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It is unlikely that any adult in Russia, or indeed in the world, needs to be told about Stalin the politician. Much less is known about Stalin as a person, but he was a husband, father and, as it turns out, a great lover of women, at least during his stormy revolutionary youth. True, the fates of those closest to him always turned out tragically. Dismissing fiction, myths and gossip, Anews talks about the wives and children of the leader.

Ekaterina (Kato) Svanidze

First wife

At the age of 27, Stalin married the 21-year-old daughter of a Georgian nobleman. Her brother, with whom he once studied at the theological seminary, was his close friend. They got married secretly, at night, in a mountain monastery in Tiflis, because Joseph was already hiding from the authorities as an underground Bolshevik.

The marriage, concluded out of great love, lasted only 16 months: Kato gave birth to a son, Yakov, and at the age of 22 she died in her husband’s arms, either from transient consumption or from typhus. According to legend, the inconsolable widower allegedly told a friend at the funeral: “My last warm feelings for people died with her.”

Even if these words are fiction, here is a real fact: years later, Stalin’s repressions destroyed almost all of Catherine’s relatives. The same brother and wife and older sister were shot. And his brother’s son was kept in a psychiatric hospital until Stalin’s death.

Yakov Dzhugashvili

First son

Stalin's firstborn was raised by Kato's relatives. He first saw his father at the age of 14, when he already had a new family. It is believed that Stalin never fell in love with the “wolf cub,” as he himself called him, and was even jealous of his wife, who was only five and a half years older than Yasha. He severely punished the teenager for the slightest offenses, sometimes he did not let him go home, forcing him to spend the night on the stairs. When, at the age of 18, the son married against the will of his father, the relationship completely deteriorated. In desperation, Yakov tried to shoot himself, but the bullet went right through, he was saved, and Stalin distanced himself even more from the “bully and blackmailer” and mocked him: “Ha, I didn’t hit!”

In June 1941, Yakov Dzhugashvili went to the front, and to the most difficult sector - near Vitebsk. His battery distinguished itself in one of the largest tank battles, and Stalin's son, along with other fighters, was nominated for an award.

But soon Yakov was captured. His portraits immediately appeared on fascist leaflets designed to demoralize Soviet soldiers. There is a myth that Stalin allegedly refused to exchange his son for the German military leader Paulus, saying: “I don’t exchange a soldier for a field marshal!” Historians doubt that the Germans even proposed such an exchange, and the phrase itself is heard in the Soviet film epic “Liberation” and, apparently, is an invention of the screenwriters.

German photo: Stalin's son in captivity

And the following photograph of the captive Yakov Dzhugashvili is published for the first time: only recently it was found in the photo archive of the military leader of the Third Reich, Wolfram von Richthofen.

Yakov spent two years in captivity and did not cooperate with the Germans under any pressure. He died in the camp in April 1943: he provoked a sentry to fire a fatal shot by rushing to the barbed wire fence. According to a common version, Yakov fell into despair after hearing Stalin’s words on the radio that “there are no prisoners of war in the Red Army, there are only traitors and traitors to the Motherland.” However, most likely, this “spectacular phrase” was attributed to Stalin later.

Meanwhile, Yakov Dzhugashvili’s relatives, in particular his daughter and half-brother Artem Sergeev, were convinced all their lives that he died in battle in June 1941, and his time in captivity, including photos and interrogation reports, was from beginning to end played out by the Germans for propaganda purposes. However, in 2007, the FSB confirmed the fact of his captivity.

Nadezhda Alliluyeva

Second and last wife

Stalin married for the second time at the age of 40, his wife was 23 years younger - a fresh graduate of the gymnasium, who looked with adoration at the seasoned revolutionary, who had just returned from yet another Siberian exile.

Nadezhda was the daughter of Stalin’s longtime associates, and he also had an affair with her mother Olga in his youth. Now, years later, she became his mother-in-law.

The marriage of Joseph and Nadezhda, initially happy, eventually became unbearable for both. Memories of their family are very contradictory: some said that Stalin was gentle at home, and she enforced strict discipline and easily flared up, others said that he was constantly rude, and she endured and accumulated grievances until tragedy struck...

In November 1932, after another public altercation with her husband while visiting Voroshilov, Nadezhda returned home, retired to the bedroom and shot herself in the heart. No one heard the shot, only the next morning she was found dead. She was 31 years old.

There were also different stories about Stalin's reaction. According to some, he was shocked and cried at the funeral. Others remember that he was furious and said over his wife’s coffin: “I didn’t know that you were my enemy.” One way or another, the family relationship was forever over. Subsequently, numerous novels were attributed to Stalin, including with the first beauty of the Soviet screen, Lyubov Orlova, but these were mostly unconfirmed rumors and myths.

Vasily Dzhugashvili (Stalin)

Second son

Nadezhda gave birth to two children for Stalin. When she committed suicide, her 12-year-old son and 6-year-old daughter found themselves under the supervision of not only nannies and housekeepers, but also male guards led by General Vlasik. It was them that Vasily later blamed for the fact that from a young age he became addicted to smoking and alcohol.

Subsequently, being a military pilot and fighting bravely in the war, he more than once received penalties and demotions “in the name of Stalin” for hooligan actions. For example, he was removed from command of a regiment for fishing with the use of aircraft shells, as a result of which his weapons engineer was killed and one of the best pilots was wounded.

Or after the war, a year before Stalin’s death, he lost his position as commander of the Air Force of the Moscow Military District when he showed up drunk at a government holiday reception and was rude to the Air Force Commander-in-Chief.

Immediately after the death of the leader, the life of Aviation Lieutenant General Vasily Stalin went downhill. He began to spread left and right that his father had been poisoned, and when the Minister of Defense decided to appoint his troubled son to a position away from Moscow, he did not obey his order. He was transferred to the reserve without the right to wear a uniform, and then he did the irreparable - he conveyed his version of Stalin’s poisoning to foreigners, hoping to receive protection from them.

But instead of going abroad, Stalin’s youngest son, a decorated participant in the Great Patriotic War, ended up in prison, where he spent 8 years, from April 1953 to April 1961. The angry Soviet leadership brought a lot of accusations on him, including frankly ridiculous ones, but Vasily admitted to everything without exception during interrogation. At the end of his sentence, he was “exiled” to Kazan, but he did not live even a year in freedom: he died in March ’62, just a couple of days before his 41st birthday. According to the official conclusion, from alcohol poisoning.

Svetlana Alliluyeva (Lana Peters)

Stalin's daughter

Naturally or not, the only one of the children whom Stalin doted on gave him nothing but trouble during his lifetime, and after his death she fled abroad and in the end completely abandoned her homeland, where she was threatened with the fate of suffering moral punishment for the rest of her days. father's sins.

From a young age, she started countless affairs, sometimes destructive for her chosen ones. When, at the age of 16, she fell in love with 40-year-old film screenwriter Alexei Kapler, Stalin arrested him and exiled him to Vorkuta, completely forgetting how he himself, at the same age, seduced young Nadezhda, Svetlana’s mother.

Svetlana only had five official husbands, including an Indian and an American. Having escaped to India in 1966, she became a “defector”, leaving her 20-year-old son and 16-year-old daughter behind in the USSR. They did not forgive such betrayal. The son is no longer in the world, and the daughter, who is now approaching 70, abruptly interrupts the inquisitive journalists: “You are mistaken, she is not my mother.”

In America, Svetlana, who became Lana Peters by her husband, had a third daughter, Olga. With her, she suddenly returned to the USSR in the mid-80s, but did not take root either in Moscow or in Georgia and eventually finally left for the USA, renouncing her native citizenship. Her personal life never worked out. She died in a nursing home in 2011, her burial place is unknown.

Svetlana Alliluyeva: “Wherever I go - to Switzerland, or India, even Australia, even some lonely island, I will always be a political prisoner in the name of my father.”

Stalin had three more sons - two illegitimate, born from his mistresses in exile, and one adopted. Surprisingly, their fates were not so tragic, on the contrary, as if distance from their father or lack of blood relationship saved them from evil fate.

Artem Sergeev

Stalin's adopted son

His own father was the legendary Bolshevik “Comrade Artem”, a revolutionary comrade-in-arms and close friend of Stalin. When his son was three months old, he died in a train accident, and Stalin took him into his family.

Artem was the same age as Vasily Stalin; the guys were inseparable from childhood. From the age of two and a half, both were raised in a boarding school for “Kremlin” children, however, in order not to raise a “children’s elite,” exactly the same number of real street children were placed with them. Everyone was taught to work equally. The children of party members returned home only on weekends, and were obliged to invite orphans to their home.

According to Vasily’s memoirs, Stalin “loved Artyom very much and set him as an example.” However, Stalin did not give any concessions to the diligent Artyom, who, unlike Vasily, studied well and with interest. So, after the war, he had a rather difficult time at the Artillery Academy due to excessive drilling and nagging teachers. Then it turned out that Stalin personally demanded that his adopted son be treated more strictly.

After Stalin's death, Artem Sergeev became a great military leader and retired with the rank of major general of artillery. He is considered one of the founders of the USSR anti-aircraft missile forces. He died in 2008 at the age of 86. Until the end of his life he remained a devoted communist.

Mistresses and illegitimate children

British specialist in Soviet history Simon Seabag Montefiori, who has many awards in documentary filmmaking, traveled around the territory of the former USSR in the 90s and found a lot of unpublished documents in the archives. It turned out that young Stalin was surprisingly amorous, was fond of women of different ages and classes, and after the death of his first wife, during the years of exile in Siberia, had a large number of mistresses.

17-year-old high school graduate Onufrieva's field he sent passionate cards (one of them is pictured). Postscript: “I have your kiss, transmitted to me through Petka. I kiss you back, and not just kiss you, but passionately (you just shouldn’t kiss!). Joseph".

He had affairs with fellow party members - Vera Schweitzer And Lyudmila Steel.

And on a noblewoman from Odessa Stefania Petrovskaya he was even planning to get married.

However, Stalin married two sons with simple peasant women from the distant wilderness.

Konstantin Stepanovich Kuzakov

Illegitimate son from his cohabitant in Solvychegodsk, Maria Kuzakova

The son of a young widow who sheltered the exiled Stalin, he graduated from a university in Leningrad and made a dizzying career - from a non-partisan university teacher to the head of cinematography at the USSR Ministry of Culture and one of the leaders of the State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company. He recalled in 1995: “My origins were not a big secret, but I always managed to avoid answering when asked about it. But I guess my promotion is also related to my abilities.”

Only in adulthood did he see Stalin closely for the first time, and this happened in the buffet of the Presidium of the Supreme Council. Kuzakov, as a member of the Central Committee apparatus responsible for propaganda, was involved in political editing of speeches. “I didn’t even have time to take a step towards Stalin. The bell rang and members of the Politburo went into the hall. Stalin stopped and looked at me. I felt that he wanted to tell me something. I wanted to rush towards him, but something stopped me. Probably, subconsciously, I understood that public recognition of my relationship would bring me nothing but big troubles. Stalin waved his phone and walked slowly..."

After this, Stalin, under the pretext of a work consultation, wanted to arrange a personal reception for Kuzakov, but he did not hear the phone call, having fallen fast asleep after a late meeting. Only the next morning they told him that he had missed it. Then Konstantin saw Stalin more than once, both close and from afar, but they never spoke to each other, and he never called again. “I think he didn’t want to make me a tool in the hands of intriguers.”

However, in 1947, Kuzakov almost came under repression due to Beria’s intrigues. He was expelled from the party for “loss of vigilance” and removed from all posts. Beria demanded his arrest at the Politburo. But Stalin saved his unrecognized son. As Zhdanov later told him, Stalin walked along the table for a long time, smoked and then said: “I see no reason for the arrest of Kuzakov.”

Kuzakov was reinstated in the party on the day of Beria’s arrest, and his career resumed. He retired under Gorbachev, in 1987, at the age of 75. Died in 1996.

Alexander Yakovlevich Davydov

Illegitimate son from his cohabitant in Kureika, Lidiya Pereprygina

And here there was almost a criminal story, because 34-year-old Stalin began living with Lydia when she was only 14. Under the threat of gendarmerie prosecution for seducing a minor, he promised to later marry her, but fled from exile earlier. At the time of his disappearance, she was pregnant and without him gave birth to a son, Alexander.

There is evidence that at first the runaway father corresponded with Lydia. Then, a rumor spread that Stalin had been killed at the front, and she married fisherman Yakov Davydov, who adopted her child.

There is documentary evidence that in 1946, 67-year-old Stalin suddenly wanted to find out about their fate and conveyed a laconic order to find bearers of such and such surnames. Based on the results of the search, Stalin was given a brief certificate - such and such lived there. And all the personal and juicy details that became clear in the process surfaced only 10 years later, already under Khrushchev, when the campaign to expose the cult of personality began.

Alexander Davydov lived a simple life as a Soviet soldier and worker. He took part in the Great Patriotic and Korean Wars, rising to the rank of major. After leaving the army, he lived with his family in Novokuznetsk, working in low-level positions - as a foreman, head of a factory canteen. Died in 1987.

The one who seemed destined for the fate of the “Kremlin prince” did not know either happiness or love in his entire short life

The firstborn, and even a son, and even from a beloved woman - as a rule, this is the main joy and hope of fathers. But not Yakov Dzhugashvili. Why is the eldest of the heirs Stalin He grew up as a foundling, lived as a hermit, and why his death is still surrounded by speculation - this is what the website talks about.

Orphan from birth

Eldest son Joseph Vissarionovich was born on March 18, 1907. The boy was named Yakov, the only one of Stalin’s children at birth who received his father’s real surname – Dzhugashvili.

Yakov's mother is Stalin's first wife Ekaterina Svanidze. Not much is known about this leader’s marriage. But almost everyone who knew this family said that Soso And Kato loved each other very much. By the time they got married, Dzhugashvili was already carried away by revolutionary ideas, the family had to constantly hide. Kato even spent several months under arrest due to her husband's activities.

A few months after Jacob was born, Kato had to leave him with his relatives. At that time, she herself worked as a dressmaker in Tiflis, one of the most sought after in the city, so she could regularly send money to relatives looking after Yakov.

But soon Ekaterina Svanidze fell ill with consumption. Joseph, who was constantly on the move, still managed to say goodbye to his wife - he returned home the day before her death. At Kato's funeral, Stalin, unable to cope with the grief that befell him, threw himself into the grave.

Fathers and Sons

Jacob was only 8 months old when his mother died. His entire childhood was spent without parents. When Stalin finally took Yakov away from his wife’s relatives, the boy was already fourteen years old. This was the first time he saw his dad. The teenager had to get used not only to his father, but also to his new family - by that time Stalin had already married a second time, to Nadezhda Alliluyeva and she bore him a son Vasily.

Stalin's relationship with his first-born son never worked out. The character of both was not distinguished by gentleness; no one wanted to meet them halfway. But the stepmother managed to find an approach to Yakov. Stalin often conveyed his instructions to his eldest son through Nadezhda.

First try

Four years later, the leader's son graduated from school and married his classmate and the priest's daughter Zoya Gunina. Stalin was enraged by this news, and a quarrel with his son ended with Yakov trying to shoot himself. But the bullet went right through. Stalin will remember his failed suicide attempt for a long time to his son.

In fact, throughout the subsequent years, Yakov lived his own life. Subsequently, some historians stated that he felt like an outcast because of his father’s attitude, which perhaps explains the fact that Jacob, in fact, was a deeply unhappy person. But their opponents claim that there was no talk of any “fatherlessness.” However, the leader’s eldest son was still not happy.

Family life did not work out. The marriage to Zoya broke up after the death of their newborn child. Over the next less than 10 years, Yakov had two more marriages, one of which was civil, and two children were born from different women - a son Eugene and daughter Galina.

War as salvation

In 1937, following his father's wishes, he began to receive a military education. In May 1941, just before the start of the war, he became commander of an artillery battery. After his father’s dry parting words (“Go and fight”) he went to the front. In mid-July '41 he was captured. And this last segment of the life of Stalin’s eldest son is most filled with mysteries and speculation.

Experts from the FSO and the Ministry of Defense at the beginning of the 2000s proved that Yakov Dzhugashvili’s letters from captivity to his father, Joseph Stalin, were fake. Just like the German propaganda photographs of Yakov, under which there was an appeal to Soviet soldiers to surrender, “like the son of Stalin.” Some Western versions say that Yakov was alive after the war.

Yakov Dzhugashvili was not the favorite son of Joseph Stalin.

Stalin did not see his eldest son for 13 years. The last time he saw him before the long separation was in 1907, when Yakov’s mother, Ekaterina Svanidze, died. Their son was not yet a year old at the time.

Ekaterina Svanidze’s sister, Alexandra, and brother Alyosha, together with their wife Mariko, took care of the child. His grandson was also raised by his grandfather, Semyon Svanidze. They all lived in the village of Badzi near Kutaisi. The boy grew up in love and affection, as often happens when close relatives try to compensate for the absence of a father and mother.

Joseph Stalin saw his first-born son again only in 1921, when Yakov was already fourteen.

Stalin had no time for his son, and then a new marriage with Nadezhda Alliluyeva and children from him. Yakov made his way in life on his own, only occasionally his father helped him with money.

On the advice of his father, Yakov enters the artillery academy.

From the certification of a fourth-year student of the command faculty of the art academy, Lieutenant Yakov Iosifovich Dzhugashvili:

“He is devoted to the party of Lenin, Stalin and the socialist Motherland, sociable, his academic performance is good, but in the last session he had an unsatisfactory grade in a foreign language.

The foreman of the group is Captain Ivanov.”

Let us pay attention to this unsatisfactory grade in a foreign language received in 1940. A year later, in 1941, the Germans, drawing up a protocol for the interrogation of the captive Yakov Dzhugashvili, would literally write the following:

Dzhugashvili speaks English, German and French and gives the impression of a completely intelligent person.”

This is how the discrepancy turns out. From a house on Granovsky Street on June 23, 1941, Yakov Dzhugashvili went to the front. He did not have time to see his father. He just called him on the phone and heard the blessing:

Go and fight.

Yakov Dzhugashvili did not have time to send a single message from the front. Daughter Galina Dzhugashvili keeps the only postal card sent by her father to his wife Yulia from Vyazma on the way to the front. It is dated June 26, 1941:

“Dear Julia. Take care of Galka and yourself. Tell her that dad Yasha is fine. At the first opportunity I will write a longer letter. Don't worry about me, I'm doing great.

All yours Yasha.”

Much has been written in detail about what happened in mid-July near Vitebsk. According to the generally accepted version, on July 16, 1941, the Germans fell into the hands of such a trump card that they could not even dream of. The news that the son of Stalin himself had surrendered to them instantly spread around all units and formations on both sides.

So, on July 11, 1941, the Germans broke into Vitebsk. As a result, three of our armies were immediately surrounded. These included the 14th Howitzer Artillery Regiment of the 14th Tank Division, in which Senior Lieutenant Dzhugashvili served as battery commander.

The command did not forget about Yakov Dzhugashvili. It understood what could happen to a commander of any rank in the event of the death or capture of Stalin’s son. Therefore, the order of the division commander, Colonel Vasiliev to the head of the special department to take Yakov into his car during the retreat was harsh. But Yakov would not be himself if he had not refused this offer. Having learned about this, Divisional Commander Vasiliev again orders, despite any objections from Yakov, to take him to the Lioznovo station. As follows from the report of the chief of artillery, the order was carried out, but on the night of July 16-17, when the remnants of the division broke out of the encirclement, Yakov Dzhugashvili was not among them.

Where did Stalin's son disappear to?

This is where the first strange thing appears. If at the moment of leaving the encirclement, despite the chaos, they tried so hard to take him out, then why after the disappearance they did not search for four days and only on the twentieth of July did intensive searches begin, when an encryption was received from Headquarters. Zhukov ordered to immediately find out and report to front headquarters where senior lieutenant Yakov Iosifovich Dzhugashvili was located.

The order to report on the results of the search for Yakov Dzhugashvili was carried out only on July 24. In another four days.

The story of the motorcyclists sent to search for Yakov looks like an attempt to completely confuse the situation. So, motorcyclists, led by senior political instructor Gorokhov, meet Red Army soldier Lapuridze at Lake Kasplya. He said that he left the encirclement with Yakov. On July 15, they changed into civilian clothes and buried their documents. Having made sure that there are no Germans nearby, Yakov decides to take a break, and Lapuridze goes further and meets the same group of motorcyclists. Senior political instructor Gorokhov, as if not understanding who he was looking for, returned back, deciding that Dzhugashvili had already reached his own people.

Doesn't sound very convincing.

The situation becomes clearer from a letter from Yakov Dzhugashvili’s close comrade, Ivan Sapegin. The letter was sent to Yakov's brother Vasily Stalin on August 2, 1941.

“Dear Vasily Osipovich! I am the colonel who was at your dacha with Yakov Iosifovich on the day of departure for the front. The regiment was surrounded. The division commander abandoned them and left the battle in a tank. Driving past Yakov Iosifovich, he did not even inquire about his fate, but he himself broke out of encirclement in a tank along with the division artillery chief.

Ivan Sapegin."

Until August 13, 1941, there was no information about what actually happened to Stalin’s son. Apart from the Red Army soldier Lapuridze, the special officers of the Western Front did not find a single witness who could shed light on the mysterious disappearance of Yakov.

The information was received on August 13. A German leaflet was delivered to the political department of the Sixth Army of the Southern Front. There is a resolution on it:

Head of the political department, brigade commissar Gerasimenko.”

There was a photograph on the leaflet. It showed an unshaven man, in a Red Army overcoat, surrounded by German soldiers, and below was the text:

“This is Yakov Dzhugashvili, Stalin’s eldest son, commander of the battery of the 14th howitzer artillery regiment of the 14th armored division, who on July 16 surrendered near Vitebsk along with thousands of other commanders and soldiers. Follow the example of Stalin’s son, and you too should cross over!”

The fact that Yakov was in captivity was immediately reported to Stalin. It was a very strong blow for him. To all the troubles of the beginning of the war, this personal one was added.

And the Germans continued their propaganda attack. In August, another leaflet appeared, which reproduced a note from Yakov to his father, delivered to Stalin by diplomatic means:

Dear father, I am in captivity, healthy. Soon I will be sent to one of the officer camps in Germany. The treatment is good. I wish you health. Hi all.

Tons of leaflets continued to be dropped on Soviet troops and front-line territories, on which Stalin’s son was depicted next to senior officers of the Wehrmacht and German intelligence services. Under the photographs there are calls to lay down your weapons. No one then noticed that in some photographs the light falls on one side and the shadow on the other, that Yakov’s jacket is buttoned on the left side, like a woman. That in hot July, for some reason, Yakov is standing in an overcoat. That in none of the photographs he is looking at the camera.

On May 31, 1948, in Saxony, Germany, while sorting through archives, Soviet military translator Prokhorova discovered two sheets of paper. This was the protocol of the first interrogation of Yakov Dzhugashvili on July 18, 1941.

“Since no documents were found on the prisoner of war, and Dzhugashvili poses as the son of the Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR Joseph Stalin-Dzhugashvili, he was asked to sign the attached statement in two copies. Dzhugashvili speaks English, German and French.”

Who was this person whose interrogation report was found by the military translator? Was it really Yakov Stalin or someone posing as the son of the leader and thus hoping for a softening of his fate in German captivity?

The interrogation reports are full of clichés. It follows from them that Yakov refused to cooperate with the Germans. He is sent to Berlin at the disposal of Goebbels' department. The Gestapo oversees the captured son of Stalin. After several unsuccessful attempts to force Yakov Dzhugashvili to participate in propaganda campaigns, he was moved first to the Lübeck officer camp and then to the Homelburg concentration camp.

But this looks strange. Was there really no place in Berlin for Stalin's son? Did the Germans really refuse to use such a trump card in the game, which, undoubtedly, was the son of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the opposing country? Hard to believe.

Joseph Stalin never ceased to be interested in the fate of his son. Therefore, Soviet foreign intelligence monitored all movements of Yakov Dzhugashvili. Or a man posing as Stalin's eldest son.

For two years of captivity, German intelligence services and propagandists for some reason did not film a single frame of newsreel, even from around the corner, even with the help of a hidden camera. As, however, there is not a single recording of Yakov Dzhugashvili’s voice. It is strange that the Germans missed this opportunity to say hello to Stalin.

Several memories have been preserved of those who lived with Yakov in the same barracks both in Lübeck and in Homelburg, and in Dzhugashvili’s last place of stay - in special camp “A” in Sachsenhausen. But the fact is that none of these people knew or saw Yakov before the war.

It looks like we are dealing with one of the most sophisticated operations of the German intelligence services. With one blow they killed two birds with one stone: they kept Stalin in suspense and waited for the enemy in their rear. It is known about several groups that received orders from the Soviet leadership to free Yakov from captivity. All these attempts ended in failure. But the Germans were able to track the connections and contacts of the underground fighters operating behind their lines.

The circumstances of Jacob's death became known after the war from the discovery of a letter from Reichsführer SS Himmler to Foreign Minister Ribbentrop, and then from the published testimony of the guard of the special camp "A" in Sachsenhausen, Konrad Harfick.

From Harfik's testimony it follows that at about 20:00 on April 14, 1943, he was ordered to lock the door in the wire fence that separated the barracks with prisoners of war. Suddenly Yakov Dzhugashvili shouted “sentry, shoot!” quickly rushed past Harfik to the wire through which a high voltage current passed. Kharfik tried to reason with Yakov for some time, but when he finally grabbed the wire, he shot him in the head from a distance of 6-7 meters. Dzhugashvili unclenched his hands and leaned back, remaining hanging on the wire.

Imagine human contact with a wire carrying a voltage of 500 volts. Death from paralysis must occur instantly. Why was it necessary to shoot, not at the legs, not at the back, but right at the back of the head? Doesn't this mean that Yakov or the person posing as Yakov was first shot and then thrown onto a wire?

Why did Yakov’s unexpected death coincide with the moment when negotiations on the exchange of Field Marshal Paulus for Yakov Dzhugashvili intensified through the Red Cross? Is this a coincidence? And finally, why is the photograph of Jacob hanging on a wire, presented in the criminal case of the Reich Criminal Police Office of Nazi Germany, so unclear?

In the spring of 2002, after an official appeal to the Federal Security Service, several examinations of photographs, leaflets and notes of Yakov Dzhugashvili were carried out.

First of all, it was necessary to establish the authorship of the note allegedly written by Yakov Dzhugashvili in captivity on July 19, 1941 and addressed to Stalin. Experts from the Center for Forensic and Criminalistic Expertise of the Ministry of Defense had authentic texts written by the hand of Stalin’s eldest son shortly before the start and in the first days of the war. During the comparative analysis, in particular, it turned out that there is no slant when writing the letter “z” in the disputed text - Yakov always wrote this letter with a slant to the left; the letter “d” in the note sent from captivity has a curl in the form of a loop at the top, which is absolutely not characteristic of the handwriting of Stalin’s son; Yakov always seemed to flatten the upper part of the letter “v” - in the note addressed to Stalin, it was spelled out classically correctly.

Experts have identified 11 more inconsistencies!

Forensic expert Sergei Zosimov then said:

Having a sufficient amount of handwritten material executed by Dzhugashvili, combining such a note from individual alphabetic and digital characters is not difficult.

Consultation certificate number 7-4/02 from the expert opinion:

“The letter on behalf of Yakov Iosifovich Dzhugashvili dated July 19, 1941, beginning with the words “dear father,” was not written by Yakov Iosifovich Dzhugashvili, but by another person.

Specialists Viktor Kolkutin, Sergey Zosimov.”

So, Yakov Dzhugashvili did not write to his father from captivity, did not call for him to lay down his arms, another or others did this for him.

Second question: who is shown in photographs taken by the Germans from July 1941 to April 1943 during the possible captivity of Senior Lieutenant Yakov Dzhugashvili?

In the photographs obtained from German archives, after research by comparison and scanning, traces of photomontage and retouching were clearly recorded.

Forensic expert Sergei Abramov said in the film “Golgotha”:

An image of a face was cut out, transferred to the picture instead of the head of another person, and this head was transferred.

They just forgot to change the shape of the disheveled hair, and the length of the shadows from the two figures depicted in the picture does not correspond to the location of the light source, they are painted on.

German propagandists made a mistake by editing a photograph where Stalin's son was allegedly captured during interrogation. If the image of two German officers does not raise any doubts that they are real, then the photographic appearance of the man posing as Yakov Dzhugashvili is not flawless. Traces of retouching are visible, and the man is dressed very strangely: his jacket is buttoned on the left side, like a woman. It turns out that when taking this photograph, a mirror image of another photograph by Yakov Dzhugashvili was used, but the German specialists forgot to flip it back.

Help-consultation number 194/02 from the expert opinion:

“The photographs were made by photomontage. The image of the head of the person under study was transferred from other photographs and retouched.

Forensic medical expert Sergei Abramov.”

The chief forensic expert of the Ministry of Defense, Viktor Kalkutin, said in the film “Calvary”:

So far, only one thing can be stated with 100% certainty: Stalin’s eldest son, Yakov Dzhugashvili, who left for the front on June 23, 1941, did not return home. Whether he was killed immediately after his capture, taken to the West, or simply died in battle is now unlikely to ever be known.

Relatives did not believe in Yakov’s death for a very long time. For many years it seemed to Svetlana Stalina that her brother, whom she loved more than Vasily, did not die. There was some kind of invisible connection between them; as she wrote, an inner voice told her that Yakov was alive, that he was somewhere in America or Canada.

In the West, after the end of the war, many were sure that Yakov Dzhugashvili was alive. And they provided evidence for this version.

1. Thus, in the TASS report for the beginning of 1945, only Stalin and Molotov were reported:

"Broadcast. London, Polish Government Broadcasting, Polish, 6 February, minutes. A special correspondent for the Daily Mail reports: The German authorities have seized 50-60 thousand Allied prisoners of war as hostages, among them King Leopold, Churchill's nephew, Schuschnigg, Stalin's son and General Boer. General Boer is imprisoned in Berchtesgaden, and the Germans are trying in every possible way to get General Boer to speak out against Russia. However, all their attempts remained in vain."

2. “Radio broadcast. Rome, Italian, May 23, 19:30, protocol recording. Zurich. Major Yakov Dzhugashvili, the son of Marshal Stalin, released from one of the concentration camps, arrived in Switzerland.”

3. In August 1949, the Danish newspaper Informachon published an article about Stalin’s children. There was also a paragraph about Yakov.

“About Stalin’s eldest son, Yakov, who was captured by the Germans during the war, they say that he is in exile in Switzerland. The Swedish newspaper Arbetaren published an article by Ostranet, who allegedly personally knew Yakov Stalin. It is alleged that Yakov, even in his youth, was in opposition to his father.”

In the West, the topic of the life and death of Yakov Dzhugashvili in captivity is still of interest to many historians and the media. Proof of this is the intensity of the discussion between the German journalist and historian Christian Neef, who believes that Stalin’s son deliberately surrendered, and the Russian-French artist and publicist Maxim Kantor. This discussion.

Stalin's son from his first marriage to Ekaterina Svanidze. Born in the village. Badji Kutaisi province (according to other sources - in Baku). Until the age of 14, he was raised by his aunt, A.S. Monasalidze in Tbilisi. In 1921, at the insistence of his uncle A. Svanidze, he came to Moscow to study. Yakov spoke only Georgian, was silent and shy.
Dzhugashvili Yakov Iosifovich (1907-1943).

Yakov and sister Svetlana

Yakov Dzhugashvili with little Galya, daughter from his marriage to Yu. Meltzer.

His father greeted him unfriendly, but his stepmother, Nadezhda Alliluyeva, tried to look after him. In Moscow, Yakov first studied at a school on Arbat, then at an electrical engineering school in Sokolniki, from which he graduated in 1925. He got married the same year.
“But the first marriage brought tragedy. My father didn’t want to hear about the marriage, didn’t want to help him... Yasha shot himself in our kitchen, next to his small room, at night. The bullet went right through, but he was sick for a long time. His father began to treat him even worse for this” (Alliluyeva S.) On April 9, 1928, N.S. Alliluyeva received the following letter from Stalin: “Tell Yasha from me that he acted like a hooligan and a blackmailer, with whom I have no relationship there can be nothing more in common. Let him live where he wants and with whom he wants."

From the first days of the war, Yakov went to the front. On July 16, 1941, senior lieutenant Yakov Dzhugashvili was captured.

Berlin radio reported “stunning news” to the population: “From the headquarters of Field Marshal Kluge, a report was received that on July 16, near Liozno, southeast of Vitebsk, German soldiers of the motorized corps of General Schmidt captured the son of dictator Stalin - senior lieutenant Yakov Dzhugashvili, commander of an artillery battery from the seventh rifle corps of General Vinogradov." The place and date of Y. Dzhugashvili’s capture became known from German leaflets.

On August 7, 1941, the political department of the Northwestern Front sent to member of the Military Council A.A. Zhdanov has three such leaflets in a secret package, dropped from an enemy plane. On the leaflet, in addition to the propaganda text calling for surrender, there is a photograph with the caption: “German officers talking with Yakov Dzhugashvili.” On the back of the leaflet the manuscript of the letter was reproduced: “Dear Father! I am a prisoner, healthy, and will soon be sent to one of the officer camps in Germany. The treatment is good. I wish you good health, hello everyone, Yakov.” A.A. Zhdanov informed Stalin about what had happened.

But neither the interrogation protocol (stored in “Case No. T-176” in the Archives of the US Congress 3)), nor the German leaflets answer the question of how Ya. Dzhugashvili was captured. There were many soldiers of Georgian nationality, and if this was not betrayal, then how did the fascists know that it was Stalin’s son? Of course, there can be no talk of voluntary surrender. This is confirmed by his behavior in captivity and the unsuccessful attempts of the Nazis to recruit him. One of Jacob’s interrogations at the headquarters of Field Marshal Gunther von Kluge was conducted on July 18, 1941 by Captain Reschle. Here is an excerpt from the interrogation protocol:

How did it turn out that you are Stalin’s son if they didn’t find any documents on you?
- Some servicemen of my unit gave me away.
- What is your relationship with your father?
- Not so good. I do not share his political views in everything.
-... Do you consider captivity a disgrace?
- Yes, I think it’s a shame...

In the fall of 1941, Yakov was transferred to Berlin and placed at the disposal of Goebbels' propaganda service. He was placed in the fashionable Adlon Hotel and surrounded by former Georgian counter-revolutionaries. This is probably where the photograph of Y. Dzhugashvili with Georgy Scriabin, allegedly the son of Molotov, the then chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, was born. At the beginning of 1942, Yakov was transferred to the officer camp "Oflag XSH-D", located in Hammelburg. Here they tried to break him with mockery and hunger. In April the prisoner was transferred to Oflag HS in Lübeck. Jacob's neighbor was a prisoner of war, Captain Rene Blum, the son of the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of France, Leon Blum. By decision of the meeting, Polish officers allocated food to Jacob monthly.

However, Yakov was soon taken to the Sachsenhausen camp and placed in a department where there were prisoners who were relatives of high-ranking leaders of the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition. In this barracks, in addition to Yakov and Vasily Kokorin, four English officers were kept: William Murphy, Andrew Walsh, Patrick O'Brien and Thomas Cushing. The German high command offered Stalin to exchange him for Field Marshal Friedrich von Paulus, captured in 1942 under Stalingrad. Stalin's official response, transmitted through the chairman of the Swedish Red Cross, Count Bernadotte, read: “A soldier is not exchanged for a marshal.”

In 1943, Yakov died in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. We have reached the following document, compiled by former prisoners and stored in the archives of the memorial of this concentration camp: “Yakov Dzhugashvili constantly felt the hopelessness of his situation. He often fell into depression, refused to eat, and was especially influenced by Stalin’s statement, repeatedly broadcast on the camp radio, that “we have no prisoners of war - we have traitors to the Motherland.”

Perhaps this pushed Yakov to take a reckless step. On the evening of April 14, 1943, he refused to enter the barracks and rushed into the “dead zone.” The sentry fired. Death came instantly. “An attempt to escape,” the camp authorities reported. The remains of Yakov Dzhugashvili were burned in the camp crematorium... In 1945, in the archive captured by the Allies, a report from SS guard Harfik Konrad was found, claiming that he shot Yakov Dzhugashvili when he threw himself on a barbed wire fence. This information was also confirmed by the British prisoner of war Thomas Cushing, who was in the same barracks with Jacob.

From the memories of a peer:

"... There is not a single reliable, authentic document indicating that Yakov was in captivity. Probably, on July 16, 1941, he was killed in battle. I think the Germans found his documents on him and staged such a game with our respective services. To me at that time I had to be in the German rear. We saw a leaflet where supposedly Yakov was with a German officer who was interrogating him. And in my partisan detachment there was a professional photographer. When I asked him what his opinion was: it was a fake or not, he didn’t say anything right away. a day later he confidently declared: editing. And now forensic examination confirms that all the photographs and texts of Yakov allegedly in captivity are montages and fakes. Of course, if Yakov, as the Germans claimed, got to them, then they would have taken care of reliable evidence, but. they would not have presented dubious ones: sometimes blurry photographs, sometimes from the back, sometimes from the side. In the end, there were no witnesses either: they knew Yakov only from photographs, but identified him in captivity, or the same frivolous evidence. The Germans then had enough technical means to shoot on film, take photos, and record a voice. There is none of this. Thus, it is obvious that Stalin’s eldest son died in battle." (A. Sergeev)

German propaganda leaflet stating that the Germans captured Stalin's son.

Here is a photograph of two German officers with a prisoner and below the words: “German officers are talking with Yakov Dzhugashvili. Stalin’s son, Yakov Dzhugashvili, senior lieutenant, battery commander of the 14th howitzer artillery regiment of the 14th armored division, surrendered to the Germans. If If such a prominent Soviet officer and Red commander surrendered, this clearly shows that any resistance to the German army is completely pointless. Therefore, end the whole war and come over to us!”
On the back of the leaflet, the manuscript of the letter was reproduced: “Dear father! I am in captivity, healthy, and will soon be sent to one of the officer camps in Germany. Good treatment. I wish you health, greetings to everyone. Jacob.”
On the bottom edge of the second page there is a comment: “A letter from Yakov Dzhugashvili to his father, Joseph Stalin, delivered to him by diplomatic means.”
There is no doubt that Zhdanov informed Stalin about what happened. A member of the Politburo, secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, a member of the Military Council enjoyed the latter’s special trust. He knew Yakov well and met him several times at Stalin’s and at home.
Yakov Dzhugashvili was Stalin's son from his first marriage. His mother, Ekaterina Svanidze, a woman from a poor family, raised her son, working either as a dressmaker or as a laundress, giving her meager resources to her father. In 1907, at the age of twenty-two, she died of typhoid fever.
It was later established that Yakov’s year of birth was indicated in all documents as 1908. This caused confusion and speculation that he was an illegitimate child born during Stalin's exile in Siberia. Perhaps this rebus would still remain unsolved if, during the lifetime of Tbilisi resident D. M. Monasalidze, her daughter Alexandra Semenovna Monasalidze (sister of Ekaterina Svanidze), in whose family Yakov was raised until the age of 14, had not confirmed that the indicated year birth appeared as a result of the baptism of the boy by his grandmother Sappora Dvali-Svanidze in 1908, which became the date of his registration. After Yakov moved to Moscow (1921), he developed a rather tense relationship with his father, most likely due to his certain unpreparedness for life in Moscow, his less preparedness for life in the capital in the early stages than the children of Nadezhda Sergeevna Alliluyeva. This is probably why Stalin the father was often irritated with Yakov, but their contradictions did not have any political overtones, but were family contradictions.

Stalin's son - Yakov Dzhugashvili

How Stalin's son Yakov entered college
After graduating from school, Yakov entered the Moscow Institute of Transport Engineers, where he (according to the story of Muscovite E.I. Chalov from the words of students Gennady Lechkov and Nathan Rudnichsky) showed himself to be a “modest and very decent person.” He loved to play chess. And, as a rule, he became the winner in almost all institute chess competitions.
They also told about the episode of Yakov’s admission to MIIT. According to them, no one - neither in the selection committee nor in the directorate - paid attention to the name Dzhugashvili and, thus, did not think that this was Stalin’s son. And then one day, towards the end of the exams, they called the director of the institute and said that Comrade Stalin would speak to him. According to eyewitnesses, the confused director picked up the telephone receiver with a shaking hand and muttered in a lost voice:
- I’m listening to you, Comrade Stalin!
- Tell me, did Yakov Dzhugashvili pass the exams and was accepted into your institute?
The director, not even really understanding who he was talking about, answered obsequiously:
- Yes, Comrade Stalin, Dzhugashvili has been admitted to our institute!

Family of Yakov Dzhugashvili

Very few documents have survived about Jacob. Some biographical information about his life before the war is available in his personal file stored in the Central Archive of the USSR Ministry of Defense. Among them is an autobiography, written in small handwriting with many corrections: “Born in 1908 in Baku in the family of a professional revolutionary. Now his father, Dzhugashvili-Stalin I.V., is at party work. Mother died in 1908. Brother, Vasily Stalin, studies at an aviation school. Sister, Svetlana, a student at a secondary school in Moscow. Wife, Yulia Isaakovna Meltser, was born in Odessa in the family of an employee.

The Germans threw Yakov's body onto the fence.

The wife's brother is an employee of the city of Odessa. The wife's mother is a housewife. Until 1935, the wife studied at her father's expense. From 1936 to 1937 he worked at the power plant of the plant named after. Stalin as a duty chimney sweep engineer. In 1937 he entered the evening department of the Art Academy of the Red Army. In 1938 he entered the 2nd year of the first faculty of the Art Academy of the Red Army."
From the party-political characteristics of Yakov Iosifovich, a 5th year student at the Artillery Academy, Dzhugashvili, it follows that he has been a member of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) since 1941, “he is devoted to the cause of the Lenin-Stalin party. He is working to improve his ideological and theoretical level. He is especially interested in Marxist- Leninist philosophy. Takes part in party work. Participated in the editorial board of the wall newspaper, showed himself to be a good organizer. He is conscientious and persistent in overcoming difficulties. He enjoys authority among his comrades.”

Characteristics of Jacob
Compared to the above document, the materials of the academy’s certification commissions are more meaningful: “Calm. General development is good. In the current (1939) year, he passed only materialology. He passed the shooting theory individually and passed up to the theory of errors on the plane, including the processing of experimental data. He has large academic debt, and there are fears that he will not be able to eliminate the latter by the end of the new academic year. Due to illness, he was not at the winter camp training, and has not been in the camps since June 24 until now. little knowledge of preparation. It is possible to transfer to the 5th year, provided that all student debt is completed by the end of the next 1939/40 academic year." And here is the following certification: “For the period from 15.8.39 to 15.7.40 for the 4th year student of the command faculty of the Art Academy, Lieutenant Dzhugashvili Yakov Iosifovich:
1. Year of birth - 1908.
2. Nationality - Georgian.
3. Party affiliation - member of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) since 1940.
4. Social position - employee.
5. General and military education - graduated from the Transport Institute named after. Dzerzhinsky.
6. Knowledge of foreign languages ​​- studied English.
7. From what time in RKK - from 10.39.
8. Since when in positions of command staff - since 12.39 in the position held.
9. Participated in the civil war - did not participate.
10. No awards.
11. Service in white and bourgeois-nationalist armies and anti-Soviet gangs - did not serve.
Loyal to the Lenin-Stalin Party and the socialist Motherland. General development is good, political development is satisfactory. Takes part in party and public life. Disciplined, but not sufficiently mastered the knowledge of military regulations on relationships with superiors. He is sociable, his academic performance is good, but in the last session he had an unsatisfactory grade in a foreign language. Physically developed, but often sick. Military training, due to short-term stay in the army, requires more refinement."
Conclusion of senior managers.

Captured senior lieutenant (in some sources major) Yakov Dzhugashvili

“I agree with the certification. It is necessary to pay attention to the elimination of hearing deficiencies that impede normal service in the future. Head of the 4th year, Major Kobrya.”

Conclusion of the certification commission.

“To be transferred to the 5th year. More attention needs to be paid to mastering tactics and developing a clear command language.
Chairman of the commission.
Head of the 1st Faculty.

Yakov spent almost three years at the academy. The last certification, written on the eve of the Great Patriotic War, notes: “General and political development is good. Disciplined, executive. Academic performance is good. Takes an active part in the political and social work of the course. Has completed higher education (thermal engineer). Entered military service voluntarily. He loves military work and studies it. He is careful and precise in his work. He has good tactical and artillery training. He has good authority. The training on the scale of the rifle division was carried out “well.” The Marxist-Leninist training was good. He was devoted to the Party of Lenin - Stalin and the Socialist Motherland. By nature he is a calm, tactful, demanding, strong-willed commander. During his military internship as a battery commander, he revealed himself to be quite prepared. He did the job well. After a short internship as a battery commander, he is subject to appointment to the position of division commander. He is worthy of being awarded the next rank - captain." He passed the state exams "good" in tactics, shooting, basic artillery weapons, and English; "mediocre" in the basics of Marxism-Leninism.
In May 1941, Senior Lieutenant Dzhugashvili became commander of an artillery battery. On June 27, 1941, the battery of the 14th howitzer artillery regiment entered combat operations and was surrounded on July 4.

How Stalin's son surrendered

The place and date of Y. Dzhugashvili’s capture became known from a German leaflet scattered in the Nikopol region on August 13, 1941 and delivered to the political department of the 6th Army of the Southern Front. (Compare with the text at the beginning of this chapter by D.T.)
The leaflet contains photographs and text: “This is Yakov Dzhugashvili, Stalin’s eldest son, commander of the battery of the 14th howitzer artillery regiment of the 14th armored division, who surrendered on July 16 near Vitebsk along with thousands of other commanders and soldiers.
By order of Stalin, Timoshenko and your political committees teach you that the Bolsheviks do not surrender. However, the Red Army soldiers come over to us all the time. To intimidate you, the commissars lie to you that the Germans treat prisoners poorly.
Stalin's own son proved by his example that this was a lie. He surrendered. Because any resistance to the German army is now useless! Follow the example of Stalin's son - he is alive, healthy and feeling great. Why would you make useless sacrifices, go to certain death, when even the son of your supreme boss has already surrendered?
Move over too!"
Fascist ideologists hoped that after reading the leaflet, Soviet soldiers would begin to surrender en masse. For this purpose, a pass was printed on it for an unlimited number of commanders and soldiers of our army going over to the side of the German troops: “The bearer of this, not wanting senseless bloodshed for the interests of the Jews and commissars, leaves the defeated Red Army and goes over to the side of the German armed forces. German soldiers and the officers will give the convert a good welcome, feed him and give him a job.”
Yakov was captured by the 4th Panzer Division of Army Group Center.
“Since no documents were found on the prisoner,” recorded in the interrogation protocol, “and Dzhugashvili claims that he is the eldest son of the Chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars of the USSR Joseph Stalin-Dzhugashvili, he had to sign the attached statement in two copies. D. immediately recognized the one shown give him a photograph of his father in his youth.

D. speaks English, German and French and comes across as very intelligent. He was born on August 18, 1908 in Baku, and is Stalin’s eldest son from his first marriage to Ekaterina Svanidze. From his second marriage to Alliluyeva, Stalin has a 20-year-old son, Vasily, and a daughter, Svetlana. The opinion that Stalin is currently in his third marriage with Kaganovich was characterized by D. as a tale. Initially, D. was preparing to become a civil engineer; he graduated from an engineering school in Moscow. Later he decided to choose a career as an officer and attended the Artillery Academy in Moscow, which he graduated in 2.5 years instead of 5 years. On June 24, 1941, with the rank of senior lieutenant and as a battery commander, he entered combat with the 14th Howitzer Artillery Regiment (as part of the 14th Tank Division). He said he spoke with his father on June 16 or 17. Before his departure to the front, he was able to say goodbye to Stalin only by telephone.
During the conversation, D. testified:
a) The Russians were strongly impressed by the speed, clarity and organization of the German Wehrmacht. The strongest impression was made by German aviation (Luftwaffe), which is able to deliver strong and destructive blows even against advancing troops. As a result of this activity of German aviation, D. believes that marching along rear roads is much more dangerous than directly fighting the enemy on the front line. The hit accuracy of attack aircraft is not always complete. At another phase of the interrogation, D. said that the accuracy of attack aircraft was very poor, for example, in one place, out of 6 bombs dropped, not a single one hit the target.
At the same time, the moral impact of stormtrooper attacks is almost devastating.
German artillery is not always at the height, especially when transferring fire in the horizontal direction there are many inaccuracies. In contrast, the accuracy of mortars is high.
D. spoke very highly of German tanks and their tactical use.
b) D. pointed out shortcomings in the top leadership of the Red Army. Commanders of brigades - divisions - corps are not able to solve operational problems. This particularly concerns the interaction of different types of armed forces. D. confirmed that the destruction of the commanders involved in the Tukhachevsky scam is currently being taken with cruelty. During German offensives, senior headquarters most often lost contact with their troops and with each other. As a result of this, panic arises among the soldiers, and they - finding themselves without leadership - flee. With weapons in their hands, officers and political commissars have to hold back the fleeing. D. himself tried to break through with a group of surrounded soldiers, but since the soldiers abandoned their weapons, and the civilian population did not want to have Red Army soldiers in uniform, he was forced to surrender.
Of the three marshals of the Soviet Union - Timoshenko, Voroshilov and Budyonny - he characterized the first as the most capable.
The Red Army is running out of cards. So, for example, D., like other battery commanders, had to fire in all types of combat without having cards.
D. could not say anything specific about the reserves still available and the supply of Siberian divisions. In any case, he knew that even before the start of the war, various units were on their way from Siberia to the European part of Russia.
When asked about Russian tank forces, D. said the following:
The Red Army benefited from the experience of German tank forces in France. The reorganization of Russian tank forces along German lines and their use to carry out independent operational tasks is almost complete. The failures of the Russian tank forces are not due to poor quality of material or weapons, but to the inability of command and lack of maneuvering experience. In contrast to this, German tanks move like clockwork. D. believes that the Americans have still not realized the striking power of concentrated German tank units, while the British are gradually beginning to understand this. As an example, D. told an episode when the Russians had an extremely advantageous combat position on 6-7.7.41 in the northern sector of Vitebsk. As a result of the tactically incorrect deployment of all Russian artillery to the combat area, the loss of artillery support, as well as an attack by German aviation on the advancing artillery, in the shortest possible time all the advantages of the situation turned into their opposite.
c) D. is convinced that the Russian leadership will defend Moscow. But even if Moscow is surrendered, this will in no way mean the end of the war. D. believes that the Germans greatly underestimate the psychological side of the Patriotic War of the Peoples of the USSR.
d) Throughout the country it is believed that the prospects for this year’s harvest are very good.
The information about the impact of German leaflets on the Red Army soldiers is interesting. So, for example, it became known from leaflets that fire would not be fired at soldiers who had abandoned their weapons and were moving in white shirts. This call was apparently followed by countless soldiers."
Analysis of this protocol allows us to conclude that Yakov did not know strategic secrets and using it in this direction was pointless. The answers he gave were known to the Nazis even without him. During this period, they had in their hands many captured officers of various ranks who knew much more important information.

Attempts by the Germans to discredit Stalin through propaganda

Regarding the issue of his father’s marriage to Kaganovich, the Germans during this period intensively distributed leaflets claiming that Rosa Kaganovich, L. Kaganovich’s sister, became Stalin’s wife, trying to arouse anti-Semitic sentiments among the Red Army soldiers and Soviet citizens and use them in their own interests for the disintegration of the army and population of the USSR.
The myth about Stalin’s third wife arose back in 1932, immediately after the death of N. Alliluyeva, in connection with Kaganovich’s repeated visits to Stalilin’s dacha and Kremlin apartment. Then they said that he would marry her. But that did not happen. Nevertheless, in order to discredit Stalin in the first days of the war, the Germans dropped hundreds of thousands of leaflets on the positions of the Soviet troops, in which they claimed that the Soviet Supreme Commander-in-Chief was an agent of “international Zionism”, and cited his relationship with Kaganovich as evidence. This crude German fake has survived to this day. Even G.K. Zhukov was woven into this story; Georgy Konstantinovich, but missed, and he or his bodyguards killed her on the spot. They say that this was the reason for Zhukov’s demotion after the war and his transfer from the center. After all, Zhukov really became the Minister of Defense after the death of I.V. Stalin.”
Ignorance of the real reasons for Zhukov’s removal led to the emergence of a version of an attempt on his life, the origins of which were found in the unjustified arrests of people of Jewish nationality that swept after the war. People didn't know the truth, so they made up a lot of things.
After interrogation, Yakov was handed over to specialists for the purpose of recruitment. He passed through the first test in captivity with dignity, which Captain Shtrikfeld later noted, recalling: “A good, intelligent face with strict Georgian features. He behaved with restraint and correctness... He categorically rejected a compromise between capitalism and communism. He did not believe in the final victory of the Germans ".
Yakov was asked to write a letter to his family, speak on the radio, and publish leaflets. He rejected all this unconditionally.
Nevertheless, Goebbels's disinformation machine was in full swing. Various versions of the “screaming” leaflet were fabricated and used: “Follow the example of Stalin’s son! He surrendered. He is alive and feels great. Why do you want to go to death when even the son of your leader surrendered? Peace to the tormented Motherland! Bayonet into the ground!"

Details of the capture of Yakov Dzhugashvili

Neither the interrogation protocol nor the German leaflets provide an answer to the question of how Ya. Dzhugashvili was captured. Of course, there can be no talk of voluntary surrender, which is confirmed by his behavior in captivity and the unsuccessful attempts of the Nazis to recruit him.
There is, however, one version that seems quite reasonable. A participant in the war, former military paramedic Lidiya Nikitichna Kovaleva from Moscow, cites the following conversation she heard about Yakov: “The soldiers were sitting near the ambulance dugout. I did not listen to the conversation, but the exclamation of intelligence officer Katamadze attracted my attention: “He! For Yashka to surrender voluntarily into captivity is nonsense. The best German spies were hunting for Yashka! There was a traitor next to him. Once he was stunned and was already dragged away, but his friends helped him out. After this, Yakov became withdrawn and suspicious, avoided people, and this destroyed him. In order to discredit J.V. Stalin, Yakov was stunned and kidnapped." Someone asked: “How do you know?” Katamadze replied: “A friend told me.” I have heard such an implausible assumption about the capture of Yakov Dzhugashvili more than once. There were many warriors of Georgian nationality , and if this is not betrayal, then how did the fascists know that it was Yakov Dzhugashvili, Stalin’s son?”

Yakov Dzhugashvili in German captivity

And here is what is said in another document written by I. D. Dubov, a participant in the Great Patriotic War: “I am not only a witness to those events, but also a direct participant in them. I served as commander of the radio department of the 5th battery of the 14th howitzer artillery regiment of the 14th armored divisions, we learned that the 6th battery of the same regiment would be commanded by Stalin’s son on the eve of the war.
When the war began, it took several days to rearm and re-uniform the regiment. Then we moved west along the Smolensk road on our own. In the area of ​​Liozno station we were ordered to take positions where we stood for several days. On July 4, 1941, we again moved west, passed the city of Vitebsk and chose positions west of this city, it seems, on the eastern side of the river. Western Dvina. Here on May 5th they first entered into battle.
There was one observation point for the entire division. It carried the division commander, commanders of the 4th, 5th and 6th batteries, as well as reconnaissance officers, signalmen and radio operators. I, as the commander of the radio department of the 5th battery, was also here with several radio operators and the 6-PK radio station. Naturally, Ya. Dzhugashvili was also here. For 3 days, July 5, 6 and 7, our division tried to knock the Germans out of their positions, but the lack of support from our aviation did not allow this to be achieved, and each time we returned to our original positions.
The telephone connection between the OP (observation point) and the division's firing position was often disrupted by German shells. Then I had to transmit commands to fire by radio. By the end of the day on July 7, the radio station assigned to me went out of order. It was necessary to carry it to the division workshop.
And at this time an order was received: to build dugouts at the OP at night. Work went on all night digging pits, collecting logs from the nearby forest and delivering them to the NP. At this time, only those who dug a pit and brought logs remained at the NP from among the Red Army soldiers and junior commanders. No sentries were posted. I participated in the delivery of logs to the NP. Because of the darkness, it was almost impossible to see the faces of those who were at the OP. And there was no time to do this - we were in a hurry to build dugouts. By dawn on July 8, the dugouts were built, and with the permission of the platoon commander, I, with other radio operators and the radio station, went to the division workshop. The way there lay past the firing positions, where we were offered breakfast. We were finishing breakfast when German artillery began shelling the firing positions. The gun crews began to move the guns out of the fire using tractors. The radio station and I were also heading towards the road. And suddenly we met a car in which all those who were at the NP were driving. Senior Lieutenant Ya. Dzhugashvili was not among them.

It turned out that on the morning of July 8, our division would be redeployed several tens of kilometers to the south. Why did we build dugouts at night then? The Germans did not interfere with our movements, only the Rama reconnaissance plane circled above us.
Soon the retreat began in an easterly direction. The regiment retreated in full force, and neither it nor the 6th battery was surrounded.
I learned later that Y. Dzhugashvili was in German captivity from German leaflets. Analyzing the entire situation, one must come to the conclusion that the capture of Y. Dzhugashvili happened on the night of July 7-8 during the construction of dugouts at the NP. Darkness. Constant movement. There are few people at the NP. There are no sentries. It is likely that German intelligence officers took advantage of this.
I remembered the date of my first battle, as well as the first battle of Ya. Dzhugashvili’s battery, for the rest of my life. Just like the date of the last battle, May 2, 1945 in Berlin. It is quite possible that the documents drawn up by the command of the regiment and division, in order to avoid trouble, deliberately distorted the facts."
The fact of Yakov Dzhugashvili’s capture as a result of a German intelligence operation is confirmed by the following testimony from an eyewitness who did not want his name mentioned in the press: “In July 1941, I was directly subordinate to Senior Lieutenant Ya. Dzhugashvili. By order of the command, our platoon of BT-6 armored tanks "The 26th Regiment was assigned to the field guard of the howitzer battery of the 14th Artillery Regiment. We were ordered, in the event of a German breakthrough and in the event of a clear threat, to remove the battery commander Ya. Dzhugashvili from the battlefield,
However, it so happened that during preparations for evacuation, he was given an order to urgently report to the division command post. The adjutant who was traveling with him died, and he never returned from there. We then decided that this was deliberately set up. After all, there was already an order to retreat, and, apparently, there was no one at the command post (command post) of the division.
Upon arrival at the Katyn crossing we were met by employees of the special department. The three of us - the commander of the 1st fire platoon, orderly Y. Dzhugashvili and me - were repeatedly interrogated - how could it happen that both the batteries and the security platoon left, and Y. Dzhugashvili was captured? The major who interrogated us kept saying: “We’ll have to rip someone’s head off.” But, fortunately, it didn’t come to that.”
The extradition of Yakov to the Germans is also evidenced by one of the answers to the German war correspondent Captain Reischli (published on October 17, 1967 in the Yugoslav magazine "Politics"):
“How did they find out that you are Stalin’s son, since no documents were found on you?” Reishli asked.
“The servicemen of my unit gave me away,” answered Ya. Dzhugashvili.”
Leaflets with photographs of Yakov Dzhugashvili, scattered in the rear of the Soviet troops, apparently produced an ambivalent impression. In any case, they did not always and did not act on everyone as the fascists expected. Here is what A.F. Maslov, a resident of Yelabuga, writes about this:
“During our next retreat, somewhere at the end of August or beginning of September 1941, a group of soldiers and three young officers gathered in the Pushkin Mountains area.

Discussion of a German leaflet by Soviet soldiers

The conversation was about the retreat of the Red Army and the abandoned territories. They asked each other with pain - what happened, why are we retreating, fighting with small forces, where is our army? Why did the military unit standing nearby, suddenly withdraw and go east, leaving us seriously battered, etc. We came to the conclusion that our army was gathering its strength to decisively defeat the enemy; time was needed. Typically, there was no talk of our defeat.
One soldier, trusting us, took out a German leaflet (and it was unsafe to pick up or store something like that at that time). The leaflet ended up in my hands (a 22-year-old tank lieutenant). At the top of the leaflet is a photograph of a man sitting on a chair, or rather reclining, in our cotton uniform, without insignia, his head hanging over the back of the chair to the left. The face is somehow lifeless.
The text of the leaflet is approximately as follows. “Look who it is. This is Yakov Dzhugashvili, Stalin’s son. These are the kind of people who surrender to us, and you, fools, fight.” And then a call for surrender. The other side of the leaflet reported our losses, which stunned us. Everything was new for us in our lives, new - naturally, we were numb.
The first to wake up was the senior lieutenant artilleryman. He said excitedly that he knew Ya. Dzhugashvili and served with him. He stated: such people do not surrender, they are a great patriot of the Motherland. I don't trust the Germans. Most likely the Germans found him dead, sat him on a chair and photographed him. Look, he's not alive, he's dead, obviously.
I commented on the leaflet that it was replete with many errors and was somehow ignorant. Did the Germans really not find one competent traitor among so many prisoners to write a more competent leaflet? Something is wrong here, the Germans benefit from fooling us with such numbers, so they write lies. Another soldier had the same leaflet, which he immediately tore and threw away.
I don’t have the courage to accuse the artilleryman of lying. Perhaps the senior lieutenant knew Ya. Dzhugashvili “by hearsay,” but he showed firmness in his assurances because he believed in our victory and did not want doubters to appear nearby. There was such a thing."
Meanwhile, leaflets with photographs of Dzhugashvili continued to be circulated. In addition to the previous two, a third appeared. There is a close-up photograph of Yakov standing in an overcoat with an open collar, thoughtful. And what is surprising? There is not a single photograph where he would look into the lens. All of them were clearly taken with a hidden camera.
In the fall of 1941, another attempt was made to extract political capital from an unusual prisoner of war.
Jacob was transferred to Berlin, placed at the disposal of Goebbels' services, leaving the supervision of the Gestapo. They were placed in the fashionable Adlon Hotel, surrounded by former Georgian counter-revolutionaries. Apparently, this was a carefully developed plan associated with an attempt to influence the prisoner through contrasts of camp conditions and especially favorable ones in the hotel and constant screenings of films about the failures of the Red Army.
It was here that the photograph of Yakov Dzhugashvili with Georgy “Scriabin” - allegedly the son of the then Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR V. Molotov - was born. The photo was taken against the backdrop of an autumn landscape, both in caps, overcoats, hands in pockets, without belts. “Scriabin” looks to the side, Yakov looks at the ground. Both have serious, concentrated faces. The photograph is dated November 25, 1941 and is accompanied by the text: “Look at them! These are your comrades of yesterday, who, seeing that further resistance was useless, surrendered. These are the sons of Stalin and Molotov! They are in German captivity - both are alive, healthy, fed and dressed. Fighters and commanders! Follow the example of the sons of Stalin and Molotov! And you will see for yourself that there is a new life that is better than the one your “leaders” forced you to lead.
Why did the Nazis bring Dzhugashvili and “Scriabin” together? There is no objective data about this, but apparently the calculation was made that in this way it would be easier to convince former Soviet soldiers to renounce their beliefs and win them over to their side.
At the beginning of 1942, Dzhugashvili was transferred to the Oflag XSh-D officer camp, located in Hammelburg. Here the Nazis tried to break him with physical abuse and starvation. But nothing came of this either.

Stay of Stalin's son in German camps

This is what the former Australian reporter and after the war owner of a small newspaper, Case Hooper from Wales, wrote in his letter on August 22, 1945:
"Dear Soviet friend!
The fact that I am writing this letter to you gives me the feeling that I am thereby contributing my small share in paying off the debt that we British owe to the Russian nation.
Let me first introduce myself. I'm Australian. I am 24 years old. I am a soldier, having joined the Australian Army as an infantryman at the beginning of the war. I don't know if you know that Australian soldiers, sailors and airmen are volunteers. I left home in April 1940. We were heading to France, but since there was a threat of Italy entering the war, we were sent instead to Palestine, and from there to Egypt, where we defeated the Italians in our first meeting with them at Bardia on January 3-5, 1941. It was the first combat operation for Australian troops (usually called "Diggers" because of our wide-brimmed hats) since they broke through the Hindenburg Line in France in the First World War as the vanguard of the British Army.
On my first day in combat, I was promoted to sergeant. After Bardia we captured Tobruk (it was not surrendered to the Germans while it was defended by the Australians, although it was surrounded for 10 months), Derna, Bars, Benghazi, Soluch, Agedabia. In March 1941 our division was replaced by another Australian division and we were sent to Greece. You've probably heard about the terrible battles we fought as we fought back to the Mediterranean Sea and even to Crete, where, despite lack of air support and supplies, we fought the Huns for 12 days, killing 20,000 enemies, until they were defeated.
As a result, I was captured and taken to Germany, where I spent 4 years in concentration camps. Twice I was in penal companies with Russian guys. We were great friends. Most of these comrades were captured near Kharkov. Some of them spoke English. Although we did not speak Russian, we spoke broken German. I made friends with young men from Dnepropetrovsk, Stalino, Voronezh, Sevastopol, Moscow and Vyazma. In the penal companies, unlike our comrades in the work camps, we received parcels from the Red Cross only once a month. We shared this parcel with our Russian comrades. In gratitude for this, they sang to us at night and danced Russian dances with us until our heads began to spin.
Despite the terrible conditions, we were all happy sometimes. But there were times when we suffered greatly for our Russian comrades, when they, 40, 50, 60 people a day, died from hunger, from cruel treatment and were left without burial. We were so embittered by this that we could have killed our enemies with our bare hands. I remember that Stalin’s eldest son, Yakov, was in captivity with us. The Germans forced him to do the hardest work we could imagine. I would like to know if he is still alive and if he remembers the Australians in the HSH-D camp, Hammelburg, near Schwenfurt, in Bavaria..."

Military ID of Yakov Dzhugashvili

Case Hooper did not know about the further fate of Dzhugashvili, since at the beginning of April 1942 Yakov was transferred to the Oflag HS camp in Lubeck, where officers who were especially dangerous for the Third Reich, people from different countries, including 2 thousand Polish officers and 200 soldier. Jacob's neighbor was a prisoner of war, Captain Rene Blum, the son of the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of France, Leon Blum.
By special order, the camp commandant, Colonel von Wachmester, was given personal responsibility for the Soviet prisoner. Dzhugashvili was not allowed to receive food parcels and letters, which was allowed to imprisoned Poles, French, and British, who even received monetary allowances. By decision of the meeting, Polish officers allocated food to Jacob monthly.
Continuing the propaganda campaign to influence the Soviet people, the fascists even distributed booklets that included photographs of Y. Dzhugashvili. In one of them, with 54 photographs, two were dedicated to Yakov with the comment: “Even Stalin’s son, senior lieutenant Dzhugashvili, gave up this senseless resistance.” "Commanders and soldiers of the Red Army! Look at these pictures from German prisoner-of-war camps! This is the reality in German captivity! The photographs do not lie! But your commissars are lying! Stop the senseless resistance! Come to us! These comrades of yours have stopped the senseless war against the powerful, invincible German army. Even Stalin’s son, senior lieutenant Dzhugashvili, abandoned this senseless resistance..."
There is reason to assume that at this time a new period of more intensive processing of Dzhugashvili began. As the main means of pressure, Yakov was presented with leaflets and newspapers in which his statements were fabricated. This is evidenced by the former Polish lieutenant Marian Wenclewicz: “On May 4, 1942, three guards armed with machine guns, led by a captain, brought a prisoner in Soviet military uniform into our barracks. This carefully guarded prisoner was Senior Lieutenant Dzhugashvili. We immediately recognized him: without a headdress , black-haired, exactly the same as in the photograph published in the fascist newspaper... Several times I was able to meet Yakov face to face. He talked about how he had never made any statements to the Germans, and asked what if he could do more. you won’t have to see your homeland, tell your father that he remained faithful to his military duty. Everything that fascist propaganda has concocted is a lie.”
This is also confirmed by the former Polish prisoner of war, Captain Alexander Salatsky: “During his stay in Lübeck, Dzhugashvili became close and made friends with the Poles. His close friends included Lieutenant Kordani, who spoke fluent Russian, Lieutenant Venclevich and Lieutenant Myslovsky. We discussed various topics, played games cards, chess... Talking about his tragic experiences, he emphasized that he would never betray his Motherland, that the statements of the German press were an undisguised lie. He believed in the victory of the Soviet Union."

An attempt to exchange Stalin's son for Marshal Friedrich Paulus

Soon a group of Polish officers attempted to escape. They failed. Yakov was taken to the Sachsenhausen death camp and placed in a department where there were prisoners who were relatives of high-ranking leaders of the allied countries of the anti-Hitler coalition.
The camp was the most difficult of all that existed for prisoners. 100 thousand Soviet citizens died within its walls. Most likely, the bet was made to exert pressure, to play on the feelings of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, so that he would appeal to the Nazi leadership with a request to return his captive son.
In this regard, the life of Jacob, whose captivity, of course, Hitler knew, unexpectedly began to depend on the Battle of Stalingrad, which ended pitifully for the Germans. The course of events developed in such a way that Jacob occupied a special place in Hitler’s plans to settle scores with those to whom he wanted to shift responsibility for the defeat. With him, he apparently pinned hopes of exchanging Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus (a participant in the 1st and 2nd World Wars, one of the main authors of the Barbarossa plan, army commander, who gave the order to his troops at Stalingrad to stop resistance and surrender) on Yakov Dzhugashvili.
Could Stalin agree to this? Did he consult anyone on this matter? Or did you make the decision yourself? It's hard to know. The official response, transmitted through the chairman of the Swedish Red Cross, Count Bernadotte, read: “I am not changing a soldier for a marshal.”
This decision was a verdict not only for the captured Lieutenant Dzhugashvili, but also for many other Soviet soldiers in Hitler’s dungeons.

Death of Stalin's son Yakov

We have reached an official document drawn up by former prisoners about his death and stored in the archives of the Sachsenhausen camp memorial: “Yakov Dzhugashvili constantly felt his hopeless situation. He often became depressed, refused to eat, and was especially affected by the statement repeatedly broadcast on the camp radio Stalin that “there are no prisoners of war - there are traitors to the Motherland.” Perhaps this pushed him to take a reckless step on the evening of April 14, 1943, Yakov refused to enter the barracks and rushed into the dead zone. Death occurred instantly.
And then the corpse was thrown onto a high-voltage wire fence. “An attempt to escape,” the camp authorities reported. The remains of Yakov Dzhugashvili were burned in the camp crematorium..."
This is what SS officer Konrad Harfik, who was on duty that day at the fence of the camp, recalls about the death of Yakov: “Dzhugashvili climbed through the wire and found himself in the neutral zone. Then he put his foot on the next strip of barbed wire and at the same time grabbed the insulator with his left hand. Having let go, grabbed the electrical wire. For a moment he stood motionless with his right leg back, chest forward, shouting: “Sentry! You're a soldier, don't be a coward, shoot me!" Harfik fired a pistol. The bullet hit the head... Death was instant.
The conclusion about the death of Dzhugashvili, made by the doctor of the “Dead Head” division, states: “On April 14, 1943, when I examined the prisoner, I stated the death of the prisoner from a shot in the head. The entrance bullet hole is located four centimeters below the ear, immediately under the zygomatic arc. Death should have occurred immediately after this shot. The obvious cause of death was destruction of the lower part of the brain."
And finally, let us turn to Himmler’s letter to Ribbentrop dated April 22, 1943, stored in the captured documents department of the US National Archives, which reports that “prisoner of war Yakov Dzhugashvili, son of Stalin, was shot while trying to escape from special block “A” in Sachsenhausen, near Oranienburg."
But do the quoted texts answer all these questions? Why did Ya. Dzhugashvili refuse to enter the barracks? Why did he choose to die from a sentry's bullet? Who, besides him, was in the barracks at that moment? Was this case known at home?
The memoirs of former prisoner of war Alexander Salatsky, published in the first issue of the Military Historical Review for 1981 in Warsaw, say that “in the barracks, in addition to Yakov and Vasily Kokorin, four more English officers were kept: William Murphy, Andrew Walsh, Patrick O "Brycene and Cushing. Relations between them were tense.

Yakov Dzhugashvili in pre-war times

The fact that the British stood at attention in front of the Germans was offensive in the eyes of the Russians, a sign of cowardice, which they made clear more than once. Russian refusals to salute German officers, sabotage of orders and open challenges caused the British a lot of trouble. The British often ridiculed the Russians for their national "shortcomings." All this, and maybe also personal hostility, led to quarrels.
The atmosphere was heating up. On Wednesday, April 14, 1943, after lunch, a stormy quarrel occurred that turned into a fight. Cushing attacked Jacob with accusations of uncleanliness. All the other prisoners got involved in the conflict. O'Brien stood in front of Kokorin with an angry expression and called him a "Bolshevik pig." Cushing also called Yakov a name and hit him in the face with his fist. This is exactly what the latter could not survive. For him, this was the culminating point of being in captivity. He can be understood. on the one hand, the son of Stalin himself, who constantly resisted, despite punishment, on the other, a prisoner, a hostage, whose name became a powerful element in disinformation. What could await him even if he were released and sent to the USSR?
In the evening, Yakov refused to enter the barracks and demanded the commandant, and after refusing to see him, shouting: “Shoot me! Shoot me!” - suddenly rushed towards the barbed wire fence and rushed at it. The alarm went off and all the floodlights on the watchtowers came on..."

How they hid the death of Stalin's son

The Nazis hid the death of Yakov Dzhugashvili. Even dead, they still needed him. It can also be assumed that they were afraid that retaliatory actions would follow against the captured Germans in the USSR.
After the surrender of Nazi Germany, many documents related to Ya. Dzhugashvili’s captivity fell into the hands of the Anglo-American group and were hidden from the public for many years. For what purpose? Was another attempt made to use Ya. Dzhugashvili in his own interests or were there other, more humane motives? Doesn’t give a final answer to this question, although he confirms one of the reasons for Yakov’s death, a letter from British Foreign Office official Michael Weinen dated July 27, 1945 to a colleague in the United States: “Our opinion on this case.” is such that the intention to inform Marshal Stalin about this should be abandoned. Undoubtedly, it would be bad to pay attention to the fact that the death of a son was caused by an Anglo-Russian quarrel."
American officials are also involved in hiding information. If we turn to the T-176 case, stored in the US National Archives, we will find several interesting Documents, including a telegram dated June 30, 1945, from Acting US Secretary of State Grew to US Ambassador to the USSR Harriman: “There is now a joint group of State Department experts in Germany and the British Ministry of Foreign Affairs is studying important German secret documents about how Stalin’s son was shot, allegedly trying to escape from a concentration camp. In this regard, a letter from Himmler to Ribbentrop in connection with this incident, photographs, several pages of documentation were discovered. Affairs recommended that the English and American governments hand over the originals of these documents to Stalin, and to do this, instruct the British Ambassador to the USSR, Clark Kerr, to inform Molotov about the found documents and ask Molotov for advice on how best to give the documents to Stalin. Clark Kerr could declare that this is a joint Anglo-American one. find, and present it on behalf of the British Ministry and the US Embassy. There is an opinion, however, that the transfer of documents should be carried out not on behalf of our embassy, ​​but on behalf of the State Department. It would be desirable for the State Department to know the embassy's opinion on the method of delivering documents to Stalin. You can contact Molotov if you find it useful. Act in concert with Clark Kerr if he has similar instructions."
However, three weeks later, the American ambassador in Moscow was instructed not to provide information. On July 5, 1945, German documents were sent to Washington. After they were declassified in 1968, a certificate was filed with the file: “After a more thorough study of this case and its essence, the British Foreign Office proposed to reject the original idea of ​​​​transferring documents that, due to their unpleasant content, could upset Stalin. Soviet officials were not told anything, and the State Department informed Ambassador Harriman in a telegram dated August 23, 1945, that an agreement had been reached not to give the documents to Stalin."
This formulation of the question hid from humanity for many decades the fate of one of the millions of Soviet prisoners of war who died far from their homeland.

Letter from Stalin's son from a German camp for captured officers

The documents were not transferred. But Stalin knew about the fate of his son even without them.
The writer I. F. Stadnyuk, who talked about this with V. M. Molotov, told the author that Stalin initially learned about Yakov’s captivity from German radio messages, and then from leaflets.
Without perhaps knowing the details, Stalin possessed certain information about Yakov’s time in captivity.
Marshal of the Soviet Union G.K. Zhukov in his memoirs cites the following conversation with him:
"- Comrade Stalin, I have long wanted to know about your son Yakov. Is there any information about his fate?
He did not answer this question immediately. Having walked a good hundred steps, he said in a somewhat muffled voice:
- Yakov won’t get out of captivity. The Nazis will shoot him. According to inquiries, they are keeping him isolated from other prisoners of war and are agitating for treason against the Motherland.
It was felt that he was deeply worried about his son. Sitting at the table, J.V. Stalin was silent for a long time, without touching his food.”

The message in the article about the death of Stalin's son is dubious, because in the concentration camps the leading economic positions were occupied by German communists. They could, under the guise of Yakov, send someone else to the crematorium, and place Yakov himself in the infectious diseases department of the camp, where German guards did not visit and where he lived until 1945 under a false name.
Further, after all, Józef Cyrankiewicz was somehow taken out of the Auschwitz concentration camp when the German guards exposed him. Cyrankiewicz led an anti-fascist group in the camp.
I also don’t believe in the availability of archival records that the British will provide. After all, you can write everything on paper. The record will be reliable in this aspect, as the death of Ernst Thälmann was once described in the press.
Personally, I believe that the path to follow Yakov Stalin should be sought through Minsk."

Version about the rescue of Stalin's son
“In 1966, in the Turkish newspaper “Cumkhruyet” (I speak Turkish), on the first page I read a large article “20 years later,” says reserve lieutenant colonel N. Ilyasov from Odessa. “From this article it followed that Stalin’s son Yakov fled from captivity, fell into the hands of the Italian partisans, married an Italian, and they had two children: a daughter and a son. In 1966, Yakov’s son Dzhugashvili served in the Italian army, and his daughter studied at the conservatory. Among the partisans, Yakov was called “Captain Monty.” hid that he was Stalin's son. When Yakov was again captured by the Nazis, he blew himself up and the Germans with an anti-tank grenade. The article further noted that Svetlana, Stalin's daughter, having settled in the USA, repeatedly helped her nephews with money. The newspaper published photographs of Yakov. surrounded by fascists (apparently before death) and a portrait of his daughter, Stalin’s granddaughter.”
But in a letter from G.E. Borovik from Kemerovo, the date of Yakov’s death is even disputed:
“Senior Lieutenant Yakov Dzhugashvili died on April 11, 1945. He and two friends were shot by guards in the Bigge River on the south-eastern outskirts of Attendorn. An eyewitness to the crime, A. Menteshashvili, tried to find the corpses of those killed in the river, but to no avail, since Bigge is a mountain river , fast-flowing. Menteshashvili lives in Moscow. I don’t know the address. They knew about this: Sergeant Vasily Ivanovich Ganzyuk from the village of Staraya Ushitsa, Novo-Ushitsa district, Vinnytsia region and captain Lukash Semyon Ivanovich from the village of Mikhailovka, Primorsky region. About the location of S.I. Lukash. You can make inquiries with the family of G.K. Zhukov."
And here is another version: “All sorts of gossip is circulating among the people. In our house and in the neighboring one live former hangers-on of the fascists, who served their sentences for committing betrayals during the Great Patriotic War,” writes former prisoner of the Spandau concentration camp No. 711 A. V. Shaloboda from Dneprodzerzhinsk. “So these are the people who say that it is as if Stalin did exchange Yakov Dzhugashvili, but not for Paulus, but for several hundred German officers, and that his son was then transported to America.”
And here is an incredible myth cited by A. S. Evtishin from Moscow: “In June 1977, I was in the twenty-ninth hospital in Moscow. Everyone in the ward was almost the same generation. War veterans. The microclimate was more than good.
Next to mine stood the bed of one of the main designers. And this is what he told us. One late evening, when all the issues at work had been resolved, in his office, in a very narrow circle, in an intimate setting, Artem Mikoyan said the following: “On June 24, 1945, I was leaving the dacha. I was rushing to the beginning of the Victory Parade and suddenly I saw: There is a man standing at the entrance to Stalin’s dacha. At first he didn’t pay attention, but then he looked closer and recognized Yakov Dzhugashvili.
- Yakov, is that you? - I ask in surprise.
“I am,” he answers.
- How did you stay alive?
- Don’t tell me... Someday when we meet, I’ll tell you.
I was in a hurry. There was no time left for conversation, he apologized and left. And I never saw him again."
There was no reason not to believe the narrator who retold Mikoyan’s story. Stalin had enough opportunities to save Yakov’s life. No one in Stalin’s place would have dared to advertise this when the war left so much grief in every home.”
Among all the myths, there is one most common - the presence of doubles of Ya. Dzhugashvili. This myth has its origins in the facts of the statements of many Red Army soldiers who, after being captured, said that they were the sons of Stalin. Probably, behind such actions there was faith in the power of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, and everyone, being captured, apparently sought to gain time and, therefore, hoped to survive. Very characteristic in this sense is the letter from A.I. Bondarenko from Ilyichevsk, Odessa region: “I am 52 years old. I served in the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany - 1956-1959. My service took place near Berlin. Somewhere in 1957, all divisions of our units and ours were at an urgent meeting of the soldiers' club (there were 500 seats). It was usually a huge club, like a barn, for showing films and concerts. There was a table and several chairs on the stage. Immediately, only 5 military men, it seems, entered the stage. and one civilian. Without introduction, one of the generals immediately asked us (the audience):
- Do you remember the incident during the war years when Stalin said that “I don’t change a soldier for a marshal”?
- We remember, we remember!..
- So, in fact, this did not happen! So a man came with us, a Pole by nationality, and by chance he had to play the role of Yakov Stalin, thanks to which he remained alive. He will tell you everything himself.
Then a short man approached the podium. I spoke for an hour, maybe more (I don’t remember). He was captured, and after being tortured, they threw him into a concrete pit and asked through a hatch whether he would speak (he stayed there for a week). Then they started filling it (the hole) with water. He, already exhausted, floated under the hatch, and was pushed back into the water. It was the first time he said he would speak. They pulled him out, it seems, he was treated for 2 weeks, since he said that he was Stalin’s son. I don’t remember how he stayed alive, I only remember that the general said that this man was being transported all over Germany on Soviet teas. It turns out that thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, saw this man."
The listed myths, legends, eyewitness accounts, and documents cited are not all from which we can learn about the life and death of Yakov Dzhugashvili. Who knows what else will be known when the secret archives of the NKVD, the intelligence department of the USSR Ministry of Defense, special departments of military units, and Stalin’s personal fund are opened.
Yakov Dzhugashvili left us many mysteries. For several decades now, people have been haunted by the famous phrase: “I don’t change a soldier for a marshal.” In it, some see the cruelty and indifference of Stalin, others that he “as a senior leader acted decently when thousands of Soviet soldiers were languishing in fascist dungeons. If he (Yakov) was exchanged for Paulus, the Soviet people would not understand and would never forgive Stalin for this.” .
It seems to me that they would forgive, but they will never forgive for the death and mutilated lives of five million prisoners, rejected by the Motherland with another terrible phrase: “There are no prisoners, there are traitors.”

A short excerpt from the book of the German officer Wilfried Karlovich Strik-Strikfeldt. He directly took part in the interrogation of the prisoner Yakov Stalin (Schmidt conducted the interrogation with Strik-Strikfeldt)

Conversations with Stalin's son
One day, Major Yakov Iosifovich Dzhugashvili was brought to the front headquarters. An intelligent face with pronounced Georgian features. He behaved calmly and correctly. Dzhugashvili refused the food and wine set before him. Only when he saw that Schmidt and I were drinking the same wine did he take the glass.
He told us that his father said goodbye to him, before he was sent to the front, by telephone.
Dzhugashvili explained the extreme poverty in which the Russian people live under Soviet rule by the need to arm the country, since the Soviet Union since the October Revolution has been surrounded by technically highly developed and well-armed imperialist states.
“You Germans attacked us too early,” he said. “That’s why you find us now under-armed and in poverty.” But the time will come when the fruits of our work will go not only into armament, but also into raising the standard of living of all the peoples of the Soviet Union.
He recognized that this time is still very far away and, perhaps, will come only after the victory of the proletarian revolution throughout the world. He did not believe in the possibility of a compromise between capitalism and communism. After all, Lenin considered the coexistence of both systems only a “respite.” Major Dzhugashvili called the German attack on the Soviet Union banditry. He did not believe in the liberation of the Russian people by the Germans, nor in the final victory of Germany. The Russian people have produced outstanding artists, writers, musicians, scientists...
“And you look down on us, like primitive natives of some Pacific island.” During the short time I was in captivity, I did not see anything that would prompt me to look up to you. True, I met a lot of friendly people here. But the NKVD can also be friendly when it wants to achieve its goal.
– You said that you don’t believe in Germany’s victory? – one of us asked. Dzhugashvili hesitated to answer.
- No! - he said. - Are you really thinking of occupying the entire huge country?
From the way he said this, we understood that Stalin and his clique were afraid not of the occupation of the country by foreign armies, but of the “internal enemy,” the revolution of the masses as the Germans advanced. Thus a political question was raised, which Schmidt and I considered extremely important, and we asked further:
– So, Stalin and his comrades are afraid of a national revolution or a national counter-revolution, in your terminology?
Dzhugashvili hesitated again, and then nodded in agreement.
“It would be dangerous,” he said.
According to him, he never talked about this topic with his father, but among the officers of the Red Army there were more than once conversations in this and similar areas.