Who really betrayed the Young Guard. Liberation of Donbass
"Young Guard": but still young people were killed
The Central Archive of the FSB provided us with the opportunity to study Case No. 20056 - twenty-eight volumes of investigation materials on charges of policemen and German gendarmes in the massacre of the underground organization Young Guard, which operated in the Ukrainian city of Krasnodon in 1942. Recall that the novel "The Young Guard", which we have not re-read for a long time, tells in detail about these events. Writer Alexander Fadeev made a special trip to Krasnodon after his release and wrote an essay for Pravda, and then a book. With the same name.
Oleg Koshevoy, Ivan Zemnukhov, Ulyana Gromova, Sergei Tyulenin and Lyubov Shevtsova were immediately awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
After that, not only the dead, but even the surviving "Young Guards" no longer belonged to themselves, but to Fadeev. In 1951, at the insistence of the Central Committee, he introduced communist mentors into his book. Immediately and in life, kilometers of dissertations were written about their role in leading the Krasnodon youth underground. And not a writer from eyewitnesses, but real participants in the events began to ask the writer: what was the Young Guard really doing? Who led it? Who betrayed her? Fadeev replied: "I wrote a novel, not a story."
The investigation was in hot pursuit, when not all the witnesses and defendants had time to read the novel, which quickly became a classic. This means that in their memory and testimony, the well-known book underground heroes have not yet had time to replace completely real boys and girls executed by the Krasnodon police. So, having read the facts, the author found ...
One of the leaflets of the "Young Guard"
"Young Guard" was invented twice. First, in the Krasnodon police. Then Alexander Fadeev. Before a criminal case was initiated on the fact of the theft of New Year's gifts at the local bazaar, there was no SUCH underground youth organization that we know about since childhood in Krasnodon.
Or was it anyway? So, facts.
From the case file No. 20056: Valya Borts:“I joined the Young Guard through my school friend Seryozha Safonov, who introduced me to Sergei Tyulenin in August 1942. Then the organization was small and was called the Hammer detachment. I took an oath. The commander was Viktor Tretyakevich, the commissar was Oleg Koshevoy, and the staff members were Ivan Zemnukhov, Sergei Tyulenin and Ulyana Gromova. Later, the headquarters was increased by Lyuba Shevtsova.
Korostylev, engineer of the Krasnougol trust:“Somehow, at the beginning of October 1942, I handed over a radio receiver to the Young Guards. The reports they wrote down were multiplied, and then spread throughout the city.
Valya Borts:“... On November 7, red flags were hung on the buildings of the coal directorate and the club of mine No. 5-bis. The labor exchange was burned down, which contained lists of Soviet citizens to be deported to Germany. Shevtsov, Lukyanchenko and Tyulenin set fire to the labor exchange.
The building of the Krasnodon police, where prisoners were kept
All, perhaps. Of course, it is not for us to judge whether this is a lot or a little when it comes to life and death, but even the gendarmes and police officers who were involved in Case No. 20056, only three years after the Krasnodon events, remembered the Young Guard with difficulty. They were never able to say how many people it consisted of, and what she really did. At first, they did not even understand why, out of all that they managed to do during the war, the investigation was interested in this particular short episode with teenagers.
In fact, only twenty-five gendarmes were left to support the Ordnung of the Germans for the entire region. Then they sent five more. They were led by a fifty-year-old German - the head of the gendarmerie Renatus, a member of the NSDAP since 1933. And for thirty Germans in the area there were four hundred policemen. And the competition for a place in the police was such that they took only on the recommendation.
“On the facts of the arson of the labor exchange and the hanging of flags,” the police reported the next day: eight people were arrested. The head of the gendarmerie, without hesitation, ordered everyone to be shot.
In the File there is a mention of only one victim of police reporting - the daughter of the collective farm manager Kaseev, who confessed to flying flags. It is absolutely known that Kaseyeva was never a “Young Guard” and does not appear on the lists of heroes.
The "guilty" of posting leaflets was also found immediately. The wife of an engineer of the coal directorate was just solving family problems. And in order to get rid of her husband, she reported to the police: here one engineer maintains contact with the partisans. The “sticker” was miraculously saved by a neighbor in the yard, burgomaster Statsenko.
Alexander Fadeev's novel "The Young Guard"
Where did the myth of a huge, ramified underground organization posing a terrible threat to the Germans come from?
On the night of December 25-26, 1942, a German car was robbed near the building of the Krasnodon district government, in which there were mail and New Year's gifts for German soldiers and officers. The driver of the car reported this to the Krasnodon gendarmerie.
The head of the Krasnodon police, Solikovsky, gathered all the policemen, showed a pack of cigarettes of the same brand as those stolen, ordered them to immediately go to the local market and deliver to the police everyone who would sell such cigarettes.
Soon, the interpreter Burgart and a German in civilian clothes walking with him through the bazaar managed to detain twelve-year-old Alexander Grinev (aka Puzyrev). The boy admitted that Yevgeny Moshkov gave him cigarettes. Eight boxes of cigarettes and cookies were found in Moshkov's apartment. So the head of the club Moshkov, the head of the string circle Tretyakevich and some others were arrested.
And then they took Olga Lyadskaya. In fact, she was arrested quite by accident. They came to Tosya Mashchenko in search of the “robber” Valya Borts, who by that time was already walking towards the front line. The policeman liked Tosya's tablecloth and decided to take it with him. Under the tablecloth lay Lyadskaya's unsent letter to her friend Fyodor Izvarin. She wrote that she did not want to go to Germany in "SLAVERY". That's right: in quotation marks and capital letters.
Olga Lyadskaya (center) was also called a traitor, although she could not betray anyone
Investigator Zakharov promised to hang Lyadskaya in the bazaar for her capital letters in quotation marks, if he did not immediately name others who were dissatisfied with the new order. She asked: who is already in the police? The investigator cheated and named Tosya Mashchenko, who had been released by that time. Then Lyadskaya showed that Mashchenko was unreliable.
The investigator did not expect more. But Lyadskaya fell for the hook and named a couple more names - those whom she remembered from her active Komsomol work even before the war, who had nothing to do with the Young Guard.
From the materials of case No. 20056: Lyadskaya:“I named the people whom I suspected of partisan activity: Kozyrev, Tretyakevich, Nikolaenko, because they once asked me if we had partisans on the farm and if I helped them. And after Solikovsky threatened to beat me, I betrayed Mashchenko's girlfriend - Borts ... ". And eighty others. Even according to the post-war lists, the organization consisted of about seventy ...
For a long time, in addition to Lyadskaya, the “Young Guard” Pocheptsov was considered an “official” traitor. Indeed, investigator Cherenkov recalls that Gennady Pocheptsov, the nephew of the former head of the Krasnodon police, handed over the group in the village of Pervomaisky to Solikovsky and Zakharov in writing. And he issued the MG headquarters in this order: Tretyakevich (chief), Lukashev, Zemnukhov, Safonov and Koshevoy. He also named the commander of his "five" - Popov.
Delivered to the police, Tosya Mashchenko admitted that she was distributing leaflets. And she betrayed Tretyakevich, who had been extradited for the third time since the New Year. Tretyakevich betrayed Shevtsova and began to call the “Young Guards” entire villages.
Sergei Tyulenin is one of the most reckless "Young Guard"
The circle of suspects expanded so much that the chief Solikovsky managed to get even the son of the burgomaster Statsenko into the police. And, judging by the post-war testimony of the pope, Zhora told everything he knew about his friends whispering behind his back. His father rescued him, as an engineer arrested "for leaflets" before. By the way, he also came running and reported that Oleg Koshevoy was illegally listening to the radio in his apartment.
Indeed, the “Young Guard” Gennady Pocheptsov, who after the war was made “the official traitor of the Young Guard”, gave out on his own initiative. But he no longer told Solikovsky anything new.
The documents mention the Chinese Yakov Ka-Fu as a traitor to the Young Guard. Investigator Zakharov told investigator Orlov already in Italy, at the very end of the war, that this Chinese had betrayed the organization. The post-war investigation was able to establish only one thing: Yakov could be offended by the Soviet authorities, because before the war he was fired from his job because of his poor knowledge of the Russian language.
Imagine how the offended Chinese Ka-Fu handed over an underground organization. How he answered in detail the questions of the investigators - probably on the fingers. It is strange that if not all of China, then at least the entire Krasnodon district of Shanghai did not appear on the lists of the “Young Guards”.
For decades there has been a debate about how the real story of the Young Guard differs from Fadeev's. It turns out that the argument is pointless. Case No. 20056 - that in the book it was not life that was embellished, but a myth already created before the writer. At first, the exploits of the youth underground were multiplied by the Krasnodon police itself.
Viktor Tretyakevich was first considered a traitor
For what? Let's not forget that the Krasnodon policemen did not fall from the moon and did not come from the Third Reich. For a report to the authorities, revealing an ordinary robbery is much less significant than an entire underground organization. And having opened it, it was not difficult for the former Soviets to believe in it. For the former Soviet - from both sides of the front.
But all this was only the prehistory of the Young Guard. The story only begins now.
From the case file No. 20056: Maria Borts:“... When I entered the office, Solikovsky was sitting at the table. In front of him lay a set of lashes: thick, thin, wide, lead-tipped straps. Vanya Zemnukhov, mutilated beyond recognition, stood by the sofa. His eyes were red, the eyelids were very inflamed. There are bruises and bruises on the face. All of Vanya's clothes were covered in blood, the shirt on his back was stuck to his body, and blood was seeping through it.
Nina Zemnukhova:“From a resident of Krasnodon Lensky Rafail Vasilievich, who was kept with Vanya in the same cell, I learned that the executioners took Vanya naked to the police yard and beat him unconscious in the snow.
Zhenya Moshkov was taken to the Kamenka River, frozen in an ice-hole and then thawed in a nearby hut in the stove, after which they were again taken to the police for interrogation ... Volodya Osmukhin was broken a bone in his arm and every time during interrogation his broken arm was twisted ... ".
Ulyana Gromova
Tyulenina (mother of Sergei):“On the third day after my arrest, I was summoned for interrogation, where Serezha was. Solikovsky, Zakharov and Cherenkov forced me to strip naked, and then beat me with whips until I lost consciousness. And when I woke up, in my presence they began to burn through the wound of Serezha's right hand with a red-hot rod. The fingers were placed under the doors and clamped until completely dead. Needles were driven under the nails and hung on ropes. The air in the torture room was filled with the smell of burnt meat. ... In the cells, police officer Avsetsin did not give us water for days at a time in order to at least slightly moisten the blood that was caked in the mouth and throat.”
Cherenkov (police investigator): “I held a confrontation between Gromova, Ivanikhina and Zemnukhov. At that moment, Solikovsky entered the office with his wife. Having laid Gromova and Ivanikhina on the floor, I began to beat them. Solikovsky, encouraged by his wife, snatched the whip from my hands and began to deal with the arrested himself. ... Since the cells of the prison were filled with young people, many, like Olga Ivantsova's mother, simply lay in the corridor.
Maria Borts:“...Solikovsky, Zakharov, Davidenko forced the girls to strip naked, and then they began to mock them, accompanied by beatings. Sometimes this was done in the presence of Solikovsky's wife, who usually sat on the sofa and burst into laughter. ... Ulya Gromova was hung up by her braids ... They trampled on her chest with boots. ... Police officer Bautkin beat Popov with a whip and forced him to lick the blood that had splashed onto the wall with his tongue.
Uli Gromova's suicide note
In 1948, Sergei Gerasimov was filming his film The Young Guard. The whole city gathered to shoot the scene of the execution of underground workers near the mine. And Krasnodon roared so loudly when the first actor who played Oleg Koshevoy, Alexander Ivanov, went to the pit ... It is unlikely that, knowing that Koshevoy was not shot near the mine, they would have sobbed less.
The decision to execute at mine No. 5 bis was made by the chief of police, Solikovsky, and burgomaster Statsenko. The place was checked, the Krasnodonites were already shot there.
According to the Case, the “Young Guards” were taken out to be executed in four steps. For the first time, on January 13, there were thirteen girls on a truck, with six Jews hooked up to them. First they shot and threw Jews into the pit of mine No. 5 bis. And then the girls started screaming that they were not guilty of anything. The police began to lift and tie the girls' dresses over their heads. And some were thrown into the mine alive.
The next day, sixteen more people, including Moshkov and Popov, were taken to the mine on three wagons.
Tretyakevich was thrown into the mine alive, because he managed to grab police investigator Zakharov and tried to drag him along. So decide for yourself what Viktor Tretyakevich really was, about whom not a single writer wrote a single line for twenty years after his execution.
Place of execution of the "Young Guards"
For the third time, on January 15, seven girls and five boys were taken out on two carts. And for the last time, in early February, Tyulenin and four others were taken out on the same cart. Then the execution almost failed. Kovalev and Grigorenko managed to untie each other's hands. Grigorenko was killed by translator Burgart, and Kovalev was only wounded - then they found his coat pierced by a bullet. The rest were hastily shot and thrown into the mine.
For almost a week, Oleg Koshevoy hid from persecution in farms, dressed in a woman's dress. Then he lay down for three days - under the bed in the apartment of a relative. Koshevoy thought that the Krasnodon police were looking for him as a commissar of the Young Guard. In fact, he was caught as a participant in a robbery of a car with New Year's gifts. And they took it for neither one nor the other - simply because in the front-line zone then they grabbed and searched all young people ...
The look of the gray-haired boy Oleg Koshevoy was remembered by the executioners forever
... Koshevoy was taken to the Rovno district gendarmerie to the investigator Orlov. Oleg knew: this is the same Ivan Orlov, who once summoned for interrogation and raped a teacher. And the Germans even had to "go to meet the population" and remove Orlov from Krasnodon here, in Rovenki.
Koshevoy shouted to Orlov: I am an underground commissar! But the investigator did not listen to the “Young Guard”: they say, can real partisans pretend to be so stupid? But the young man irritated the investigator so much that during the six days of interrogation Oleg turned gray.
About how Koshevoy was dying, the Germans from the firing squad testified. They hardly remembered how, during breakfast, the head of the gendarmerie, Fromme, came into the dining room and said: hurry up, there is work. As usual, the prisoners were taken to the forest, divided into two parties, and placed facing the pits...
But they clearly remembered that one gray-haired boy, after a volley, did not fall into the pit, but remained lying on the edge. He turned his head and just looked in their direction. The gendarme Drevitz could not stand it, came up and shot him in the back of the head with a rifle ...
For the Germans, neither the name of Oleg Koshevoy nor the Young Guard existed. But even a few years after the war, they did not forget the look of a gray-haired boy lying on the edge of the pit ...
After the liberation of Krasnodon, on March 1, 1943, forty-nine corpses of the dead were stacked in coffins and transported to the park. Komsomol. It was snowing, immediately turning to mud. The funeral went on from morning until late in the evening...
Monument to the "Young Guards" in Krasnodon
In 1949, Lyadskaya asked to be given the opportunity to independently complete the 10th grade program, because she had been in prison since the age of seventeen. Olga Lyadskaya was rehabilitated in the mid-nineties on the grounds that she was not a member of the Young Guard youth Komsomol organization, which means she could not extradite her.
In 1960, Viktor Tretyakevich was included in the lists of the "Young Guard" and awarded the Order of the Patriotic War, I degree, posthumously ...
The editors express their gratitude to the leadership of the CA FSB.
Eric SCHUR, "Top Secret"
"B E S S M E R T I E"Alexander Fadeev September 15, 1943
“I, joining the ranks of the Young Guard, in the face of my friends in arms, in the face of my native, long-suffering land, in the face of all the people, solemnly swear: to unquestioningly carry out any task given to me by a senior comrade; to keep in the deepest secrecy everything that concerns my work in the "Young Guard"!
I swear to avenge mercilessly for the burned, devastated cities and villages, for the blood of our people, for the martyrdom of thirty miners-heroes. And if this revenge requires my life, I will give it without a moment's hesitation.
If I break this sacred oath under torture or because of cowardice, then may my name, my family be forever damned, and I myself will be punished by the harsh hand of my comrades.
This oath of allegiance to the Motherland and the struggle to the last breath for its liberation from the Nazi invaders was given by members of the underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard" in the city of Krasnodon, Voroshilovgrad region. They gave it in the autumn of 1942, standing opposite each other in a small hillock, when the piercing autumn wind howled over the enslaved and devastated land of Donbass. The small town lay lurking in the darkness, Nazis stood in the miners' houses, only corrupt skins-policemen and shoulder cases from the Gestapo ransacked the apartments of citizens on this dark night and committed atrocities in their dungeons.
The eldest of those who took the oath was nineteen years old, and the main organizer and inspirer Oleg Koshevoy was sixteen.
The open Donetsk steppe is harsh and unwelcome, especially in late autumn or winter, under a freezing wind, when the black earth freezes into clods. But this is our native Soviet land, inhabited by a mighty and glorious coal tribe, giving energy, light and warmth to our great Motherland. For the freedom of this land in the civil war fought its best sons, led by Klim Voroshilov and Alexander Parkhomenko. It gave birth to the wonderful Stakhanovite movement. The Soviet man penetrated deeply into the bowels of the Donetsk land, and powerful factories grew over its unpleasant face - the pride of our technical thought, socialist cities flooded with light, our schools, clubs, theaters, where the great Soviet man flourished and revealed in all his spiritual strength. And this land was trampled by the enemy. He walked along it like a tornado, like a plague, plunging cities into darkness, turning schools, hospitals, clubs, nurseries into barracks for soldiers, into stables, into Gestapo dungeons.
Fire, rope, bullet and ax - these terrible instruments of death became constant companions of the life of the Soviet people. Soviet people were doomed to torment, unthinkable from the point of view of the human mind and conscience. Suffice it to say that in the city park of the city of Krasnodon, the Nazis buried thirty miners alive in the ground for refusing to appear for registration at the "labor exchange". When the city was liberated by the Red Army and began to tear off the dead, they stood in the ground: first their heads were exposed, then their shoulders, torsos, arms.
Innocent people were forced to leave their native places, to hide. Families collapsed. “I said goodbye to my dad, and tears flowed from my eyes,” says Valya Borts, a member of the Young Guard organization. “Some unknown voice seemed to whisper:“ You see him for the last time. ”He went, and I stood until he was out of sight. Today this man still had a family, a corner, an orphanage, children, and now he, like a stray dog, must wander. And how many were tortured, shot!"
Young people who evaded registration by all means were seized by force and driven to slave labor in Germany. Truly heartbreaking scenes could be seen these days on the streets of the town. The rude shouts and abuse of the policemen merged with the sobbing of fathers and mothers, from whom their daughters and sons were forcibly torn off.
And the enemy sought to corrupt the soul of the Soviet people with a terrible poison of lies, spread by vile fascist newspapers and leaflets about the fall of Moscow and Leningrad, about the death of the Soviet system.
It was our youth - the same one that is growing up, brought up in the Soviet school, by pioneer detachments, by Komsomol organizations. The enemy sought to destroy in her the spirit of freedom, the joy of creativity and work, instilled in the Soviet system. And in response to this, the young Soviet man proudly raised his head.
Free Soviet song! She became related to the Soviet youth, she always rings in her soul.
“Once Volodya and I were going to Sverdlovka to see my grandfather. It was quite warm. Airplanes were flying over our heads. We were going through the steppe. There was no one around.
I know where our troops are.
He started telling me the story. I rushed to Volodya and began to hug him.
These simple lines of memoirs of Volodya Osmukhin's sister cannot be read without emotion. The direct leaders of the "Young Guard" were Koshevoy Oleg Vasilyevich, born in 1926, a member of the Komsomol since 1940, Zemnukhov Ivan Aleksandrovich, born in 1923, a member of the Komsomol since 1941. Soon, the patriots attracted new members of the organization to their ranks - Ivan Turkenich, Stepan Safonov, Lyuba Shevtsova, Uliana Gromova, Anatoly Popov, Nikolai Sumsky, Volodya Osmukhin, Valya Borts and others. Oleg Koshevoy was elected Commissioner. The headquarters commander approved Ivan Vasilyevich Turkenich, a member of the Komsomol since 1940.
And this youth, who did not know the old system and, naturally, did not go through the experience of the underground, for several months disrupts all the activities of the fascist enslavers and inspires the population of the city of Krasnodon and the surrounding villages - Izvarin, Pervomayka, Semeykina, where branches of the organization are being created, to resist the enemy. The organization grows to seventy people, then it has over a hundred - the children of miners, peasants and employees.
The "Young Guard" distributes leaflets in hundreds and thousands - in the markets, in the cinema, in the club. Leaflets are found on the police building, even in the pockets of the police. The "Young Guard" installs four radio receivers and daily informs the population about the reports of the Information Bureau.
Under the conditions of the underground, new members are admitted to the ranks of the Komsomol, temporary certificates are issued, and membership fees are accepted. As the Soviet troops approached, an armed uprising was being prepared and arms were obtained in a variety of ways.
At the same time, strike groups are carrying out sabotage and terrorist acts.
On the night of November 7-8, Ivan Turkenich's group hanged two policemen. Posters were left on the chests of the hanged men: "Such a fate awaits every corrupt dog."
On November 9, a group of Anatoly Popov on the road Gundorovka - Gerasimovka destroys a passenger car with three top Nazi officers.
On November 15, Viktor Petrov's group liberates 75 soldiers and commanders of the Red Army from the concentration camp in the Volchansk farm.
In early December, Moshkov's group on the road Krasnodon - Sverdlovsk burns three motor vehicles with gasoline.
A few days after this operation, Tyulenin's group commits an armed attack on the Krasnodon-Rovenki road against the guards, who were driving 500 heads of cattle taken from the inhabitants. Destroys the guards, drives the cattle across the steppe.
Members of the "Young Guard", who, on the instructions of the headquarters, have settled in occupational institutions and enterprises, by skillful maneuvers hinder their work. Sergey Levashov, working as a driver in a garage, disables three cars one after another. Yuri Vytsenovsky arranges several accidents at the mine.
On the night of December 5-6, a brave trio of young guards - Lyuba Shevtsova, Sergey Tyulenin and Viktor Lukyanchenko - carry out a brilliant operation to set fire to the labor exchange. By destroying the labor exchange with all the documents, the Young Guards saved several thousand Soviet people from being deported to Nazi Germany.
On the night of November 6-7, members of the organization hang red flags on the buildings of the school, the former district consumer union, the hospital and on the highest tree in the city park. “When I saw the flag at the school,” says M.A. Litvinova, a resident of the city of Krasnodon, “an involuntary joy, pride seized me. I woke up the children and quickly ran across the road to Mukhina. I found her standing in her underwear on the windowsill, tears crawled in streams on her thin cheeks. She said: “Marya Alekseevna, this was done for us Soviet people. We are remembered, we are not forgotten by ours."
The organization was uncovered by the police because it recruited too many young people into its ranks, including some less resilient people. But during the terrible tortures to which the members of the "Young Guard" were subjected by brutal enemies, the moral image of young patriots was revealed with unprecedented force, an image of such spiritual beauty that it will inspire many more generations to come.
Oleg Koshevoy. Despite his youth, this is a great organizer. Dreaminess was combined in him with exceptional practicality and efficiency. He was the inspirer and initiator of a number of heroic events. Tall, broad-shouldered, he breathed strength and health all over, and more than once he himself was a participant in bold sorties against the enemy. When arrested, he infuriated the Gestapo with unshakable contempt for them. They burned him with a red-hot iron, launched needles into his body, but stamina and will did not leave him. After each interrogation, gray strands appeared in his hair. He went to the execution completely gray-haired.
Ivan Zemnukhov is one of the most educated, well-read members of the "Young Guard", the author of a number of wonderful leaflets. Outwardly clumsy, but strong in spirit, he enjoyed universal love and authority. He was famous as an orator, loved poetry and wrote them himself (as did Oleg Koshevoy and many other members of the Young Guard, by the way). Ivan Zemnukhov was subjected to the most brutal tortures and tortures in the dungeons. He was hung in a loop through a special block to the ceiling, poured with water when he lost consciousness, and hung again. Three times a day they were beaten with whips made of electric wires. The police stubbornly sought evidence from him, but achieved nothing. On January 15, together with other comrades, he was thrown into the pit of mine No. 5.
Sergei Tyulenin. This is a small, mobile, impetuous teenage boy, quick-tempered, with a perky character, bold to the point of desperation. He participated in many of the most desperate enterprises and personally destroyed many enemies. "He was a man of action," his surviving comrades characterize him.
Sergei Tyulenin was not only subjected to cruel torture himself, his old mother was tortured in his presence. But like his comrades, Sergei Tyulenin was steadfast to the end.
Here is how Maria Andreevna Borts, a teacher from Krasnodon, characterizes the fourth member of the Young Guard headquarters - Ulyana Gromova: "She was a tall girl, a slender brunette with curly hair and beautiful features. Her black, piercing eyes were striking in their seriousness and intelligence .. "She was a serious, intelligent, intelligent and developed girl. She did not get excited, like others, and did not curse the torturers ... "They think to keep their power through terror," she said. - Foolish people! Can the wheel of history be turned back...
The girls asked her to read The Demon. She said: "With pleasure! I love The Demon. What a wonderful work it is! Just think, he rebelled against God himself!" The cell became completely dark. She began to read in a pleasant, melodious voice... Suddenly a wild cry pierced the stillness of the evening twilight. Gromova stopped reading and said: "It's starting!" The moans and screams got louder and louder. There was deathly silence in the chamber. This went on for several minutes. Gromova, turning to us, read in a firm voice:
Sons of the snows, sons of the Slavs.
Why did you lose courage?
What for? Your tyrant will die
How all tyrants died.
Ulyana Gromova was subjected to inhuman torture. They hung her by her hair, carved a five-pointed star on her back, burned her body with a red-hot iron and sprinkled salt on her wounds, and put her on a red-hot stove. But even before her death, she did not lose heart and, using the Young Guard cipher, tapped out encouraging words to her friends through the walls: “Guys!
Her friend Lyubov Shevtsova, on the instructions of the headquarters, worked as a scout. She established contact with the underground workers of Voroshilovgrad and visited this city several times a month, showing exceptional resourcefulness and courage. Dressed in the best dress, portraying a "hater" of Soviet power, the daughter of a major industrialist, she penetrated the environment of enemy officers and stole important documents. Shevtsova was tortured the longest. Having achieved nothing, the city police sent her to the county gendarmerie department of Rovenek. There they drove needles under her nails, carved a star on her back. A person of exceptional cheerfulness and fortitude, she, returning to the cell after the torment, sang songs in spite of the executioners. Once, during the torture, when she heard the noise of a Soviet aircraft, she suddenly laughed and said: "Our voice is being raised."
So, keeping their oath to the end, most of the members of the Young Guard organization died, only a few people survived. With the favorite song of Vladimir Ilyich "Tormented by heavy bondage" they went to the execution.
The "Young Guard" is not a single exceptional phenomenon in the territory seized by the fascist invaders. Everywhere and everywhere the proud Soviet man is fighting. And although the members of the Young Guard militant organization died in the struggle, they are immortal, because their spiritual features are the features of the new Soviet man, the features of the people of the country of socialism.
Eternal memory and glory to the young Young Guards - the heroic sons of the immortal Soviet people!
IMMORTAL FEAT OF KOMSOMOL MEMBERS-UNDERGROUND WORKERS
"Komsomolskaya Pravda" from 24.IX. 1943
On July 20, 1942, the city of Krasnodon, Voroshilovgrad region, was occupied by Nazi troops. From the very first day of the occupation, the Nazi scoundrels began to introduce their "new order" in the city. With cold German cruelty and frenzy, they killed and tortured innocent Soviet people, drove young people to hard labor, carried out wholesale robberies.
The orders of the German command, which covered all the fences and walls of buildings, threatened the death penalty for the slightest disobedience. For evasion of registration - execution, for failure to appear at the labor exchange, which was in charge of sending slaves to Germany - a noose, for appearing in the evening hours on the street - execution on the spot. Life has become an unbearable torture, the city seems to have died out, as if a terrible pestilence broke into its wide streets, into its bright houses.
In early August, the Germans began to commit even more atrocities. Once they herded the population into the city park and staged a public execution of 30 miners who refused to appear for registration. The invaders buried the miners alive in the ground and looked with pleasure at the death throes of innocent victims.
These days, in the difficult conditions of the occupation in Krasnodon, an underground Komsomol organization arose. The sons and daughters of the famous Donetsk miners, brought up by the great Motherland, brought up by the Bolshevik Party, rose to the deadly struggle against the fierce enemy. The organizers and leaders of the underground cell were Komsomol members Oleg Koshevoy, Ivan Zemnukhov, Sergei Tyuleniy, Ulyana Gromova, Lyuba Shevtsova, Ivan Turkenich. The oldest of them was barely 19 years old.
Young patriots, fearless fighters with self-forgetfulness give themselves up to the sacred struggle against the Germans, involve new members of the organization in their ranks: Stepan Safonov, Anatoly Popov, Nikolai Sumsky, Volodya Osmukhin, Valeria Borts and many other brave and selfless young men and women.
In early September, the first meeting of young underground workers took place at the apartment of Oleg Koshevoy. At the suggestion of Sergei Tyulenin, they decided to call the organization "Young Guard". At the meeting, a headquarters was created consisting of Oleg Koshevoy, Ivan Zemnukhov, Ivan Turkenich and Sergei Tyulenin (later Lyubov Shevtsova and Ulyana Gromova also joined the headquarters), which was entrusted with all the leadership of the military and political activities of the underground. The meeting unanimously elected Oleg Koshevoy as the secretary of the Komsomol organization. He also became the commissioner of the "Young Guard".
The young underground workers of Krasnodon set their goals and objectives:
To strengthen the people's confidence in the inevitable defeat of the Nazi invaders;
Raise the youth and the entire population of the Krasnodon region to an active struggle against the German invaders;
Provide yourself with weapons and at a convenient moment go over to open armed struggle.
After the first meeting, the Young Guards began to act even more energetically, even more persistently. They create the simplest printing house, mount radios, establish contacts with young people, raising them to fight against the German invaders. In September, the underground organization already had 30 members in its ranks. The headquarters decides to break all the members of the organization into fives. The most courageous and resolute comrades were placed at the head of the fives. To communicate with the headquarters, each five had a liaison.
A little time passed, and the "Young Guard" establishes close contact with the youth of the surrounding villages - Izvarino, Pervomayka, Semeykino. On behalf of the headquarters, members of the organization Anatoly Popov, Nikolai Sumskoy, Ulyana Gromova create separate underground groups here, establish contact with the farms of Gundorovka, Gerasimovka, Talovoye. Thus, the "Young Guard" extended its influence to the entire Krasnodon region. Despite the cruel, bloody terror of the Germans, the leaders and activists of the "Young Guard" created an extensive network of combat groups and cells that united over 100 young Soviet patriots.
Everyone joining the "Young Guard" took an oath of allegiance to the Motherland.
The surviving member of the "Young Guard" Radiy Yurkin recalls this solemn moment in such a way;
“In the evening, we gathered at Victor’s apartment. There was no one else at home except him - father and mother left for the village to get bread.
Oleg Koshevoy lined up all those gathered and addressed us with a short speech. He spoke about the fighting traditions of the Donbass, about the heroic deeds of the Donbass regiments led by Kliment Voroshilov and Alexander Parkhomenko, about the duty and honor of a Komsomol member. His words sounded softly, but firmly, and they took the heart so much that everyone was ready to go into fire and into water.
With mother's milk, we absorbed the love of freedom, fortunately, and the Germans will never put us on our knees, - said Koshevoy. - We will fight as our fathers and grandfathers fought - to the last drop of blood, to the last breath. We will go to torment and death, but with honor we will fulfill our duty to the Fatherland.
Then he called out one by one to take the oath. When Oleg called my last name, I was even more excited. I took two steps forward, turned to face my comrades and stood at attention. Koshevoy in an undertone, but very clearly, began to read the text of the oath. I repeated after him.
Oleg approached me, congratulated me on behalf of the headquarters on taking the oath and said:
From now on, your life, Radiy, belongs to the "Young Guard", its cause."
In the merciless struggle against the German occupiers, the ranks of the "Young Guard" grew and hardened. Each member of the Young Guard considered it an honor to join the Komsomol and carry a small booklet printed in an underground printing house and replacing the Komsomol ticket for the duration of the Patriotic War. In their statements, young men and women wrote: "I ask you to become a member of the Komsomol. I will honestly carry out any tasks of the organization, and if necessary, I will give my life for the cause of the people, for the cause of the great party of Lenin-Stalin."
These mean and simple words, like a drop of water, reflect all the noble qualities of our youth.
From the first day of its existence, the "Young Guard" has been carrying out tremendous political work among the youth and the entire population, exposing the false German propaganda, instilling in the people confidence in the victory of the Red Army, raising them to fight the Germans, to disrupt and sabotage the measures of the fascist authorities.
The Young Guards, having installed radio receivers, inform the population of the city and the region every day about all the events at the front, in the Soviet rear, and abroad.
With the beginning of the offensive of the Soviet troops in the Stalingrad region, the propaganda work of the "Young Guard" intensified even more. Almost daily, leaflets appear on fences, houses, poles, telling about the offensive of the Soviet troops, calling on the population to actively help our advancing regiments.
For 6 months, "Young Guard" in only one city issued more than 30 titles of leaflets, with a circulation of over 5,000 copies.
All members of the underground organization took part in the distribution of leaflets. At the same time, the Young Guards showed a lot of initiative, cunning and dexterity.
Oleg Koshevoy put on a police uniform at night and distributed leaflets among the population. On market days, Vasya Pirozhok managed to stick small posters on the backs of police officers with brief inscriptions: "Down with the German occupiers!", "Death to corrupt skins!" Semyon Ostapenko pasted leaflets on the car of the manager of the directorate, on the buildings of the police, gendarmerie and city government.
Sergei Tyulenin "patronized" the cinema. He invariably appeared in the hall just before the beginning of the session. At that moment, when the mechanic turned off the lights in the hall, Sergei scattered leaflets among the public.
Fiery Bolshevik proclamations passed from house to house, from hand to hand. They were read to holes, their content on the same day became the property of the whole city. Many of the leaflets went beyond Krasnodon to the Sverdlovsky, Rovenkovsky, Novosvetlovsky districts.
The 25th anniversary of the October Socialist Revolution was approaching. The "Young Guard" decided to adequately celebrate the national Soviet holiday and began to actively prepare for it. Members of the organization collected money and gifts for the families of commanders and soldiers of the Red Army, and prepared food packages for distribution to imprisoned communists. The headquarters made a decision: on the day of the holiday, hang out red flags in the city.
On the night of November 6-7, the Young Guards hoisted red banners at the school. Voroshilov, at the 1-bis mine, on the building of the former district consumer union, on the hospital and on the tallest tree in the city park. Slogans were posted everywhere: "Congratulations on the 25th anniversary of October, comrades!", "Death to the German occupiers!"
On a gloomy November morning, the inhabitants of the city saw on the tallest buildings the red banners dear to their hearts. It seemed that the clear sun had risen in the middle of the night - this picture was so majestic and exciting. People could not believe their eyes and looked again and again at the banners fluttering in the wind.
The news of the flags was passed from mouth to mouth, from village to village, from farm to farm, raising the spirit of the population, inciting hatred for the German invaders.
Policemen, gendarmes, detectives of the Gestapo, like mad, rushed about the streets, but it was already too late. The banners could be torn down, hidden, but no force could kill the joyful excitement and pride that inevitably flared up in the hearts of the Soviet people.
Comrade Stalin's report on the 25th anniversary of the October Socialist Revolution and his order of November 7, 1942, inspired the young underground workers to new exploits, to intensify the struggle against the Nazis. Each Young Guard vowed to deliver even more tangible blows to the enemy, to fulfill the leader's historic order to the end. Underground combat groups destroy staff vehicles with German officers, kill soldiers, traitors to the motherland, police officers, commit acts of sabotage at enterprises, and steal weapons.
By the beginning of December, the Young Guards had at their disposal 15 machine guns, 80 rifles, 300 grenades, 15,000 rounds of ammunition, 10 pistols, 65 kg of explosives, and several hundred meters of Fickford cord.
Members of the "Young Guard" in every possible way disrupted the events that the Germans tried to carry out. When the Nazis began intensive preparations for the export of grain to Germany, the headquarters made a bold decision - not to give the Germans grain. The Young Guards burn huge stacks of bread, and the already threshed grain is infected with a tick.
A few days after this operation, Tyulenin's group makes an armed attack on the German guards on the Krasnodon-Rovenki road, which drove 500 heads of cattle taken from the inhabitants. In a short fight, the young patriots destroyed the guards, and drove the cattle into the steppe.
Members of the "Young Guard", who, on the instructions of the headquarters, have settled in German institutions and enterprises, by skillful maneuvers in every possible way frustrate their plans. Sergey Levashov, working as a driver in a garage, disables 3 cars one after another; Yuri Vytsenovsky arranges several accidents at the mine.
Truly heroic work was carried out by the organization to disrupt the mobilization of youth in Germany.
On the night of December 5-6, 1942, a brave trio of young guards - Lyuba Shevtsova, Sergey Tyulenin and Viktor Lukyanchenko - carry out a difficult operation to set fire to the German labor exchange. Having destroyed the exchange with all the documents, the underground saved several thousand Soviet people from being deported to German penal servitude. At the same time, the Young Guards released 75 fighters and commanders from the Volchansk prisoner of war camp and organized the escape of 20 prisoners of war from the Pervomaiskaya hospital.
The Red Army stubbornly advanced towards the Donbass. The "Young Guard" was preparing day and night for the realization of its cherished dream - a decisive armed attack on the Krasnodon garrison of the Germans.
The commander of the "Young Guard" Turkenich developed a detailed plan to capture the city, deployed forces, collected intelligence materials, but a vile betrayal interrupted the military activities of the glorious underground.
As soon as the arrests began, the headquarters gave the order - all members of the "Young Guard" to leave and make their way to the units of the Red Army. But it was already too late. Only 7 Komsomol members managed to leave and stay alive - Ivan Turkenich, Georgy Arutyunyants, Valeria Borts, Radiy Yurkin, Ole Ivantsova, Nina Ivantsova and Mikhail Shishchenko. The remaining members of the "Young Guard" were captured by the Nazis and imprisoned.
Young underground workers were subjected to terrible torture, but none of them backed down from their oath. The German executioners went berserk, for several hours in a row they beat and tortured the Young Guards, but they were silent, proudly and courageously enduring the torture. The Germans could not break the spirit and iron will of the young Soviet people, and did not achieve recognition.
Sergei Tyulenin was beaten by the Gestapo several times a day with whips made of electric wires, his fingers were broken, and a red-hot ramrod was driven into the wound. When this did not help, the executioners brought their mother, a 58-year-old old woman. In front of Sergei, she was undressed and tortured.
The executioners demanded that he tell about his connections in Kamensk, Izvarina. Sergei was silent. Then the Gestapo, in the presence of his mother, hung Sergei in a noose from the ceiling three times, and then gouged out his eye with a red-hot needle.
The Young Guards knew that the time of execution was coming. And even in the last hour they remained strong in spirit, they were full of faith in our victory. Ulyana Gromova, a member of the "Young Guard" headquarters, transmitted in Morse code to all cells:
The last order of the headquarters... The last order... they will lead us to the execution. We will be led through the streets of the city. We will sing Ilyich's favorite song.
Exhausted, mutilated, young fighters were taken out of prison. Ulyana Gromova walked with a star carved on her back, Shura Bondareva with her breasts cut off. Volodya Oemukhin's right hand was cut off.
The Young Guards went on their last journey with their heads held high. Solemnly and sadly rushed their song:
Tormented by heavy bondage,
You died a glorious death
In the fight for a job
You put your head down...
The executioners threw the Komsomol members of the underground alive into the pit of the mine.
In February 1943, our troops entered Krasnodon. A red flag hoisted over the city. And, looking at how it was rinsing in the wind, the inhabitants again remembered the Young Guards. Hundreds of people went to the prison building. They saw bloody clothes in the cells, traces of unheard-of torture. The walls were covered with inscriptions. On one of the walls is not drawn, but almost carved a heart pierced by an arrow. In the heart are four surnames: "Shura Bondareva, Nina Minaeva, Ulya Gromova, Angela Samoshina." And above all the inscriptions, throughout the bloody wall, as a testament to contemporaries, they called out the words of revenge: "Death to the German invaders!"
This is how the glorious pupils of the Komsomol lived and fought for their fatherland. And they died like true heroes. Their death is immortality.
Years will pass. Our great country will heal the grave wounds inflicted by the Nazi cannibals, new, bright cities and villages will grow on the ashes and ruins. A new generation of people will grow up, but the names of young fearless underground workers from the Donetsk city of Krasnodon will never be forgotten. Their immortal deeds will forever burn like a bright ruby in the crown of our glory. Their life, struggle and death will serve as an example for our youth of selfless service to the Motherland, the great cause of the party of Lenin and Stalin.
YOUNG GUARD OF UKRAINE
V. KOSTENKO secretary of the Central Committee of the Young Communist League of Ukraine "Komsomolskaya Pravda" from 14.IX. 1943
FOR OVER two years, the Ukrainian people have been fighting shoulder to shoulder with their Russian brother, together with the sons of all the peoples of the Soviet country, against the mortal enemy of our Motherland - the German invaders. Every day of struggle brings new news of the unparalleled heroism, courage and self-sacrifice of the Ukrainian patriots, who vowed not to lay down their arms until the last Nazi was expelled from Soviet soil.
In the forefront of the fighting people is its pride and hope - the glorious youth of Ukraine. The sons and daughters of the Ukrainian people, carefully brought up by the Soviet government and the Lenin-Stalin party, in the struggle for their homeland, for its honor and independence, show examples of courage and fearlessness.
The feat of a group of boys and girls from the small Donetsk city of Krasnodon, which the whole country now knows about, clearly reflects the high patriotic feelings of our youth, their nobility, courage, courage, ardent love for the Motherland and burning hatred for the enemy.
On July 20, 1942, the German invaders broke into the quiet green mining town of Krasnodon. Wild reprisals against peaceful innocent people began. For failure to appear for registration, the Germans buried thirty miners alive in the city garden. People's faces darkened, life became unbearable. The population of Krasnodon, like the inhabitants of all cities and villages occupied by the Germans, was doomed to death from hunger, disease, torture and abuse. With terrible terror, provocations and intimidation, the Germans here also tried to morally disarm people, break their will to resist, put them on their knees, turn them into obedient slaves ..
But could young people who grew up in the Soviet country put up with the slave share prepared for them by the Germans?
The son of a worker, Oleg Koshevoy, perfectly answered this question in the ingenuous lines of a poem written in the first days of the occupation of the city:
It's hard for me ... Wherever you look,
Everywhere I see Hitler's rubbish.
Everywhere a hateful form before me,
SS badge with a dead head.
I decided that it's impossible to live like this
Look at the pain and suffer yourself.
We must hurry before it's too late
Behind enemy lines - destroy the enemy!
I decided so, and I will fulfill it, -
I will give my whole life for my Motherland,
For our people, for our dear,
Beautiful Soviet country.
So decided Oleg. The son of an old Kyiv worker, who moved in 1940 with his whole family to the city of Krasnodon, could not do otherwise. Image. Kyiv arsenalers, an immortal example of the Don miners, who more than once defended their native Donbass from the enemy with weapons in their hands, lived in the mind of a young man, was a guiding star for him.
Like Oleg Koshevoy, hundreds and thousands of young men and women of the Donetsk basin, the oldest working center of Ukraine, decided to take the path of struggle against the German enslavers. "Better death in battle than life in captivity" - became their motto.
An ardent patriot, seventeen-year-old Komsomol member Oleg Koshevoy quickly found comrades-in-arms and fighting friends. Together with Vanya Zemnukhov and Sergei Tyulenin, he creates an underground Komsomol organization. They called it - "Young Guard". The organization grew rapidly, absorbing the best that was among the miners' youth.
Here were Ivan Turkenich - a favorite of the youth and already a battle-hardened warrior, respected by the whole city for valor in work and success in science, Komsomol member Lyuba Shevtsova, Anatoly Popov, Stepan Safonov, Nikolai Sumskoy, Vladimir Osmukhin, Viktor Lukyanchenko, Uliana Gromova, Valya Borts and a lot others. In the fight against the enemy, yesterday's teenagers became stern and determined warriors, excellent organizers. They were not satisfied with the creation of an organization in the city itself, they put together similar groups in the workers' settlements. They intensively collected weapons, ammunition, explosives, studied military affairs.
At underground meetings, the Young Guard take an oath:
"..." I swear to avenge mercilessly for the burned, devastated cities and villages, for the blood of our people, for the martyrdom of thirty miners-heroes. And if this revenge requires my life, I will give it without a moment's hesitation.
If I break this sacred oath under torture, or because of cowardice, then may my name, my family be forever damned, and I myself will be punished by the harsh hand of my comrades.
Blood for blood! Death for death!"
In every word of this oath, in every military deed of the young Krasnodon patriots, the glorious, revolutionary traditions of the Donetsk miners, who never bowed their heads before the enemy, were reflected.
A group of young guards - Vladimir. Osmukhin, Anatoly Orlov, George: Arutyunyants - created an underground printing house. Soon the city learns from numerous leaflets the truth about the situation on the fronts, reads fiery calls for struggle. Mysterious postmen distribute leaflets to all houses, post them on fences, on telegraph poles, in the most crowded places. Young Guards warn Soviet citizens about the danger that threatens them - about the widespread deportation of our people to Hitler's penal servitude, give advice on how to avoid this danger. And their voice reached the masses. In Krasnodon, the Germans failed to "recruit" a single person to work in Germany; forced mobilizations also failed one after another.
Terrible slogans appeared on the walls of houses: "Death to the German invaders!" In the church, people received notes: "As we lived, so we will live, as we were, so we will be under the Stalinist banner." On the backs of the Nazi policemen walking around the bazaar, people read with pleasure short - five or six words - leaflets pasted by the hand of a young patriot.
It is not difficult to understand and appreciate the significance of this underground work in the conditions of ferocious terror, shameless lies and slander, with which the German propagandists tried to poison the consciousness of the Soviet people.
On the day of the great holiday, the 25th anniversary of the October Socialist Revolution, red banners were hoisted on the highest buildings of the city by the hands of the Young Guards.
Worker M. A. Litvinova says:
When I saw the flag on the school, joy and pride swept over me. I woke up the children and quickly ran across the road to Mukhina K.A., she was sitting on the windowsill. Tears streamed down her sunken cheeks. "Maria Alekseevna," said my neighbor, "it was done for us, the Soviet people. We are remembered, we are not forgotten!"
“We are not forgotten, we are remembered, we will be rescued, rescued from German captivity!” - these are the thoughts and feelings that the courageous activity of the Young Guards engendered in the hearts of suffering people. It was a ray of light that cut through the darkness of the fascist night, foreshadowing the bright day of liberation.
The young guards celebrated the great date of the 25th anniversary of October with a touching concern for the Soviet people. Families of workers, especially those who suffered at the hands of the German occupiers, received gifts that day. Orphans had bread that day. It is easy to imagine what a great holiday it was in the difficult, joyless life of the townspeople. Things, of course, are not only in these modest gifts, not in that piece of bread that still could not satisfy the hunger of exhausted children - it is impossible to overestimate the value of the life-giving force that these gifts of the Young Guards breathed into the soul of people.
The seething combat life of the "Young Guard" was felt daily in the city and inspired Soviet citizens. The youthful underground organization became a thunderstorm for the occupiers, sowing in their ranks an animal fear of imminent retribution.
The city did not obey the invaders, did not obey their orders. The city openly rejoiced, having learned about the victories of our troops near Stalingrad, the city was preparing to welcome the Red Army with open arms. The murders, mass executions committed by the Nazis did not frighten people, but only kindled their rage, hatred and contempt for the enemy. Almost every night, the black heart of the enemy was hit by a well-aimed bullet of an invisible avenger, warehouses flew into the air.
The Germans hunted for the Young Guards for a long time. Finally, the Gestapo bloodhounds managed to grab the thread in their hands. There were arrests and torture. The tortures were indescribable in cruelty, fanaticism, and, despite this, the executioners failed to break the young patriots, to wrest from them the words of recognition and repentance.
17-year-old Lyuba Shevtsova, a fragile blond girl, in a cell where Soviet people were doomed to death, said:
Lyubka is not afraid to die. Lyubka, will be able to die honestly,
Ulya Gromova in her dying hours read with inspiration Lermontov's "Demon",
What a wonderful work, - she said, - Just think, he rebelled against the strongest!
Shura Dubrovina and Lyuba Shevtsova managed to send encouraging notes to their friends.
When the Red Army cleared the city of Krasnodon from Nazi scoundrels, the miners removed the corpses of young men and women from the pit of the destroyed mine. Relatives and friends barely recognized their dear, dear sons and daughters, brutally tortured by German monsters.
The memory of young heroes will live forever in our hearts. She will live as an undying symbol of love and devotion of the Ukrainian youth to their native land, the great party of Lenin-Stalin, as a symbol of the all-conquering Stalinist friendship of peoples who have sworn to spare neither their strength nor life itself to free all their brothers and sisters from fascist captivity.
Now, when the Red Army is waging successful offensive battles, rescuing their native Ukrainian land from captivity, the memory of the young heroes of Krasnodon, like a calling bell, will call the red warriors forward. The noble images of young fighters will inspire the sons and daughters of Ukraine to new feats in battle, in the partisan rear, in work and study. Their example will show the way to speedy liberation for hundreds and thousands of our brothers and sisters, who are still languishing under the Nazi yoke.
Glory to the Krasnodon heroes of the Young Guard, who immortalized their names and wrote a new page in the history of the liberation war of the Soviet people!
THE WORD OF THE HERO'S MOTHER
Speech by Elena Nikolaevna Koshevoy at a meeting of young Stakhanovites in the Oktyabrsky district of Moscow on September 14, 1943
"Komsomolskaya Pravda" of September 15, 1943
I am the mother of Oleg Koshevoy, whom the Germans brutally tortured and executed. I want to tell you about how he lived, studied and fought, how passionately he hated the Germans.
My Oleg was born in 1926 in the city of Priluki, Chernihiv region. He was a strong, very mobile boy. He loved, like all boys, all sorts of perky games, he loved to sing, play, listen to fairy tales. When Oleg got older and went to school, he became interested in sports. He was good at skating and good at skiing. As now, he stands before my eyes, rosy-cheeked from frost, covered in snow, cheerful and contented. Oleg loved, returning from the cinema, - and he went to the cinema with his grandmother, - showering her with snow. Grandmother did not remain indebted to her granddaughter. And this friendship of such people of different ages was truly touching. I was also surprised how Oleg, despite his age, knew how to find a limit to his pranks.
Oleg was a favorite in the family, perhaps because he was our only son. But we did not indulge him, although we denied him little in anything. Everyone in the family tried to instill in Oleg a noble feeling of love for the Motherland, for the Bolshevik Party, which provided him with a happy childhood and a happy future.
Oleg studied well and always sincerely and with pleasure helped his comrades. Oleg was a social activist at school, a newspaper editor, and the teachers treated him with respect.
Oleg loved his comrades very much. Whenever we had a Christmas tree, he would invite those friends whose parents could not arrange Christmas trees. He told me: "Mom, those who have the opportunity to arrange a holiday will not be offended by me, but I must invite comrades who have difficult conditions at home."
The sense of duty was one of the strong qualities of his character. When Oleg's father died in 1940 and financial difficulties appeared in the family, Oleg told me: "Look, Mom, I'm not small anymore, I can work and study, but it will be easier for you." I was touched by this concern, but I did not let Oleg go to work. Then he began to do everything he could at home to alleviate my situation.
Oleg's love for books was boundless. He re-read the entire library of Vali Borts to a single book, and some of them several times. He really wanted to learn how to play the piano, and even during the days of the occupation he did not give rest to Valya Borts, demanding that she study with him.
This is how my Oleg grew up. He dreamed of becoming a design engineer. And it seemed that nothing could stop it. But a terrible thing happened: on July 20, 1942, the Germans entered our city. The very next day they began to establish the so-called "new order". They started with robberies, arrests, violence against girls and women. The Germans executed communists, Komsomol members, and in general all Soviet, innocent people. In August 1942, German cannibals buried 58 men, women and children in a pit in the Krasnodon city park. They were tied by the hands of 5 people, placed side by side and so, in a standing position, they were covered with earth alive.
The communist Valko, his wife with a baby, engineer Udavinsky and many others were buried here. The Nazis forcibly drove young people to Germany. Moaning and crying were heard in almost every house.
Once Oleg came home very upset. I tried to get him to have a frank conversation. But he was silent for a long time. It was strange. Before that, Oleg always shared with me all his thoughts and experiences. I realized that something big was happening in the boy’s soul, that literally before our eyes every minute he was becoming more and more mature. At night, when my grandmother was already asleep, Oleg, apparently, still could not stand it and told me that in the afternoon the Germans had led a group of captured Red Army soldiers. He told how hard it was for him to look at our Russian people, who were bullied by the Nazis.
You see, mother, what the Germans are doing with our people? Can we endure any longer? If we all sit like this, with folded arms, we will all be put in chains. We must fight, fight and fight!
He spoke passionately, passionately, as if speaking at some kind of rally, and I felt that some big decision was born in Oleg's mind.
Since that time, Oleg began to come home late, became thoughtful and less talkative. I followed my son very carefully, and as a mother, of course, I really wanted to know his thoughts, his thoughts. Once Oleg told me that he decided to fight the Germans, to fight with all his strength and means. I was proud of my son, but it was very important for me to convince him that the path he is taking is a dangerous path, that the consequences can be the most unexpected and difficult, and that whoever decides to fight must be ready for anything - to accept death, if necessary, and accept it courageously, as befits a fighter. And then Oleg told me:
Mommy! If I have to die, then I can die the death of a warrior. Who does not want to betray the motherland, he must take revenge on the enemy, at any moment go to the mortal battle and in the fight to win the right to a happy life.
It became clear to me that Oleg was ready to fight, that, despite his 16 years, he was mature enough to understand the full complexity and responsibility of the task he had taken on. No matter how painful it was for me to realize that henceforth my son's life was in danger, I decided to help him with all my strength, by all means, and, if I may say so, to inspire him.
Soon I learned that in the city of Krasnodon an underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard" was created. The organizers of this underground group were: Oleg, Ulyana Gromova, Sergei Tyulenin, Ivan Zemnukhov, Lyuba Shevtsova. After they were joined by Valya Borts, Vanya Turkenich, Volodya Osmukhin and others. Oleg was elected secretary of the Komsomol committee and commissioner of the Young Guard detachment. Vanya Turkenich became commander. Later, I learned that Tolya Popov and Volodya Osmukhin managed to organize an underground printing house in which temporary Komsomol tickets and leaflets were printed. The "Young Guard" grew rapidly. Soon there were 100 people in the organization. Mostly they were very young guys and girls - students of 8-9-10 grades. Each person joining the organization took a solemn oath of allegiance to the service of his Motherland.
And in Krasnodon, events that were completely incomprehensible to the Germans began to take place: then suddenly reports from the Sovinformburo appeared on the walls of houses, then leaflets, then various kinds of threats addressed to the German commandants, the police, etc. Or suddenly in the market in the baskets of merchants, at stalls and even leaflets appeared on the backs of the policemen, signed with the three letters "SH.M.G.", which meant the headquarters of the "Young Guard".
Oleg took out a radio receiver somewhere. At great risk, this receiver was brought to our home and installed in the kitchen under the floor. Now the Young Guards gathered in small groups to listen to Moscow, and the next day the whole city learned the truth about the Soviet Union, the truth about the situation at the front. the youth. The young underground fighters exposed Hitler's lie that supposedly the Red Army no longer exists, that the Germans took Stalingrad and Leningrad, that Moscow was already in the ring and should fall one of these days.
The Young Guards grew in number and quality. Even recent schoolchildren today were already real underground workers who had their own tactics, their own specific combat mission. Gradually, Oleg and his comrades turned their organization from a purely agitational organization into an organization of armed resistance to the Germans. The warehouse of the "Young Guard" began to receive rifles and grenades obtained from the Germans. Since then, the roads for the Nazi machines have become unsafe.
The German commandants were worried. They increased the police force. The Young Guard pursued the Germans day and night. It was they, the Young Guards, who spoiled telephone and telegraph communications. It was they who, when the Germans tried to take bread out of Krasnodon, burned 6 stacks of bread and 4 stacks of hay. It was the Young Guards who recaptured 500 heads of cattle, which the Germans had prepared for shipment to Germany, and also killed the Romanian soldiers who accompanied the cattle.
One day, the headquarters of the Young Guard became aware that the Nazis were going to send several thousand young residents from Krasnodon to Germany. According to the inquiries made, the Young Guards learned that a special case had been prepared for each candidate to be sent to the labor exchange. The headquarters developed a precise plan for setting fire to the stock exchange. One fine evening, Krasnodon was lit up by the glow of a fire. It was the labor exchange that was on fire, which we called the nest of slavery.
On November 7, flags suddenly turned red over Krasnodon, on which it was written: "Death to the German invaders!" It was the work of the young guards.
It is very difficult to list all the cases of the Young Guard. They did a lot, they would have done even more if not for the hand of a traitor.
On January 1, 1943, mass arrests of the Young Guards began. It was very difficult to hide. Oleg left and did not come home for 11 days. I knew what awaited my son. The Germans gave the order that if Oleg Koshevoy or any other of the Young Guards is found with anyone, he will be executed along with them. On the eleventh night Oleg returned. We spoke very seriously and for a long time with Oleg, I will never forget his words:
Even if they manage to catch me, mother, they still won’t torture me for a long time. I will not say a word, I will accept all the torment, but I will not kneel before the executioners.
Oleg disappeared again.
The traitor betrayed Oleg. He was executed.
No, I cannot describe in words all the tortures endured by Oleg and his comrades. The executioners burned the numbers of Komsomol tickets on their bodies, drove needles under their nails, burned their heels with a red-hot iron, gouged out their eyes, hung them by their feet from the ceiling and held them until blood began to pour from their mouths. The Germans broke the arms and legs of the Young Guard, smashed their chests with machine gun butts, beat them with two whips, inflicted a hundred blows at once. The walls of the prison were stained with the blood of the Young Guards, the executioners forced the young patriots to lick this blood with their tongues, and then they threw them half-dead into the shaft of mine No. 5.
But the Nazis did not manage to find out anything by any of the most sophisticated tortures. The Komsomol members were brave and steadfast. Serezha Tyulenin was pierced with a bayonet, and then a hot ramrod was thrust into fresh wounds. Seryozha died without saying a word to the executioners.
Luba Shevtsova! Comrades, I cannot calmly pronounce the name of this brave Komsomol member. She endured all the torture, but did not name a single name of her comrades in the struggle. She told the executioners:
No matter how much you torture me, you will not be able to learn anything from me.
With mother's pride, I pronounce the names of Vanya Zemnukhov, Zhenya Moshkov, Ulya Gromova, Shura Dubrovina, Anatoly Popov, Zhenya Shepelev and many, many others: they died as heroes. No torture forced them to hand over their comrades. Tolya Popov, to the question of the chief of police: "What did you do?", - answered:
What we have done, I will not say, but it is a pity that we have done little!
The chief of police asked my Oleg a question:
What made you join the partisans?
Love for the Motherland and hatred for enemies. Don't make us live on our knees. We'd rather die standing. There are more of us and we will win!
Oleg behaved courageously and fearlessly in prison. The letters I received from him were cheerful, and, as always, he tried to convince me that nothing would happen to him. He reassured me and even joked. He told the guys:
Don't show that it's hard for us to part with life. After all, these barbarians will not have mercy, and we are dying for a great cause - for the Motherland, and the Motherland will avenge us. Let's sing guys!
Exhausted from torture, tormented, they sang, sang in spite of their tormentors, executioners.
Oleg was sent from the police to the gendarmerie. And there he did not lose courage. He loved life. He wanted to live. Together with two comrades, he prepared an escape. They broke the bars and fled, but unsuccessfully. The police caught them, and in the basement of the hospital the heroes were executed.
When I found the corpse of my dear son, he was mutilated beyond recognition.
Oleg at that time was not even 17 years old, but from everything experienced in the Gestapo, his hair turned gray. The executioners gouged out his eye, cut his cheek with a bayonet, and knocked out the entire back of his head with the butt of a machine gun.
Dear my friends! My heart stops when I remember what the executioners did to my son and dozens of the same young Krasnodon. May the Germans be damned! Let the ghost of terrible executions hover over them. Let them all suffer a terrible inevitable death!
Dear comrades! I, the mother of Oleg Koshevoy, make an appeal - do not spare your strength, help the front with honest and selfless work. Defend the freedom of your native country from the German barbarians, do not spare your strength and life in this struggle, just as my son Oleg and his comrades did not spare it. My son, just like you, loved life, loved, like you, to laugh and sing, but in difficult times, in difficult hours of trials, his heart did not falter. He fearlessly rebelled against the enslavers and devoted his young life to the great cause of liberating his native land.
Oleg told me many times that the brave die once, but the cowards many times.
I speak to you on behalf of all the parents of members of the underground Komsomol organization Young Guard. I urge you: help the soldiers of the Red Army mercilessly destroy the Germans, destroy them like the very last reptiles. In the voice of my mother, I call on you to take merciless revenge on the Germans.
MY COMRADES
VALERIA BORTS, member of the underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard".
"Komsomolskaya Pravda" from 16.IX-1943
I would like to tell you about my friends and comrades, members of the underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard", with whom I worked during the days of the German occupation of the city of Krasnodon. Many, many years will pass, but with deep emotion I will remember the names of those who did not submit to the Germans, who went underground during the dark days of the occupation, who burned warehouses, blew up bridges, did not give the Germans an hour of rest on our land. I am proud that my comrades - the leaders and organizers of the "Young Guard" - received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. The government highly appreciated their services to the Motherland.
I would like to briefly talk about the comrades who died for the happiness of the people.
On a rainy day, July 20, 1942, the Germans entered Krasnodon. Residents of the city learned what the German "new order" is. In the first days, the invaders buried fifty-eight people alive in the city park. All the pits of the quarries around our breed were filled with the corpses of innocent people. How could the Soviet youth respond to these atrocities? We saw the blood and faces of people brutally executed by the Germans, distorted by death horror. We saw children, women; old men mutilated by the bayonets of German soldiers. Only those who have seen it with their own eyes can understand how great our hatred for the Germans was. Hate knows no words. We clenched our teeth, we went underground, organized our detachment - a detachment of people's avengers and called it the "Young Guard".
We decided from the very first days to act boldly and persistently. It couldn't be otherwise. The leaders and organizers of the "Young Guard" were courageous, strong-willed Komsomol members, stubbornly moving towards their goal.
Once, a group of prisoners of war were led down the street - ragged, hungry. The inhabitants brought them bread, but the guards threw the bread into the mud. One Romanian hit the prisoner in the face because he wanted to pick up potatoes. We were nearby at the time. Leonid Dadyshev grabbed a stone and threw it at the Romanian. The soldier ran after him. At this time, Sergei Tyulenin, Oleg Koshevoy and I took away three prisoners.
I remember the fallen comrades and their courageous, strong images rise before me. Here is Ulyana Gromova - a slender, beautiful girl. She graduated from high school, studied well. The German came, and everything went to dust. Not only to study, it is impossible to live under the Germans. Ulyana often said: "It's better to die than to be a slave. If I get caught by the Germans, I won't say a word to them." And she died like a heroine, she was not broken by torture, she did not betray her comrades, who were still free then, with a single word. Sometimes, in difficult moments, Ulyana would smile warmly and joyfully, and everything heavy would go far away, and strength and energy would appear again. We loved her, took care of her, and each of us always found participation in her. Even in prison, she did not change, she was just as cheerful, cheerful, and this supported everyone who was sitting with her in the cell.
Lyuba Shevtsova. Cheerful girl with blue eyes, mobile, perky, tireless. If she received a task from the headquarters, then she took it ardently. She inspired us all with her courage and audacity.
In prison, after the torture that only the Germans are capable of, Lyuba told her comrades: "I don't care to die, and I want to die honestly and nobly." Lyuba died a hero... Just thinking that Lyuba is no more makes you feel like an orphan.
A glorious and fighting comrade was known in the organization of Sergei Tyulenin - a 17-year-old young man with an open face and stubborn features. He was a very persistent man; he always got what he wanted. Strong character - you can't bend that. And they didn't bend him. The executioners broke his hands with a red-hot iron, gouged out his eye, but Sergei Tyulenin did not say a word.
Combat Chief of Staff! How good and warm it was with him, how he rejoiced at good luck, how he straightened up when danger approached! Bold and adventurous, he was our favourite. His martyrdom in the hearts of the surviving young guards will always be a call for revenge.
I knew Oleg Koshevoy before the war. He was very inquisitive, interested in everything and loved music. True, our lessons progressed poorly, but this, perhaps, rather depended on the teacher. I had a big library at home. Oleg, as we said jokingly, swallowed it whole. He took away several books at once, and returned them three or four days later.
Oleg looked to be about 20 years old, he looked physically strong and healthy. In fact, he was not even 17 years old. His most characteristic features were determination, enterprise, perseverance. We already knew: Oleg said - so it will be done. He was a wonderful friend - sensitive, reliable. Oleg wrote poetry, had a kind, good heart; but when it came to the Germans, he was angry and merciless. Before his death, Oleg said: "We did not live on our knees, and we will die standing." I will never forget those words of his. Oleg was our conscience.
Vanya Zemnukhov enjoyed great love in our organization. This is how it seems that a slightly stooped young man with bright and intelligent eyes will now enter the room and speak, and he will speak well and intelligently. And every time we looked at him, we felt like teenagers; I wanted to work hard to earn the right to be friends with him. We were amazed at the calmness of Vanya Zemnukhov in moments of danger, as if she did not touch him, as if he had nothing to do with it. But it wasn't just carelessness or apathy. No, in this calmness we saw strength, the ability to courageously meet the difficulty, to meet it halfway and win. This is how we knew him in the days of our struggle, this is how he remained until the last second of his life.
I well remember Alexandra Bondareva, a girl of medium height, with dark eyes, lively and regular features. Sasha sang and danced very well. At first glance, it seemed that this was just a cheerful girl, but it only seemed. She never refused dangerous assignments and knew how to go on a risky business with a joke. She openly and proudly accepted death at the hands of the executioner.
In the name of the freedom of the motherland, my friends fought, sparing neither strength nor life. In the name of the liberation of the Motherland, the surviving young guards continue to fight in the ranks of the Red Army.
I appeal to the officers and soldiers of the Red Army as a member of the underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard": revenge, comrades, for the death of those who died, but remained faithful to their homeland. The blood of my tortured comrades calls for revenge. Revenge! I say this, a simple Soviet girl who saw with her own eyes what the "new order" of the Germans is.
* * *
Organizers of the Krasnodon Komsomol underground
Viktor Tretyakevich
Oleg Koshevoy
Ivan Zemnukhov
Ulyana Gromova
Sergei Tyulenin
Lyubov Shevtsova
Ivan Turkenich
Vasily Levashov
Members of the "Young Guard"
Lidia Androsova
Georgy Arutyunyants
Vasily Bondaryov
Alexandra Bondaryova
Vasily Prokofievich Borisov
Vasily Methodievich Borisov
Valeria Borts
Yuri Vizenovsky
Nina Gerasimova
Boris Glavan
Mikhail Grigoriev
Vasily Gukov
Leonid Dadyshev
Alexandra Dubrovina
Antonina Dyachenko
Antonina Eliseenko
Vladimir Zhdanov
Nikolay Zhukov
Vladimir Zagoruiko
Antonina Ivanikhina
Lilia Ivanikhina
Nina Ivantsova
Olga Ivantsova
Nina Kezikova
Evgenia Kiykova
Anatoly Kovalev
Claudia Kovaleva
Vladimir Kulikov
Sergey Levashov
Anatoly Lopukhov
Gennady Lukashov
Vladimir Lukyanchenko
Antonina Mashchenko
Nina Minaeva
Nikolai Mironov
Evgeny Moshkov
Anatoly Nikolaev
Dmitry Ogurtsov
Anatoly Orlov
Semyon Ostapenko
Vladimir Osmukhin
Pavel Palaguta
Maya Peglivanova
Hope Loop
Nadezhda Petrachkova
Viktor Petrov
Vasily Pirozhok
Yuri Polyansky
Anatoly Popov
Vladimir Rogozin
Ilya Savenkov
Angelina Samoshina
Stepan Safonov
Anna Sopova
Nina Startseva
Viktor Subbotin
Nikolay Sumskoy
Vasily Tkachev
Demyan Fomin
Evgeny Shepelev
Alexander Shishchenko
Mikhail Shishchenko
Georgy Shcherbakov
Nadezhda Shcherbakova
Radiy Yurkin
Adult underground workers of the city of Krasnodon
Philip Petrovich Lyutikov
Nikolay Petrovich Barakov
Andrey Andreevich Valko
Gerasim Tikhonovich Vinokurov
Daniil Sergeevich Vystavkin
Maria Georgievna Dymchenko
Nikolai Nikolaevich Rumyantsev
Nikolai Grigorievich Taluev
Tikhon Nikolaevich Sarancha
Nalina Georgievna Sokolova
Georgy Matveevich Solovyov
Stepan Grigorievich Yakovlev
* * *
DECREE
ON AWARDING THE TITLES OF HERO OF THE SOVIET UNION TO THE ORGANIZERS AND LEADERS OF THE UNDERGROUND KOMSOMOL ORGANIZATION "Young Guard"
For outstanding services in the organization and leadership of the underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard" and for the manifestation of personal courage and heroism in the fight against the German invaders, to be awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union with the award of the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal:
Gromova Uliana Matveevna.
Zemnukhov Ivan Alexandrovich
Koshevoy Oleg Vasilievich.
Tyulenin Sergey Gavriilovich.
Shevtsova Lyubov Grigorievna.
Chairman of the Presidium
Supreme Soviet of the USSR
M. KALININ.
Secretary of the Presidium
Supreme Soviet of the USSR
A. GORKIN.
Moscow, Kremlin. September 13, 1943
UKA3
Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR
ON AWARDING ORDERS TO MEMBERS OF THE UNDERGROUND KOMSOMOL ORGANIZATION "Young Guard"
For valor and courage shown in the fight against the German invaders behind enemy lines, award:
ORDER OF THE RED BANNER
1. Popov Anatoly Vladimirovich.
2. Sumsky Nikolai Stepanovich.
3. Ivan Vasilievich Turkenich.
THE ORDER OF THE PATRIOTIC WAR OF THE FIRST DEGREE
1. Androsova Lydia Makarovna.
2. Bondarev Vasily Ivanovich.
3. Bondareva Alexandra Ivanovna.
4. Gerasimova Nina Nikolaevna.
5. Glovan Boris Grigoryevich.
6. Dadyshev Leonid Alekseevich.
7. Alexandra Emelyanovna Dubrovina.
8. Eliseenko Antonina Zakharovna.
9. Zhdanov Vladimir Alexandrovich.
10. Ivanikhina Antonina Alexandrovna.
11. Ivanikhina Lilia Alexandrovna.
12. Kiikova Evgenia Ivanovna.
13. Kulikov Vladimir Tikhonovich.
14. Levashov Sergey Mikhailovich.
16. Lukashev Gennady Alexandrovich.
16. Lukyanchenko Viktor Dmitrievich.
17. Mashchenko Antonina Mikhailovna.
18. Minaeva Nina Petrovna.
19. Moshkov Evgeny Yakovlevich.
20. Nikolaev Anatoly Georgievich.
21. Orlov Anatoly Alexandrovich.
22. Ostapenko Semyon Markovich.
23. Osmukhin Vladimir Andreevich.
24. Peglivanova Maya Konstantinovna.
25. Loop Nadezhda Stepanovna.
26. Petrov Viktor Vladimirovich.
27. Vasily Markovich Pie.
28. Rogozin Vladimir Pavlovich.
29. Samoshina Angelina Tikhonovna.
30. Safonov Stepan Stepanovich.
31. Sopova Anna Dmitrievna.
32. Startseva Nina Illarionovna.
33. Fomin Demyan Yakovlevich.
34. Shishchenko Alexander Tarasovich.
35. Shcherbakov Georgy Kuzmich.
ORDER OF THE RED STAR
1. Arutyunyants Georgy Minaevich.
2. Wrestler Valeria Davydovna.
3. Ivantsova Nina Mikhailovna.
4. Ivantsova Olga Ivanovna.
5. Shishchenko Mikhail Tarasovich.
6. Yurkin Radiy Petrovich.
Chairman of the Presidium
Supreme Soviet of the USSR
M. KALININ
Secretary of the Presidium
Supreme Soviet of the USSR
A. GORKIN
DECREE
Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR
ON AWARDING KOSHEVOY ELENA NIKOLAEVNA WITH THE ORDER OF THE PATRIOTIC WAR OF THE SECOND DEGREE
For the active assistance provided to the underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard" in the fight against the German invaders, to award Koshevaya Elena Nikolaevna with the Order of the Patriotic War of the second degree.
Chairman of the Presidium
Supreme Soviet of the USSR
M. KALININ.
Secretary of the Presidium
Supreme Soviet of the USSR
A. GORKIN.
Moscow Kremlin. September 13, 1943
In the summer of 1943, after returning from a front-line trip, the writer Alexander Alexandrovich Fadeev was invited to the Central Committee of the Komsomol. There he was introduced to people who had just returned from the Donetsk city of Krasnodon, where they collected information about the youth underground organization "Young Guard".
The Germans occupied Krasnodon on July 20, 1942, and from the first days they established a regime of cruel terror there - roundups, executions, mobilization to work in Germany.
Several high school students and recent graduates of the school created a military headquarters, united a combat group of peers around it and began their underground war with the Nazis.
The history of the "Young Guard" in brief is as follows. At the end of September 1942, after the Germans captured the Donbass, an underground organization spontaneously arose in the small mining town of Krasnodon (before the war, according to the census, 22 thousand inhabitants). The basis of it was young people aged 14 to 25 years, the total number - up to 100 people. 16-17-year-old boys and girls wrote and distributed leaflets among the population, attacked German vehicles, destroyed food prepared by the Nazis for their troops. They managed to free a large group of prisoners of war and disrupt the mobilization of young people to work in Germany. They collected a lot of weapons in order to raise an armed uprising in the city by the time the Soviet troops approached.
Leaflets appeared on the walls of houses, on November 7 a red flag was raised, and anti-fascist agitation was carried out among the population.
By the end of December 1942, the "Young Guard" included about a hundred people, the organization's arsenal was 15 machine guns, 80 rifles, 10 pistols, 300 grenades, about 15 thousand cartridges, 65 kilograms of explosives. The organization did not exist for long, and in early January 1943, after an attack on a car with gifts for German officers, it was revealed.
On January 1, 1943, foolishly, several members of the organization got into the police. The betrayal that followed led to the fact that by January 10, 1943, almost the entire "Young Guard" was in prison. The young guards were brutally tortured.
On the back of Uli Gromova, a beautiful slender girl, a star was carved. Tosya Eliseenko was put on a hot stove. Tolya Popov's foot was cut off, and Volodya Osmukhin's hand. Vita Petrov's eyes were gouged out.
One of the jailers, the later convicted defector Lukyanov, said: “There was a continuous groan in the police, because during the entire interrogation the arrested were beaten. They lost consciousness, but they were brought to their senses and beaten again. .
They were tortured terribly - they put them on stoves, drove needles under their nails, cut out stars, - and in the end they were all executed - they were thrown alive into mine No. 5. They were thrown in separate batches, 15-20 people each. Bullets were not used up, and dynamite, sleepers, and trolleys flew into the mine after the executed. The shaft was worked out, filled with water, so that the grave was already ready.
On February 14, 1943, Soviet troops entered the city. Parents came to the police building, where the young guards spent their last days. In the cells, they saw traces of blood on the floor, and on the walls there were inscriptions: "Death to the German occupiers", a drawn heart pierced by an arrow, and a number of names of the girls who were sitting there.
Pink streams flowed from the police yard - it was a thaw. With a shudder, people realized that it was blood with melted snow.
Then the parents went to the pit of mine No. 5. For several days, stones, piles of earth, rails, trolleys were removed from the mine, then parts of the bodies of the Young Guards began to come across. Having thrown children into the pit, the Nazis, in order to cover their tracks, threw grenades into the mine. There were no faces, and relatives recognized their children, sisters and brothers only by special signs, by clothes. All this was terrible - 14-16-year-old boys and girls, tortured by a terrible death. More than 30 bodies were recovered from the mine, but not all of them could be identified. They tried to quickly put Vanya Zemnukhov's head in a coffin and nail it up so that his mother would not suffer. And for her this atrocity was a secret for a long time. The corpses that did not fit in the bath were laid on the street, in the snow, under the walls of the bath. Painting. was terrible. In the bathhouse and around the bathhouse there are corpses and corpses, seventy-one corpses.
Parents recognized their children, washed, dressed, laid them in the coffins they brought.
By March 1, 1943, all extraction work was completed. A mass grave was prepared in the park named after Lenin Komsomol. Coffins with the bodies of the dead were brought here. A lot of people gathered, a military unit. Funeral fireworks - and in solemn sadness the Young Guards were buried.
In the autumn of 1943, the Young Guards were awarded. Five were awarded the title "Hero of the Soviet Union". The museum "Young Guard" was created in Krasnodon.
In 1946, the feat of children was highlighted by Alexander Fadeev in the novel The Young Guard.
2. 2 HEROES OF KRASNODON: MYTH OR REALITY?
Materials on the "Young Guard" are in different archives of Ukraine and Russia, some of them have been lost, the facts of its activities have been distorted more than once, but the main problem, from my point of view, was the problem of reticence, the desire to artificially make these children "heroes", stone idols , zombified robots that do not have internal contradictions and human feelings. And it is completely incomprehensible why it had to be done? They were heroes anyway, and even more than those that propaganda tried to create from them.
About how these children lived, what they read, what they wrote about in diaries, how they treated each other, what questions tormented them, what they thought about themselves and their lives - Alexander Fadeev asked himself all these questions when he worked on the book. .
What were these people? What force led them through life? What did they dream of there, in the pit, when they groaned from their wounds, lying under the weight of the bodies of their comrades, under the weight of the sleepers and trolleys dropped on them?
And did these children even exist? Is this not an invention? Isn't it the work of Soviet propaganda?
Yes, they were, they lived and suffered, suffered, but they left life unbroken.
TWO COMMISSIONERS
2. 3VIKTOR TRETYAKEVICH
Meanwhile, the very history of the "Young Guard" and the novel keep many mysteries and even secrets.
Shortly after the book was published, Fadeev would say in one of his letters: “The novel as a whole was received favorably, but there was an ominous silence from Krasnodon.” Alexander Alexandrovich, until the end of his days, did not dare to visit the homeland of his heroes again. Moreover, in every way he avoided meeting with their parents, with the survivors of the Young Guard. And there were good reasons for that.
Take, for example, the story of Viktor Tretyakevich. He stood at the origins of the creation of the "Young Guard", was its first commissar. Fadeev could not have been unaware of this. Of course, one can argue whether he brought Tretyakevich in the image of Stakhovich or not. We do not have direct evidence, and Fadeev himself has repeatedly emphasized that his novel is a work of art. Another thing is that in the martyrology published on the last page, the name of Tretyakevich is missing. And this is a fact:
Before the occupation of Krasnodon, Viktor Tretyakevich fought in a partisan detachment, and then he was sent to the city to organize an underground. Tretyakevich participated in many military operations of the Young Guard. Arrested among the first, Victor steadfastly held on to interrogations. The father of the young guard Vasily Levashov was in the same cell with Tretyakevich and said that he recognized him only by his voice: he was so disfigured.
In order to persuade the arrested person to confess and take revenge on the commissar for his impudent behavior, the Nazis spread a rumor about his betrayal through the cells. However, the true traitor was free, and Victor was martyred in the mine shaft on January 15, 1943.
In the very first publications about the Young Guard, Viktor Tretyakevich is still mentioned. With the beginning of the work of the commission from the KGB, headed by A. V. Toritsyn, Viktor was declared a traitor, and Oleg Koshevoy was declared a commissar.
Fadeev used the report of the commission. So the image of Stakhovich appears in the novel, and at the end of the book, among the listed names of the dead, there is no Tretyakevich's name.
Victor's surviving comrades spared no effort to restore the honest name of the commissar.
Only in 1959 did publications appear about his innocence, he was posthumously awarded the Order of the Patriotic War.
Then a sharp turn began again in the history of the Young Guard. To please unknown officials, the name of Viktor Tretyakevich, the commissar, was erased on temporary Komsomol certificates that were issued by the headquarters.
Today, only a few people in our country remember the history of the Young Guard: Ukraine is already a different state, Fadeev's novel has long been removed from school curricula. But historical truth must triumph, and the good name of Commissar Victor
Tretyakevich should be restored.
2. 4 OLEG KOSHEVOY
For some, Oleg Koshevoy was a hero, for others - a victim, for someone - an instrument of indoctrination of the youth of the Land of Soviets. And who was this guy really?
Thanks to Alexander Fadeev, Oleg Koshevoy was raised to an unattainable height. Although his friends, members of the "Young Guard", deserve no less kind words, as well as fame and honors.
Now it is difficult to say why so much attention was paid to the image of Koshevoy. But there is one unofficial version of this: the close relationship between Fadeev and the mother of Oleg Koshevoy.
For the most part, the parents of the Young Guard were poorly educated people, and Elena Nikolaevna favorably differed from them in her youth, intelligence, and extraordinary beauty. Maybe that's why she kept a little apart, almost none of her parents kept in touch with her. Nevertheless, it was she who was elected to the regional committee of the party, a delegate to various party and Komsomol congresses. It seems that popular rumor could not forgive her increased attention to herself. Yes, and rumors about the close relationship between Kosheva and Fadeev probably appeared due to ordinary jealousy.
Oleg's father was frightened that his son did not have a craving for some kind of craft. The guy was only interested in books, music and dancing. Dramatic changes occurred with Oleg after the death of his stepfather. By that time, it was the first death of a loved one in his life. This had such an effect on him that he became more serious, more attentive to his relatives.
In Krasnodon, in a short time, Oleg gained authority among his comrades. And it was not surprising. A strong, literate and intelligent guy beyond his years could not help but attract attention. Even in the first grade, he impressed teachers with his knowledge, composed poems, and drew. And in the first class, he studied for only three days, after which he was immediately transferred to the second.
The director of the Krasnodon School No. 1 admired Oleg's analytical mindset, who could quote Tolstoy's "War and Peace" in whole chapters. But at the same time he continued to be the soul of any cheerful company. The girls were crazy about him.
After the defeat of the Young Guard and the arrests that began, Oleg tried to escape from Krasnodon along with some other members of the organization, but was captured by a traitor in Rovenki. “During interrogations by the chief of police, Oleg behaved courageously. In the cell, Oleg did not let his comrades lose heart, he said that he would never ask for mercy from the executioners
Oleg tried to escape. Someone handed him a nail file. During the night, with the help of his comrades, he sawed through the bars on the window and fled, but he could not go far - weakened, he was caught by the Gestapo and again subjected to severe torture. He taught the youth in the cell to sing songs, and he himself sang first, ”his mother Elena Nikolaevna Koshevaya writes about Oleg in The Tale of a Son. (3)
After the release of Rovenek, she, not finding her son among the dead young guards in Krasnodon, went there, hoping to find her son alive. But this was not destined to happen.
“My son, who was not yet seventeen years old, lay before me gray-haired. The hair at the temples was white-white, as if sprinkled with chalk. The Germans gouged out Oleg's left eye, smashed the back of his head with a bullet, and burned the number of his Komsomol card on his chest with an iron.
During interrogation in November 1947, gendarme Yakov Shults said: “At the end of January 1943, I participated in the execution of members of the underground organization“ Young Guard ”, among which was the head of the organization, Koshevoy. This group was shot in the Rovenkovsky forest. I remember Koshevoy, because he had to be shot twice.
After the first shot, all the arrested fell down and lay motionless, only Koshevoy got up and, turning around, looked intently in our direction. This greatly angered the commander of the gendarmerie platoon Fromet, and he ordered the gendarme Dervits to finish him off, which he did by shooting Koshevoy in the back of the head.
Oleg Koshevoy and A. Fadeev, and Soviet propaganda, was declared the commissar of the "Young Guard" to please some political figures, although today it is known for certain that he was Viktor Tretyakevich. But this does not make his feat any less significant.
One thing is certain: if Oleg Koshevoy is lowered from the ideological skies and shaken off the dust of a propaganda raid from his personality, he is worthy of fame, eternal memory and fresh flowers on his grave.
2. 5IVAN TURKENICH
The situation with the commander of the "Young Guard" Ivan Turkenich remains a mystery. His subordinates are Heroes, and he is "only" the Order of the Red Banner.
In the novel about the commander, as if in passing. Same question: why?
Before appearing in Krasnodon, Turkenich, being in the rank of senior lieutenant, fought, was surrounded, captured, but managed to escape. To his misfortune, however, like hundreds of thousands of other soldiers and commanders, in the summer of 41, Stalin's order No. 270 came out, stating that all military personnel remaining in the territory occupied by the enemy were declared traitors. There were two ways out: either make your way to your own people and then redeem the "temporary delusion" with blood in battles, or shoot yourself. Turkenich did neither.
The authority of the 22-year-old Turkenich among the underground was indisputable. In the organization, he introduced military discipline, taught how to handle weapons, disguise. According to all the rules of military affairs, he developed military operations, he himself was a direct participant in many of them: the defeat of enemy vehicles, the release of prisoners of war from the Volchensk camp and Pervomaiskaya hospital, the execution of policemen.
With the light hand of Fadeev, he seemed to be out of work. The author mentions it only in passing. The writer's logic is clear: one who has been in German captivity cannot be a hero. Obvious absurdity: the rank and file members of the Young Guard are Heroes, but the commander is not.
When the arrests of the "Young Guard" began, the commander managed to escape unnoticed, crossed the front line. Endless interrogations began in SMERSH, but then the decree of September 13 arrived. Turkenich is sent to the active army. He will never know that in the submission of the military council of the South-Western Front of the Young Guard to the highest ranks, he was listed under No. 1:
Turkenich fought bravely, as his comrades testified, he was not afraid of death. One of them, the director of a secondary school in the Zhytomyr region Alexander Leontyevich Rudnitsky, spoke about the last days of the commander. In a fierce battle for the Polish city of Gongow Turkenich died a hero's death.
The Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation has a performance on Turkenich - for the battle near Gongów. From it it is clear that the commanders of all degrees - from the battalion commander to the commander of the army - were in favor of conferring the title of Hero of the Soviet Union on Captain Turkenich.
At the last moment, again, someone's evil will put a fat cross on the fate of the brave officer. And only 46 years later, the truth was able to triumph - the commander of the "Young Guard" was posthumously awarded this high rank.
2. 6 LOVE SHEVTSOV
Quite different than in the novel by A. Fadeev, Love Shevtsova appears in life.
In the novel, she is a beautiful, cheerful, courageous, charming laughing girl. “Sergey Tyulenin in a skirt,” Fadeev writes about her.
Only after the release of Krasnodon did some facts from the life of Lyubov Shevtsova become known. She was left in the city as a radio operator to communicate with the underground. Knowing well from the school the future leaders of the Young Guard, Lyuba could not help but become one of its active members who participated in the most daring attacks of the Young Guard.
After the defeat of the organization, she was captured in Rovenki.
She did not give evidence and, as a radio operator, categorically refused to cooperate.
She was tortured in such a way that the Inquisition fades. A friend managed to send Lovely cotton trousers to the cell: open wounds made it impossible to sit or lie down. As if in mockery on the eve of the execution, she was offered to take a bath. Shevtsova answered: "The land will accept me!" Lyubov Shevtsova was shot on February 9, 1943 in the Rattlesnake Forest. And soon parts of the Red Army entered the city.
The legend says: just before her death, Lyubka sang "In the wide expanses of Moscow."
All those who were shot were buried in the forest.
When the bodies were brought to the surface, in the pocket of Lyubin's trousers they found a note of religious content, as archival evidence calls it. Mom sent her daughter a prayer "Our Father". And in response I received a letter full of childish longing and adult pain:
“Hello, Mommy and Mikhailovna! Mommy, I’m very sorry now that I didn’t listen to you. I never thought that it would be so difficult for me. Mommy, I don’t know how to ask you to forgive me, but it’s too late now. Mommy , do not be offended! Your daughter Lyubasha. In the next world I will see my dad. "
A pure, simple, cheerful, brave girl from the Izvarino mine. What permanents and silk stockings! Felt boots for the winter, canvas slippers for going out, the rest of the time - barefoot. She was weak in literacy. Didn't get along with discipline. She graduated from the seven-year plan as an "overage", just before the war. Rushed to the front. The military enlistment office was refused, but they remembered him as an active comrade, although not a Komsomol member. After all, only the best are taken there!
She was accepted into the Komsomol quickly: in February 1942, when the issue of enrolling in the NKVD school was finally decided.
In Fadeev's novel, as we can see, many heroes are glossed over. They have almost no flaws, because Soviet heroes cannot have flaws. Komsomol member Lyubov Shevtsova cannot believe in God, she does not study diligently, etc.
The communist ideologists were in such a hurry to use the names of new heroes that they themselves mixed up these names. For example, Vanya Zemnukhov was actually Zimnukhov. Sergei Tyulenin actually bore the surname Tyulenev. But when the decree was issued to award them the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, it was already too late. It is interesting that later even parents had to change their surnames to incorrect, but already famous ones.
2. 7TRAITORS
The criminal case against 16 traitors, one way or another involved in the death of the underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard" in the occupied Krasnodon, was sent to the archive back in 1957.
In the famous novel by Alexander Fadeev, there is not a word about these people - they were arrested after the publication of the book. That is why their testimonies remained "top secret". Otherwise, history would have to be corrected. After all, the main question - who is to blame for the failure of the "Young Guard" - Fadeev's book does not give an answer. The author himself repeated more than once: "I did not write the true history of the Young Guard, but a novel that not only allows, but even suggests fiction."
What is the truth in this tragedy and what is History stubbornly silent about?
"Bookish" traitors
The novel was published in 1946. According to the surviving members of the underground, Fadeev very accurately conveyed the characters of the characters. However, the book, remarkable in artistic terms, was not up to par in terms of observing historical truth. First of all, this concerned the personalities of the traitors - the perpetrators of the failure of the "Young Guard". They were Fadeev's young guard Stakhovich, who betrayed his comrades during torture, as well as two schoolgirl girlfriends who collaborated with the policemen - Lyadskaya and Vyrikova.
Stakhovich is a fictitious surname. The prototype of this anti-hero was one of the organizers of the "Young Guard" Viktor Tretyakevich. But it is by no means Fadeev who is to blame for the fact that the name of this fighter was anathematized. The version about Tretyakevich's cowardly behavior during interrogations was already presented to the writer as an absolute truth (as you know, in 1960 Viktor Tretyakevich was completely rehabilitated and even posthumously awarded the Order of the Patriotic War of the 1st degree).
Unlike the fictional Stakhovich, Zinaida Vyrikova and Olga Lyadskaya are real people, and therefore the novel The Young Guard played a tragic role in their lives. Both girls were convicted of betrayal and sent to camps for a long time. Moreover, suspicion on Lyadskaya, for example, fell only because she spent 9 days in police custody and returned home safe and sound. Olga Alexandrovna herself later said that the police simply abused her. And they never even asked. And they released her for a bottle of moonshine - her mother brought it.
The stigma of traitors was removed from women only in 1990 after their numerous complaints and strict inspections by the prosecutor's office.
Here, for example, what kind of "certificate" Olga Alexandrovna Lyadskaya received after 47 years of shame: "The criminal case on charges of O. A. Lyadskaya, born in 1926, was reviewed by the military tribunal of the Moscow Military District on March 16, 1990. The decision of the Special Meeting at The Ministry of State Security of the USSR dated October 29, 1949 in relation to Lyadskaya O. A. was canceled, and the criminal case was discontinued due to the absence of corpus delicti in her actions. Lyadskaya Olga Alexandrovna was rehabilitated in this case. "
Approximately the same document was received by Zinaida Vyrikova, who spent more than 10 years in the camps. By the way, these women were never girlfriends, as described in the novel, and first met only after rehabilitation. (6)
We see how the fate of these two women was crippled by Fadeev's book. Talking about the feat of some people, one should not forget that other people lived and suffered next to these heroes. A writer, like no one else, must feel responsible for his words.
2. 8 WAS THE PARTY LEADERSHIP?
But the biggest oversight was the status of the "party and Komsomol underground" imposed on the "Young Guard" in 1982.
The organizational design of the "Young Guard" took place in August - October 1942 without party patronage. But, having familiarized himself with Fadeev's novel, Stalin discovered that the author did not show the leading and guiding role of the party. The position of the leader was voiced by the Pravda newspaper. She was picked up by other media, abruptly moving from praise to accusations that this, they say, was done by the writer almost intentionally. The Lugansk Regional Committee of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Ukraine also filed claims against the author for the fact that the retreat and evacuation from Krasnodon in July 1942 were shown as a spontaneous, uncontrollable process. And Alexander Fadeev had to rewrite the novel, creating monumental images of communists - the leaders of the underground.
The Young Guards are just children who loved their fatherland and were so well brought up that they were not afraid to stand up for it.
And the party leaders should have been proud that, without any prompting from above, these children already in the first days of the war understood what and how they needed to do.
We see how the party "leadership" of literature crippled the fate of many people, how, for the sake of truth, events and people were portrayed not as they really were, but as the party leaders wanted to see them.
3. CONCLUSION
A. A. Fadeev, of course, thought a lot in his novel "The Young Guard", but he wrote a work of art, literally in hot pursuit. He needed to embellish the events, otherwise his book would simply not be interesting to readers. And yet, perhaps, there is more truth in the work than fiction. The author tried to bring his "Young Guard" as close as possible to the one that is celebrating its 60th birthday the other day!
In connection with the anniversary of the Victory in the Great Patriotic War, talk about the "Young Guard" is of great interest to journalists and writers, and although it is said that the history of the "Young Guard" is still awaiting detailed study, some facts have become known for certain. But what is paradoxical is that if you ask someone about Oleg Koshevoy, the answer will be related to the Young Guard, and if you name, say, Anna Sopova, you will receive only a surprised look in response. People don't forget those they are reminded of. But not only do they deserve respect and fame. After all, there were dozens of young guards who were not awarded the title of Hero. But their feat was no less significant.
Of course, the Young Guards, as they were, will remain heroes, only the older generation does not need to be reminded of their feat, and the current ones do not even know about the existence of A. A. Fadeev's novel "The Young Guard", they began to forget about it and removed it from the school curriculum. But this is our memory and without it it is impossible! Maybe it's worth thinking about it?
"Young Guard", an underground Komsomol organization operating in the city of Krasnodon, Voroshilovgrad region. during the Great Patriotic War of 1941-45, during the period of temporary occupation of the Donbass by the Nazi troops.The "Young Guard" arose under the leadership of the party underground, headed by F.P. Lyutikov. After the occupation of Krasnodon by the Nazis (July 20, 1942), several anti-fascist youth groups were formed: I. A. Zemnukhova, O. V. Koshevoy, V. I. Levashov, S. G. Tyulenin, A. Z. Eliseenko, V. A. Zhdanov , N. S. Sumsky, U. M. Gromova, A. V. Popov, M. K. Peglivanova.
On October 2, 1942, communist E. Ya. Moshkov held the first organizational meeting of the leaders of youth groups in the city and nearby villages. The created underground organization was named "M. g.". Its headquarters included: Gromova, Zemnukhov, Koshevoy (commissioner "M. G."), Levashov, V. I. Tretyakevich, I. V. Turkenich (commander "M. G."), Tyulenin, L. G. Shevtsov.
"Young Guard" consisted of 91 people. (including 26 workers, 44 students and 14 employees), of which 15 are communists. the organization had 4 radios, an underground printing house, weapons and explosives. Issued and distributed 5,000 anti-fascist leaflets of 30 titles; on the eve of the 25th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution, she hung out 8 Soviet flags in the city. Members of the organization destroyed enemy vehicles with soldiers, ammunition and fuel. On November 15, 1942, the Young Guards released 70 Soviet prisoners of war from a fascist concentration camp, and 20 Soviet prisoners of war who were in the hospital were also released.
As a result of the arson on the night of December 6, 1942, the building of the fascist labor exchange, where lists of people intended for export to Germany were stored, about 2 thousand Krasnodon residents were saved from being deported into fascist slavery.
The underground party organization of the city and the "Young Guard" were preparing an armed uprising in order to destroy the fascist garrison and meet the Soviet Army. The betrayal of the provocateur Pocheptsov interrupted this preparation.
In the fascist dungeons, the Young Guard bravely and steadfastly withstood the most severe tortures. On January 15, 16 and 31, 1943, the Nazis, partly alive, partly shot, threw 71 people. in the pit of mine No. 5, with a depth of 53 m. Koshevoy, Shevtsova, S. M. Ostapenko, D. U. Ogurtsov, V. F. Subbotin, after brutal torture, were shot in the Thundering Forest near the city of Rovenka on February 9, 1943. 4 people. shot in other areas. 11 people left the police pursuit: A. V. Kovalev went missing, Turkenich and S. S. Safonov died at the front, G. M. Arutyunyants, V. D. Borts, A. V. Lopukhov, O. I. Ivantsova, N. M. Ivantsova, Levashov, M. T. Shishchenko and R. P. Yurkin survived. By decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of September 13, 1943, Gromova, Zemnukhov, Koshevoy, Tyulenin, Shevtsova were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, 3 participants "M. g." were awarded the Order of the Red Banner, 35 - the Order of the Patriotic War of the 1st degree, 6 - the Order of the Red Star, 66 - the medal "Partisan of the Patriotic War" of the 1st degree. The feat of the heroes of "M. g." depicted in the novel by A. A. Fadeev "The Young Guard". The new city of Voroshilovgrad region was named in memory of the organization. - Molodogvardeysk (1961); the names of the heroes are named settlements, state farms, collective farms, ships, etc.
Lit .: Young Guard. Sat. documents and memories, 3rd ed., Donetsk, 1972.
Materials provided by the Rubricon project
Fighting affairs of the Krasnodon underground
MINISTRY OF CULTURE OF THE Ukrainian SSR
Krasnodon State Order of Friendship of Peoples Museum "Young Guard"
Krasnodon, Voroshilovgrad region, pl. them. Young Guard, tel. No. 2-33-73
The Nazis occupied Krasnodon on July 20, 1942. About this time, the commander of the "Young Guard" Ivan Turkenich in his report "Days of the Underground" wrote: "A council was created, a labor exchange, the police were introduced, the Gestapo arrived. Mass arrests of communists, Komsomol members, order bearers, old red partisans began. All of them were shot. .. In the days of the bloody fascist revelry, our "Young Guard" was born. A headquarters was created, which included Ivan Turkenich (commander), Oleg Koshevoy (commissar), Ulyana Gromova, Ivan Zemnukhov, Vasily Levashov, Viktor Tretyakevich, Sergei Tyulenin, Lyubov Shevtsova.
All combat activities of the youth organization took place under the direct supervision of the party underground, which was carried out through the headquarters of the "Young Guard". The communists set before the young underground workers the task of debunking the lies of Hitler's propaganda, instilling faith in the inevitable defeat of the enemy. The Young Guards considered it their duty to rouse the youth and the population of Krasnodon region to an active struggle against the Nazis, provide themselves with weapons and, at a convenient moment, switch to open armed struggle.
From the first days of their rule, the Nazis tried to get the mines working. Therefore, following the occupied troops, the so-called Directorate No. 10 arrived in Krasnodon, which is part of the system of the "Eastern Society for the Exploitation of Coal and Metallurgical Enterprises", designed to pump out Krasnodon coal. The work of the Central Electromechanical Workshops was resumed, where, risking their lives, the leaders of the underground communists Filipp Petrovich Lyutikov and Nikolai Petrovich Barakov settled down. Using their official position, they accept underground workers into the workshops and from here they lead the "Young Guard". Everything necessary is being done so that the enterprise, which, according to the plan of the invaders, was supposed to restore the mines of Krasnodon, does not work at full capacity. Young heroes spoiled the equipment, slowed down the work, destroying individual parts of the machines, committed sabotage. So, on the eve of the launch of mine No. 1 "Sorokino", Yuri Vizenovsky sawed a rope, with the help of which the cage was lowered into the shaft. The multi-ton cage broke off, destroying in its path everything restored with such difficulty by the occupiers. Thanks to the active work of the people's avengers, the Nazis were not able to take out a single ton of coal from the Krasnodon mines.
The Young Guard attached great importance to the distribution of leaflets among the population. Radio receivers were installed in the apartments of Nikolai Petrovich Barakov, Oleg Koshevoy, Nikolai Sumsky, Sergey Levashov. Underground workers listened to the reports of the Soviet Information Bureau, based on their texts they compiled leaflets, with the help of which they conveyed to the inhabitants of the city and the region the truth about the Red Army, about our Soviet power. In the beginning, proclamations were written by hand on pieces of school notebooks. It took a lot of time, so the headquarters of the "Young Guard" decided to create an underground printing house. She was in the house of Georgy Harutyunyants on the outskirts of the city. Having closed the windows with shutters, Ivan Zemnukhov, Viktor Tretyakevich, Vasily Levashov, Vladimir Osmukhin, Georgy Arutyunyants and other guys spent the night at a primitive machine, printing leaflets.
The first printed leaflets appeared in the city on November 7, 1942. When spreading their underground, they showed initiative and ingenuity. Oleg Koshevoy, for example, wore a police uniform at night and, moving freely along the street after curfew, pasted leaflets; Vasily Pirozhok managed to stick leaflets into the pockets of Krasnodon residents at the market, even attach them to the backs of policemen; Sergei Tyulenin "patronized" the cinema. He appeared here before the beginning of the session. At the most convenient moment, when the projectionist turned off the lights in the hall, Sergei threw leaflets into the auditorium.
Many leaflets went outside the city - to Sverdlovsky, Rovenkovsky, Novosvetlovsky districts, to the Rostov region. In total, during the occupation, the Young Guard distributed more than 5,000 copies of leaflets of 30 names.
The headquarters constantly carried out work to involve young people in the ranks of the "Young Guard". If in September there were 35 people in the underground, then in December there were 92 underground members in the organization. On the recommendation of the Communists, all members of the "Young Guard" were divided into fives, with whom the headquarters maintained contacts through liaisons.
At the end of September, the Young Guards, led by Ivan Turkenich, hanged in the city park two traitors to the Motherland, who were especially zealous in reprisals against civilians. Shock groups of youth carried out successful operations to destroy German vehicles on the roads going from Krasnodon to Sverdlovsk, Voroshilovgrad, Izvarino.
The 25th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution was approaching. The Communists instructed the Young Guards to hang red flags over the occupied city. On the night of November 7, eight groups of underground fighters set off to carry out a combat mission. The day before, the girls had prepared the cloths by sewing together pieces of cloth and repainting them into red cloth. In the morning, Krasnodon residents saw red flags blazing in the autumn wind. This military operation of the underground made a huge impression on the inhabitants of the city. “When I saw the flag at the school,” said M.A. Litvinova, an eyewitness of the events, “an involuntary joy seized me. I woke up the children and quickly ran across the road to Mukhina. She said: “Maria Alekseevna, this was done for us Soviet people. We are remembered, we are not forgotten by ours ... ".
On this unforgettable day, young underground workers distributed leaflets throughout the city and the region and provided material assistance to the families of veterans. “... We prepared holiday gifts for the families of workers, especially those who suffered at the hands of German executioners,” wrote Ivan Turkenich. “We allocated money for them from our Komsomol fund and bought food. I remember that on the eve of the holiday I went with a bundle under my arm to the outskirts where the family of my comrade-front-line soldier lived. He was also, like me, a Soviet officer. His wife, an old mother and four children remained in Krasnodon. And so I brought them a holiday gift. The hungry children unfolded the paper and, with a cry of joy, found bread and a little cereal. How grateful the weary people were to us for these modest gifts."
In December, Ivan Zemnukhov, Ivan Turkenich, Anatoly Popov, Demyan Fomin helped 20 prisoners of war escape from captivity, who were placed by the Nazis in the building of the Pervomaiskaya hospital, and soon a group of Yevgeny Moshkov released more than 70 Soviet soldiers from the prisoner of war camp, which was located in the Volchensky farm of the Rostov region.
The glory of the "Young Guard" grew. The underground workers of Krasnodon were not limited to activities in the city and the region. The communists believed that it was necessary to look for connections with the partisans of other districts and regions. To establish contacts with the people's avengers operating in the Rostov region, the headquarters sent a messenger Oksana. Olga Ivantsova worked underground under such a pseudonym. Oksana repeatedly visited the Kamensk partisans, met with messengers and the command of the detachment. It was about uniting the forces of partisans and underground fighters for a joint action against the Nazis behind enemy lines.
The vigorous activity of the underground workers aroused impotent anger among the occupiers. The police begin to intensively search for the perpetrators of anti-fascist measures. The most severe regime is established in the city. To disguise the activities of the underground, Ivan Zemnukhov, Yevgeny Moshkov, Viktor Tretyakevich, Valeria Borts, Lyubov Shevtsova, Vladimir Zagoruiko, Vasily Levashov and others, on the advice of the Communists, get a job at the Gorky Club. Three circles began to operate here, in which most of the participants were underground workers. Young people, hiding behind classes in circles, could meet without arousing suspicion from the authorities. From here the guys went on combat missions.
Once Lyuba Shevtsova came excitedly to a meeting of the headquarters. She learned that the Nazis were going to steal young people to work in Germany. Lists have already been prepared at the labor exchange. The headquarters decided to disrupt the recruitment. To this end, several leaflets were issued, in which they called on the population to save their children from fascist slavery. And Lyuba Shevtsova, Viktor Lukyanchenko and Sergey Tyulenin, on the night of December 5, carried out a brilliant operation to set fire to the labor exchange. Documents prepared by the Nazis for more than 2,000 Krasnodon residents were burned in the fire. By morning, only charred walls remained from the ominous building of the exchange, which the people called the "black exchange".
The headquarters attached great importance to the armament of the underground. The Young Guards obtained weapons and ammunition by all means. They stole them from the Nazis, collected them in places of recent battles, and finished them off in armed clashes with the enemy. The weapon was stored in the cellars of the destroyed building of the city bath. Ivan Turkenich noted in his report that by the end of 1942 "the warehouse had 15 machine guns, 80 rifles, 300 grenades, about 15,000 rounds of ammunition, 10 pistols, 65 kg of explosives and several hundred meters of Fickford cord." The underground workers were going to direct all these weapons against the Nazis located on the territory of Krasnodon. The Young Guards were actively preparing for an armed uprising. Their plan was to destroy the enemy and thereby help the Red Army to liberate their hometown faster. But vile betrayal interrupted the preparations for an armed uprising. Most of the Young Guards were arrested and, after severe torture in January 1943, were thrown into the pit of mine No. 5.
Directorate of the Museum "Young Guard"
Legends of the Great Patriotic War. "Young guard"
More than sixty years have passed since the world learned about the brutal massacre perpetrated by the fascist invaders on members of the underground organization "Young Guard" operating in the Ukrainian mining town of Krasnodon. However, to this day, despite the abundance of documented eyewitness accounts and court verdicts, it is not known for certain who was responsible for the defeat of the Krasnodon underground.
In mid-February 1943, after the liberation of Donetsk Krasnodon by Soviet troops, several dozen corpses of teenagers tortured by the Nazis, who during the period of occupation were in the underground organization "Young Guard", were removed from the pit of mine N5 located near the city.
A few months later, Pravda published an article by Alexander Fadeev "Immortality", on the basis of which the novel "Young Guard" was written a little later, dedicated to the events that resulted in the death of people found in the mine. Subsequently, it was from this work that the vast majority of citizens, first of the Soviet Union, and then of Russia, formed an idea of the activities of the Krasnodon underground during the occupation. Until the end of the 80s, Fadeev's novel was perceived as a canonized history of the organization, and any other interpretation of events was impossible by definition.
Meanwhile, it is no secret to anyone that the novel, which glorified its heroes - young underground workers, had a rather difficult fate. The book was first published in 1946. However, after some time, Alexander Fadeev was sharply criticized for the fact that the “leading and guiding” role of the Communist Party was not clearly expressed in the novel. The writer took into account the wishes, and in 1951 the second edition of the novel "Young Guard" saw the light. At the same time, Fadeev repeated more than once: "I did not write the true history of the Young Guard, but a novel that not only allows, but even suggests fiction."
These circumstances have become fertile ground for the emergence of many speculations about the reality of the events described in the novel. At first, distrust of the official version manifested itself mainly at the level of quiet whispers in the kitchens and vulgar children's jokes, and with the beginning of perestroika, it spilled over into the pages of newspapers and magazines.
And for more than a decade and a half, between those who continue to adhere to the traditional version, and those who do not stop trying to separate the facts from the fiction of the author of the novel "The Young Guard", there has been a rather lively correspondence discussion, the end of which is not yet in sight. Moreover, most copies break around several key points: the reality of the events described by Fadeev, the names of the real organizers and leaders of the underground, as well as the true culprits of the death of most members of the organization.
Parade of "traitors"
In fairness, it should be noted that there were not so many of those who tried to challenge the very existence of an underground youth organization in Krasnodon. The facts collected in the post-war years, the memories of eyewitnesses, as well as the surviving members of the Young Guard, indicated that the underground organization really existed. And not only existed, but also conducted a very active activity.
In 1993, a press conference was held in Lugansk by a special commission to study the history of the Young Guard. As Izvestiya wrote then (05/12/1993), after two years of work, the commission gave its assessment of the versions that had excited the public for almost half a century. The conclusions of the researchers were reduced to several fundamental points. In July-August 1942, after the capture of the Luhansk region by the Nazis, many underground youth groups spontaneously arose in the mining Krasnodon and the surrounding villages. They, according to the memoirs of contemporaries, were called "Star", "Sickle", "Hammer", etc. However, there is no need to talk about any party leadership. In October 1942, Viktor Tretyakevich united them into the Young Guard. It was he, and not Oleg Koshevoy, who, according to the findings of the commission, became the commissioner of the underground organization. There were almost twice as many members of the "Young Guard" as later recognized by the competent authorities. The guys fought like a partisan, risky, suffering heavy losses, and this, as was noted at a press conference, ultimately led to the failure of the organization.
At the suggestion of Alexander Fadeev, the image of the main culprit in the death of the "Young Guard" - Yevgeny Stakhovich, who, under torture, gave out the names of most of the underground fighters, firmly settled in the public mind. At the same time, although Fadeev himself repeatedly stated that the traitor Stakhovich is a collective image and resemblance to real Young Guards by chance, very many, and primarily the participants in those events who managed to survive, were deeply convinced that its prototype, paradoxically, was the already mentioned Viktor Tretyakevich. The debate about how the hero suddenly turned into a traitor has not subsided so far.
In 1998, the newspaper "Duel" (09/30/1998) published an article by A.F. Gordeev Heroes and Traitors. It described in sufficient detail the history of the emergence, activity and collapse of the Krasnodon underground, which differed significantly from that described by Fadeev in the novel The Young Guard.
According to Gordeev, the "Young Guard" (the real name of the organization "Hammer") was created in early October 1942 on the initiative of Viktor Tretyakevich. The anti-fascist Komsomol youth groups of Ivan Zemnukhov, Yevgeny Moshkov, Nikolai Sumsky, Boris Glavan, Sergey Tyulenin and others, which spontaneously arose and acted separately in Krasnodon and its environs, became the core of it. On October 6, 1942, Gennady Pocheptsov, whose stepfather , V.G. Gromov, collaborated with the occupation authorities and subsequently played a fatal role in the history of the "Young Guard".
"Duel", referring to archival documents, writes that after learning about the arrest of the leaders of the underground (Zemnukhov, Tretyakevich and Moshkov were captured on January 1, 1943) and not finding a way out of the current situation, Pocheptsov turned to his stepfather for advice. Gromov immediately suggested that his stepson immediately inform the police about the underground workers. Gromov confirmed this treacherous parting word during interrogation on May 25, 1943: "I told him that he could be arrested and, in order to save his life, he must write a statement to the police and extradite the members of the organization. He listened to me."
On January 3, 1943, Pocheptsov was taken to the police and interrogated first by V. Sulikovsky (head of the Krasnodon district police), and then by investigators Didyk and Kuleshov. The informant confirmed the authorship of the applicant and his affiliation with the underground Komsomol organization operating in Krasnodon, named the goals and objectives of its activities, indicated the place of storage of weapons and ammunition hidden in Gundor mine No. 18. As Kuleshov later testified, “Pocheptsov said that he really was a member of the underground Komsomol organization ... called the leaders of this organization, or rather, the city headquarters, namely: Tretyakevich, Lukashov, Zemnukhov, Safonov, Koshevoy. Pocheptsov called Tretyakevich the head of the citywide organization. He himself was a member of the May Day organization. " Those secret information that Pocheptsov owned and which became the "property" of the police turned out to be quite enough to uncover the Komsomol youth underground and liquidate it. In total, more than 70 people were arrested for belonging to the underground in Krasnodon and its environs.
"Duel" cites the testimony of some participants in the brutal massacre of underground workers.
During the interrogation on July 9, 1947, the head of the gendarmerie, Renatus, said: “... The translator Lina Artes asked to be released from work, since the gendarmes during interrogations treat the arrested too rudely. Guardsman Zons allegedly beat the arrested severely after dinner. I granted her request and spoke on this issue with Zons. He admitted that he really beat the arrested, but for the reason that he could not get evidence from them in any other way. "
Police investigator Cherenkov about Sergey Tyulenin: “He was mutilated beyond recognition, his face was covered with bruises and swollen, blood oozed from open wounds. Three Germans immediately entered and after them Burgardt (translator A.G.), called by Sulikovsky, appeared. One German asked Sulikovsky what kind of person he was beaten like that. Sulikovsky explained. The German, like an angry tiger, knocked Sergey down with a blow of his fist and began to torment his body with forged German boots. He struck him with terrible force in the stomach, back, face, trampled and tore to pieces his clothes along with the body. At the beginning of this terrible execution, Tyulenin showed signs of life, but he soon fell silent and was dragged out of the office, dead.
Courageously kept on interrogations and other young guards. Ulyana Gromova was hung up by her hair, a five-pointed star was carved on her back, her chest was cut off, her body was burned with a red-hot iron, salt was sprinkled on her wounds, and she was put on a red-hot stove. However, she was silent, just as Bondareva, Ivanikhina, Zemnukhova and many others, who were subsequently thrown into the pit of mine N5, were silent.
Pocheptsov, according to Duel, managed to hide for some time after the arrival of the Soviet troops, and he was arrested only on March 8, 1943. To mitigate his guilt, Pocheptsov already at the first interrogation cast a shadow of suspicion on Viktor Tretyakevich. Answering the question of the Soviet investigator about what prompted him to hand over the members of the underground organization, he referred to Ivan Zemnukhov, who allegedly told him on December 18, 1942 that Tretyakevich had betrayed the Young Organization and that the police had information about it. This news allegedly prompted Pocheptsov to file a statement with the police.
At the same time, in 1999, the Sovershenno Sekretno newspaper (03/17/1999), referring to the materials of Case N20056 on charges of policemen and German gendarmes in the massacre of the underground organization Young Guard, expressed the opinion that the "official traitor" Pocheptsov did not told investigators nothing new. Before him, Olga Lyadskaya allegedly managed to tell the Germans about the activities of the underground in detail, who was not an underground worker and was arrested quite by accident.
After the arrest of Zemnukhov, Tretyakevich and Moshkov came to Tosya Mashchenko in search of Valya Borts, who by that time had already gone to the front line. The policeman liked Tosya's tablecloth and decided to take it with him. Under the tablecloth lay Lyadskaya's unsent letter to her friend Fyodor Izvarin. She wrote that she did not want to leave for Germany in "SLAVERY". That's right: in quotation marks and capital letters. The investigator promised to hang Lyadskaya in the bazaar for her capital letters in quotation marks, if he did not immediately name others who were dissatisfied with the new order. Further, the publication cites the testimony of Lyadskaya contained in Case No. 20056:
“I named the people whom I suspected of partisan activity: Kozyrev, Tretyakevich, Nikolaenko, because they once asked me if we had partisans on the farm and if I helped them. And after Solihovsky threatened to beat me, I gave girlfriend Mashchenko, Borts ... "
As for Pocheptsov, according to Top Secret, he really betrayed the group in the village of Pervomaisky and the headquarters of the Young Guard in the following order: Tretyakevich (chief), Lukashev, Zemnukhov, Safonov and Koshevoy. In addition, Pocheptsov named the commander of his "five" - Popov. However, his testimony, according to the publication, was no longer so important, since Tretyakevich was betrayed by another member of the underground - Tosya Mashchenko. After that, Tretyakevich himself "betrayed Shevtsova and began to call the 'Young Guards' whole villages."
But Sovershenno sekretno is not limited to this list of traitors and notes that in the documents a certain Chinese Yakov Ka Fu is also mentioned as a traitor to the Young Guard. He allegedly could be offended by the Soviet government, because before the war he was fired from his job because of his poor knowledge of the Russian language.
... for lack of corpus delicti
For a long time, Zinaida Vyrikova was considered another culprit for the death of the Young Guard. She, like Lyadskaya, was one of the anti-heroines of the novel The Young Guard. At the same time, Fadeev did not even change the names of the girls, which subsequently greatly complicated their life. Both Vyrikova and Lyadskaya were convicted of treason and sent to camps for a long time. As "Moskovsky Komsomolets" notes (06/18/2003), the stigma of traitors was removed from women only in 1990, after their numerous complaints and strict inspections by the prosecutor's office.
"MK" quotes the "certificate" that Olga Alexandrovna Lyadskaya received after 47 years of shame (according to the publication, Zinaida Vyrikova also received approximately the same document): "Criminal case on charges of Lyadskaya O.A., born in 1926, reviewed by the military tribunal of the Moscow Military District on March 16, 1990. The decision of the Special Conference under the Ministry of State Security of the USSR of October 29, 1949 in relation to Lyadskaya O.A. was canceled, and the criminal case was dismissed due to the absence of corpus delicti in her actions. rehabilitated."
There is not a word in the material of Moskovsky Komsomolets about whether Lyadskaya's confession that she betrayed Kozyrev, Tretyakevich, Nikolaenko, Mashchenko, Borts was taken into account when deciding on the rehabilitation issue. At the same time, the article mentions two more new names of persons through whose fault the "Young Guard" could have been crushed.
"MK", as well as four years earlier, the newspaper "Sovershenno sekretno", refers to materials found in the archives of the FSB. Namely, a criminal case against 16 traitors to the Motherland who worked for the Germans in the occupied Krasnodon. 14 of them openly collaborated with the German gendarmerie. And only two defendants, according to the publication, are somewhat out of the general picture of absolute traitors - 20-year-old Georgy Statsenko and 23-year-old namesake of the author of the novel "Young Guard" Gury Fadeev.
George's father - Vasily Statsenko - was the burgomaster of Krasnodon. That's why George got "on the pencil." In addition, he was a Komsomol member and knew the Young Guard: Zemnukhov, Koshevoy, Tretyakevich, Levashov, Osmukhin, Turkenich, and others.
"Moskovsky Komsomolets" cites excerpts from the testimony of Statsenko, who was arrested on September 22, 1946:
“Being a Komsomol member, I enjoyed the trust of my comrades, because outwardly I showed myself devoted to the Soviet regime. I told my father about Levashov’s proposal to me to join the underground Komsomol organization. He also said that Zemnukhov showed me a leaflet, read poems written by him against the Germans. And in general, I told my father, my schoolmates: Zemnukhov, Arutyunyants, Koshevoy and Tretyakevich, are members of an underground organization and are actively working against the Germans.
Gury Fadeev, according to MK, also knew the Young Guards, was especially friendly with the family of Oleg Koshevoy. He became suspicious after one night he got into the police - at an odd hour, a German patrol caught him on the street and, during a search, found an anti-fascist leaflet in his pocket. However, for some reason he was quickly released from the gendarmerie. And then, according to witnesses, he allegedly almost did not get out of the police.
"After I was recruited by the police to identify those who were distributing Young Guard leaflets, I met with Deputy Police Chief Zakharov several times. During one of the interrogations, Zakharov asked: "Which of the partisans recruited your sister Alla?" I, knowing about this, according to my mother, betrayed Zakharov to Vanya Zemnukhov, who really made an offer to my sister to join an underground anti-fascist organization... I told him that in the apartment of Korostylev (Oleg Koshevoy's uncle), sister Korostyleva Elena Nikolaevna Koshevaya and her son were listening to radio broadcasts from Moscow Oleg, who writes down messages from the Sovinform Bureau."
From the words of Fadeev, recorded in the protocol of interrogation, it turned out that during the occupation he entered the service of the German directorate as a geologist and was engaged in redrawing geological maps compiled under the Soviet regime, plans for mines and developments. At the same time, Fadeev gave a signature stating that he undertakes to help the police in identifying partisans.
The most curious thing about this story is that neither Statsenko nor Fadeev were shot. On March 6, 1948, by a special meeting at the USSR Ministry of State Security for treason, Guriy Fadeev was sentenced to 25 years in camps, and Georgy Statsenko to 15 years (the remaining 14 people involved in this case received 25 years each). But the amazing adventures of Statsenko and Fadeev did not end there either. In 1954, with the coming to power of Khrushchev, the "case of traitors" was reviewed: the sentence was left unchanged to everyone except Statsenko. His sentence was reduced by 5 years.
Moskovsky Komsomolets quotes case materials that shed light on the reasons for the unexpected commutation of the sentence:
“During the interrogation on October 4, 1946, Statsenko admitted his guilt, but later retracted his testimony. He claimed that the arrests of the Young Guards began long before his conversation with his father. his son ... None of the convicts in this case showed that the burgomaster's son would have provided any information that would have been used by the police in the arrest of the Young Guards ... Thus, the accusation of the convicted Statsenko G.V. organization "Young Guard" is not proved by the materials of the investigation.
Fadeev also had a chance to be released ahead of time, for whom a large number of relatives, neighbors and acquaintances interceded. The Chief Military Prosecutor's Office was not too lazy to interrogate everyone who had testified against Fadeev ten years earlier. The military prosecutor Gorny even prepared a protest to the military tribunal of the Moscow Military District with a request "to cancel the decision of the Special Meeting of the Ministry of State Security of March 6, 1948 in relation to Fadeev, to stop the case for lack of evidence of the charge." However, someone's bossy hand on the same document scribbled in blue ink: "I find no grounds for making a protest. Fadeev's complaint should be dismissed."
However, Fadeev was still released ahead of schedule. According to "MK", out of 25 years he served only 10. His criminal record was removed, but he was refused rehabilitation. So formally, he is still considered the main traitor of the Young Guard.
Parcel truck
Meanwhile, the last of the eight Young Guardsmen who survived the war, Vasily Ivanovich Levashov, shortly before his death (he died in 2001), gave an interview to the Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper (06/30/1999) in which he stated that in fact there were no traitors, and " the organization burned down because of stupidity."
The former underground worker said that after the first reading of Fadeev's book, he had the most contradictory feelings. On the one hand, he was delighted by how subtly the writer captured the moods and feelings of the Young Guard. On the other hand, Levashov was outraged by the free treatment of some facts: the traitor Stakhovich appeared in the novel, but there was no person with such a surname in the organization, so there was a clear allusion to Viktor Tretyakevich, the commissioner of the Young Guard.
“In fact, there were no traitors, the organization burned out because of stupidity,” Vasily Ivanovich said. “A truck with parcels for the Germans arrived in Krasnodon for Christmas, and we decided to capture them. We dragged everything into the barn at night to one of our guys, "and the next morning they sent him in torn bags to the club. On the way, a box of cigarettes fell out. A boy of about twelve was spinning around nearby, grabbed it. Tretyakevich gave him cigarettes for his silence. And a day later, the Germans grabbed the boy at the market."
According to Levashov, Tretyakevich was slandered by the police for his steadfastness during interrogations. Vasily Ivanovich's father was sitting in the same cell with the commissioner of the "Young Guard" and saw how he was taken away for interrogation, and dragged back by the legs of the beaten, almost alive. And the names of the underground, according to Levashov, the Nazis could find out from the lists of employees of the club, the director of which was Moshkov, a young guard. The latter compiled these lists for the labor exchange: hundreds of young people were driven to work in Germany, and for club workers they were given "reservations".
Viktor Tretyakevich was rehabilitated only in 1959. Prior to that, his relatives had to live with the stigma of the traitor's relatives. According to Vasily Levashov, Victor's rehabilitation was achieved by his middle brother Vladimir. Viktor Tretyakevich was posthumously awarded, but he was never reinstated in the rank of commissar of the Young Guard.
Levashov, in a conversation with a Komsomolskaya Pravda correspondent, also touched upon the fate of another resident of Krasnodon, who was accused of betrayal - Georgy Statsenko:
“Statsenko served 15 years for betraying the Young Guard,” said Levashov. “I got out of prison and wrote a letter to the KGB asking him to remove the blame because he did not betray. And he asked me and Harutyunyants to be called as witnesses. for interrogation at the KGB, and I said that Statsenko had nothing to do with the Young Guard, and therefore could not know anything. The blame was removed from Statsenko."
At the same time, some facts indicate that not everything is so simple in the story of the rehabilitation of Viktor Tretyakevich, as Vasily Levashov told about it. And there are still many pitfalls in this case ...
A. Druzhinina, student of the Faculty of History and Social Sciences, Leningrad State Regional University. A. S. Pushkin.
Viktor Tretyakevich.
Sergei Tyulenin.
Ulyana Gromova.
Ivan Zemnukhov.
Oleg Koshevoy.
Lyubov Shevtsova.
Monument "Oath" on the square named after the Young Guard in Krasnodon.
A corner of the museum dedicated to the Young Guards is the banner of the organization and the sledge on which weapons were carried. Krasnodon.
Anna Iosifovna, the mother of Viktor Tretyakevich, waited for the day when the honest name of her son was restored.
While studying for three years how the “Young Guard” arose and how it worked behind enemy lines, I realized that the main thing in its history is not the organization itself and its structure, not even the feats it accomplished (although, of course, everything done by the guys causes immense respect and admiration). Indeed, during the Second World War, hundreds of such underground or partisan detachments were created in the occupied territory of the USSR, but the Young Guard became the first organization that they learned about almost immediately after the death of its members. And almost everyone died - about a hundred people. The main thing in the history of the "Young Guard" began precisely on January 1, 1943, when its leading troika was arrested.
Now some journalists write with disdain about the fact that the Young Guard did nothing special, that they were OUN members at all, or even just “Krasnodon lads”. It's amazing how seemingly serious people cannot comprehend (or don't want to?) that they - these boys and girls - accomplished the main feat of their lives right there, in prison, where they experienced inhuman torture, but to the end, until death from a bullet at the abandoned pit, where many were dumped while still alive, they remained people.
On the anniversary of their memory, I would like to recall at least some episodes from the life of the Young Guard and how they died. They deserve it. (All facts are taken from documentary books and essays, conversations with eyewitnesses of those days and archival documents.)
They were brought to an abandoned mine -
and pushed out of the car.
The guys led each other by the arms,
supported in the hour of death.
Beaten, exhausted, they walked into the night
in bloody rags.
And the boys tried to help the girls
and even joked, as before ...
Yes, that's right, at an abandoned mine, most of the members of the underground Komsomol organization Young Guard, which fought in 1942 against the Nazis in the small Ukrainian town of Krasnodon, lost their lives. It turned out to be the first underground youth organization about which it was possible to collect quite detailed information. The Young Guards were then called heroes (they were heroes), who gave their lives for their homeland. A little over ten years ago, everyone knew about the Young Guard. The novel of the same name by Alexander Fadeev was studied in schools; at the screening of Sergei Gerasimov's film, people could not hold back their tears; motor ships, streets, hundreds of educational institutions and pioneer detachments were named after the Young Guards. More than three hundred Young Guard museums were created throughout the country (and even abroad), and about 11 million people visited the Krasnodon Museum.
And who now knows about the Krasnodon underground? In recent years, the Krasnodon Museum has been empty and quiet, only eight out of three hundred school museums in the country have remained, and in the press (both in Russia and in Ukraine) young heroes are increasingly called “nationalists”, “unorganized Komsomol lads”, and some and even denies their existence.
What were they like, these young men and women who called themselves Young Guardsmen?
The Krasnodon Komsomol youth underground included seventy-one people: forty-seven boys and twenty-four girls. The youngest was fourteen, and fifty-five of them never turned nineteen. The most ordinary, no different from the same boys and girls of our country, the guys were friends and quarreled, studied and fell in love, ran to dances and chased pigeons. They were engaged in school circles, sports clubs, played stringed musical instruments, wrote poetry, many of them were good at drawing.
They studied in different ways - someone was an excellent student, and someone with difficulty overcame the granite of science. There were also a lot of tomboys. Dreamed of a future adult life. They wanted to become pilots, engineers, lawyers, someone was going to enter the theater school, and someone - to the pedagogical institute.
The “Young Guard” was as multinational as the population of these southern regions of the USSR. Russians, Ukrainians (there were Cossacks among them), Armenians, Belarusians, Jews, Azerbaijanis and Moldavians, ready to help each other at any moment, fought against the Nazis.
The Germans occupied Krasnodon on July 20, 1942. And almost immediately the first leaflets appeared in the city, a new bathhouse, already ready for the German barracks, was on fire. It was Seryozhka Tyulenin who began to act. One.
On August 12, 1942, he turned seventeen. Sergey wrote leaflets on pieces of old newspapers, and the policemen often found them in their pockets. He began to collect weapons, not even doubting that they would definitely come in handy. And he was the first to attract a group of guys ready to fight. It initially consisted of eight people. However, by the first days of September, several groups were already operating in Krasnodon, not connected with one another - in total there were 25 people in them. The birthday of the underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard" was September 30: then the plan for creating a detachment was adopted, specific actions for underground work were outlined, and a headquarters was created. It included Ivan Zemnukhov - chief of staff, Vasily Levashov - commander of the central group, Georgy Arutyunyants and Sergey Tyulenin - members of the headquarters. Viktor Tretyakevich was elected commissar. The guys unanimously supported Tyulenin's proposal to name the detachment "Young Guard". And in early October, all the scattered underground groups were united into one organization. Later, Uliana Gromova, Lyubov Shevtsova, Oleg Koshevoy and Ivan Turkenich joined the headquarters.
Now you can often hear that the Young Guards did nothing special. Well, they put up leaflets, collected weapons, burned and contaminated the grain intended for the invaders. Well, they hung out several flags on the day of the 25th anniversary of the October Revolution, burned the Labor Exchange, saved several dozen prisoners of war. Other underground organizations have existed longer and done more!
And do these unfortunate critics understand that everything, literally everything, these boys and girls committed on the verge of life and death. Is it easy to walk down the street when warnings are posted on almost every house and fence that if you don’t hand over your weapon, you will be shot. And at the bottom of the bag, under the potatoes, there are two grenades, and you have to walk past several dozen policemen with an independent air, and everyone can stop ... By the beginning of December, the Young Guard already had 15 machine guns, 80 rifles, 300 grenades, about 15 thousand rounds of ammunition, 10 pistols, 65 kilograms of explosives and several hundred meters of Fickford cord.
Isn't it scary to sneak past the German patrol at night, knowing that for appearing on the street after six in the evening there is a threat of execution? But most of the work was done at night. At night, they burned the German Labor Exchange - and two and a half thousand Krasnodon residents were delivered from German hard labor. On the night of November 7, the Young Guards hung out red flags - and the next morning, when they saw them, people experienced great joy: “We are remembered, we are not forgotten by ours!” At night, prisoners of war were released, telephone wires were cut, German vehicles were attacked, a herd of cattle of 500 heads was recaptured from the Nazis and dispersed to the nearest farms and settlements.
Even leaflets were pasted mostly at night, although it happened that they had to do it during the day. At first, leaflets were written by hand, then they began to be printed in the same organized printing house. In total, the Young Guards issued about 30 separate leaflets with a total circulation of almost five thousand copies - from which Krasnodon residents learned the latest reports from the Sovinformburo.
In December, the first disagreements appeared at the headquarters, which later became the basis of the legend that still lives on and according to which Oleg Koshevoy is considered the commissar of the Young Guard.
What happened? Koshevoy began to insist that a detachment of 15-20 people be singled out from all the underground workers, capable of operating separately from the main detachment. It was in him that Koshevoy was supposed to become a commissar. The guys did not support this proposal. Nevertheless, Oleg, after another admission to the Komsomol of a youth group, took temporary Komsomol tickets from Vanya Zemnukhov, but did not give them, as always, to Viktor Tretyakevich, but issued them to the newly accepted ones himself, signing: “Commissar of the Molot partisan detachment Kashuk.”
On January 1, 1943, three Young Guardsmen were arrested: Yevgeny Moshkov, Viktor Tretyakevich and Ivan Zemnukhov - the Nazis fell into the very heart of the organization. On the same day, the remaining members of the headquarters urgently gathered and decided: all the Young Guards should immediately leave the city, and the leaders should not spend the night at home that night. All underground workers were informed about the decision of the headquarters through messengers. One of them, who was in the group of the village of Pervomaika, Gennady Pocheptsov, having learned about the arrests, got cold feet and wrote a statement to the police about the existence of an underground organization.
The entire punitive apparatus was set in motion. Mass arrests began. But why didn't the majority of the Young Guards follow the order of the headquarters? After all, this first disobedience, and hence the violation of the oath, cost almost all of them their lives! Probably due to the lack of life experience. At first, the guys did not realize that a catastrophe had happened and their leading trio could no longer get out of prison. Many could not decide for themselves: whether to leave the city, whether to help the arrested, or voluntarily share their fate. They did not understand that the headquarters had already considered all the options and took the only correct one into action. But most of them didn't do it. Almost everyone was afraid for their parents.
Only twelve young guards managed to escape in those days. But later, two of them - Sergei Tyulenin and Oleg Koshevoy - were nevertheless arrested. Four cells of the city police were packed to capacity. All the guys were terribly tortured. The office of the chief of police, Solikovsky, looked more like a slaughterhouse - it was so spattered with blood. In order not to hear the screams of the tortured in the yard, the monsters started the gramophone and turned it on at full volume.
Underground workers were hung by the neck to the window frame, simulating execution by hanging, and by the legs, to the ceiling hook. And they beat, beat, beat - with sticks and wire whips with nuts on the end. The girls were hung by braids, and the hair could not stand it, it broke off. The Young Guards were crushed by the door with fingers, shoe needles were driven under the nails, they were put on a hot stove, stars were cut out on the chest and back. Their bones were broken, their eyes were gouged out and burnt out, their arms and legs were cut off…
The executioners, having learned from Pocheptsov that Tretyakevich was one of the leaders of the Young Guard, decided at all costs to force him to speak, believing that then it would be easier to cope with the rest. He was tortured with extreme cruelty, he was mutilated beyond recognition. But Victor remained silent. Then a rumor was spread among the arrested and in the city: Tretyakevich had betrayed everyone. But Victor's comrades did not believe it.
On a cold winter night on January 15, 1943, the first group of Young Guardsmen, including Tretyakevich, was taken to the ruined mine for execution. When they were put on the edge of the pit, Victor grabbed the deputy chief of police by the neck and tried to drag him along with him to a depth of 50 meters. The frightened executioner turned pale with fear and almost did not resist, and only the gendarme arrived in time, hitting Tretyakevich on the head with a pistol, saved the policeman from death.
On January 16, the second group of underground workers was shot, on the 31st - the third. One of this group managed to escape from the place of execution. It was Anatoly Kovalev, who later went missing.
Four remained in prison. They were taken to the city of Rovenki in the Krasnodon region and shot on February 9 along with Oleg Koshev, who was there.
On February 14, Soviet troops entered Krasnodon. February 17 became a day of mourning, full of weeping and lamentations. From a deep, dark pit, the bodies of tortured young men and women were taken out with a bucket. It was difficult to recognize them; some of the children were identified by their parents only by their clothes.
A wooden obelisk was placed on the mass grave with the names of the dead and with the words:
And drops of your hot blood,
Like sparks flare up in the darkness of life
And many brave hearts will be lit!
The name of Viktor Tretyakevich was not on the obelisk! And his mother, Anna Iosifovna, never took off her black dress again and tried to go to the grave later so as not to meet anyone there. She, of course, did not believe in her son's betrayal, just as most of her fellow countrymen did not, but the conclusions of the commission of the Central Committee of the All-Union Leninist Young Communist League under the leadership of Toritsin and the subsequently remarkable novel by Fadeev, which was published in artistic terms, had an impact on the minds and hearts of millions of people. One can only regret that Fadeev's novel The Young Guard did not turn out to be equally remarkable in respecting historical truth.
The investigating authorities also accepted the version of Tretyakevich's betrayal, and even when the true traitor Pocheptsov, who was subsequently arrested, confessed to everything, the charge was not removed from Viktor. And since, according to party leaders, a traitor cannot be a commissar, Oleg Koshevoy was elevated to this rank, whose signature was on the December Komsomol tickets - “Commissar of the Molot partisan detachment Kashuk.”
After 16 years, one of the most ferocious executioners who tortured the Young Guards, Vasily Podtynny, was arrested. During the investigation, he stated: Tretyakevich was slandered, but he, despite severe torture and beatings, did not betray anyone.
So almost 17 years later, the truth triumphed. By decree of December 13, 1960, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR rehabilitated Viktor Tretyakevich and awarded him the Order of the Patriotic War, I degree (posthumously). His name began to be included in all official documents, along with the names of other heroes of the Young Guard.
Anna Iosifovna, Victor's mother, who never took off her mourning black clothes, stood in front of the presidium of the solemn meeting in Voroshilovgrad when she was presented with her son's posthumous award. The crowded hall, standing up, applauded her, but it seemed that what was happening no longer pleased her. Maybe because her mother always knew that her son was an honest man... Anna Iosifovna turned to her friend who rewarded her with only one request: not to show the film "Young Guard" in the city these days.
So, the stigma of a traitor was removed from Viktor Tretyakevich, but he was never restored to the rank of commissar and the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, which was awarded to the rest of the dead members of the Young Guard headquarters, was not awarded.
Finishing this short story about the heroic and tragic days of the Krasnodon people, I would like to say that the heroism and tragedy of the Young Guard are probably still far from being revealed. But this is our history, and we have no right to forget it.
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