Conquering death. For everyone and about everything Conquering death with Sergei Polyansky

Leading: Sergey Polyansky

About the film: A documentary series about people who found themselves on the brink of life and death, but despite fate, won a brutal battle. Fires and floods, earthquakes and man-made disasters claim hundreds and thousands of human lives. But even with such tragic circumstances, sometimes happy endings happen. Each episode of the cycle is a complete story about strength of spirit and love of life, a story about overcoming. To clearly show how the impossible was accomplished, the filmmakers use a detailed reconstruction of events using pyrotechnics and the best stuntmen. The host - Sergei Polyansky, the legendary "voice of NTV" - will not be a detached observer, because in each episode he will have to survive with the heroes in order to discover the secrets of their unique experience.

1. Hell route
June 1989, Trans-Siberian Railway. Between Ufa and Chelyabinsk two passenger trains meet at one point. One follows the Novorossiysk-Adler route, the second - from Adler to Novorossiysk. By tragic coincidence, it was at the moment of this meeting that a powerful explosion was heard. Both trains are almost completely burned out, and 575 passengers die in the fire. Within a kilometer radius of the explosion, the taiga is blazing. 623 people are saved, but the wounded and burned people have little chance of survival. The nearest village can only be reached via sleepers, but the path is cut off by a wall of flame...

2. Killer avalanche
2006, Greater Caucasus Range. Russian Winter Mountaineering Championship. A group of professional climbers is about to storm the training peak of Nahar. On the eve of the ascent, the weather in the mountains deteriorates, heavy snowfall begins and the avalanche danger increases tenfold. The climbers' camp is set up in a safe place, but an insidious avalanche comes from where no one expected it. One of the climbers dies. Shocked athletes prepare for evacuation, not even suspecting that the death of their comrade will not be the last...

3. Concubines
The story of two girls from Yoshkar-Ola, who, having signed a contract with a travel agency, traveled abroad: one to the United Arab Emirates, the other to Germany. They were promised jobs as waitresses and nannies. Instead, the girls fell into the hands of pimps. Both spent six months in sexual slavery. Both tried to escape. The film is about the difficulties they had to go through and what it took to break free.

4. Neftegorsk. Ghost town
On the night of May 28, 1995, a monstrous earthquake wiped out the city of Neftegorsk from the face of the earth. The disaster claimed the lives of more than two thousand people. In just 17 seconds, 17 panel houses folded like houses of cards and turned into a pile of concrete. Two-month-old Dasha Yagudina spent four days alone under the rubble. This baby has become a real symbol of life for the Neftegorsk people.

5. Captives of the old devil
Ryazan region, 2004. In a town called Skopin, police release two girls from sexual slavery. Those rescued tell investigators that the abuse lasted more than three years. The gloomy basement under the garage was equipped as a dungeon by an elderly sharpener from the Skopino plant, Viktor Mokhov. One day he kidnapped girls straight from a Ryazan disco and sentenced them to long imprisonment. For three and a half years he abused them, raped and beat them. During this time, one of the girls - Lena - became a mother twice, giving birth to two sons right in the basement. She was separated from the boys almost immediately...

6. Last flight
August 31, 1986, Novorossiysk. The cruise ship Admiral Nakhimov with 1,234 passengers on board leaves the port waters in the direction of Sochi. Leaving the bay, the ship notices an obstacle on its course - the cargo ship "Peter Vasev", a huge ship that is carrying barley from Canada to Novorossiysk. Instruments show that the ships should disperse, but a collision occurs. A chilling story of the death of more than four hundred people and incredible eyewitness accounts of survivors of this terrible disaster.

7. Fire
2003, Moscow. A fire in a dormitory at the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia claims the lives of 42 first-year students. The sixth block, which became the source of the fire, is home to students from the preparatory department who came from all over the world. They have only been in Russia for two months and still don’t really know the language.

8. Samara trap
February 1999, Samara, building of the Central Internal Affairs Directorate. A fire broke out in a few minutes, engulfing all 5 floors and blocking people’s path to emergency exits. 340 people were locked in their offices. It was possible to leave the burning building only through the windows, but there were bars on the windows. Fire escapes do not reach the upper floors. Employees twist ropes from the curtains and try to leave the building using them, but 57 fail to escape...

9. Tears of Armenia
December 1988, Soviet Socialist Republic of Armenia. A cloud of dense fog descends on the city of Leninakan from the mountain peaks with which it is surrounded. None of the residents realize that this white shroud is a harbinger of one of the most terrible earthquakes in the history of mankind. Tens of thousands of people die under the rubble, the same number remain disabled, more than half a million are left homeless.

10. Deadly Guardianship
Five adopted and three natural children of the Danilov family went through real hell. Two didn't survive...

11. Fatal goal
Moscow, October 1982. Two football teams meet at the Luzhniki Stadium - Moscow's Spartak takes on the Dutch Haarlem in the 1/16 UEFA Cup match. Before the start of the game, the fans were looking forward to an interesting game, not suspecting that after the end of the match they would have to count not only the goals, but also the bodies of the dead. The story of one of the worst stampedes in the history of football.

12. Dance of Death
June 1985, Nevinnomyssk. 14-year-old Seryozha Pavlov disappears without a trace. Prosecutor's office investigator Tamara Langueva discovers that this is not the first case of missing teenagers. Step by step, the investigative team reveals the horrifying details of the crimes committed over the past 20 years by a serial killer, who turned out to be the head of a children's tourist club, teacher, excellent student of education of the RSFSR Anatoly Slivko.

13. Transvaal - paradise lost
February 2004. Sports and entertainment complex "Transvaal Park". 1,300 visitors came to celebrate Valentine's Day. In a matter of seconds, a huge dome collapses and covers the pool area. In 20-degree frost, wet, undressed people find themselves under a rubble of concrete slabs, metal and glass fragments. For more than an hour and a half, 8-year-old Sasha Ershova is between the bottom of the pool and a broken slab, holding her three-year-old sister in her arms. The heroic behavior of the brave girl helps them both escape.

14. Varandey is a bad place
Varendey village, Nenets Autonomous Okrug, 2005. An An-24 plane, on which oil production workers are flying on shift, crashes - it falls to the ground, not reaching the runway a couple of hundred meters. Among the passengers is Tyumen resident Gennady Spirin. During the disaster, despite his own injuries, Spirin saves several comrades, helping them get out of the plane engulfed in flames.

15. Explosion in the subway
On February 6, 2004, an explosion in the Moscow metro kills forty-one passengers. About a hundred people who were traveling in the carriage where the explosion occurred miraculously remain alive. But we still need to get out of the burning carriage, and then out of the smoke-filled tunnel: What happened to those who survived the tragedy? How did their destinies turn out? What gives people the strength to survive in situations where salvation seems impossible? The film contains happy stories of salvation, revelations of surviving people and incredible mystical coincidences on the eve of the incident.

16. Lightning Sign
Over 16 million lightning strikes the earth's surface every day. This is one of the most formidable and unpredictable natural phenomena. It is believed that it is impossible to survive after being struck by lightning. Paradoxically, approximately half of the people who are hit by a powerful discharge manage to survive. What is this - a happy accident or a scientific pattern?

17-18. Stars that conquered death (2 parts)
Fans are used to seeing their idols strong, healthy and successful. It is believed that stars are not subject to age and illness. But this is just a stereotype. In life, they are no less vulnerable than mere mortals. Vladimir Levkin, after a terrible diagnosis of cancer of the lymphatic system, underwent four courses of chemotherapy. He overcame the disease. Singer Anita Tsoi was confined to a hospital bed for six months and returned to the stage only thanks to her strong character. Writer Daria Dontsova, figure skater Elena Berezhnaya, trainer Vadim Kambegov - they all visited the brink of life and death.

19. Cruel sport
The goal of any professional athlete is victory and an Olympic gold medal. They go to this milestone, despite injuries, sacrificing their health, and sometimes their lives. August 18, 2001, football match CSKA - Anzhi. While defending his team's goal, goalkeeper Sergei Perkhun received a serious injury. In the fight for the top ball, the army goalkeeper collided with the Anzhi striker. He was in a coma for ten days, but doctors were unable to save the life of the young football player. NHL, match for reaching the Stanley Cup playoffs. About the price at which professional athletes get gold medals - in the documentary film from the series “Death Conquers”

20. Deadly Celebration
When going to a party or to a regular restaurant, few people think that the owners of entertainment establishments skimp on the safety of clients. In Israel, a luxurious wedding ended in the death of 23 guests. The floor of the hall, where tables were set for 800 invited guests, collapsed into the ground from a height of the third floor. Rescuers spent days clearing the rubble in search of survivors.

Current page: 1 (book has 11 pages in total)

N. Strutinsky, S. Dranov
CONQUERING DEATH

In the Ukrainian city of Lutsk, captured by the Germans, the communist underground is active. After the tragic death of the leader of the underground communist group Viktor Izmailov, the fight is led by Komsomol member Pasha Savelyeva.

Shortly before the liberation of the city by Soviet soldiers, the Gestapo managed to pick up the trail of the underground fighters. Many of them were arrested and executed. The Nazis burned Pasha Savelyeva alive at the stake. Until the last minutes of her life, she remained a staunch and fearless patriot.

By decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of May 8, 1965, Praskovya Ivanovna Savelyeva was posthumously awarded the Order of Lenin for the courage and courage shown in the fight against the Nazi invaders. In the city of Lutsk, a school and a street are named after her.

IN THE ENEMY'S RING

Pasha opened the window. A June breeze filled with the steppe aroma rushed into the room.

- Shura! Where are you going? – seeing a friend passing by the house, Pasha asked in a strong chest voice. - Come out. Let's take a walk.

Shura waved her tanned hand and stopped, straightening the scarf on her head.

Pasha quickly put on a colorful cotton dress. She ran an old comb through her short brown hair and looked in the mirror. There is a blush on the cheeks. Big full lips are burning. She smiled to herself and ran out into the street.

- Let's go! – Pasha said, grabbing Shura by the arm. And the girls laughed merrily, seemingly for no reason at all. People laugh like that only in youth, when everything makes you happy, everything causes delight.

Pasha Savelyeva and Shura Belokonenko have been friends for a long time. When I was a child, we lived in the same village. Almost simultaneously we moved with our parents to Rzhev, on the banks of the Volga. There they went to school together. Studying at different institutes separated the friends for a while. But then fate brought them together again, as adults, independent. After graduating from the financial and economic institute, Pasha was sent to Lutsk, where she began working in a state bank. Shura Belokonenko also ended up here - she taught Russian language and literature at school.

They spent the evenings together, often relaxing in the forest or on the picturesque bank of the river. So this Saturday, right after work, my friends came to their favorite clearing with a huge spreading beech tree, from under which the entire city and its surroundings were visible.

The city was cut through by the winding, branchy Styr River, like an old tree. In the distance, in the blue haze, the ancient castle of Lubart rose gloomily with stern, as if charred by time, square towers along the edges.

Roads and paths radiated from the city in all directions. Behind them lie the picturesque white huts of suburban villages and hamlets.

Along the road towards the forest, from which the huts of a neighboring village, illuminated by the evening sun, looked out, a flock of village girls, tied with white scarves, was moving away. Embracing, the girls sang sadly:

Gutsulko Ksenya,
I'm Tobi on trembiti, the only one in the whole world
I'll tell you about my regret...
The soul suffers
The sound of trembiti lunae.
Why is your heart shaking?
It's hotter, it's hotter.

- Good song! – Pasha sighed, looking after the round dance. – Do you know her story?

-Very funny. “And Pasha told everything she knew about the song “Hutsulka Ksenia.”

Once upon a time, girls and boys gathered in a Carpathian village. The Hutsuls had a custom of choosing the “queen” of the evening. And so they chose the most beautiful blue-eyed Ksenia. When she received the right to command others, one guy, a village teacher, asked what he should fulfill her desire. Ksenya offered to compose a song about her.

The wish was fulfilled, and the melody of “Hutsulka Ksenia” flew around the world like a free bird.

The friends sat down under a beech tree and sang the tune of “Hutsulka” for a long time... Daydreaming, the girls did not notice how the day began to fade.

Suddenly they heard a rustling behind them. They both looked back. A tanned, strongly built guy in a white shirt approached them. Pasha recognized the bank driver, Dmitry Yashchuk.

- Hello! Shall I disturb you? – Smoothing his heavy black hair with his hand, Dmitry spoke embarrassedly.

Shura looked at him in surprise: so handsome, strong, apparently an athlete, but he’s shy around girls - maybe he loves Pasha?..

The three of them returned home, talking animatedly about movies, books they had read, and work. Dmitry turned out to be a pleasant conversationalist. He did not miss a single premiere, was fond of adventure literature and dreamed of becoming a film director to direct films on fantastic themes.

They stopped at an intersection, not far from Savelyeva’s house. Shura, citing the fact that she urgently needed to check her student notebooks, left.

Left alone, Pasha and Dmitry felt awkward and could not start a conversation. Finally Dmitry timidly suggested:

- Maybe we can go to the park?

- It's already late. Mom will worry. I promised her to be home early.

The young man did not want to part with Pasha. He internally fought the urge to kiss her. When Pasha wanted to say goodbye, he held her hand, and then hastily and awkwardly pushed the girl towards him. Pasha pulled away sharply and said dryly:

“I didn’t think you were such a rude person.” Don't follow me. - And she quickly left.

At home, Pasha thought that she had treated Dmitry badly. He's a kind, decent guy. And it’s not at all his fault that he loves her. But she’s not indifferent to him either. And why did you insult him like that?

Pasha's mother woke up from the menacing roar of engines. Huge black planes flew past the brightening sky. Five... Ten... Another... And another... And suddenly the whole house shook with a roar. Evdokia Dmitrievna began to disturb her daughter, who was still fast asleep.

- Daughter, daughter, wake up...

Pasha opened her eyes and, seeing her mother’s frightened face, screamed:

- What? Thunder?

A heavy, prolonged roar shook everything around again...

- No, not thunder, daughter. Falling from airplanes...

- They're bombing?! Who?! – Pasha immediately jumped up.

She ran to the bank first. The policeman on duty stood outside the door and argued with someone on the phone. Approaching the window, the girl looked in horror at the pillars of black smoke and flame that rose in the next block.

Suddenly someone's strong hand fell on her shoulder. Startled, Pasha turned around. Standing nearby was Yashchuk, out of breath—apparently from running so fast.

- Dmitriy! Mitya! What is this?!

An embarrassed smile slid across Dmitry's face, as if he was to blame for what was happening around him before his beloved girl.

- Probably fascists. Wait here. I’ll just run to the military registration and enlistment office and find out what’s going on.

Pasha nodded in agreement and wanted to say something good so that the guy would immediately forget yesterday’s insult, but she didn’t have time. Dmitry looked at her affectionately and disappeared around the corner.

Soon all the employees gathered at the bank building. Many people look confused and have fear in their eyes. The nimble and, as always, energetic director of the bank appeared, and two trucks pulled up almost right behind him.

- Comrades! Please don't panic! - this small, dry man ordered loudly and imperiously. – We must immediately remove valuables and documents to a safe zone.

People began to fuss. They began to hastily load bags sealed with wax seals, stacks of papers, and folders into the cars. A fat elderly man with a bald head overdid his zeal and dragged out the path. Someone shouted to him:

– Don’t forget a carafe of water and an inkwell!

The cars are gone. The bank employees began to disperse.

Pasha was in no hurry, she was waiting for Dmitry. But he never returned.

The radio announced the evacuation of the civilian population from Lutsk. When Pasha returned home, her mother was already sitting on the bundles.

-Where are we going now? – she gasped when she saw her daughter.

“Where everyone goes, we go too...” Pasha answered with a stern frown on her wide black eyebrows.

For the second day, Pasha with his mother and aunt, loaded with belongings, wearily moved east, towards Klevan. There were deep craters along the highway. The burnt edges turned black. The burning villages and farmsteads were smoking...

The refugees were exhausted. The meager supplies of food have run out.

“Pashenka,” Evdokia Dmitrievna pleaded, unable to bear it, “how far are we still?”

- I don’t know, mom!

Seeing a haystack near the road, Evdokia Dmitrievna offered to spend the night. Tired, they collapsed on the hay. Ours lay between her mother and aunt, feeling neither her arms nor her legs, but she could not sleep. She changed her mind about many things. What will happen to them now? I remembered Dmitry. At her last meeting, he seemed like the closest person to her after her mother. I regretted not seeing each other again.

Pasha fell asleep only late at night. But as soon as the sun's rays slid across the ground, the Savelyevs again tyrannized on the road. We had to hurry to get out of the danger zone in time. However, at noon they learned from those they met that the Germans had occupied Baranovichi and that the enemy ring had closed. There was no point in going east anymore. We decided to return to Lutsk.

Pasha tied her knot tighter and confidently said to her tired, slightly hunched mother and her sister, Efrosinya Dmitrievna:

The women looked at Pasha trustingly. During these days, her face lengthened and faded, her eyes became stern, and her armor completely converged into one wide black line.

- God, we are so tired, will we ever get back? – Evdokia Dmitrievna despaired.

Exhausted and hungry, they entered Lutsk early in the gray morning. The familiar streets were silent, sad, littered. Military men in cabbage-green uniforms scurried along them... Their forged boots stomped loudly and fearfully, as if in an empty barrel. Everything seemed like a nightmare to Pasha...

A group of Nazis came out from behind a large corner house. They immediately paid attention to the girl. The red-haired man walking ahead asked in German:

-Where are you going, beauty? Will you come with us?

- Or maybe just with me?

“Ho-ho-ho...” echoed through the street.

Pasha turned away. She knew German and understood what the soldiers were talking about.

Evdokia Dmitrievna became worried and quickened her pace.

The Nazis turned the Savelyevs’ former apartment into a warehouse for stolen goods. Pasha had to run around a lot until she found a small room on another street. There the three of them settled.

One day Pasha went out into the city. Carts and trucks rumbled through the streets. Everywhere on the walls of the houses there were orders. And in each of them the word “EXECUTATION” was written in large letters. The orders were signed by the Commissar General of Volyn and Podolia, General Schone.

The Gestapo settled in the bank building. A blood-red flag with a swastika loomed over the two-story house No. 45 on Shevchenko Street, where the Gebite-Missariat was located. The Nazis set up a prison in the Catholic monastery, and nearby there was a prisoner of war camp surrounded by barbed wire. The Nazis drove men and women into the wide gates. Seeing this, Pasha shuddered, as if she herself was going there.

Returning home, Pasha rushed to her mother, who, standing at the trough, was washing clothes that had become dusty on the road.

- Mom, what is going on? The whole city is in fear!

“Be quiet, daughter,” the mother said quietly, removing the dirty foam from her hands, “be quiet.” Let's see what happens next... Now we need to think about work, how to continue to live, what to feed. Please be reasonable. Don't say anything unnecessary. Don't hang out with unreliable people.

In the morning Pasha went to look for work. Near the Gebitskommissariat building, a thin woman of about forty called out to her:

- Hello, Savelyeva!

Pasha clasped her hands joyfully:

- Maria Ivanovna!

Before the arrival of the Nazis, Maria Ivanovna Dunaeva and Savelyeva worked in a bank. Pasha then became friends with her. Here they are together again...

Dunaeva bombarded Pasha with questions: where did the war find him? what is he doing now? Is the mother healthy? And when Pasha told about everything she had experienced, Maria Ivanovna invited her to her home.

- Come. Let's sit. Let's grieve together.

- I'll definitely come. Is the address the same?

Pasha returned home in high spirits.

- Found a job? – Evdokia Dmitrievna asked hopefully.

- No, mommy, there’s nothing to please you with yet.

– And you look cheerful!

– I met a friend. Invites you to visit.

- Who is she?

– You know her, Dunaeva. We met before at work. Smart, charming woman. When you talk to such a person, you become a better person.

– Of course, it’s still worth meeting good people now. Man is not a wolf, there is no way to live alone...

Maria Ivanovna greeted Pasha cordially. Over a cup of tea, the hostess immediately said that her husband worked as a groom for the burgomaster Kulhoff.

“We had to settle down somewhere,” Dunaeva added hastily, as if making excuses, and began talking about the burgomaster.

Kulhof is an angry, arrogant person. He only loves his dog. He always comes to work with a bulldog. People look from the corners and whisper: “The dog sled is coming!” “Look how he pouted, he’s angrier than a bulldog!” And one day someone glued a piece of paper to the back of his chaise with the inscription: “Kulhof will die as a dog!”

While talking with the girl, Maria Ivanovna involuntarily fell in love with her.

“You’ll look at you, Pasha, and you’ll forget that there’s so much grief around,” she noted with quiet joy.

– If you, Maria Ivanovna, looked into my soul!

“I guess...” Dunaeva nodded, slightly narrowing her dark gray soulful eyes. - Well, Pasha, let’s speak frankly, without hiding...

Maria Ivanovna had the ability to guess the mood of her interlocutor. And I was rarely wrong. And when she was internally convinced that she understood the person, she completely trusted him. And now she was carefully watching the impression her proposal to speak openly made on Pasha. Pasha’s eyes sparkled, his full crimson lips pressed together a little more tightly than usual, and wrinkles gathered on the bridge of his nose.

“Tomorrow I’ll introduce you to the girls from our underground group,” Dunaeva said confidentially, “and then we’ll decide what business to entrust you with.”

– Maria Ivanovna, do you only have girls in the underground? – Pasha asked in a voice choked with excitement and joy.

“The time will come, you will find out everything, my dear.” “A gentle smile, which always warmed Pasha, began to play in the corners of the hostess’s small mouth.

And your husband?..

“And we’ll keep quiet about him,” Dunaeva nodded and smiled mysteriously. - All in due time, dear...

FIRST STEPS

On the first day of the war, Vyacheslav Vasilyevich Izmailov was summoned to the city party committee. The Lutsk party organization hastily selected future underground members. We were ready to settle on his candidacy. But the trouble is, lawyer Izmailov is well known in Lutsk. There will be no conspiracy here.

Vyacheslav Vasilyevich himself found a way out of the difficult situation. He recommended his younger brother, Victor, who had recently arrived in Lutsk.

– Victor is also a member of the party, almost no one here knows him. I vouch for him both as a brother and as a communist.

- Where is he now?

- At the military registration and enlistment office. They are drafted into the army.

The secretary of the city committee, an elderly man with a tired face, asked Izmailov for a long time about his brother. Then I contacted the military commissar by phone. Victor soon arrived at the city committee. He was asked if he was ready to carry out a top secret and dangerous task for the party organization. When Victor, standing at attention, answered in the affirmative, the secretary shook his hand and, inviting him to sit on a chair next to him, began to outline a plan for organizing an underground group in the city to fight the fascists.

- Where to begin? - he asked, looking at the Izmailov brothers in turn, and immediately answered, addressing only Victor. – For the first few days you will have to hide somewhere in the village. Then appear as a deserter who did not want to serve the Soviets. My brother is trying to get a job in a retail chain. Then wait for a trusted person. He will give instructions.

There was a rumble coming from the street. Somewhere nearby shells were exploding. The enemy was furiously shelling the city.

– Do you have your membership card?

- As always!

- Put it in the safe.

In conclusion the secretary said:

- Begin to act carefully. Don't take risks unless absolutely necessary. “And, shaking hands goodbye, he added informally: “You have a wonderful quality for working in trade.”

- Which? – Victor raised his thin long eyebrows high.

“A charming smile,” replied the secretary. – Try to become a kind of cheerful tradesman, dreaming of getting rich under the “new order” and opening your own shop.

– Even if the devils scratch your heart, smile, be courteous! – added the elder Izmailov.

“Yes, the role is not easy,” the secretary said, shaking his hand again firmly.

Viktor Izmailov immediately left the city and returned only on the fifth day, when the Nazis established their power. He went to work at a grocery store, but had nothing to sell. There were few buyers, so there was no one to smile, no one to test the power of the “young merchant”’s charm...

Long, anxious days of waiting dragged on. Two weeks have passed and no one has contacted me. Having no experience in underground work, Victor acted at his own discretion. With the help of his brother, he established contact with Maria Ivanovna Dunaeva, instructed her to take a closer look at people and bring closer those who, without fear of consequences, are ready to fight the fascist occupiers.

Dunaeva carried out this task with great caution.

One day, when Victor was transporting goods from the base, a man with a pleasant appearance approached him. There was a wart on his left cheek.

- Izmailov? Viktor Vasilievich?

– Very nice, I’m a sales agent. Are you going to the store?

-Will you allow me to go with you?

- Please.

On the way, the stranger suddenly asked:

– Do you know where you can buy sweets for tea?

Victor’s heart began to beat faster, and he happily looked into the stern eyes of his long-awaited contact.

- They were sold by the end of the day yesterday...

The fellow traveler shook Izmailov’s hand firmly.

- Finally! – Victor involuntarily burst out. - I've already been waiting for you.

– And we wanted to contact you earlier, but...

- Understand!

– Tomorrow you must meet with Dobry, a representative of the underground regional committee of the party. He will be waiting for you near the river, near Lubart's castle.

At the appointed time, Victor and the messenger, taking fishing rods and simple fishing gear to divert their eyes, went to the meeting.

Near the castle, the “fishermen” passed a dilapidated bridge and walked along the shore. In the appointed place sat a plump man of about forty. From under his thick eyebrows he carefully watched the floats, and from the corner of his eye he examined those approaching.

- Well, is it biting? – asked the messenger.

“Not much yet, but when the sun starts to set, it will definitely bite,” he answered in a thick bass voice.

There was no one around. The messenger moved closer:

- This is him, Viktor Izmailov.

“Cast your fishing rods,” Dobry nodded to Victor.

Victor settled down next to him, and the messenger stepped aside and also cast his fishing rods.

Dobry asked Izmailov in detail how he got settled, who he was dating, what his brother and friends were doing.

Having pulled out the fishing rod and adjusted the worm, Dobry instructed Izmailov in a fatherly manner. He said that the underground must, first of all, expose the fascist version of the incapacity of the Red Army, distribute leaflets with reports from the Sovinformburo, and raise the spirit of the population and faith in the victory of the Land of the Soviets.

– Please note, Comrade Izmailov, there are others operating in addition to your group. So, if you suddenly have unspoken assistants, don’t be surprised.

The kind one pulled the fishing rod, although it didn’t bite, he put a new worm on the hook.

– Are your people armed?

– Do you personally have a pistol?

“In two or three days we will give you a couple of pistols and a few grenades.” But do not undertake any serious operations without our consent; inform us more often about everything that is happening in the city. You will always find a contact person in the watch workshop, which is at the main entrance to the bazaar. Ask Ivan Denisovich. Well, it's time to leave...

As soon as he said this, a light whistle was heard: the messenger warned - a stranger!

A short, frail man approached. In his hands he held a long bamboo rod.

- Hello. Rich catch today?

“Hello,” responded Dobry. - No luck today...

- Hey, you have to skillfully! So, why are you returning empty-handed? – he asked, looking intently at Victor, who was about to leave. - Not ashamed?

“If I had such a beautiful float as yours, maybe I’d get a bite.” – Without hiding the irony, Victor nodded at the brand new red float with a long goose rod on the stranger’s fishing rod.

“Well, well...” the “fisherman” chuckled under his breath and walked away.

“Beware of these,” Good warned. - Stupid, looking for simpletons! Yes, I almost forgot,” he realized, “in any case, we don’t know each other.” We only met here.

- It's clear.

Dunaeva brought Pasha together with Natasha Kosyachenko and Anna Ostapyuk. After consulting, the girls decided first of all to get medicine for the wounded prisoners of war.

Pasha visited several pharmacies. In one of them she met a pharmacist she knew. She gave her cotton wool, a dozen bandages, several vials of iodine tincture and two thermometers...

Pasha returned home joyful: it turns out that something can be done, you just have to start.

That same day I went to the apartment where Shura Belokonenko lived.

“If it weren’t for the happy meeting with Dunaeva,” Pasha shared with her friend, “I would have been struggling alone for a long time, like a fish on ice.” And you, Shura, will you be with us?

- Where are you going, Pasha, there I am too! – my friend stated firmly.

However, Pasha had no doubt about exactly this answer from Shura Belokonenko. The girls hugged each other warmly: they would continue to follow the same path, but this time it would be more difficult—the harsh road of struggle.

Shura became friends with the owner of the apartment, Maria Grigorievna Galushko, even before the war. And when she returned to Lutsk after an unsuccessful evacuation, Maria Grigorievna willingly sheltered her again.

Now Galushko just as cordially received her lodger’s friend, Pasha Savelyeva, whom she liked from the first meeting. Pasha had a proud posture, she spoke thoughtfully, slowly, as if weighing every word. And Galushko concluded: “Serious, collected.”

Once, having heard Pasha and Shura talking about the atrocities of the Nazis, the hostess sighed heavily and, out of habit, tilting her head to the side, inquisitively asked what to do, how to live further.

“Most of all I feel sorry for those in the prisoner of war camp,” she said sadly. “If it weren’t for the children...” And deep wrinkles appeared on her full, good-natured face.

Maria Grigorievna had three small children. Thinking about this, Pasha looked at the hostess encouragingly:

– Don’t be upset, Maria Grigorievna. You don't have to take the risk yourself. If you want to help prisoners of war, first get some clothes. After all, many still have men's clothes. Or collect some crackers.

A smile lit up on Maria Grigorievna’s kind face.

One evening, when Pasha, Shura and Maria Grigorievna were thinking about how best to transfer medicine to the camp, there was a knock on the door.

- Who? – Maria Grigorievna called out loudly.

A man of medium height, thin, with an expressive pale face and lush brown hair came in. He inquired whether his arrival had disturbed him, and, without waiting for the landlady to introduce him, he introduced himself:

- Tkachenko.

Pasha and Tkachenko looked at each other in surprise.

- You? – Tkachenko was delighted.

– As you can see, Alexey Dmitrievich! - Pasha answered, enthusiastically shaking the hand of an old acquaintance, and immediately explained to Shura: - Alexey Dmitrievich is an engineer, we have known each other for a long time.

– I didn’t expect to meet you here! Are you in Lutsk all the time? – Tkachenko was interested.

- Do you live in your old place?

1– No, I had to live in a small room.

- Are you working?

- Going to...

Maria Grigorievna, rejoicing at the meeting of old friends, joked:

- So I arranged a date for you!

“I’ve been meaning to visit you for a long time, Maria Grigorievna, but time didn’t allow it,” Tkachenko said apologetically. “And today I was here nearby and came in as an uninvited guest.”

“You have always been a welcome guest, Alexey Dmitrievich,” Galushko said sincerely, smiling widely. – And now even more so... Do you work in your specialty?

– In a familiar industry, but not in my specialty. Yes, I’m not complaining, as long as I’m doing business. It brings relative balance in life.

The guest put his large, gnarled hands on the table, as if not knowing where to put them.

– You can’t imagine a worse “balance” than this! – Pasha inserted carefully.

In the conversation, Tkachenko mentioned printing products - “ausweiss” and “meld cards”.

Hearing about this, Pasha was so happy that she was afraid to betray herself with involuntary excitement.

– What are all these pieces of paper for?

- So much for you! – the engineer said in tone.

– Of course, they look after the forms? -. Pasha lowered her voice to a whisper.

- As they say - both ways. But they still won’t keep track of everything.

As soon as Tkachenko left, Pasha asked Maria Grigorievna how long she had known him.

- For a long time. A sincere person... And you, Pasha, where did you meet him before?

– At the bank, right after I arrived in Lutsk. - I thought about it. – Did you understand his hint: “They won’t keep track of everything”? Wouldn't you help? The certificates will be very useful to us...

Old acquaintances met again. Maria Grigorievna invited Tkachenko for a cup of tea, but in reality she, Pasha and Shura decided to “involve the engineer in useful work.” That evening no one felt the same constraint.

Pasha met Tkachenko near the printing house and went to the park.

“Alexey Dmitrievich,” the girl began, noticeably worried, and this made her wide black eyebrows frown more than usual. – We ask for your help.

Tkachenko slightly moved his shoulders:

- Who are we"? What kind of “advice” has this appeared? Maiden?

- No, not a girl’s one, Alexey Dmitrievich. And you can enter it if you wish. And since you work in a printing house...

- What I should do?

- We need identification forms. We will fill them out ourselves and hand them over...

“If you get down to business properly, it will work out.”

“I knew you wouldn’t refuse.”

- Why?

- Yes, because I see that you are an honest person.

And at home Pasha said to Maria Grigorievna and Shura:

– Now we need to quickly get a job so that less suspicion falls on us.

- You're right, Pasha. Only in this “new order”, where everything is upside down, it is not so easy to get a job in a specialty, especially for me, a teacher.

“We must take on any task,” Pasha firmly stated, although she was not yet sure that she was doing the right thing.

In the morning, the girls went around the city in search of work. We went into shops and institutions. But they were not offered anything concrete. In one place we accidentally heard that waitresses were needed for a military canteen.

They saw the owner at the door of the dining room. Tall, with protruding ears, thin, bones and skin, although not at all old - about fifty years old.

– Are you friends or sisters? – the owner asked, taking off his black glasses.

- Girlfriends.

- Last names? – he narrowed his left eye.

– Mine is Savelyeva.

- I am Belokoienko.

– What can you do?

The girls hesitated. Really, what kind of work can they do in the cafeteria?

– Do you need waitresses? This will suit us quite well,” Pasha said obediently.

“Yes,” said the owner. -Who will vouch for you? Very decent people eat here, they should only be served by those in whom I have absolute confidence!

The pleading eyes of the girls did not soften the entrepreneur’s heart. He himself recently returned to these lands from abroad, where he fled in 1939. Now he dreams of big things and is picky about who he hires.

- So no one will vouch for it? Then I won't hire you as a waitress.

- Sorry. Goodbye!

- Try to get sureties.

- Let's try.

The owner looked at the girls for a long time and, as if regretting their departure, shouted after them:

- I’ll take it to the dishwashers!

Belokonenko got a job in a prisoner of war camp, and Pasha had to go to work as a scullery maid.

“I’ll work a little, and then I’ll find something better,” she decided and went to the dining room.

It was embarrassing and scary to go. It seemed that everyone she met saw her off with contemptuous glances and nodded, saying that another one had gone to serve the Nazis.

I involuntarily remembered the first dreams of my youth about the future. School in Rzhev. Severe snowy winter. Peers of the same age went out on the ski track. Everyone was thinking about one thing - not to be left behind! The command rang out. Pasha left the start fifth. But a few meters before the finish line, she made a breakthrough and, to the noisy approval of her friends, was the first to cross the red ribbon. It seems that the applause is still ringing in my ears...

And one day, when they were sitting in the park and wondering who to be, Pasha unexpectedly announced to everyone:

- I will be a pilot.

- A pilot? – the friends asked in unison.

– Think: a person is like a bird! You fly high, high, huge rivers seem like just blue ribbons. And the villages and towns are so tiny. And you will rise twice, three times higher, to where no one has flown before, and you will see the whole earth from edge to edge...

From then until the end of high school, Pasha was called a pilot...

As soon as she turned sixteen, Pasha applied for admission into the ranks of the Leninist Komsomol. “I will be devoted to the Komsomol and the party, like Pavka Korchagin...” she wrote then.

At the meeting, everyone said that she was a good student, disciplined, and active. But then one young man stood up, coughed, straightened his ruffled hair and said in a broken bassoque:

– Everything I heard here about Pasha is correct. It just seems to me that Savelyeva is too proud, putting on airs in front of... the guys. You need to be simpler with your comrades. You're not a real pilot yet!

Someone in the back rows chuckled.

Pasha blushed and thought: “Maybe it’s true that I’m so arrogant in front of the guys...”

We returned home late. Holding hands, they walked along the central square, filling it with ringing laughter and song. It was an unforgettable walk. Everyone wanted to be together longer. There was also a young man here who criticized her. She walked up to him and took him by the arm with a kind smile.

- You see, I don’t put on airs anymore...

Hearing the tramp of a column of German soldiers, Pasha woke up from rosy memories and involuntarily thought: “After all this, work as a dishwasher, and even for the Nazis?!”

- Well, I’ll show you the dishwasher! – she muttered through her teeth and angrily looked after the marching soldiers.

Now that Pasha and Shura had started work, they had very little free time, but they felt more confident. And when the gendarmes came to check the Savelyevs’ documents, Pasha took it calmly. The words “I work in the officers’ mess” made an impression.

But a few days later, Savelyeva told Shura alarming news - the owner of the canteen was calling her “for a conversation.” The friends spent a long time making various guesses about the purpose of the call. Having thought everything over, Pasha went with the firm intention of leaving work if the owner was planning something unkind,

Most people live their lives in a fairly standard way. We work, raise children, buy a new car, take care of our health and worry about a thousand different reasons. A fascinating activity, this is precisely why man appeared on this planet.

There is an alternative. In order not to spend our lives in empty troubles, saving our body from a cold, and our mind from the reality of the world around us, we just need to stop being afraid. Take a look, for example, at these five brave men who managed to bring death itself to its knees. Were they afraid? Hardly.

Peter Freuchen

In 1906, Peter graduated from medical school and went not to the nearest hospital for a prestigious job from 9 to 18, but to Greenland. The twenty-year-old boy wondered what it would be like to travel across the frozen plains on a dog sled - an understandable desire. One of the trips ended in disaster: Peter fell into a hole from which he could not get out. The resourceful boy used his own frozen excrement as a chisel and hollowed out steps for himself in the walls of the prison. By the time Peter returned to camp, his left leg was hopelessly frostbitten. Without wasting time on stupid lamentations, the guy amputated himself. Freuchen returned to his homeland to join the Danish resistance movement; the Nazis were never able to catch this strong-willed and unbending man.

Jack Lucas

Fourteen-year-old Jack forged his parents' signature and went to fight against the damned Nazis. On the shores of Iwo Jima, the boy accomplished his first feat, covering with his body two grenades that landed in a trench. To the surprise of the doctors, he not only survived, but also escaped with literally a slight fright. By mid-war, Jack's body resembled an anatomical atlas, containing more than 250 pieces of shrapnel - including six in the brain and two in the heart. After celebrating his 17th birthday, Lucas decided to change things up by enlisting in the Marines. The very first parachute jump almost ended in tragedy, since none of the canopies opened. Is Jack dead? No. Having fallen from almost a kilometer in height, the boy broke his arms, legs and all his ribs, spent six months in the hospital and returned to duty.

Sam Houston

In 1809, Sam Houston ran away from his parents' home to join the Cherokee tribe. But then the American war against the Indians began and Sam quickly remembered his skin color. During his Army career, Houston received more than 50 wounds, none of which caused him significant discomfort. The grown-up trapper had a terrible character and once attacked a Tennessee congressman right on the street, starting to beat him with a cane. William Stanbury obediently endured the attacks of the heroic warrior for some time, and then simply took out a revolver and fired at the aggressor in the chest. Twice. What can I say, this cooled Houston’s ardor a little, but not completely. Rising from the ground, the bloodied Sam looked like an angel of vengeance in the flesh, and Stanbury chose to get away from him. Houston survived and took part in many more American-Indian skirmishes.

Tibor Rubin

Tibor Rubin was born into a poor Jewish family in Hungary. At the age of 15, the Nazis threw the boy into the notorious Mauthausen concentration camp, from where American troops rescued him. Tibor decided to go to the Korean War, where his entire regiment was killed in the first skirmish. The poor but brave Jewish fighter single-handedly held off the attack of almost the entire North Korean army in a tiny patch of jungle. At the end of the second day, Tibor's forces left him and he was captured. The guy escaped from the camp on the third night and spent another two months as a partisan in the jungle, becoming a real curse for the Korean soldiers.

Brian Blessed

Brian Blessed is remembered for his role in 1980's Flash Gordon, but few people know that at 67, this brave man became the oldest person to conquer Everest. In addition, a couple of years later, Brian reached the Magnetic North Pole on foot, fighting his way through polar storms and polar bears with the help of a gun and a raincoat. Brian is now 80 years old and recently announced that he was going to go to the very bottom of the Mariana Trench.

Many people consider themselves strong people... But what happens if they come face to face with death? Will they fall out of the plane without a parachute or will they be buried alive? This can only be dreamed of in a nightmare, but these people experienced this in reality...

Vesna Vulovich is a Guinness Book of Records record holder; she holds the world altitude record for surviving a free fall without a parachute - 10,160 meters...

The incident occurred on January 26, 1972, near the village of Srbska Kamenice in Czechoslovakia, after the crash of JAT flight 367, on which Vulović was working as a flight attendant. The explosion, presumably caused by terrorists, tore the plane into pieces, but Vesna was lucky enough to be saved, the only one on board.
After the disaster, Vulovich was in a coma for 27 days, and then remained in the hospital for another 16 months. She continued to work for the airline, but in ground work - her skull, legs and three vertebrae were damaged.

Vesna Vulović was considered a national heroine of Yugoslavia.

Aron Ralston, a mechanical engineer working for Intel, was a rock climber...

Aron Ralston was exploring the mountains in Utah when a huge boulder fell into his arms and crushed him.

He managed to free one hand, but the other was firmly crushed. Realizing that he would die if he did not free himself, Aron cut off his second hand with a small penknife. He tied his arm in a sling to avoid much blood loss, then broke the bones of his arm and, using an almost dull knife, cut the remaining flesh until he was free. It all took about an hour.

Ralston underwent treatment for a long time, but his love for rocks did not leave him. Over time, he replaced his missing arm with one more suitable for climbing.

James Thompson spent nine years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, thus becoming the record holder for prisoners of war. James was an ordinary store worker until he joined the Green Berets...During the Vietnam War, Thompson was captured and held hostage, subjected to torture and torture.

When his plane was shot down in 1964, he was hit by a bullet and suffered a broken spine. For most people, going through this in itself can be a heartbreaking story, but for James it was only just the beginning. After James was captured, he was kept in the jungle, locked in a wooden cage that was too small for him, in which he could neither sit upright nor stretch out. For a long time, the jailers, using torture, tried to force James to sign papers that stated that he was being treated well... In the end, he finally signed. After this, he was placed in prison along with other prisoners.

In the new place, conditions were not much better: hunger, unsanitary conditions, beatings. James tried to escape 5 times, but to no avail. During his imprisonment he became so weak that he suffered a heart attack. However, he was able to hold out until his release in 1973. When released, Thompson weighed approximately 40.8 kg. He died 30 years later in Florida.

Punn Lim set a record for extreme sea survival. On November 19, 1942, the English steamer Ben Lomond, on which he sailed from Cape Town to Brazil, was torpedoed by a German submarine.

Pun Lim, the cook of the sunken ship, was the only person left on a standard 25-passenger life raft, which had a 2-day supply of food and water for the crew. Drawn by the current and the wind, the raft went into the unknown, and the unwitting sailor migrated along with it. In the heat, the Chinese swam, tied with a line, and almost fell into the shark's mouth; in the rain, he collected water. His menu was varied with caught fish, seagulls and a shark caught with a homemade hook. The cutting of the predator was carried out with the same improvised knife.

The lone man was picked up on April 5, 1943 by Brazilian fishermen. Tanned and weathered, he lost only 10 kilograms. The English consul sent the sea pilgrim to New York, where the brother of the rescued man ran a Chinese restaurant.

The British government awarded Poon Lim the Imperial Medal for Valor. The person who presented the award told the hero that he had set a world record for staying at sea on a raft - 133 days. In response, the modest Chinese remarked: “I want to believe that no one will ever break this record.”

Two Chinese miners, the Meng Brothers, who found themselves walled up in a mine after a collapse, fought their way to the surface for six days. The men survived by eating coal and urine.

Brothers Meng Xianchen and Meng Xianyu were trapped while working in an illegal mine outside Beijing on the evening of August 18, 2007. Two days later, the rescue service stopped trying to find them, and relatives began traditional rituals accepted after the death of loved ones.

“At first I didn’t feel anything, but then such hunger awoke in me that I could no longer crawl,” recalls Xianchen. “I ate some coal, and it even seemed tasty to me. Of course, coal tastes bitter and unpleasant. But a small piece the size of a finger can be chewed. In the mine we found two empty plastic bottles and drank our own urine. You can only do this in tiny sips, and when you finish, you want to burst into tears." Miraculously, the surviving brothers promised that they would never go into anything again one mine.

Canadian Brent Case was attacked by a 400-kilogram grizzly bear in the forest.

Brent only had a small ax with him, so he played dead. However, the bear began gnawing on Brent's skull, but then gave up and suddenly walked away, leaving the poor guy to die.

Despite all this, Brent, with his scalp hanging, stood up and went looking for help. He returned to his car, drove 15 miles, bleeding, where he met help...

American Alexis Goggins became the heroine of Detroit, shielding her mother from the bullets of an armed robber! The girl received a total of six bullets, three of them in the face, but miraculously survived...

29-year-old Kevin Tilley - the mother's former "boyfriend", a previously convicted criminal, released on bail by some irresponsible idiot - tried to steal a car in which the girl and her mother were. When a woman tried to call the police at a nearby gas station, Kevin, without hesitation, put two bullets into her almost point-blank. Alexis rushed to her mother and covered her with her body. After which the angry bandit fired 6 bullets at the child!

One of them hit Alexis in the eye, the second in the chin area, and the third in the jaw. The girl saved her mother, who received non-life-threatening injuries, but she herself was on the verge of death: she underwent six severe operations in the intensive care unit.

And she still needs further treatment...

Underwater warfare means not only submarines with opposing merchant ships and warships, but also thousands of sailors of their crews, for whom fate prepared a different fate in the event of the death of a ship. Those who managed not to go down with the ship seemed to be born under a lucky star. But they, swinging on the waves on debris, rafts or in boats, in order to survive, sometimes had to go through hellish torment on the open sea, which in most cases ended in tears. However, the history of submarine warfare knows several cases of amazing rescue.

Life rafts and boats from the Second World War had a limited supply of provisions and water, which, when completely filled with people, only lasted for a few days. If the castaways did not reach the shore during this time or were not picked up by passing ships, then a terrible death awaited them. American merchant sailors even developed a simple and terrible formula for survivors, which was called the “rule of three”: “You can live three weeks without food, three days without water and three minutes without air.”

However, in the history of underwater warfare there are several cases where people from sunken ships spent dozens of days at sea, sometimes forced to survive in the middle of the ocean in absolute solitude. This story is about them and their courage.

Summer spent in the Atlantic

On June 10, 1942, Gibraltar left Convoy HG-84, which consisted of 22 merchant ships and one rescue ship guarded by a sloop and four corvettes of the 36th Escort Group. The convoy included the British ship Etrib with a cargo of fruit and alcohol, which had arrived from Cartagena to Gibraltar the day before.

On the night of June 15, 400 miles west of the Spanish port of La Coruña, the convoy was attacked by the German submarine U 552 of the famous submarine ace - Lieutenant Commander Erich Topp. At 0:58, from a long distance, the boat fired two torpedoes at an interval of 30 seconds. The salvo turned out to be successful, and three minutes later two ships, the Etribe and the Pelayo, on which the convoy commodore was sailing, were torpedoed and began to sink.

Built in 1919, the British steamship Etribe (1943 GRT) had gone through several names and owners by 1942. The ship left on its last voyage with a harmless cargo: its holds were loaded with apricot puree, wine, as well as cork and tartaric acid salts for the food industry

A large hole was formed on the right side of the Etribe from the torpedo explosion, and the steamer, having received a list, began to slowly lie down on the water. The captain of the Etribe, Baldie McMillan, ordered a signal to be transmitted to the rescue ship Copeland, and the crew began to abandon the ship. The sailors managed to lower the boat from the starboard side in time, and it accommodated the captain, 27 crew members, six gunners and two passengers (sailors from the previously sunk ship).

Half an hour later, they were all picked up by the corvette HMS Marigold, which began rescuing people from the ships sunk by Topp. It is worth noting that the submarine U 552 gave the corvette a lot of work: on the same night, in addition to the Etribe and Pelayo, Topp sank three more ships from convoy HG-84. Having completed the selection of people, the Marigold caught up with the convoy and transferred most of the rescued to the Copeland, after which it joined the escort group.

Four sailors from the Etribe were declared dead. Second mate Frederick Webb and seaman Herbert Ridgway were likely killed on the bridge while on watch when a torpedo struck the bridge. The fate of boatswain George William Briscoe and sailor William Swinchin was unknown. They were the last to leave the sinking ship, but did not have time to board the boat, and they were not among those rescued.

However, Briscoe and Swinchin survived. Both sailors swam away from the Etrib and managed to get to one of the life rafts that remained on the surface of the sea after the death of the ship. After some time, they saw a half-submerged boat, and Briscoe offered to move into it, bailing out the water, in order to have a more reliable watercraft.

Thanks to its experienced and successful commander, as well as its spectacular emblem - two red devils dancing with torches on either side of the wheelhouse - the submarine U 552 became one of the most famous in the Kriegsmarine. The emblem was inherited by Topp along with the old “deuce” U 57 from the previous commander, Lieutenant Commander Klaus Kort, but it was Topp who glorified it, subsequently transferring it to each of his boats. Pictures show the wheelhouse of the U 552 and a laughing Erich Topp

As a result, the boatswain swam to the boat, but Swinchin remained on the raft, and in the fog they lost each other. They had a chance to meet again a few months later, but fate gave them very different trials. Briscoe was picked up on the evening of June 24 by the German submarine U 106, returning from a cruise, under Captain-Lieutenant Hermann Rasch, and five days later he was captured in France when the submarine arrived in Lorient.

If George Briscoe was lucky and spent no more than 10 days in the boat, then fate had in store for William Swinchin a much more serious test of strength. Unfortunately, the history of his “solo voyage” in the Atlantic was not documented, so its description is not replete with details. It is known that there was some supply of food and fresh water on the raft. The food ran out on approximately the 32nd day the sailor was in the ocean. By this time, William had become very weak and began to periodically lose consciousness, so he lost track of the days and practically did not remember what happened to him next.

On August 29 at 13:15, a life raft with a person was spotted from the German submarine U 214, captain-lieutenant Günther Reeder. Raeder ordered to approach the raft and take the man on board. William Sunchin was saved. The Germans were amazed to see the exhausted state in which the sailor from the Etribe was. Since U 214’s campaign was in full swing (the boat was hunting convoys off the coast of Portugal), the submariners had to literally babysit the rescued Englishman, nursing him for more than a month.

The commander of the 9th Submarine Flotilla, Lieutenant Commander Heinrich Lehmann-Willenbrock, meets U 214 in Brest, October 9, 1942. Pictured from left to right: Lehmann-Willenbrock, U 214 commander Lieutenant Commander Günther Raeder, an unknown officer and William Swinchin. It is worth paying attention to the views of the German officers on the British sailor: they contain surprise and curiosity

U 214 returned to Brest on October 9, where Swinchin saw land again for the first time in four months. The duration of his “single voyage” on the raft was 76 days. It is curious that at first U 214 did not believe his story, but later Gunther Raeder gave the Englishman a certificate dated the day of his rescue.

After the boat's arrival in France, William Swinchin was sent to the Marineinterniertenlager Nord camp, where captured Allied merchant seamen were held, and became prisoner number 875. He remained there until the end of the war, until he was released on April 28, 1945.

Widely known and a great mystery

The case of the Chinese Pan Lian is included in the Guinness Book of Records as an absolute record for the duration of a person's stay on a life-saving craft on the high seas. However, it is worth noting that this story can be divided into two parts, which do not fit together in everything.

It all started in November 1942. Lieutenant Commander Carl Emmermann's U 172, returning from Cape Town, still had six torpedoes left on board. The submarine commander had no intention of returning to base with them, and the submarine was actively looking for targets for its “eels.” At 8:15 a.m. on November 23, a steamer was spotted on the horizon and Emmerman gave chase.

The submarine cruiser U 172 (Type IXC), under the command of Karl Emmermann, became one of the most successful Kriegsmarine boats, with over 150,000 tons sunk. The picture shows the boat emblem with Poseidon blowing his horn. German submariners proudly, although not according to regulations, wore such silhouettes carved from brass on their caps and caps.

At 13:23, the boat plunged to periscope depth to attack the ship, which was sailing in an anti-submarine zigzag. 40 minutes later, Emmerman fired a salvo of two torpedoes, which hit the “merchant” in the area of ​​the engine room and stern. The ship sank very quickly, so most of the crew went to the bottom with it. Literally five minutes after the attack, when the boat surfaced, the Germans found on the surface only debris and a life raft on which there were 10 people.

From them, Emmerman learned that he had sunk the English steamer Benlomond with a tonnage of 6,630 gross tons, which was traveling in ballast from Bombay through Cape Town to an unknown port (in fact, the ship was traveling from Port Said to New York). Having finished the interrogation, the Germans left, leaving the people on the raft to the will of the waves - no one ever saw them again.

At the same time that the ship began to sink, one of the Benlomond's crew, 25-year-old steward Pān Lián, managed to put on a life jacket and jump overboard. The Chinese were in the water for two hours until he noticed an empty life raft nearby and climbed onto it. It was a standard raft for British ships, shaped like a large wooden box. The structure was held in the water by six waterproof cylinders.

The Benlomond steamship, built in 1922, received this name only in 1938 during another change of owner. In the picture it bears the name "London Corporation", under which it went from 1923 to 1937

Having climbed onto the raft, Pan Lian realized that in the near future he would not be in danger of dying from hunger and thirst, since he had a good supply of provisions at his disposal: six boxes of biscuits, two pounds of chocolate, a bottle of lime juice, five cans of condensed milk, 10 gallons (about 40 liters) water and 10 cans of pemmican. The latter was a nutritional concentrate of beef jerky, flour, molasses/molasses and fat. Judging by the descriptions, it tasted like a rare nasty thing, and most of those who tried it hated this “food” with all their hearts.

Pan Lian also found four beams and a piece of tarpaulin, a sail, oars, flares, smoke bombs, a jar of massage oil, a flashlight and a piece of rope. All these supplies were packed in sealed jars with a reserve of buoyancy. If there were many people on the raft, then the provisions and water would not last long, but now all supplies were at the disposal of only one, which played an important role in the story of the sailor’s rescue.

When Pan Lian began to run out of food, he took up fishing. At first he made a small hook from a flashlight spring, but it could only catch small fish. We managed to make a larger hook from nails - we had to tear them out of the raft with our teeth! First, the Chinese caught small fry on a small hook, which he then baited on a large hook. Soon he began to come across large fish, up to 20 pounds.

Reconstruction of the life raft as Pan Lian traveled on it

Pan Lian laid out the fish to dry in the sun, and soon birds began to fly in and try to steal it. This provided the wanderer with additional food: he caught birds and also ate them. The Chinese built a shelter from the sun from a tarpaulin stretched over beams, with one corner hanging down so that rainwater flowed directly into a container placed for this purpose.

Pan Lian counted the days spent at sea by the knots he tied on the rope, but then he gave up this activity and began counting the months, using full moons as a guide. So, alone in the middle of the Atlantic, the Chinese celebrated the New Year of 1943.

Finally, on April 5, 1943, Brazilian fishermen discovered the raft 10 miles off the Brazilian coast and removed Pan Lian from it. Three days later, the fishermen came to the port, where the Chinese man went ashore on his own. During his stay at sea, he lost only nine kilograms of weight! Pan Lian spent four weeks in a Brazilian hospital before the British consul in Brazil helped him return to England via Miami and New York.

By the time Pan Lian found himself in Great Britain, nothing in the appearance of the respectable young man reminded him of the tragedy. In 1993, he was included in the Guinness Book of Records as having survived the longest solo voyage in the ocean.

King George VI awarded the Chinese the British Empire Medal, and the Admiralty included Pan Lian's story in a sea survival manual. After the war, he wanted to emigrate to the United States, but the quota for accepting Chinese emigrants did not allow him to do this. However, Pan Lian’s fame was such that he was given special permission to obtain American citizenship. By the way, when, after being discharged from a Brazilian hospital, Pan was flown to the United States, he tried to enlist in the American Navy, but he was not accepted due to flat feet.

In total, the courageous Chinese spent 133 days on the raft. When he was informed that no one had ever held out for so long before, he replied: “I hope no one ever has to break this record.”

Now it is worth explaining why the story of Pan Lian’s rescue was divided into two parts. He was the only survivor of the 54 crew members of the Benlomnod, however, as already mentioned, Karl Emmerman saw 10 people on the raft after surfacing. According to the war log of U 172, the steamer sank in two minutes, and the boat surfaced five minutes after the torpedoes were launched. It turns out that 10 sailors managed, just as quickly as Pan Lian, not only to leave the sinking ship, but also to climb onto one raft together.

In the numerous accounts of Pan Lian's rescue found in literature and on the Internet, there is no mention of him seeing other people or a submarine. Everywhere it is said that the steward tried to swim as far away from the ship as possible so as not to be pulled into the funnel, but, according to the stories of Pan Lian himself, he swam so poorly that he subsequently tied himself with a rope to the raft. It is unlikely that he would have been able to sail far in such a short period of time between his jump overboard and the moment the ship disappeared under water.

As a result, inconsistencies arise in the descriptions of the death of the ship by the Germans and Pan Lian, which raise questions. Why didn't the Chinese notice the submarine and the other survivors? What happened to them next? Answers to this riddle are hardly possible, since there are no witnesses left alive...

German victims, Japanese prisoners

On September 9, 1943, the British ship Fort Longueuil left the port of Aden on the Arabian Peninsula for the Australian port of Fremantle with a cargo of phosphates. However, he was not destined to reach Australia: on September 19, the ship was torpedoed by one of the submarines of the Monsoon group, U 532 of frigate captain Ottoheinrich Junker. Since the submarine's combat log has not been preserved, a description of the sinking of the ship exists only from the British side.

According to the testimony of Indian stokers Thakar Miah and Mohamed Aftab, who survived the death of the ship, the Fort Longueuil was torpedoed at about 15:00. Both stokers, wearing life jackets, managed to jump overboard and were able to get to the raft, which already had five people on it, including the ship’s gunner, a steward and a cook.

Dramatic photo taken on May 11, 1943. A US Coast Guard ship lifts sailors from a torpedoed British ship from a life raft in rough seas.

According to Thakar Mia, the ship sank very quickly and no one had time to reach the boat deck. In addition to the raft that he managed to climb onto, there were two more nearby, one of which had five people on it, and the other three. Another crew member was floating on a piece of wood. A few hours later it got dark, it started to rain, and because of the great distance, people were unable to gather together. The next morning there were no other rafts within sight. It is difficult to read about what happened next without shuddering. Takar Mia recalled it this way:

“Three days after the ship sank, we ran out of food and water. The gunner said to leave the sail as it is and not touch it. After about 25-26 days, it started raining at night. I drank some water and regained some strength. I tried to give water to the other five people, but they did not move. Then I checked Mohamed Aftab - he could only move one arm. I gave him water, he got a little stronger and after a while he stood up. I touched the others, but they didn't move. I don't know when they died. I was too weak to look at them until it started to rain. The next morning I threw the corpses into the sea. Then I caught fish and birds, and we both ate them.”

Thakar Mia and Mohamed Aftab did not know how long they had been on the raft in the ocean. However, Neptune did not need these victims, so one day the life raft washed up on an island covered in the jungle. On the shore, the Indians saw a Malay boy and asked him for help. He ran away and returned with people. They carried the sailors to the village and fed them. On the same day, the Malays handed over Thakar Mia and Mohamed Aftab to the Japanese. When the Indians asked the Japanese what day it was today, they received the answer: February 1, 1944!

Eight days later, both sailors were interrogated by a Japanese officer. Having learned that the Indians were members of the crew of an English steamer, he declared them spies and arrested them. As a result, the Indians were sent to Sumatra, where they began an 18-month “voyage” through Japanese prisons and camps. However, both sailors managed to survive this severe test. After the end of the war, Thakar Mia and Mohamed Aftab were released by British troops and transported to Singapore. From there they were flown to Rangoon and then by sea (along with the rest of the repatriated prisoners of war) to Great Britain in January 1946.

German submarine U 532, which sank the ship Fort Longueuil. The photo was taken after the surrender of the boat in May 1945

There, the entire crew of the Fort Longueuil had long been considered dead. On October 15, 1943, the ship was reported missing, and by November 3 it became known that she had been sunk, as well as the place where it happened. Since out of 59 crew members only two of the above-mentioned Indians survived, the most likely source of information was the decoding of an intercepted radiogram from U 532, in which Juncker reported to headquarters about the sinking of Fort Longueuil.

It is worth noting that the Indians surpassed Pan Lian’s “record” by a day, having spent 134 days on a life raft at sea, of which only three days they used the food supply, sharing it with their later deceased comrades. However, having been captured, like William Swinchin, they did not receive their share of the fame they deserved, unlike Pan Lian, who instantly became famous and is often remembered to this day.

The exceptional fortitude and ingenuity that these people showed on the high seas in extreme conditions inspired many talented people to explore this topic in art. Thus, director Alfred Hitchcock embodied it in his famous film “Lifeboat”, and writer Alistair Maclean - in the story “South of Cape Java”.