Was there a young guard. "Young Guard" - who are they? Blood for blood

One of the mythologized pages of the history of the USSR, which, unfortunately, is perceived by many now, but which has always been true. In mid-February 1943, after the liberation of Donetsk Krasnodon by Soviet troops, several dozen corpses of teenagers tortured by the Nazis, who during the occupation period were in the underground organization "Young Guard" were removed from the pit of mine N5 located near the city ...
At an abandoned mine, most members of the underground Komsomol organization Young Guard, which fought against the Nazis in the small Ukrainian town of Krasnodon, died in 1942. It turned out to be the first underground youth organization about which it was possible to collect quite detailed information. The Young Guards were then called heroes (they were heroes), who gave their lives for their homeland. Just over twenty years ago, everyone knew about the Young Guard.
The novel of the same name by Alexander Fadeev was studied in schools; at the screening of Sergei Gerasimov's film, people could not hold back their tears; motor ships, streets, hundreds of educational institutions and pioneer detachments were named after the Young Guards. What were they like, these young men and women who called themselves Young Guardsmen?
The Krasnodon Komsomol youth underground included seventy-one people: forty-seven boys and twenty-four girls. The youngest was fourteen, and fifty-five of them never turned nineteen. The most ordinary, no different from the same boys and girls of our country, the guys were friends and quarreled, studied and fell in love, ran to dances and chased pigeons. They were in school circles, sports sections, played stringed musical instruments, wrote poetry, many drew well.
They studied in different ways - someone was an excellent student, and someone with difficulty overcame the granite of science. There were also a lot of tomboys. Dreamed of a future adult life. They wanted to become pilots, engineers, lawyers, someone was going to enter the theater school, and someone - to the pedagogical institute.

The “Young Guard” was as multinational as the population of these southern regions of the USSR. Russians, Ukrainians (there were Cossacks among them), Armenians, Belarusians, Jews, Azerbaijanis and Moldavians, ready to help each other at any moment, fought against the Nazis.
The Germans occupied Krasnodon on July 20, 1942. And almost immediately the first leaflets appeared in the city, a new bathhouse, already ready for the German barracks, was on fire. It was Seryozhka Tyulenin who began to act. One.
On August 12, 1942, he turned seventeen. Sergey wrote leaflets on pieces of old newspapers, and the policemen often found them in their pockets. He began to collect weapons, not even doubting that they would definitely come in handy. And he was the first to attract a group of guys ready to fight. It initially consisted of eight people. However, by the first days of September, several groups were already operating in Krasnodon, not connected with one another - in total there were 25 people in them.
The birthday of the underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard" was September 30: then the plan for creating a detachment was adopted, specific actions for underground work were outlined, and a headquarters was created. It included Ivan Zemnukhov - chief of staff, Vasily Levashov - commander central group, Georgy Arutyunyants and Sergey Tyulenin are members of the headquarters.
Viktor Tretyakevich was elected commissar. The guys unanimously supported Tyulenin's proposal to name the detachment "Young Guard". And in early October, all the scattered underground groups were united into one organization. Later, Uliana Gromova, Lyubov Shevtsova, Oleg Koshevoy and Ivan Turkenich joined the headquarters.
Now you can often hear that the Young Guards did nothing special. Well, they put up leaflets, collected weapons, burned and contaminated the grain intended for the invaders. Well, they hung out several flags on the day of the 25th anniversary of the October Revolution, burned the Labor Exchange, saved several dozen prisoners of war. Other underground organizations have existed longer and done more!

And do these unfortunate critics understand that everything, literally everything, these boys and girls committed on the verge of life and death. Is it easy to walk down the street when warnings are posted on almost every house and fence that if you don’t hand over your weapon, you will be shot. And at the bottom of the bag, under the potatoes, there are two grenades, and you have to walk past several dozen policemen with an independent air, and everyone can stop ... By the beginning of December, the Young Guard already had 15 machine guns, 80 rifles, 300 grenades, about 15 thousand rounds of ammunition, 10 pistols, 65 kilograms of explosives and several hundred meters of Fickford cord.
Isn't it scary to sneak past the German patrol at night, knowing that for appearing on the street after six in the evening there is a threat of execution? But most of the work was done at night. At night, they burned the German Labor Exchange - and two and a half thousand Krasnodon residents were delivered from German hard labor. On the night of November 7, the Young Guards hung out red flags - and the next morning, when they saw them, people experienced great joy: “We are remembered, we are not forgotten by ours!” At night, prisoners of war were released, telephone wires were cut, German vehicles were attacked, a herd of cattle of 500 heads was recaptured from the Nazis and dispersed to the nearest farms and settlements.
Even leaflets were pasted mostly at night, although it happened that they had to do it during the day. At first, leaflets were written by hand, then they began to be printed in the same organized printing house. In total, the Young Guards issued about 30 separate leaflets with a total circulation of almost five thousand copies - from which Krasnodon residents learned the latest reports from the Sovinformburo.

In December, the first disagreements appeared at the headquarters, which later became the basis of the legend that still lives on and according to which Oleg Koshevoy is considered the commissar of the Young Guard.
What happened? Koshevoy began to insist that a detachment of 15-20 people be singled out from all the underground workers, capable of operating separately from the main detachment. It was in him that Koshevoy was supposed to become a commissar. The guys did not support this proposal. Nevertheless, Oleg, after another admission to the Komsomol of a youth group, took temporary Komsomol tickets from Vanya Zemnukhov, but did not give them, as always, to Viktor Tretyakevich, but issued them to the newly accepted ones himself, signing: “Commissar of the Molot partisan detachment Kashuk.”
On January 1, 1943, three young guards were arrested: Yevgeny Moshkov, Viktor Tretyakevich and Ivan Zemnukhov - the Nazis fell into the very heart of the organization. On the same day, the remaining members of the headquarters urgently gathered and decided: all the Young Guards should immediately leave the city, and the leaders should not spend the night at home that night. All underground workers were informed about the decision of the headquarters through messengers. One of them, who was in the group of the village of Pervomaika, Gennady Pocheptsov, having learned about the arrests, got cold feet and wrote a statement to the police about the existence of an underground organization.

The entire punitive apparatus was set in motion. Mass arrests began. But why didn't the majority of the Young Guards follow the order of the headquarters? After all, this first disobedience, and hence the violation of the oath, cost almost all of them their lives! Probably due to the lack of life experience.
At first, the guys did not realize that a catastrophe had happened and their leading trio could no longer get out of prison. Many could not decide for themselves: whether to leave the city, whether to help the arrested, or voluntarily share their fate. They did not understand that the headquarters had already considered all the options and took the only correct one into action. But most of them didn't do it. Almost everyone was afraid for their parents.
Only twelve young guards managed to escape in those days. But later, two of them - Sergei Tyulenin and Oleg Koshevoy - were nevertheless arrested. Four cells of the city police were packed to capacity. All the guys were terribly tortured. The office of the chief of police, Solikovsky, looked more like a slaughterhouse - it was so spattered with blood. In order not to hear the screams of the tortured in the yard, the monsters started the gramophone and turned it on at full volume.
Underground workers were hung by the neck to the window frame, simulating execution by hanging, and by the legs, to the ceiling hook. And they beat, beat, beat - with sticks and wire whips with nuts on the end. The girls were hung by braids, and the hair could not stand it, it broke off. The Young Guards were crushed by the door with fingers, shoe needles were driven under the nails, they were put on a hot stove, stars were cut out on the chest and back. Their bones were broken, their eyes were gouged out and burnt out, their arms and legs were cut off…

The executioners, having learned from Pocheptsov that Tretyakevich was one of the leaders of the Young Guard, decided at all costs to force him to speak, believing that then it would be easier to cope with the rest. He was tortured with extreme cruelty, he was mutilated beyond recognition. But Victor remained silent. Then a rumor was spread among the arrested and in the city: Tretyakevich had betrayed everyone. But Victor's comrades did not believe it.
On a cold winter night on January 15, 1943, the first group of Young Guardsmen, including Tretyakevich, was taken to the ruined mine for execution. When they were put on the edge of the pit, Victor grabbed the deputy chief of police by the neck and tried to drag him along with him to a depth of 50 meters. The frightened executioner turned pale with fear and almost did not resist, and only the gendarme arrived in time, hitting Tretyakevich on the head with a pistol, saved the policeman from death.
On January 16, the second group of underground workers was shot, on the 31st - the third. One of this group managed to escape from the place of execution. It was Anatoly Kovalev, who later went missing.
Four remained in prison. They were taken to the city of Rovenki in the Krasnodon region and shot on February 9 along with Oleg Koshev, who was there.

On February 14, Soviet troops entered Krasnodon. February 17 became a day of mourning, full of weeping and lamentations. From a deep, dark pit, the bodies of tortured young men and women were taken out with a bucket. It was difficult to recognize them; some of the children were identified by their parents only by their clothes.
A wooden obelisk was placed on the mass grave with the names of the dead and with the words:
And drops of your hot blood,
Like sparks flare up in the darkness of life
And many brave hearts will be lit!
The name of Viktor Tretyakevich was not on the obelisk! And his mother, Anna Iosifovna, never took off her black dress again and tried to go to the grave later so as not to meet anyone there. She, of course, did not believe in her son's betrayal, just as most of her fellow countrymen did not, but the conclusions of the commission of the Central Committee of the All-Union Leninist Young Communist League under the leadership of Toritsin and the subsequently remarkable novel by Fadeev, which was published in artistic terms, had an impact on the minds and hearts of millions of people. One can only regret that Fadeev's novel The Young Guard did not turn out to be equally remarkable in respecting historical truth.
The investigating authorities also accepted the version of Tretyakevich's betrayal, and even when the true traitor Pocheptsov, who was subsequently arrested, confessed to everything, the charge was not removed from Viktor. And since, according to party leaders, a traitor cannot be a commissar, Oleg Koshevoy was elevated to this rank, whose signature was on the December Komsomol tickets - “Commissar of the Molot partisan detachment Kashuk.”
After 16 years, one of the most ferocious executioners who tortured the Young Guards, Vasily Podtynny, was arrested. During the investigation, he stated: Tretyakevich was slandered, but he, despite severe torture and beatings, did not betray anyone.
So almost 17 years later, the truth triumphed. By decree of December 13, 1960, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR rehabilitated Viktor Tretyakevich and awarded him the Order Patriotic War I degree (posthumously). His name began to be included in all official documents, along with the names of other heroes of the Young Guard.

Anna Iosifovna, Victor's mother, who never took off her mourning black clothes, stood in front of the presidium of the solemn meeting in Voroshilovgrad when she was presented with her son's posthumous award.
The crowded hall, standing up, applauded her, but it seemed that what was happening no longer pleased her. Maybe because her mother always knew that her son was an honest man... Anna Iosifovna turned to her comrade, who was rewarding her, with only one request: not to show the film "Young Guard" in the city these days.
So, the stigma of a traitor was removed from Viktor Tretyakevich, but he was never restored to the rank of commissar and the title of Hero Soviet Union, which was awarded to the rest of the dead members of the Young Guard headquarters, was not honored.
Finishing this short story about the heroic and tragic days of the Krasnodon people, I would like to say that the heroism and tragedy of the Young Guard are probably still far from being revealed. But this is our history, and we have no right to forget it.

Crimea, Feodosia, August 1940. Happy young girls. The most beautiful, with dark braids - Anya Sopova.
On January 31, 1943, after severe torture, Anya was thrown into the pit of mine No. 5. She was buried in a mass grave of heroes in the central square of the city of Krasnodon.
... now "Young Guard" is on television. I remember how we loved this picture as a child! They dreamed of being like the brave Krasnodontsy... vowed to avenge their deaths. What can I say, the tragic and beautiful story of the Young Guards shocked the whole world at that time, and not just the immature children's minds.
The film became the leader of the box office in 1948, and the leading actors, unknown students of VGIK, immediately received the title of Laureates of the Stalin Prize - an exceptional case. "Woke up famous" - it's about them.
Ivanov, Mordyukova, Makarova, Gurzo, Shagalova - letters from all over the world came to them in bags.
Gerasimov, of course, took pity on the audience. Fadeev - readers.
What really happened that winter in Krasnodon, neither paper nor film could convey.

Uliana Gromova, 19 years old
".... a five-pointed star is carved on the back, right hand broken, broken ribs" (KGB archive at the Council of Ministers of the USSR).

Lida Androsova, 18 years old
"... extracted without an eye, an ear, a hand, with a rope around the neck, which strongly cut into the body. Baked blood is visible on the neck" (Museum "Young Guard", f. 1, d. 16).

Anya Sopova, 18 years old
"They beat her, hung her by her scythes ... They lifted Anya from the pit with one scythe - the other broke off."

Shura Bondareva, 20 years old
"... extracted without a head and right breast, the whole body is beaten, bruised, has a black color."

Lyuba Shevtsova, 18 years old (in the photo, first from the left in the second row)

Lyuba Shevtsova, 18 years old
On February 9, 1943, after a month of torture, she was shot in the Thundering Forest near the city, along with Oleg Koshev, S. Ostapenko, D. Ogurtsov and V. Subbotin.

Angelina Samoshina, 18 years old.
"Traces of torture were found on Angelina's body: her arms were twisted, her ears were cut off, a star was carved on her cheek" (RGASPI. F. M-1. Op. 53. D. 331)

Shura Dubrovina, 23 years old
“Two images rise before my eyes: the cheerful young Komsomol member Shura Dubrovina and the mutilated body raised from the mine. I saw her corpse only with lower jaw. Her friend, Maya Peglivanova, was lying in a coffin without eyes, without lips, with twisted arms ... "

Maya Peglivanova, 17 years old
"Maya's corpse is disfigured: her breasts are cut off, her legs are broken. All outer clothing has been removed." (RGASPI. F. M-1. Op. 53. D. 331) In the coffin she lay without lips, with twisted arms.

Tonya Ivanikhina, 19 years old
"... extracted without eyes, the head is tied with a scarf and wire, the breasts are cut out."

Serezha Tyulenin, 17 years old
"On January 27, 1943, Sergei was arrested. Soon his father and mother were taken away, all his belongings were confiscated. In the police, Sergei was severely tortured in the presence of his mother, they confronted Viktor Lukyancheiko, a member of the Young Guard, but they did not recognize each other.
On January 31, Sergei was tortured for the last time, and then, half-dead, he, along with other comrades, was taken to the pit of mine No. 5 ... "

The funeral of Sergei Tyulenin

Nina Minaeva, 18 years old
"... My sister was recognized by woolen leggings - the only clothes that remained on her. Nina's hands were broken, one eye was knocked out, there were shapeless wounds on her chest, her whole body was in black stripes ..."

Tosya Eliseenko, 22 years old
"The corpse of Tosi was disfigured, torturing her, they put her on a red-hot stove."

Victor Tretyakevich, 18 years old
"... Among the latter, Viktor Tretyakevich was raised. His father, Iosif Kuzmich, in a thin patched coat, stood every day, clutching a pole, did not take his eyes off the pit. And when they recognized his son, - without a face, with a black with a blue back, with shattered arms, - he, as if knocked down, fell to the ground. No traces of bullets were found on Victor's body - which means they threw him alive ... "

Oleg Koshevoy, 16 years old
When arrests began in January 1943, he made an attempt to cross the front line. However, he is forced to return to the city. Near the railway station Kortushino was captured by the Nazis and sent first to the police, and then to the district office of the Gestapo in Rovenka. After terrible torture, together with L.G. Shevtsova, S.M. Ostapenko, D.U. Ogurtsov and V.F. Subbotin, on February 9, 1943, he was shot in the Thundering Forest near the city.

Boris Glavan, 22 years old
"From the pit, he was taken face to face with barbed wire connected with Yevgeny Shepelev, his hands were cut off. His face was mutilated, his stomach was ripped open."

Evgeny Shepelev, 19 years old
"...Eugene's hands were cut off, his stomach was pulled out, his head was smashed...." (RGASPI. F. M-1. Op. 53. D. 331)

Volodya Zhdanov, 17 years old
"Retrieved from laceration in the left temporal region, the fingers are broken and twisted, there are bruises under the nails, two strips three centimeters wide, twenty-five centimeters long are cut on the back, the eyes are gouged out and the ears are cut off" (Museum "Young Guard", f. 1, d. 36)

Klava Kovaleva, 17 years old
"... extracted swollen, cut off right breast, the soles of the feet were burned, cut off left hand, the head is tied with a handkerchief, traces of beatings are visible on the body. It was found ten meters from the trunk, between the trolleys, it was probably thrown alive" (Museum "Young Guard", f. 1, d. 10)

Evgeny Moshkov, 22 years old (pictured left)
"... Young Communist communist Yevgeny Moshkov, having chosen a good moment during interrogation, hit the policeman. Then the fascist beasts hung Moshkov by his legs and held him in this position until blood gushed from his nose and throat. They removed him and again they began to interrogate. But Moshkov only spat in the face of the executioner. The enraged investigator who tortured Moshkov hit him with a bang. Exhausted by torture, the communist hero fell, hitting the back of his head on the door frame and died. "

Volodya Osmukhin, 18 years old
“When I saw Vovochka, disfigured, almost completely without a head, without his left arm to the elbow, I thought I would go crazy. I didn’t believe that it was him. He was in one sock, and the other leg was completely bare. warm. No outer clothing. The hungry animals took off.
Head is broken. The back of the head fell out completely, only the face remained, on which only Volodya's teeth remained. Everything else is ruined. The lips are distorted, the nose is almost completely absent. My grandmother and I washed Vovochka, dressed her, decorated her with flowers. A wreath was nailed to the coffin. Let the road rest in peace."

Ulyana Gromova's parents

Uli's last letter

The funeral of the young guards, 1943

In 1993, a press conference was held in Lugansk by a special commission to study the history of the Young Guard. As Izvestiya wrote then (05/12/1993), after two years of work, the commission gave its assessment of the versions that had excited the public for almost half a century. The conclusions of the researchers were reduced to several fundamental points.
In July-August 1942, after the capture of the Luhansk region by the Nazis, many underground youth groups spontaneously arose in the mining Krasnodon and the surrounding villages. They, according to the memoirs of contemporaries, were called "Star", "Sickle", "Hammer", etc. However, there is no need to talk about any party leadership. In October 1942, Viktor Tretyakevich united them into the Young Guard.
It was he, and not Oleg Koshevoy, who, according to the findings of the commission, became the commissioner of the underground organization. There were almost twice as many members of the "Young Guard" as later recognized by the competent authorities. The guys fought like a partisan, risky, suffering heavy losses, and this, as was noted at a press conference, ultimately led to the failure of the organization.
“…. Blessed memory to these girls and boys… who were infinitely stronger… all of us, millions, combined.…”

The history of the "Young Guard" is undoubtedly one of the most mythologized pages of our past. Although a myth is not always a lie. Often this is a simplified version of the truth, easy to understand.

A set of cliches: "friends - foes", "leaflets", "feat", "betrayal", "pit", "immortality". Stamps replace living people, impoverish and devalue their history. That's probably why around "Young Guard"» so many speculations, conjectures, disputes, doubts.

Meanwhile, there are sources of information that in many cases can dot the i's in these disputes. These are archival documents.

The archive of the SBU Directorate in the Luhansk region contains a significant array of documentary materials relating to the activities of the Young Guard, including the earliest that have come down to us and date back to the 20th of February 1943.

We are talking about the materials of the investigation of the crimes of the executioners and traitors of the "Young Guard", detained by the NKVD literally immediately after the Germans left Krasnodon. There may be no special sensations in the protocols of interrogations of these persons, but they are able to dispel many speculations. For example, the doubts of some of our contemporaries as to whether this organization existed in principle. It turns out there was. At least for representatives of the German special agencies and the occupation authorities, this was precisely a real anti-fascist organization, and not a gang of hooligans.

Start of investigation

Krasnodon was liberated from the fascist invaders on February 14, 1943, and already on February 16, the NKVD began arrests of those involved in the death of the underground organization.

There is nothing surprising in the fact that this happened so quickly: the Soviet state security agencies prepared in advance for work in the territories liberated from the Nazis, and by this time they had already managed to develop an algorithm of actions that made it possible to very quickly identify agents and official employees of intelligence, counterintelligence and punitive agencies enemy, study their activities, detain active collaborators. For this purpose, operational groups were created to serve the areas occupied by the enemy. The groups were deployed near the assigned territories and by the time they were liberated accumulated operational materials (mainly due to the testimony of Soviet citizens who crossed the front line, as well as operational sources operating in the occupied territory), which were subsequently used in practical work.

Groups entered the liberated areas with advanced units of the Red Army and immediately began work. So, in Voroshilovgrad, an operational group of 42 people under the leadership of the deputy chief UNKVD V.A.Koroba I started working the very next day after my release.

What the Nazis were doing in the occupied territories by the beginning of 1943 was well known. But even against this background, what happened in Krasnodon attracted attention due to the mass character and cruelty of the massacre of local youth. Hence the special scrupulousness of the investigation.

The search and detention of Nazi criminals who participated in these bloody events continued during and after the war. For example, Walter Eichhorn, which in 1942-1943. as part of a gendarmerie group, he directly participated in punitive actions and murders of members of the Young Guard and other members of the anti-fascist Resistance in the Voroshilovgrad region, was searched for in Thuringia (Germany), where he worked ... in a doll factory. Similarly searched for and detained in Germany Ernst-Emil Renatus- a musician, in the past - the head of the German district gendarmerie in the city of Krasnodon. They and other Nazi criminals who participated in the defeat of the Krasnodon underground were tried in Moscow.

The protocols of interrogations of these persons are still kept in the archives. Their monotonous dialogues with investigators are also a story about the Krasnodon events 70 years ago. But from an unusual point of view - on behalf of the executioners. Which gives credibility to this story - it is difficult to blame the executioners for the desire to create a “heroic myth” about the “Young Guard”. Here are excerpts from some of the protocols.

"I followed these directives"

From the testimony Eichhorn(9.3.1949):

“While still in Magdeburg, before being sent to the occupied Soviet territory, we received a number of instructions regarding the establishment of a“ new order ”in the East, which said that the gendarmes should see a communist partisan in every Soviet citizen, and therefore, with all composure, each of we are obliged to exterminate peaceful Soviet citizens as their opponents.

From the testimony Renatus a (VII.1949):

Arriving in July 1942 as part of a gendarmerie team in the city of Stalino, I participated in a meeting of officers of the "Einsatzkommando gendarmerie" ... At this meeting, the head of the team, Lieutenant Colonel Ganzo r instructed us to deal first with the arrests of communists, Jews and Soviet activists. At the same time, Gantsog emphasized that the arrest of these persons does not require any action against the Germans at all. At the same time, Gantsog explained that all communists and Soviet activists should be destroyed and only as an exception imprisoned in concentration camps. As the appointed head of the German gendarmerie in the mountains. Krasnodon, I followed these directives…”

« Artes Lina(translator. - Yu.E.) told me that Zons and Solikovsky torture the detainees. He especially liked to torment the arrested Zons ( chief of the gendarmes. - Yu.E.) . It was a great pleasure for him after dinner to call the arrested and subject them to torture. Zons told me that it is only through torture that he brings those arrested to confession. Artes Lina asked me to release her from work in the gendarmerie due to the fact that she could not be present at the beatings of those arrested.

The death of 32 Krasnodon miners

In September 1942, Krasnodon was shocked by the massacre of the invaders over more than 30 communists, who were mainly miners of local mines.

It was the shock of what happened that pushed many young people to become members of the anti-fascist underground. In 1947, during interrogations at the MGB Renatus told the investigation that, on his instructions, the head of the Krasnodon police Solikovsky revealed communists, Komsomol members and other unreliable persons for the Germans.

From the testimony of Renatus (12.XI.1947):

“Having received a list of 32 local communists, I summoned Solikovsky and Statsenkov, who confirmed to me that all these persons are active supporters of Soviet power. For me it was quite enough to shoot these people. On September 28, 1942, I ordered Solikovsky to destroy the arrested communists, without limiting him in the methods of destruction. The next day, Solikovsky reported to me that my order had been carried out.

From police testimony Lukyanova(11.XI.1947):

“The first time I participated in the mass execution of Soviet patriots at the end of September 1942 in the Krasnodon city park ... At night, a group of German gendarmes led by an officer arrived in the Krasnodon police in cars Kozak. After a short conversation, Kozak Solikovsky and Orlov according to a pre-compiled list, the police began to remove the arrested from the cells. In total, more than 30 people were selected, mainly communists ... Having announced to the arrested that they were being transported to Voroshilovgrad, they took them out of the police building and drove them to the Krasnodon city park. Upon arrival at the park, the arrested were tied by the hands of five people and led into a pit that had previously served as a refuge from German air raids and shot there. ... Some of the shot were still alive, in connection with which the gendarmes who remained with us began to shoot those who still showed signs of life. However, the gendarmes soon got tired of this occupation, and they ordered to bury the victims, among whom were still alive ... ".

Krasnodon underground and its defeat

Not much is said about the activities of the Young Guard in the materials of criminal cases.

Much more about her death. And how much did an organization that existed for only a few months, which included almost children, manage to do much? Mounted and installed 4 radios. Published and distributed several hundred leaflets. On the night of November 6-7, 1942, red flags were hung out in Krasnodon. They collected a considerable arsenal - according to some reports, up to 15 machine guns and 30 rifles, over 13 thousand cartridges and 10 pistols (weapons were collected at the “warehouse” of the “Young Guard” in the city bath). They planned to establish contact with the active partisan detachments and gradually arm the organization so that with the onset of spring they would go into the forests for partisan struggle against the Nazis.On the night of December 5-6, a fire was set on the German labor exchange. In principle, these documents are about something else. They are about executioners and traitors.

The beginning of the collapse of the youth underground was the theft of New Year's gifts for soldiers from a German car on the night of December 30-31, 1943.

From the testimony Kuleshova- senior investigator of the Krasnodon police, written by him personally (20.II.1943 and 7.3.1943):

“On December 31 or January 1, the head of the gendarmerie summoned me and Solikovsky and demanded to find the culprits. Then Solikovsky called all the police officers, set them the task of finding the culprits by any means. He himself went to restaurants, and some of the police officers went to the market. Solikovsky found 5 packs of cigarettes from the owner of the restaurant, which he bought from one woman. They tried to find the woman, but nothing came of it. . Zakharov, deputy chief of police, managed to get on the trail of the thieves through one boy. The chiefs were arrested. club them. Gorky Moshko in, chief string circle Tretyakevi h and a number of others. As a result of the searches, a part of the stolen goods was found ... "

Here they remembered the denunciation, which had been received by the police a little earlier, but for some reason was not awarded serious attention.

From Kuleshov's testimony:

“On December 24 or 25, 1942, I went into the office of the commandant of the Krasnodonsky district, who is also the head of the police of this area, Solikovsky Vasily Alexandrovich, where I saw on his desk a statement addressed to the head of mine No. 1 bis Sorokino Zhukov from Pocheptsov Gennady Prokofievich. Below is the verbatim text of the statement:

"To the head of mine No. 1 bis, Mr. Zhukov

from Mr. Pocheptsov Gennady Prokofievich

statement

Mr. Zhukov, an underground Komsomol organization "Young Guard" was organized in the city of Krasnodon, in which I became an active member. I ask you to come to my apartment in your free time and I will tell you in detail about this organization and its members. My address: st. Chkalova, house 12 entrance number 1, Gromov D.G.

20.XII.1942 Pocheptsov.

... During the interrogation of Gennady Pocheptsov, the latter betrayed the entire May Day organization, headed by its leader Popov Anatoly».

“There was such an order in the police that the first person arrested was brought to Solikovsky, he brought him back to consciousness, and ordered the investigator to interrogate him. Pocheptsov was called to the police. He said that he really is a member of an underground youth organization that exists in Krasnodon and its environs. He named the leaders of this organization, or rather, the city headquarters, namely: Tretyakevich, Zemnukhov, Lukashov, Safonov and Koshevoy. Pocheptsov called Tretyakevich the head of the citywide organization. He himself is a member of the May Day organization, headed by Anatoly Popov. The May Day organization consisted of 11 people, including Popov, Glavan, Zhukov, Bondarevs (two), Chernyshov and a number of others. He said that the headquarters had weapons, Popov had a rifle, Nikolaev and Zhukov had submachine guns, and Chernyshov had a pistol. He also said that in one of the quarries in the pit there is a storehouse of weapons. There used to be a warehouse of the Red Army, which was blown up during the retreat, but the youth found a lot of cartridges there. The organizational structure was as follows: headquarters, May Day organization, an organization in the village of Krasnodon and a city organization. He did not name the total number of participants. Up to 30 people were arrested before I was fired. Personally, I interrogated 12 people, incl. Pocheptsov, Tretyakevich, Lukashov, Petrov, Vasily Pirozhok, and others. Of the members of the headquarters of this organization, Koshevoy and Safonov were not arrested, because. they fled.

As a rule, preliminary interrogations were carried out personally by Solikovsky, Zakharov and the gendarmerie with the use of whips, fists, etc. Even investigators were not allowed to be present during such “interrogations”. Such methods have no precedent in the history of criminal law.”

From the testimony of Gury Fadeev, an agent of the German special forces:

“After I was recruited by the police to identify those who were distributing the leaflets of the Young Guard, I met several times with the deputy chief of the Krasnodon police, Zakharov. At one of the interrogations, Zakharov asked me the question: “Which of the partisans recruited your sister Alla?” I, knowing about this from the words of my mother Fadeeva M.V., gave Zakharov Vanya Zemnukhov, who really made my sister an offer to join an underground anti-fascist organization. I told him that Korostyleva's sister Elena Nikolaevna Koshevoy and her son Oleg Koshevoy were listening to radio broadcasts from Moscow in Korostylev's apartment, who was recording the messages of the Soviet Information Bureau.

way of the cross

From the testimony of the head of the Rovenkovsky district police, Orlov (14.XI.1943)

"Oleg Koshevoy was arrested at the end of January 1943 by a German gendarme and a railway policeman at a junction 7 km from the city of Rovenka and brought to my police station. During the arrest, a revolver was confiscated from Koshevoy, and during a second search in the Rovenkovsky police, he was found the seal of the Komsomol organization and some two blank forms. I interrogated Koshevoy and received evidence from him that he was the head of the Krasnodon underground organization.

From the testimony of the district police investigator Cherenkov:

“I interrogated members of the Young Guard organization, Komsomol members Ulyana Gromova, two Ivanikhin sisters, a brother and sister Bondarev, Maya Peglivanova, Antonina Eliseenko, Nina Minaeva, Viktor Petrov, Klavdia Kovalyova, Vasily Pirozhok, Anatoly Popov, about 15 people in total ... Using torture and mockery of the “Young Guards”, we found that soon after the arrival of the Germans in the Donbass, the youth of Krasnodon, mostly Komsomol members, organized and led an underground struggle against the Germans ... I admit that during interrogations I beat the arrested members of the underground Komsomol organization Gromova and Ivanikhina.

From police testimony Bautkin:

“In early January 1943, I arrested and brought to the police a member of the underground Komsomol organization “Young Guard” discovered by the police in Krasnodon ... Dymchenko who lived at the mine number 5. She was tortured by the police and, among her other friends in the underground, was shot by the Germans ... I arrested the "Young Guard" who lived in mine No. anti-fascist leaflets.

From the testimony Orlova- Head of the Rovenkovsky district police:

“Shevtsova was required to indicate the location of the radio transmitter, which she used to communicate with the Red Army. Shevtsov and categorically refused, stating that she did not Lyadska I called us monsters. The next day, Shevtsova was handed over to the gendarmerie and shot.

At the pit

From the testimony Renatus:

"…In February Wenner and Sons I was informed that my order to execute the Krasnodon Komsomol members had been carried out. Part of those arrested ... were shot in Krasnodon in mid-January, and the other part, in connection with the approach of the front line to Krasnodon, was taken out of there and shot in the mountains. Rovenki.

From police testimony Davidenko:

“I admit that I participated in the executions of the “Young Guards” three times and about 35 Komsomol members were shot with my participation ... In front of the “Young Guards”, 6 Jews were first shot, and then in turn all 13 “Young Guards”, whose corpses were thrown into the pit mine No. 5 with a depth of about 80 meters. Some were thrown into the mine shaft alive. To prevent the shouting and proclamation of Soviet patriotic slogans, the girls' dresses were raised and twisted over their heads; in this state, the doomed were dragged to the shaft of the mine, after which they were shot at and then pushed into the shaft of the mine.

Execution in Rovenki

From the testimony Schultz

“At the end of January, I participated in the execution of a group of members of the underground Komsomol organization Young Guard, including the head of this organization, Koshevoy. ... I remember him especially clearly because I had to shoot him twice. After the shots, all the arrested fell to the ground and lay motionless, only Koshevoy got up and, turning around, looked in our direction. This greatly annoyed Fromme and he ordered the gendarme Drevitz to finish him off. Drevitz went up to the lying Koshevoy and shot him in the back of the head.

... Before fleeing from Rovenki on February 8 or 9, 1943, Fromme ordered me, Drevitz and other gendarmes to shoot a group of Soviet citizens held in Rovenkov prison. Among these victims were five men, a woman with a three-year-old child, and an active young guard Shevtsova. Having delivered the arrested people to the Rovenkovsky city park, Fromme ordered me to shoot Shevtsova. I led Shevtsova to the edge of the pit, stepped back a few steps and shot her in the back of the head, but the trigger mechanism of my carbine turned out to be faulty and a misfire occurred. Then Hollender, who was standing next to me, shot at Shevtsova. During the execution, Shevtsova behaved courageously, stood on the edge of the grave with her head held high, a dark shawl slipped over her shoulders and the wind ruffled her hair. Before the execution, she did not utter a word about mercy ... ".

From the testimony Geist- gendarme of the German district gendarmerie in Rovenki:

“... I took part, along with ... other gendarmes, in the execution in Rovenkovsky Park of Komsomol members arrested in Krasnodon for underground work against the Germans. Of the executed members of the Young Guard organization, I remember only Shevtsova. I remember her because I interrogated her. In addition, she drew attention to herself by her courageous behavior during the execution ... ".

Vore

From police testimony Kolotovich:

“Having arrived at the mother of the young guard Vasily Bondarev, Davidenko and Sevastyanov told her that the police were sending her son to work in Germany, and he asked to give him things. Bondarev's mother gave Davidenko gloves and socks. The latter, when leaving, took gloves for himself, and gave Sevastyanov socks and said: “There is an initiative!”

Then we went to the house of the young guard Nikolaev. Entering Nikolaev's house, Davidenko, turning to Nikolaev's sister, said that the police were sending her brother to work in Germany, asking for food and things on the way. Nikolaev's sister apparently knew that he had been shot, so she refused to give any things or food. After that, Davidenko and Sevastyanov, a policeman (I don’t know my last name) and I forcibly took away a man’s coat and a sheep from her. Then we went to another Young Guard (I don’t know the last name) and they also forcibly took four pieces of lard and a man’s shirt from the mother of the latter. Having put the fat in the sleigh, we went to the family of the young guard Zhukov. In this way, Davidenko, Sevastyanov and others robbed the families of the Young Guards.

Afterword

September 19, 1943 in Krasnodon, by the verdict of the Military Tribunal, the troops of the NKVD of the Voroshilovgrad region were publicly shot Kuleshov, Gromov and Pocheptsov, recognizedresponsible for the death of the Young Guard.

In the 40s, almost all the other executioners of the Young Guards - both policemen and German punishers - were sentenced to 25 years in prison or 25 years in a camp. In the mid-1950s, German prisoners were placed at the disposal of the government of the GDR as criminals and served their sentences in Germany. There is no data on whether any of them lived to see their release in the archives of the SBU.

Prepared by the head of the press service of the SBU Directorate in the Lugansk region, Yulia Eremenko, especially for

During the Great Patriotic War, many underground organizations operated in the Soviet territories occupied by Germany, which fought against the Nazis. One of these organizations worked in Krasnodon. It consisted not of experienced military men, but of young men and women who were barely 18 years old. The youngest member of the Young Guard at that time was only 14.

What did the Young Guard do?

Sergey Tyulenin laid the foundation for everything. After the city was occupied by German troops in July 1942, he single-handedly began to collect weapons for the soldiers, put up anti-fascist leaflets, helping the Red Army to counteract the enemy. A little later, he assembled a whole detachment, and already on September 30, 1942, the organization numbered more than 50 people, headed by the chief of staff, Ivan Zemnukhov. [S-BLOCK]

The Young Guard carried out sabotage in the electromechanical workshops of the city. On the night of November 7, 1942, on the eve of the 25th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution, the Young Guards hoisted eight red flags on the tallest buildings in the city of Krasnodon and the villages adjacent to it.

On the night of December 5-6, 1942, on the Day of the Constitution of the USSR, the Young Guards set fire to the building of the German labor exchange (the people dubbed it the "black exchange"), where lists of people (with addresses and filled out work cards) were stored, intended for hijacking for compulsory work in Nazi Germany, thereby about two thousand young men and women from the Krasnodon region were saved from forcible export. [S-BLOCK]

The Young Guards were also preparing to organize an armed uprising in Krasnodon in order to defeat the German garrison and join the advancing units of the Red Army. However, shortly before the planned uprising, the organization was uncovered.

On January 1, 1943, three young guards were arrested: Yevgeny Moshkov, Viktor Tretyakevich and Ivan Zemnukhov - the Nazis fell into the very heart of the organization. [S-BLOCK]

On the same day, the remaining members of the headquarters urgently gathered and decided: all the Young Guards should immediately leave the city, and the leaders should not spend the night at home that night. All underground workers were informed about the decision of the headquarters through messengers. One of them, who was in the group of the village of Pervomaika, Gennady Pocheptsov, having learned about the arrests, got cold feet and wrote a statement to the police about the existence of an underground organization.

massacre

One of the jailers, later convicted defector Lukyanov, said: “There was a continuous groan in the police, because during the entire interrogation the arrested were beaten. They lost consciousness, but they were brought to their senses and beaten again. I myself was sometimes terrified to look at these torments. They were shot in January 1943. 57 young guards. The Germans did not achieve any "frank confessions" from the Krasnodon schoolchildren. This, perhaps, was the most powerful moment for which the whole novel was written.

Viktor Tretyakevich - "the first traitor"

The Young Guards were arrested and sent to prison, where they were severely tortured. Viktor Tretyakevich, the organization's commissar, was treated with particular cruelty. His body was mutilated beyond recognition. Hence the rumors that it was Tretyakevich, unable to withstand the torture, betrayed the rest of the guys. Still trying to establish the identity of the traitor, the investigating authorities accepted this version. And only a few years later, on the basis of declassified documents, the traitor was established, it turned out to be not Tretyakevich at all. However, the charges were not dropped from him at the time. This will happen only 16 years later, when the authorities arrest Vasily Podtynny, who participated in the torture. During interrogation, he confessed that Tretyakevich had indeed been slandered. Despite the most severe torture, Tretyakevich held firm and did not betray anyone. He was rehabilitated only in 1960, posthumously awarded the Order. [S-BLOCK]

However, at the same time, the Central Committee of the All-Union Leninist Young Communist League adopted a very strange closed resolution: “There is no point in stirring up the history of the Young Guard, remaking it in accordance with some facts that have become known recently. We believe that it is inappropriate to revise the history of the "Young Guard" when appearing in the press, lectures, reports. Fadeev's novel has been published in our country in 22 languages ​​and in 16 languages ​​of foreign countries... Millions of boys and girls are brought up and will be brought up on the history of the Young Guard. Based on this, we believe that new facts that contradict the novel The Young Guard should not be made public.

Who is the traitor?

At the beginning of the 2000s, the Security Service of Ukraine in the Lugansk region declassified some materials in the case of the Young Guard. As it turned out, back in 1943, a certain Mikhail Kuleshov was detained by the SMERSH army counterintelligence. When the Nazis occupied the city, he offered them his cooperation and soon took the position of field police investigator. It was Kuleshov who led the investigation into the Young Guard case. Judging by his testimony, the real reason for the failure of the underground was the betrayal of the Young Guard Georgy Pocheptsov. When the news came that three Young Guardsmen had been arrested, Pocheptsov confessed everything to his stepfather, who worked closely with the German administration. He convinced him to turn himself in to the police. During the first interrogations, he confirmed the authorship of the applicant and his affiliation with the underground Komsomol organization operating in Krasnodon, named the goals and objectives of the underground, indicated the place where weapons and ammunition were stored, hidden in Gundor mine No. 18. [S-BLOCK]

As Kuleshov testified during the SMERSH interrogation on March 15, 1943: “Pocheptsov said that he really is a member of the underground Komsomol organization that exists in Krasnodon and its environs. He named the leaders of this organization, or rather, the city headquarters, namely: Tretyakevich, Lukashov, Zemnukhov, Safonov, Koshevoy. Pocheptsov called Tretyakevich the head of the citywide organization. He himself was a member of the May Day organization, headed by Anatoly Popov, and before that Glavan. The next day, Pocheptsov was again taken to the police and interrogated. On the same day, he was confronted with Moshkov and Popov, whose interrogations were accompanied by brutal beatings and cruel torture. Pocheptsov confirmed his previous testimony and named all members of the organization known to him. [C-BLOCK] From January 5 to 11, 1943, on the denunciation and testimony of Pocheptsov, most of the Young Guards were arrested. The traitor himself was released and was not arrested until the liberation of Krasnodon by the Soviet troops. Thus, the secret information that Pocheptsov had and which became known to the police turned out to be enough to liquidate the Komsomol youth underground. This is how the organization was revealed, having existed for less than six months.

After the liberation of Krasnodon by the Red Army, Pocheptsov, Gromov (Pocheptsov's stepfather) and Kuleshov were recognized as traitors to the Motherland and, on the verdict of the USSR military tribunal, were shot on September 19, 1943. However, the public learned about the real traitors for an unknown reason many years later.

Was there any betrayal?

In the late 1990s, Vasily Levashov, one of the surviving members of the Young Guard, said in an interview with one of the well-known newspapers that the Germans got on the trail of the Young Guard by accident - because of poor conspiracy. Allegedly, there was no betrayal. At the end of December 1942, the Young Guards robbed a truck with Christmas gifts for the Germans. This was witnessed by a 12-year-old boy who received a pack of cigarettes from members of the organization for his silence. With these cigarettes, the boy fell into the hands of the police and told about the robbery of the car. [S-BLOCK]

On January 1, 1943, three young guards were arrested, participating in the theft of Christmas gifts: Yevgeny Moshkov, Viktor Tretyakevich and Ivan Zemnukhov. Without knowing it, the Nazis got into the very heart of the organization. during interrogations, the guys were silent, but during a search in Moshkov’s house, the Germans accidentally discovered a list of 70 members of the Young Guard. This list became the reason for mass arrests and torture.

It must be admitted that Levashov's "revelations" have not yet been confirmed.

Discussion:

Documentary film "Young Guard":

"Young Guard" - an underground anti-fascist Komsomol organization of boys and girls that operated during the Great Patriotic War (from September 1942 to January 1943), mainly in the city of Krasnodon, Voroshilovgrad region of the Ukrainian SSR.

The organization was created shortly after the beginning of the occupation of the city of Krasnodon by the troops of Nazi Germany, which began on July 20, 1942. The "Young Guard" consisted of about one hundred and ten participants - boys and girls. The youngest member of the underground was fourteen years old.

Krasnodon underground

During the work of a special commission of the Voroshilovgrad regional committee of the CP (b) U in 1949-1950, it was established that an underground party group headed by Philip Lyutikov operated in Krasnodon. In addition to his assistant Nikolai Barakov, communists Nina Sokolova, Maria Dymchenko, Daniil Vystavkin and Gerasim Vinokurov participated in the underground work.

The underground workers began their work in August 1942. Subsequently, they established a connection with the youth underground organizations of Krasnodon, whose activities they directly supervised.

Creation of the "Young Guard"

Underground anti-fascist youth groups arose in Krasnodon immediately after the start of the occupation of the city by Nazi German troops, which began on July 20, 1942. By the beginning of September 1942, soldiers of the Red Army who ended up in Krasnodon join them: soldiers Yevgeny Moshkov, Ivan Turkenich, Vasily Gukov, sailors Dmitry Ogurtsov, Nikolai Zhukov, Vasily Tkachev.

At the end of September 1942, underground youth groups united into a single organization "Young Guard", the name of which was proposed by Sergei Tyulenin. Ivan Turkenich was appointed commander of the organization. Who was the commissioner of the "Young Guard" is still not known for certain.

The overwhelming majority of the Young Guard were members of the Komsomol, temporary Komsomol certificates for them were printed in the underground printing house of the organization along with leaflets

The activities of the "Young Guard"

Over the entire period of its activity, the Young Guard organization has produced and distributed in the city of Krasnodon more than five thousand anti-fascist leaflets with data on the real state of affairs at the front and calls on the population to rise in a merciless fight against the German invaders.

Along with the underground communists, members of the organization participated in sabotage in the electromechanical workshops of the city.

On the night of November 7, 1942, on the eve of the 25th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution, the Young Guards hoisted eight red flags on the tallest buildings in the city of Krasnodon and the villages adjacent to it.

On the night of December 5-6, 1942, on the Day of the Constitution of the USSR, the Young Guards set fire to the building of the German labor exchange (the people dubbed it the "black exchange"), where lists of people (with addresses and filled out work cards) were stored, intended for hijacking for compulsory work in Nazi Germany, thereby about two thousand young men and women from the Krasnodon region were saved from forcible export.

The Young Guards were also preparing to organize an armed uprising in Krasnodon in order to defeat the German garrison and join the advancing units of the Red Army. However, shortly before the planned uprising, the organization was uncovered.

Disclosure of the "Young Guard"

Shortly before fleeing from the advancing units of the Red Army, the German counterintelligence, the Gestapo, the police and the gendarmerie intensified their efforts to capture and eliminate the Komsomol-communist underground in the Krasnodon region.

Using informants (most of whom, after the liberation of the Ukrainian SSR, were exposed and convicted of treason and collaboration with the Nazis), the Germans got on the trail of young partisans, and in January 1943 mass arrests of members of the organization began.

On January 1, 1943, Yevgeny Moshkov and Viktor Tretyakevich were arrested, their arrest was due to the fact that they tried to sell New Year's gifts on the local market from looted German trucks, which had been attacked by the Young Guards the day before.

On January 2, Ivan Zemnukhov was arrested, who was trying to rescue Moshkov and Tretyakevich, and on January 5, the police began mass arrests of underground workers, which continued until January 11, 1943.

Traitor

Until 1959, it was believed that the young guards were given to the SS by the commissioner of the Young Guard, Viktor Tretyakevich, who was pointed out during the 1943 trial by the former investigator of the occupation police, Mikhail Emelyanovich Kuleshov, stating that Viktor could not stand the torture.

However, in 1959, during the trial of Vasily Podtynny, recognized as a traitor to the Motherland, who served as deputy chief of the Krasnodon city police in 1942-1943 and for sixteen years hiding under a false name, often changing work and place of residence, new circumstances of the death of the fearless young guards.

A special state commission created after the process established that Viktor Tretyakevich became the victim of a deliberate slander, and one of the members of the organization, Gennady Pocheptsov, was identified as a real traitor, who on January 2, 1943, on the advice of his stepfather Vasily Grigoryevich Gromov, head of mine No. 1-bis and secret agent police of Krasnodon, made a corresponding denunciation to the occupying authorities and named the names of all the members of the Young Guard known to him.

After the liberation of Krasnodon by the Red Army, Pocheptsov, Gromov and Kuleshov were recognized as traitors to the Motherland and, according to the verdict of the USSR military tribunal, on September 19, 1943, they were shot.

Vasily Gromov, immediately after the liberation of Krasnodon, was forced to participate in the extraction of the corpses of the Young Guards, thrown by the Nazis into the mine.

Not all young guards perished.
From the persecution of the Nazis, who began the arrests of the Young Guard in the first days of January 1943, 11 underground workers managed to escape.

The commander of the "Young Guard" Turkenich Ivan Vasilyevich crossed the front line and in the ranks Soviet army passed through the whole of Ukraine. In the summer of 1944, having become a communist, I.V. Turkenich was appointed to the post of assistant chief of the political department of the 99th Rifle Division of the Zhytomyr Red Banner Komsomol. On August 14, 1944, during the liberation of the fraternal Polish people from fascist tyranny, he died a hero's death. I.V. Turkenich was buried at the cemetery of Soviet soldiers in the city of Rzeszow (Poland).

Levashov Vasily Ivanovich - a member of the headquarters of the "Young Guard" - left Krasnodon towards the front. At the station Amvrosievka, Donetsk region. hid with relatives until the arrival of the Red Army. After his release, he joined the Soviet Army, in whose ranks he fought from Krasnodon to Berlin and took part in the storming of Berlin. Had injuries. Shortly after the war, the former underground fighter graduated from the Military-Political Academy. IN AND. Lenin, served in the Navy.

Safonov Stepan Stepanovich crossed the front line in early January. In the ranks of the Red Army, which liberated the Donbass, he took part in the battles for the city of Kamensk. He died on January 20, 1943. He was buried in a mass grave at the Ryginsky cemetery in Kamensk.

Kovalev Anatoly Vasilievich until the end of January was in deep underground in the city of Krasnodon. Arrested January 28th. On the 31st - he fled from the execution from the pit of mine N5. While escaping, he was wounded in the arm. For a week he hid with relatives and friends in the city of Krasnodon. Avoiding police pursuit, he fled the city. It is known that until May 1943 he was on the territory of the Zaporozhye region, then his traces are lost. Kovalev Anatoly went missing.

Arutyunyants Georgy Minaevich went to the front when arrests began in Krasnodon. Before the arrival of the Red Army, he hid with relatives in the city of Novocherkassk. From March 1943 he served in the ranks of the Soviet Army. Had injuries. In 1957 he graduated from the Military-Political Academy. IN AND. Lenin. Was a military man.

Wrestler Valeria Davydovna, before the arrival of Soviet troops, was hiding with relatives in the city of Lugansk. After the war, she studied at the institute foreign languages. Served in the army.

Ivantsova Nina Mikhailovna, avoiding the persecution of the Nazis, was hiding in villages and farms near Krasnodon. With the arrival of Soviet troops, she voluntarily joined the Soviet Army. Participated in battles on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War. After the war, she was in the Komsomol and party work, she graduated from the Pedagogical Institute in absentia. She worked in the apparatus of the Luhansk Regional Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine.

Ivantsova Olga Ivanovna was hiding with her sister. After her release, she worked in the system of labor reserves as a political officer. For a long time she worked in a managerial position in trade organizations in the Lugansk region.

Lopukhov Anatoly Vladimirovich, before the arrival of our troops, was hiding with friends in the mines and in the villages near the city of Lugansk. After the expulsion of the Nazis, he was drafted into the Soviet Army. Had an injury. Graduated from the Military-Political Academy. V. I. Lenin. Served in the army.

Shishchenko Mikhail Tarasovich during the arrests of the Young Guards went into deep underground. After the liberation of Krasnodon, he was sent as secretary of the Rovenkovsky district committee of the Komsomol. Since 1946, he was at party work in the mines of the Frunzeugol trust. Luhansk region

Before the liberation of Krasnodon, Yurkin Radiy Petrovich was hiding with residents of suburban villages and farms. With the arrival of our troops, he was sent to the school of military pilots, after graduating from which he served in the ranks of the Soviet Army. He worked as a fleet mechanic in Krasnodon.

As for the native Young Guards, the most famous of them was the mother of Oleg Koshevoy. This did not please the mother of the other hero.

First Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU comrade. Brezhnev L.I. from Tyulenina Alexandra Vasilievna

Dear Leonid Ilyich!

This letter is written to you by Alexandra Vasilievna Tyulenina, mother of the Hero of the Soviet Union Sergei Tyulenin, a member of the staff of the "Young Guard", the Krasnodon underground organization.
Earlier, I repeatedly applied verbally to various central organizations with a request to sort out the case with Elena Nikolaevna Kosheva, the mother of Oleg Koshevoy, who also participated in the Young Guard, and he was also awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Every time I was promised to sort it out, but no one figured it out. The comrades I contacted probably thought that the old one had nothing to do - so she complains.
I'm really not young. I have lived in the world for over 80 years. Raised ten children. What they grew up not only for me, but also visible from the outside. None of my children has ever been on trial or under investigation. In the difficult time of the German occupation, most of them fought the enemy, some at the front, some in the rear, and from party members who are in our family, you can make up a separate party organization. For my children, for grandchildren and great-grandchildren, I would be ashamed to report to Vladimir Ilyich Lenin himself. It was Ilyich in 1922, when I wrote to him, saved our family from ruin and starvation.
I ask you, Leonid Ilyich, to sort out the following case:
Why is the local authorities raising E.N. Koshevaya so high? She is both a member of the regional party committee and a deputy, in business and not in business, she is awarded orders. After all, she did not take any part in the fight against the Germans, and in her current job - the head of the kindergarten - (she, too) at the mine N1bis im. Sergei Tyulenin, she also does nothing outstanding. If her son, Oleg, whom she passes off as the commissioner of the Young Guard, plays a role in this matter, then he was not the commissioner of this organization either. And if in 1943, when our eyes did not dry out from tears for the dead children, she entangled the chairman of the commission of the Central Committee of the Komsomol Toritsyn, as well as the writer Fadeev, who came to Krasnodon, who lived in her apartment and to whom she only allowed those who told the writer what she wanted, so I think it's time to end with this. My daughter Nadezhda and I stood under the windows, where Fadeev invited us for a conversation, but she did not let us into the dm.
Under the dictation of Koshevoy, Fadeev described in the book "Young Guard" that Oleg Koshevoy was the commissar of the "Young Guard", and she and her brother N.N. Korostylev, as people who helped Oleg in underground work. And they not only helped, but almost directed the entire work of the Young Guard. Everyone knows that this is not true. Oleg Koshevoi has never been a commissar of the "Young Guard". The commissar was Viktor Tretyakevich. She, Koshevaya, slandered Victor. She told Fadeev that Viktor Tretyakevich was allegedly a traitor. And how could she know that. She was not arrested by the police. She was not interrogated. It was me and our family that were bullied by the police. I, not her, was beaten unconscious. I, and not she, knows what questions were asked and what the policemen wanted to know. I, not she, knows who did what in the "Young Guard".

Leonid Ilyich, his heart bleeds from the fact that because of the slander against Tretyakevich erected by Kosheva, his brothers suffered, his father went crazy and died, for more than 15 years he did not receive a pension for his son, tortured by executioners, Victor's mother - Anna Iosifovna. That's what Koshevaya is. It was she, Koshevaya, young and healthy, who since 1943 received a pension for Oleg. She worked, received a salary and received a pension in addition.
And Korostylev. You do not know, but we do know that he worked as an engineer in the German directorate. We know that German officers lived in his house almost all the time and there were never any meetings of the headquarters of the Young Guard. And on that house, on the house of a German servant, there is still an inscription that meetings of the headquarters were held there. Who needs cheating? Coming to Krasnodon, people still find out the truth. And who needs a lie, even though it is written in golden letters. If Korostylev had fought the Germans, then the head of the Rovenkovskaya police, Orlov, would not have let him go home, but would have sent him to execution, as he sent Lyuba Shevtsova and other guys.
After the liberation from the Germans, when Korostylev was arrested as a German servant, Koshevaya began to help him out. It was then that she told the writer Fadeev that Korostylev helped the guys in underground work, that Oleg was a commissar, that all meetings of the headquarters were held in Korostylev's house. She wrote this lie in a letter to M.I. Kalinin, she deceived the Soviet government. And later this lie was written by Kosheva in the book "The Tale of the Son".
Leonid Ilyich, Lenin taught people to tell the truth, no matter how bitter it was. This is written down in the new party program. And correctly written. But Koshevaya, on the contrary, wrote a lie in her book and probably thinks that it brings benefits. And from this untruth only harm to our youth. They read the book and think that the truth is written there, but they come to Krasnodon and find out that there is a lie there and stop believing not only the parents of the Young Guards, but also the party, the Soviet people. Who gave Kosheva the right to undermine the youth's faith in the most sacred, faith in the Motherland?!
And one more question I wanted to ask. Where did Oleg Koshevoy die? In the film "Young Guard" it is shown that he is the first to be thrown into the pit of mine N5 in Krasnodon. But he was not even close to the pit, they did not pull him out of the pit, and they did not bury him in a mass grave in the city of Krasnodon. Koshevaya writes in the book that she buried her son in Rovenki. And there are no documents about it. Whom she buried in Rovenki, no one knows. Where is Oleg Koshevoy?
Leonid Ilyich, in my life I have seen and experienced both good and bad, but I have never deceived people in anything big or small. After the war, I did not send such a letter to the government, because I did not have faith that they would be able to properly understand the matter. Many years ago I wrote to Lenin on a personal matter; and now I am addressing you on a matter of great national importance, on the question of restoring the truth, which our local leaders are trying to replace with lies. I want everyone to take the place in life that he deserves not by deceit, not by lies, but by honest work, an honest struggle for Soviet power.
Leonid Ilyich! I would write to you and more, but I'm not literate. And the people who write this under my dictation are already tired.
I want one thing - to receive a message from you that the truth will be restored.

Tyulenin
My address: Krasnodon, Lomonosov st. 8,
Tyulenina Alexandra Vasilievna.
RGASPI, F-1, Inventory 53, File 41

Tyulenin's mother had reason to be offended: after all, it was Sergei Tyulenin who was the first to start the fight against the Nazis. Already on the second day of the occupation, leaflets appeared, which he wildly wrote and pasted on the walls of houses.
But otherwise she is wrong. Of course, Koshevoy died. Many people saw his corpse. They say that whiskey young guy were gray.

Passions for the Young Guard have not subsided to this day. Ukrainians are now trying to make them OUN fighters. They fought for an independent Ukraine from the communists!

Or such opuses:
« Let's start with a subject, apparently completely unknown to the "patriots". From the Hague Convention on the Rules of Engagement. Convention that Germany signed (unlike the USSR). The exact name of the convention is “On the Rights and Customs of War on Land”, adopted at the 2nd Hague Conference on October 18, 1907.

Contrary to some misconceptions, this convention does not prohibit guerrilla operations. However, he puts forward four conditions, only under which the militia will be considered not a war criminal subject to trial by a military tribunal (and, as a rule, the death penalty), but a combatant to whom all the rights of a prisoner of war apply.

First, "to have a distinctive and clearly visible from a distance distinctive sign." Distinguishing mark of a combatant, that is. Ideally, wear a military uniform (which is why the fighters of the UPA, the Home Army, the Baltic "forest brothers", etc. preferred to wear the uniform of the corresponding armed forces). However, a red stripe on a headdress or even an armband will also do.

Secondly, openly carry weapons. Thirdly, observe the norms and customs of war. And, finally, fourthly, to be not a "free shooter", but part of a detachment that has a responsible commander.

Therefore, alas and oh, but Oleg Koshevoy, who was detained in civilian clothes without any distinguishing mark and with a weapon in his pocket, according to all norms of international law, was a military (that is, criminal) criminal and was shot in full accordance with the norms of international law. Like all, without exception, underground workers who carried weapons in secret.

The notorious Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya was twice a criminal. Firstly, because she - like Koshevoy - was taken in civilian clothes with a revolver in her pocket and, secondly, because the purpose of her assignment was to fulfill Stalin's savage order No. 0428, in comparison with which all Nazi occupation orders - petty mischief.

One can, of course, say that this international law we have no decree in our "holy war" ... but this automatically puts the Red Army on the same level as the Einsatzgruppen, and the Stalinist regime - with the Nazi (also grossly violating the Hague Convention).

A responsible historian (unlike an agitprop worker) has no right to ignore international military law. Therefore, the activities of the "Young Guard" must be considered, including from a legal point of view.

.... the reality of life "under the occupiers" in Krasnodon was strikingly different from propaganda propaganda (although, it should be noted, in his novel Fadeev also draws a completely calm and comfortable life, the quality of which was an order of magnitude superior to life "under Stalin"). With these realities, I strongly recommend that the "patriots" who foam at the mouth spread agitprop tales about the "Slavic Holocaust", "Plan Ost", etc., foam at the mouth.

First, the occupiers eliminated criminality. Harsh and inevitable punishments. For petty theft, the perpetrators were mercilessly flogged (by the way, in full accordance with the traditions of the Don Cossacks). For larger ones, they were shot and hanged. But when the "liberators" swooped down ... then such a wave of criminality arose that they could not appease even until the 60s. Either it wasn’t before, or the methods turned out to be inappropriate ...

Yes, the occupiers introduced compulsory labor service (where would we be without it). But, firstly, it was much softer than labor mobilization at defensive facilities under Soviet rule. And, secondly, this duty guaranteed a piece of bread - and better and more than "under the Soviets." The occupiers allowed private property and private enterprise, which instantly filled the markets with goods. Yes, and there were no "requisitions" at all. The occupiers either paid for food (usually in Soviet rubles, although it happened that they also used special “occupation stamps”), or exchanged them for goods that the local population, living in poverty under the Soviets, did not see in the “Stalin’s paradise”.

Mines were restored, private shops, enterprises and even restaurants were opened. By the way, although units of the Wehrmacht entered Krasnodon on July 20, 1942 (without meeting the slightest resistance, it should be noted), the occupation administration was appointed only at the end of August. For a month, a real self-government existed in the city (also not such a rarity in the occupied territories of the USSR).

It is very important that there was no trace of any arbitrariness of the occupation administration. First, the occupiers did not interfere in the day-to-day activities of the magistrate. Secondly, they introduced a clear system of laws and regulations, which were unconditionally followed. The notorious "Ordnung" was introduced, in other words. The population, tired of the insane and endless arbitrariness and lies of Stalin's officials, breathed a sigh of relief.

An interesting touch - in the same district hospital In Krasnodon, wounded Wehrmacht servicemen, and captured Red Army soldiers, and local residents were treated. However, it has long been known that the medical staff of the Wehrmacht and even the Waffen-SS did not care who to treat. The Hippocratic Oath, however...

In short, the occupiers tried with all their might to ensure a calm, working rear. Therefore, they tried to provide the population with the most comfortable living conditions (as far as it was generally possible in wartime conditions and the unconditional priority of the interests of the occupiers). As a result, there were simply no incentives for organizing resistance among the population of Krasnodon. And since the NKVD simply could not technically throw “external” detachments into the Donetsk steppes, it was impossible to provoke the Germans into repressions against the population.

Therefore, the archival documents of the occupiers inexorably testify: not a single occupier or collaborator in the territory of the Krasnodonsky district suffered from the hands of partisans or underground fighters.
What does the "Young Guard" mean for an impartial researcher? But only one thing - during its existence, this organization did absolutely nothing that could somehow attract the attention of the local police. That is, the burning of the exchange, and the release of prisoners of war, and leaflets, and red flags - all these are myths of Soviet and Russian agitprop. Pure water myths.
the robbery of cars with gifts could well have been an ordinary criminal "trial on business" that had nothing to do with the activities of the "Young Guard". Judging by the fact that food and cigarettes were put on sale through markets and restaurants, it was so. But in any case, this trick of teenagers (Moshkov and Tretyakevich were 18-19 years old) had the most tragic consequences. And for them, and for many dozens of boys and girls of Krasnodon.

For the disclosure of a criminal case, of course, raises the prestige of the chief of police in the eyes of his superiors. But not as far as the disclosure of a huge, ramified underground organization. As soon as Moshkov, Tretyakevich, and then Zemnukhov ended up in a prison cell, Solikovsky immediately remembered Pocheptsov's denunciation. Realizing that fate gives him a great chance to earn a lot of points in the eyes of the German authorities (not at all superfluous on the eve of the inevitable evacuation).
The robbery of Moshkov / Stakhovich and the denunciation of Pocheptsov launched a terrible, inhuman machine, which crushed the “Young Guards”. If you believe the official version, then with monstrous, insane, inhuman cruelty ...

Why not believe? Let's turn to the physical evidence. The bodies of the Young Guard were thrown into the pit No. 5 of one of the Krasnodon mines. The depth of the pit is 80 meters. This is the height of a 27-storey building. Ask any forensic scientist (or just a pathologist) - what will happen to human body when falling from such a height onto frozen rock? And if you lower a couple of trolleys from above? How can one distinguish intravital injuries from post-mortem ones?

Even if you really want to distinguish. And if we take into account that the investigation in the Young Guard case was conducted, in fact, by the same forensic experts who, without batting an eyelid, recognized the Katyn execution as the work of the Germans ... then the reliability of their conclusions raises, to put it mildly, serious doubts. There is no confidence in the testimony of police investigators in this part - the NKVD knew how to convince them to give the “necessary” testimony. For these were exactly the same investigators (in fact, and even by name) who carried out the Great Terror. And the methods were the same. However, the shoulder masters of the allies did not go far from them. Until they were appeased by the "Malmedy case"...

Therefore, only one thing can be stated with certainty - the police investigators managed to get the “necessary” testimony from the boys and girls under investigation. And slanders of friends and acquaintances, and confessions of what they did not commit. As is often the case, the knocked-out (it is clear that certain measures of physical influence could not have been done) testimonies were then unceremoniously used by the masters of Stalin's agitprop, attributing to the Young Guard deeds that they did not commit.
Dropping into the mine alive, too, most likely clean water agitprop demonization of the enemy (as well as a strong exaggeration of the cruelty of physical influences). The pit was chosen, firstly, for convenience (digging a hole in frozen ground is not a pleasure) and, secondly, because it gave a chance to conceal the crime (hence the trolleys dropped from above). Therefore, most likely, the main group of the Young Guards was simply shot (along with five Jews who “came under the arm”). The rest (Koshevoy, Shevtsova and others) were shot later - in Rovenki.

Let's sum up the final results. The real “Young Guard” was a small group (about a dozen people) of Krasnodon boys and girls who refused to completely submit to the occupation authorities and went into some kind of “internal emigration”.

They created a secret society in the image and likeness of the Komsomol organization (the only model known to them), in which they observed certain rituals typical of such societies (oaths, membership cards, meetings, etc.). None active action this society did not fight against the invaders, although, perhaps, it was preparing an armed uprising in the city. And therefore, it did not cause any harm to the invaders and did not have the slightest influence on the course of the war, even locally.

Due to the betrayal of one of the members of the organization (apparently, more out of fear than for ideological or mercantile reasons), as well as a criminal offense committed by two members of the society, it "came on the radar" of the local police and gendarmerie. Who from their own selfish careerist interests came up with an organization and its actions that never existed and did not happen. As a result, both the members of this organization and other young men and women of the city who had nothing to do with it were arrested, subjected to harsh physical methods, and then shot.
Immediately upon the arrival of the invaders in Krasnodon, as many as two Cossack hundreds were formed. The Cossacks staged a parade in Krasnodon on October 24, 1941 and, having marched in front of German officers, swore allegiance to Hitler and received a blessing "to fight the enemy" from the local priest. Absolutely sincere, because the occupants of the church were restored and the priests were returned, and the "liberators" from the Red Army destroyed the church, and the priests were shot.

http://www.litsovet.ru/index.php/material.read?material_id=427684
See how simple it is? And you made up your mind.

And let's take the point of view of the bastard who composed the quoted opus. So to speak, underground workers, or rather, young hooligans, there were only about a dozen. They could not harm the Germans in any way, but they were caught stealing. Since the Germans fought crime, the thieves were imprisoned.
The Nazis would not touch the partisans if they wore badges or armbands with the inscription "partisans". But here Stalin is to blame, who did not sign the Hague Convention, sacred to the Germans.
The inhabitants of Krasnodon prospered under the Germans. There were no persecutions. So, they shot some communists ... But the communists were good too: it was they who killed the innocent Poles in Katyn.
In the rest, real European grace came: the mines worked, wages were paid, food and industrial goods were sold in stores, churches were opened and services began, a city government was appointed from the locals. Virtually overcame crime. Happy and grateful citizens formed hundreds of Cossacks to fight the Soviets.
But then something happened that is called the excess of the performer, and the police, consisting of local nuggets, overdid it a little. Wanting to receive a reward, instead of ten people, the police arrested a hundred. Then they tortured them a little, well, slightly, and shot them.

Is it normal to shoot a hundred young people just like that, for no reason? Perhaps the occupation was not such a happiness, as some Ukrainians, and even our fellow citizens, imagine today?

Needless to say, the inhabitants of Krasnodon themselves saw all the corpses and signs of torture. Here they are trying to prove that the injuries on the corpses are posthumous in nature, as if the experts (the same ones that worked in Katyn - there were no other experts in the USSR) all lied, etc. The stars on the back and on the face from falling into the mine in no way will not appear, and the breasts will not be cut off by themselves either.

Well, and most importantly, the policemen, under the leadership of their German superiors, did all this literally under the guns of the Soviet troops - it was clear that Krasnodon was about to be taken by the Red Army.
And the police tried to kill as many people as possible, young people at that. Did they do this so that the Germans would take them with them? After all, they didn't take them all anyway. Or did they not believe that the Red Army would take Krasnodon? Or were they driven by an incredible hatred for those who did not surrender to the Germans?

Exactly the same hatred that drives today those who write such opuses about the Young Guard, who these days slander the Victory.
Their faith in the West and hatred for the USSR and Russia is so great that even at the very last moment of their worthless life they will only think about how to harm us more.

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