains was in the House of Unions for three days, and on March 9 it was moved to the Mausoleum. Between these two dates, hundreds of thousands of people passed by Stalin's body. Stalin ruled for so long that the country felt more like an orphan than liberated. The poet Tvardovsky called these days "the hour of the greatest sorrow." The grief and excitement at Stalin's funeral led to hundreds of [exact data classified] killed in a stampede en route to the Hall of Columns. Pravda newspaper March 6, 1953: Dear comrades and friends! The Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, with a feeling of great sorrow, inform the Party and all the working people of the Soviet Union that on March 5 at 9 o'clock. For 50 minutes in the evening, the heart of Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, a comrade-in-arms and genius successor to the cause of Lenin, the wise leader and teacher of the Communist Party and the Soviet people, stopped beating. The immortal name of Stalin will always live in the hearts of the Soviet people and all progressive mankind. "

2.

Resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR of March 6, 1953: “In order to perpetuate the memory of the great leaders Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, as well as prominent figures of the Communist Party and the Soviet state, buried in Red Square near the Kremlin wall, build a monumental building - the Pantheon - a monument to the eternal glory of the great people of the Soviet country. At the end of the construction of the Pantheon, transfer to it the sarcophagus with the body of V.I.Lenin and the sarcophagus with the body of I.V. Stalin, as well as the remains of prominent figures of the Communist Party and the Soviet state, buried at the Kremlin wall, and open access to the Pantheon for the broad masses of working people ". The Pantheon was planned to be built either on the site of the historic GUM, or on a wide highway from Moscow University to the Palace of Soviets, but they did not realize their plans. Stalin's remains were buried at the Kremlin wall.

3. Photo: Oleg Knorring

Stalin's death was marked by hundreds, if not thousands, of deaths in a stampede en route to the Hall of Columns. Poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko recalled how a young man found himself in this terrible crowd: “In some places on Trubnaya Square you had to raise your legs high - they walked over the meat.”

4.

Yuri Borko, born in 1929, student of the history department of Moscow State University: “I will refrain from telling how different people perceived Stalin's death, all this came to light later. And on March 6, the main and lasting impression of what he saw was the insanity of thousands and thousands of Muscovites who rushed into the streets to join the queue and see a dead man who, with more reason than Louis XIV himself, could say about himself: "The state is me ". "I" turned to dust, and this was perceived by millions of Soviet citizens almost as the collapse of the universe. I was shocked too. All my critical reflections, which had been accumulating over several years, seemed to be erased. "

5.

Newspaper "Komsomolskaya Pravda" March 7, 1953: "The gravest misfortune befell our country, our people. The towns and villages of the beloved Motherland were dressed in mourning. As soon as the message was broadcast on the radio that the coffin with the body of Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was installed in the Column Hall of the House of Unions, an uncontrollable stream of people rushed to the center from all parts of the capital, from its outskirts, from its outposts. People walked in groups alone, walked in families, holding hands, or with large garlands of flowers and very small modest wreaths. They walked in silence, sternly knitting their eyebrows, looking at the low-lowed flags with a black border hung on the gables of the buildings. Thousands of people were moving towards the House of Unions, but the silence reigned as if there was no such huge stream of people, merged in immeasurable and deepest sorrow. Everyone in those minutes understood: together it is easier. "

6.

Speech of Patriarch Alexy I on the day of the funeral: “Having gathered to pray for him, we cannot pass in silence through his always benevolent, sympathetic attitude to our church needs. The memory of him is unforgettable for us, and our Russian Orthodox Church, mourning his departure from us, sees him off on his last journey, "on the path of all the earth," with fervent prayer. We prayed for him when the news of his serious illness came. And now we pray for the peace of his immortal soul. We believe that our prayer for the deceased will be heard by the Lord. And to our beloved and unforgettable Joseph Vissarionovich, we prayerfully, with deep, ardent love proclaim eternal memory. "

7.

Maya Nusinova, born in 1927, school teacher: “Many people told later, and now there are as many memories as they were happy when they learned about Stalin's death, as they repeated: dead, dead. I don't know, I only remember the horror. As for the doctors, they said that the process would end with a public execution, and the rest of the Jews would be loaded into wagons, like kulaks once, and taken out, that the barracks were already ready somewhere in Siberia. There was a teacher in my school, her husband worked somewhere in the Central Committee, so after Timashuk's article she shouted in the teacher's room: think, the children of these nonhumans studied with ours! Yes, I thought that without Stalin this hatred would spill out, that only he could control it, and now they will start killing us. It was naive, of course, but so it seemed to me then. "

8.

Sergey Agadzhanyan, born in 1929, a student of Stankin: “We approached the coffin. I had a wild thought: I have never seen Stalin, but now I will. A few steps away. There were no members of the Politburo at that moment, only ordinary people. But even in the Hall of Columns, I did not notice the crying people. The people were frightened - by death, by the crowd - maybe they did not cry from fright? Fear mixed with curiosity, loss, but not melancholy, not mourning. "

9.

Oleg Basilashvili, born in 1934, a student at the Moscow Art Theater: “I lived on Pokrovka and went to study on foot - along Pokrovka, along Maroseyka, then along Teatralny Proezd, then along Pushkinskaya Street (B. Dmitrovka - ed.) , up the Kamergersky - and came to the Moscow Art Theater studio. In order to get into the studio, in those days I had to cross two lines that went to Stalin for days. Some major was standing there, and I showed him my student card, said that I should be let through, that I should go to the studio. But as a result, I joined the queue and very soon found myself in the Column Hall of the House of Unions. There was no guard of honor at the coffin, in any case, I did not pay attention. I was amazed that there was no particular mourning atmosphere in the hall. It was very light, very dusty, and there were a lot of wreaths along the walls. Stalin lay in a uniform with shiny buttons. His face, which was always so kind in the photographs, struck me as deadly evil. "

10.

The New York Times: “Moscow has begun to stir. Buses scurried back and forth. More and more mustard-colored convoy trucks could be seen on the streets. I was taken aback. It seemed to me that a coup was being prepared. "

11.

Elena Orlovskaya, born in 1940, schoolgirl: “At recess, everyone walked quietly too, and at the beginning of the second lesson the teacher came in, pointed her finger at one girl and me: and you go with me. We came to the assembly hall. On the right there are two windows, between them there is an opening, in the opening the generalissimo always hung, five meters high, in parade, in full growth, in a tunic. There is such a red step and the flowers are always alive. The teacher says: stand in the guard of honor. They walk around, run around, no one has lessons, then gradually everyone left, silence came, and we were standing in line with our hands at the seams. We stand for an hour - the clock opposite is hanging, we stand two ... I am overwhelmed with thoughts: what will I say at home? How do I confess to my dad that I was on the guard of honor? It was torture. "

12.

Lyudmila Dashevskaya, born in 1930, senior laboratory engineer at the Krasnaya Zvezda plant: “And as I was all wrinkled and beaten, I went out - just in time for Stoleshnikov Lane. And there was cleanliness, emptiness, and there were urns. And I was so emaciated that I sat down on one of these urns and rested. And I walked first along Stoleshnikov, then along Petrovka, then went out along Likhov Lane to Sadovoe. Silence, light was burning everywhere, like in a room, everything was lit. And what amazed me: all the posters (they used to be pasted on wooden boards) - all the posters were pasted over with white paper. Therefore, from time to time, these white spots were displayed on an empty street. And there was no one to the people. "

13.

The newspaper "Moskovsky Komsomolets" March 8, 1953: "The name of the great Stalin has been borne by the Moscow depot of the October railway for more than a quarter of a century. 26 years ago, Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin made a speech here at a meeting of workers. The funeral meeting begins. The workers listened with deep emotion to the appeal of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR to all party members, to all working people of the Soviet Union. The floor is given to the machinist Hero of Socialist Labor V. I. Vyshegradsev. He says:

He left us who was our father, teacher and friend, who, together with the great Lenin, created our mighty party, our socialist state, who showed us the path to communism. The great Stalin, the creator of our happiness, has died! "

14.

Andrey Zaliznyak, born in 1935, student of the Faculty of Philology of Moscow State University: “It became known that some distant acquaintances had died, mostly boys and girls. People died in many places, on Trubnaya it was the most terrible and on Dmitrovka too - there quite a lot of people were simply crushed against the walls. Any protrusion of the wall was enough ... corpses were lying almost all the way. My then friend turned out to be unusually dexterous, he was a heroic man, and he considered it his duty to be there without fail. He said that he managed to walk past Stalin's coffin three times - maybe he exaggerated his exploits a little. Then it became clear that it was a lethal number. "

15.

16.

Formally, Stalin was buried twice. The second time on the night of October 31 to November 1, 1961, at the Kremlin wall, covering the burial place with plywood shields. Red Square was cordoned off by the military all night. Stalin had already been exposed by the congress, and there were no people left in the country who did not understand what was happening.

17.

Former director of the Mausoleum laboratory, Professor Sergei Debov, on the autopsy of Stalin in a special gentle way, so that later it would be easier to preserve the embalmed body: “On the night of March 5-6, 1953, first of all, they made a cast of the hands and face. Then they proceeded to the autopsy and temporary embalming. There was a surprise. We never saw Stalin during his lifetime. In his portraits, he was always handsome, youthful. But it turned out that the face with severe pockmarks and age spots. They appear especially after death. It is impossible to put up such a face for farewell in the Hall of Columns. We did a great job removing the stains. But then, after installing the coffin, I had to mask everything with light. Otherwise, everything was as usual. We are always afraid of body contact with metal, especially copper. Therefore, everything for Stalin was made of gold - buttons, shoulder straps. The order stock was made of platinum. "