Memoirs of eyewitnesses about the Leningrad blockade. Class hour on history on the topic: Children about the blockade of Leningrad

According to Vitya's memoirs, his brother got a stomach ulcer during the blockade, when he had to eat soap because of hunger. In the film "Soldier Ivan Brovkin" Leonid played just during the exacerbation of peptic ulcer, many scenes had to be re-shot because of his constantly red eyes ...

Ilya Glazunov with his mother Olga Konstantinovna.

He lost all his relatives who lived in the same apartment in besieged Leningrad.
They died in front of the boy: in January-February 1942 - uncle, then dad, grandmother, aunt. Mom died in April 1942.
Ilya at the age of 11 was taken out of the besieged city through Ladoga along the "Road of Life".

Lena Obraztsova. By the beginning of the blockade - 2 years:
- I remember air raids, bomb shelters, lines for bread in 40-degree frost, a hospital under the window where corpses were taken, a terrible famine when they cooked and ate everything that was made of genuine leather.

At the same time, Lena's grandmother, receiving 100 grams of bread per day, managed to keep the cat Kenka in the besieged city.
They were evacuated along Lake Ladoga to the Vologda region only in the spring of 1942.

Joseph Brodsky. Born in 1940, by the beginning of the war he was a year and a month old:
- Mother drags me on a sled through the streets littered with snow. Evening, spotlights roam the sky. Mother drags me past an empty bakery. This is near the Transfiguration Cathedral, not far from our house. This is what childhood is...
Evacuated in April 1942.

Valya Leontieva (first in the photo). By the beginning of the war - 17 years.

During the siege, Valya and his sister signed up for an air defense unit, but soon there was not enough food in the city, and their 60-year-old father became a donor in order to receive additional rations for his daughters. Once, while dismantling furniture for firewood, Mikhail Leontiev injured his hand, and he began to become infected with blood. The girls took him to the hospital, but he died there. Not from infection, but from hungry psychosis.

About that time, Valentina Leontieva said:
- In 1942, the "Road of Life" was opened, and we managed to leave. Me, my mother and sister Lucy got out. Mom saved us, forcing us to smoke so that we would be less hungry, but Lucy's son, whom she gave birth to at the beginning of the war, died on the road, her sister was not even allowed to bury him. She buried the baby's body in a nearby snowdrift...

Larisa Luzhina with her mother Evgenia Adolfovna and grandmother. By the beginning of the blockade - 2 years.

Larisa and her mother survived the blockade: when the "Road of Life" was opened, they were evacuated along Ladoga to the city of Leninsk-Kuznetsky Kemerovo region. The eldest six-year-old sister and the father who returned from the front after being wounded died of starvation, the grandmother died from a shell fragment.

Kira Kreilis-Petrova (pictured is the smallest in the center). In 1941 she is 10 years old.

It is believed that comedians ordinary life- dark and boring. But I'm not like that at all. I love to mix. Even in besieged Leningrad, in a bomb shelter, trying to calm the kids roaring with fear, she painted mustaches with soot and sang: "Peas are pouring from above, if only Hitler would die soon!"

Mom was offered to evacuate on the last barge, but she refused: "The war will not end today tomorrow." And all eight hundred and seventy-two days of the blockade we remained in Leningrad. We are me, mother Ekaterina Nikolaevna and elder sister Nadia. Father Alexander Nikolaevich was at the front.

From Kira's interview with 7 Days magazine:

There are few witnesses of those events, and it is more important than ever that every voice be heard.
But the blockade attackers are attacked from all sides, accused of lying. We agreed to the point that Leningrad should have been surrendered, and all our torment was in vain. But the blockade runners brought victory closer with their very lives. To be able to remain human inhuman conditions— is already a feat. And how many people found the strength to help their neighbors!
That went to Daniil Granin, who wrote about how fattened then the Soviet bosses. Already in the blockade, there was talk that the secretary of the Leningrad Regional Committee, Zhdanov, was baked rum women and brought peaches, and he was so full that he ran along the Smolny corridor, hoping to lose weight. The truth must be told about the war, only in this case it will not happen again. Therefore, I will tell everything as I remember myself.

The blockade is not only a constant, every second, tearing feeling of hunger. It is also anesthesia for someone else's grief. I was friends with the neighbor's children, Lucy and Kolya. Their father once collected family cards, bought them at once, and at home laid out food on the table and ate everything to the last crumb in front of his wife and children. The death of this family ran into the memory with vivid shots, as if from a newsreel. Their windows were almost flush with the ground, I often looked into them. Click: the father, who has fallen into madness, is hunched over in front of a potbelly stove, collecting lice from his clothes. He died first. Click: Kolka lies by the corpse of her mother, holding out her hands, as if in a plea for help. Click: Lucy is standing, pressed against the window glass, and suddenly grabs and stuffs a dead fly into her mouth. She was taken to Orphanage, issued rations, but did not follow. She ate it all at once and died immediately.

I remember the blockade spirit - the smell of death. You can’t get rid of it by holding your nose, it seeped under the skin ... An old teacher Serafima Antonovna lived behind our wall with her son Boris. He worked as a railway worker, they were not taken to the front. Already in the winter of 1941, mother and son were so exhausted that they fell ill. One day, Borin's young wife Vera announced that they were moving. The door was slammed. A few days passed, my mother hears a dull knock on the wall. He says to his sister: "Let's go and see, in my opinion, there is someone there." They tore off the boards, entered ... Lord! Both Boris and Serafima Antonovna ended up in the apartment. Exhausted, they lay in icy feces - there were terrible frosts, all in huge white lice. But both were still alive!

The old woman said that the daughter-in-law stole the cards from them and ran away. Mom brought them soup: that's what we called duranda - brown, dried pieces of cake that were soaked in salt water. I remember when they put the plate on a chair by the bed and spilled a little, Serafima Antonovna screamed so terribly ... Borya died almost immediately, we wrapped him in a sheet and dragged him up the stairs. And the old woman still lived, even wrote a will. She told her mother:
“I bequeath to you all our wealth. So that Verka does not get it.
- Why? Mom was genuinely surprised. “We will soon die ourselves.

But she wouldn’t take it anyway, she thought she had no right to it. She was principled, with character. Helped people. Once we were walking down the street, a woman fell in front of us and could not get up. We asked where she lives, picked her up by the arms, brought her, handed her over to her relatives. Many helped. But there were also those who crossed a certain inner barrier and ceased to be a person.

I still can’t forget the creepy carnivorous looks that I caught on myself. I was always strong, ruddy, in my childhood they even called me Pomodorchik. One evening I just entered the house - a knock on the door. I look into the hole, and there is an eye. Creepy, crazy. I hid, and the man began to fight with a dull cry of “Open, open!” Apparently, he tracked down the street. My mother was about to return, and what scared me the most was that she would run into him. Fortunately, it worked out. But one day, going to the bakery, I saw a dead woman on the road. When she returned, someone had already cut off pieces of flesh from the unfortunate woman.

They were then buried at the cemetery of the memory of the victims of the Ninth of January. At the exit, the soldiers pierced the sled with bayonets. If meat was found, they were shot on the spot. Cannibals were destroyed without trial or investigation. How did we manage to survive?"

On the picture: Shooting the film "Forest", 1980. Kira Kreilis-Petrova (Ulita), Vladimir Ilyin (cameraman), Stanislav Sadalsky (Bulanov), Lyudmila Tselikovskaya (Gurmyzhskaya), Vladimir Motyl (film director).

To the anniversary of the lifting of the blockade of Leningrad.

Children in besieged Leningrad: just memories of different people...

“By the beginning of the war, I was not even 7 years old. In October 1941, after the bombing and the wound, my mother took me to get dressed at the polyclinic on Krasnaya Street. All the way she instructed me that I should not cry when the nurse would take it off, or rather tear off the old bandage: “It’s a shame to cry. It’s hard for everyone, it’s hard, it hurts, not only for you, clench your fists and be silent.”

"... The townspeople quickly ate all their supplies in their homes. They cooked stew from wood glue tiles… All the cats and dogs disappeared in the city… My relatives went to work, and I was left alone in an empty apartment and lay on the bed. When leaving, the adults left me a mug of water and a small piece of bread. Sometimes rats came for him, I called them "pussies"
". "We did not know another life, did not remember it. It seemed that this is normal life- siren, cold, bombings, rats, darkness in the evenings ... However, I think with horror how mom and dad must have felt, seeing how their children are slowly moving towards starvation. I can only envy their courage, their fortitude.”


“Once in October, my mother took me with her to the bakery for bread ... I suddenly saw a fake roll in the window and screamed that I wanted it. The queue began to explain to me that this is not a real “bun” and you can’t eat it, you can break your teeth. But I didn’t hear anything anymore, I didn’t understand, I saw a roll and wanted it. I started to break free, rush to the window, a tantrum began with me ... "
“Schools closed one after another because there were fewer and fewer students. And they went to school mainly because they gave a bowl of soup there. I remember roll calls before classes, at each of which it sounded - died, died, died ... "


“Mom admitted that she could not look into our sunken eyes, and muffled her conscience, she once caught the same hungry cat in the basement. And so that no one could see, she immediately skinned him. I remember that for many years after the war, my mother brought home unfortunate stray cats, wounded dogs, various tailless birds, which we cured and fed.
Mom's milk was gone, and Verochka had nothing to feed her. She died of starvation in August 1942 (she was only 1 year and 3 months old). For us it was the first ordeal. I remember: my mother was lying on the bed, her legs were swollen, and Verochka's body was lying on a stool, my mother put nickels in her eyes.


“Every day I wanted to eat more and more. Hunger accumulated in the body. So today, I am writing these lines, and I am so hungry, as if I had not eaten for a long time. This feeling of hunger always haunts me. From hunger, people became dystrophic or swollen. I was swollen and it was funny to me, I slapped my cheeks, letting out air, showing off how plump I am.
“Of our entire densely populated communal apartment, three of us remained in the blockade - me, my mother and a neighbor, the most educated, most intelligent Varvara Ivanovna. When the most difficult times came, her mind was clouded by hunger. Every evening she guarded my mother from work in the common kitchen. “Zinochka,” she asked her, “perhaps the baby’s meat is delicious, but the bones are sweet?”
“People were dying right on the go. Drove a sled - and fell. There was a dullness, the presence of death was felt nearby. I woke up at night and felt - live mom or not".


"... Mom ended up in the hospital. As a result, my brother and I were left alone in the apartment. One day my father came and took us to the orphanage, which was located near the Frunze school. I remember how dad walked, holding on to the walls of the houses, and led two half-dead children, hoping that maybe strangers would save them.


“Once for lunch we were served soup, and for the second cutlet with a side dish. Suddenly, the girl Nina sitting next to me fainted. She was brought to her senses, and she again lost consciousness. When we asked her what was going on, she replied that she could not calmly eat cutlets from her brother's meat ... ... It turned out that in Leningrad during the blockade, her mother hacked her son to death and made cutlets. At the same time, the mother threatened Nina that if she did not eat cutlets, then she would suffer the same fate.
“My sister came out to me, put me on a bench and said that my mother had recently died. ... I was informed that they take all the corpses to the Moscow region to a brick factory and burn them there. ... The wooden fence was almost completely dismantled for firewood, so it was possible to get quite close to the stoves. The workers laid the dead on the conveyor, turned on the machines, and the corpses fell into the oven. It seemed that they were moving their arms and legs and thus resisting burning. I stood dumbfounded for a few minutes and went home. That was my farewell to my mother."

"The first to die of hunger was mine brother Lenya - he was 3 years old. His mother took him to the cemetery on a sled and buried him in the snow. A week later I went to the cemetery, but only his remains were lying there - all the soft places were cut out. They ate him."
“The corpses lay in the room - there was no strength to take them out. They didn't decompose. The room had walls frozen through, frozen water in mugs, and not a grain of bread. Only corpses and me and my mother.”
“Once our flatmate offered my mother meatballs, but my mother sent her out and slammed the door. I was in indescribable horror - how could one refuse cutlets with such hunger. But my mother explained to me that they are made of human meat, because there is nowhere else to get minced meat in such a hungry time.
“Grandfather said to his father, who was leaving for the front:“ Well, Arkady, choose - Leo or Tatochka. Tatochka is eleven months old, Leo is six years old. Which of them will live? This is how the question was posed. And Tatochka was sent to an orphanage, where she died a month later. It was January 1942, the most difficult month of the year. It was very bad - terrible frosts, no light, no water ... "
“Once one of the guys told a friend his cherished dream - a barrel of soup. Mom heard and took him to the kitchen, asking the cook to come up with something. The cook burst into tears and said to her mother: “Don’t bring anyone else here ... there is absolutely no food left. There is only water in the pot. “Many children in our garden died of starvation - out of 35 of us, only 11 remained.”

“Employees of children's institutions received a special order: “Distract children from talking and talking about food.” But no matter how hard they tried, it didn't work. Six- and seven-year-old children, as soon as they woke up, began to list what their mother cooked for them, and how delicious it was.

“Not far away, on the Obvodny Canal, there was a flea market, and my mother sent me there to change a pack of Belomor for bread. I remember how a woman used to go there and ask for a loaf of bread for a diamond necklace.”
“The winter of 1942 was very cold. Sometimes she collected snow and thawed it, but she went to the Neva for water. Go far, slippery, I’ll carry it home, but I can’t climb the stairs, it’s all covered in ice, so I’m falling ... and there’s no water again, I enter the apartment with an empty bucket, It happened more than once. A neighbor, looking at me, said to her mother-in-law: “this one will soon die too, it will be possible to profit”
.”I remember February 1942, when bread was added to the cards for the first time. At 7 o'clock in the morning the shop was opened and an increase in bread was announced. People were crying so much that it seemed to me that the columns were trembling. It's been 71 years since then, and I can't enter the premises of this store."


“And then spring. The legs of the dead stick out of the melted snowdrifts, the city is frozen in sewage. We went out to clean up. Scrap is difficult to lift, difficult to break ice. But we cleaned the yards and streets, and in the spring the city shone with cleanliness.”
“When mail arrived at the pioneer camp where I ended up, it was a great event. And I received a long-awaited letter. I open it and freeze. It is not my mother who writes, but my aunt: “... You are already a big boy, and you should know. Mother and grandmother are no more. They died of starvation in Leningrad…”. Everything went cold inside. I don’t see anyone and I don’t hear anything, only tears flow like a river from wide-open eyes.”
“I worked alone in the family during the war. Received 250 grams of bread. Mom and older sister with their little daughter only 125 grams each. I was losing weight, my mother was losing weight, my niece was losing weight, and my sister was plump. At the age of 17, I weighed a little over 30 kg. We’ll get up in the morning, I’ll cut off a strip of bread for each, save a small piece for lunch, the rest - in a chest of drawers ... The shell weighed 23-24 kilograms. And I’m small, thin, it happened that in order to raise a projectile, first I laid it on my stomach, then I stood on tiptoe, put it on a milling machine, then I wrapped it up, worked it out, then again on my stomach and back. The norm per shift was 240 shells.

Ivanova Olga
Synopsis of the NOD "Blockade of Leningrad" for older children up to school age

Target: the formation of intellectual competence preschoolers on examples of children's lives and adults behind enemy lines during the Great Patriotic War.

Integration of educational regions: "Knowledge", "Communication", "Socialization", "Health", "Artistic Creativity".

Tasks:

cognitive:

To give children knowledge about the importance of means of communication in informing people and the situation in the country and on the fronts of the Second World War;

develop performance about the organization of life and life of adults and children during the war;

expand knowledge children about the history of the hero city Leningrad about the heroism of people, children who survived the siege;

to teach to see the state of the city, to cultivate the ability to sympathize, empathize;

contribute to the formation of skills in establishing the simplest connections and relationships between facts and events of wartime;

promote the development of auditory and visual perception through the atmosphere prevailing in the group, video film and musical compositions.

Speech:

activate vocabulary children on lexical topic « Leningrad blockade» ;

develop the ability to answer questions with a full answer.

Socio-communicative:

to cultivate respect for veterans of the Second World War and home front workers, for women and children who survived all the horrors and hardships of wartime;

to cultivate love for the Fatherland, pride in their homeland, for their people.

Artistic and aesthetic:

consolidate the ability to assemble a whole image from parts;

learn to express the received emotions through the drawing.

Physical:

Develop motor activity associated with exercise.

Benefits and equipment:

presentation about blockade, split pictures, electronic media with musical compositions, a piece of black bread.

preliminary work:

learning poems about blockade, learning a song , thematic drawing, modeling.

The course of directly educational activities.

caregiver:

In one beautiful city there lived a girl. Her name was Tanya. Tanya Savicheva. The girl lived on Vasilyevsky Island, in a house that still stands today. She was big and friendly a family: mother, grandmother, brothers, sisters and two uncles. Tanechka lived very happily. Everyone loved and spoiled her, because she was the youngest. On holidays, the family gathered at a large table, everyone was cheerful and joyful, they loved to walk along Nevsky Prospekt.

Did you guess in which city the girl lived? (St. Petersburg)

At the time when Tanya lived, our city was called Leningrad. And suddenly, one day, all this happiness ended.

Children read by heart poetry:

Kyiv was bombed, they announced to us,

That the war has begun.

One summer day at dawn

Hitler ordered the troops

And sent German soldiers

Against the Russians, against us.

And menacing clouds of fascist blockade

erupted over the city Leningrad.

Song recording "Get up, the country is huge".

caregiver:

attacked our country Nazi Germany. The war has begun. Terrible, merciless. Cities collapsed, villages burned, bridges and factories exploded. All mans, old men and children from the age of 15 who could hold weapons in their hands went to the front. There they dug trenches, made dugouts and of course fought with the German troops, fought, but in moments of calm, they sat by the fire, remembered their loved ones, children, wives, mothers and sang songs.

Let's sit down by our fire now and sing a song of the war years “Fire is beating in a cramped stove.”

Children sing a song to a musical soundtrack.

caregiver:

The fascist army came so close to Leningrad that I could easily view the streets and avenues of our city. But not only to consider, but also to shoot at them. The Admiralty needle sparkling in the sun helped the Germans aim. They gladly spoke: "Great landmark! Watch and shoot!". And then we decided to call for help climbers who were able to climb so high and close the Admiralty needle with camouflage covers. The golden dome of St. Isaac's Cathedral was painted green. The sculptures of horse tamers from the Anichkov Bridge were removed and buried in the ground. Buried in the ground and sculptures in the Summer Garden. Everything around them took on a military look. The Nazis wanted not only to capture Leningrad and destroy it completely. In the autumn of 1941, they surrounded the city from all sides, captured the railway that connected Leningrad with the country.

Look (map, what does it look like? (circle, ring). So and spoke: "The ring around the city closed". This ring is also called blockade. All roads leading to our city were cut. There was only one left - on Lake Ladoga. The terrible 900 days dragged on. Every night the rumble of planes, explosions of bombs. Frosts came very early. It must have never been so cold before. Haven't been home all winter heating, water and light.

Let's make a circle that reminds us of a ring blockade, and then we will come closer to each other, hug and warm each other with our warmth.

Children read poetry:

Plywood boarded up our window

The city is quiet, very dark

The sound of airplanes is heard

They fly low over the roof.

Quietly with lips

Whisper understandable mom:

"Mom, I'm scared

Mom is 125 and no more grams.

Mom cuts her bread

And split it in half.

caregiver:

In the most difficult period blockade bread rations were very small. Here is a piece of bread given to a resident besieged Leningrad for the whole day(show). And that's all, nothing more - just water, for which they went to the Neva. From the last forces they carried water home, because there were waiting for those who could no longer walk at all. The city was plunged into silence, darkness, cold and hunger.

Tanechka went out into the street and did not recognize her city. What changed? (children compare photos with views of the city and black and white times blockade).

And even then the factories were working, tanks were leaving the Kirov factory for the front. Worked radio: transmitted news from the front, music, poetry. Often an artist or an announcer fainted from hunger, but the programs did not stop, because it was the only connection with the country.

The country has not forgotten Leningrad. A road was laid along Lake Ladoga, called the road of life. On it, under enemy fire, bread was transported to the city, and evacuated back old people and children, the wounded. They also evacuated Tanechka, because all her relatives died of hunger and cold and she was left alone. The road was swept up, cracks formed in the ice, enemy aircraft fired at cars - but the road existed.

When the ice melted, bread was transported on barges. In January 1944, our troops moved into offensive. January 18, 1944 the blockade was broken, and on January 27 Leningrad was completely freed from blockade.

Children read poetry:

AT blockade days

Under fire in the snow

Didn't give up, didn't give up

Our city to the enemy.

Here proud, brave people live.

And their valiant work is famous everywhere!

caregiver:

Many buildings in the liberated city were destroyed. Let's try to restore them.

The game "Cut Pictures".

caregiver:

At the place where the ring was broken blockade, now a monument is erected, which is called "Broken Ring". For courage and heroism, our city received the title « Hero cities» . We will never forget the feat of our countrymen. At the Piskarevsky cemetery, where thousands of Leningraders who died in the years blockade the mournful figure of the Motherland rises.

Guys, today we learned a lot of new things, you are great. I would like you to draw now what you remember the most. We will create an album of your drawings.

Children sit down to draw to the music "Scarlet sunsets."

The wars of 1941-1945 lack dramatic, tragic pages. One of the worst was the blockade of Leningrad. In short, this is the story of a real genocide of the townspeople, which lasted almost until the very end of the war. Let's recap how it all happened.

The attack on the "city of Lenin"

The attack on Leningrad began immediately, in 1941. The grouping of German-Finnish troops was successfully moving forward, breaking the resistance of the Soviet units. Despite the desperate, fierce resistance of the defenders of the city, by August of that year, all railways, which connected the city with the country, were cut, as a result of which the main part of the supply was disrupted.

So when did the blockade of Leningrad begin? Briefly list the events that preceded this, you can long. But the official date is September 8, 1941. Despite the fiercest battles on the outskirts of the city, the Nazis could not take it “with a swoop”. And therefore, on September 13, artillery shelling of Leningrad began, which actually continued throughout the war.

The Germans had a simple order regarding the city: wipe it off the face of the earth. All defenders were to be destroyed. According to other sources, Hitler simply feared that during a massive assault, the losses of German troops would be unreasonably high, and therefore ordered the blockade to begin.

In general, the essence of the blockade of Leningrad was to ensure that "the city itself fell into the hands, like a ripened fruit."

Population Information

It must be remembered that at that time there were at least 2.5 million inhabitants in the blockaded city. Among them were about 400 thousand children. Almost immediately, food problems began. Constant stress and fear from bombing and shelling, lack of medicines and food soon led to the fact that the townspeople began to die.

It was estimated that during the entire blockade, at least a hundred thousand bombs and about 150 thousand shells were dropped on the heads of the inhabitants of the city. All this led to both mass deaths of the civilian population and catastrophic destruction of the most valuable architectural and historical heritage.

The first year turned out to be the most difficult: German artillery managed to bomb food warehouses, as a result of which the city was almost completely deprived of food supplies. However, there is also an opposite opinion.

The fact is that by 1941 the number of residents (registered and visitors) totaled about three million people. The bombed Badaev warehouses simply could not physically accommodate such a quantity of products. Many modern historians quite convincingly prove that there was no strategic reserve at that time. So even if the warehouses had not been damaged by the actions of German artillery, this would have delayed the onset of famine in best case for a week.

In addition, just a few years ago, some documents from the archives of the NKVD concerning the pre-war survey of the strategic reserves of the city were declassified. The information in them paints an extremely disappointing picture: “Butter is covered with a layer of mold, stocks of flour, peas and other cereals are affected by ticks, the floors of storage facilities are covered with a layer of dust and rodent droppings.”

Disappointing conclusions

From September 10 to 11, the responsible authorities made a complete re-account of all food available in the city. By September 12, a full report was published, according to which the city had: grain and ready-made flour for about 35 days, stocks of cereals and pasta were enough for a month, meat stocks could be stretched for the same period.

Oils remained exactly for 45 days, but sugar and ready-made confectionery products were in store for two months at once. There were practically no potatoes and vegetables. In order to somehow stretch the stocks of flour, 12% of ground malt, oatmeal and soy flour were added to it. Subsequently, cakes, bran, sawdust and ground bark of trees began to be put there.

How was the food problem solved?

From the very first days of September food cards were introduced in the city. All canteens and restaurants were immediately closed. Livestock owned by local businesses Agriculture, was immediately packed and handed over to procurement points. All feed of grain origin was brought to flour mills and ground into flour, which was subsequently used to make bread.

Citizens who were in hospitals during the blockade were cut out rations for this period from coupons. The same procedure applied to children who were in orphanages and institutions preschool education. Virtually all schools have canceled classes. For children, the breakthrough of the blockade of Leningrad was marked not so much by the opportunity to finally eat, but by the long-awaited start of classes.

In general, these cards cost the lives of thousands of people, as the cases of theft and even murder committed in order to obtain them increased dramatically in the city. In Leningrad in those years, there were frequent cases of raids and armed robberies of bakeries and even food warehouses.

With persons who were convicted of something like this, they did not stand on ceremony, shooting on the spot. There were no courts. This was explained by the fact that each stolen card cost someone a life. These documents were not restored (with rare exceptions), and therefore the theft doomed people to certain death.

The mood of the inhabitants

In the early days of the war, few believed in the possibility complete blockade, but many began to prepare for this turn of events. In the very first days of the German offensive that began, everything more or less valuable was swept off the shelves of stores, people removed all their savings from the Savings Bank. Even jewelry stores were empty.

However, the famine that began sharply crossed out the efforts of many people: money and jewelry immediately depreciated. Food cards (which were obtained exclusively by robbery) and food became the only currency. In the city markets, one of the most hot goods There were kittens and puppies.

Documents of the NKVD testify that the blockade of Leningrad that had begun (the photo of which is in the article) gradually began to inspire anxiety in people. Quite a few letters were confiscated, in which the townspeople reported on the plight of Leningrad. They wrote that not even cabbage leaves were left in the fields; in the city it was already impossible to get old flour dust, from which wallpaper paste was previously made.

By the way, in the most difficult winter of 1941, there were practically no apartments left in the city, the walls of which would be covered with wallpaper: hungry people simply cut them off and ate, since they had no other food.

Labor feat of Leningraders

Despite the enormity of the situation, courageous people continued to work. And to work for the good of the country, releasing a lot of weapons. They even managed to repair tanks, make cannons and submachine guns literally from "grass material". All weapons received in such difficult conditions were immediately used for fighting on the outskirts of the unconquered city.

But the situation with food and medicine became more complicated day by day. It soon became obvious that only Lake Ladoga could save the inhabitants. How is it connected with the blockade of Leningrad? In short, this is the famous Road of Life, which was opened on November 22, 1941. As soon as a layer of ice formed on the lake, which theoretically could withstand the cars loaded with products, their crossing began.

The beginning of the famine

Hunger was approaching inexorably. As early as November 20, 1941, the grain allowance was only 250 grams per day for workers. As for dependents, women, children and the elderly, they were supposed to be half as much. First, the workers, who saw the condition of their relatives and friends, brought their rations home and shared with them. But soon this practice was put to an end: people were ordered to eat their portion of bread directly at the enterprise, under supervision.

This is how the blockade of Leningrad went. The photos show how exhausted the people who were in the city at that time were. For every death from an enemy shell, there were a hundred people who died of terrible hunger.

At the same time, it must be understood that “bread” in this case was understood as a small piece of sticky mass, in which there was much more bran, sawdust and other fillers than the flour itself. Accordingly, the nutritional value of such food was close to zero.

When the blockade of Leningrad was broken, people who for the first time in 900 days received fresh bread often fainted from happiness.

On top of all the problems, the city water supply system completely failed, as a result of which the townspeople had to carry water from the Neva. In addition, the winter of 1941 itself turned out to be extremely severe, so that doctors simply could not cope with the influx of frostbitten, cold people, whose immunity was unable to resist infections.

Consequences of the first winter

By the beginning of winter, the grain ration had almost doubled. Alas, this fact was explained not by the breaking of the blockade and not by the restoration of normal supplies: by that time, half of all dependents had already died. Documents of the NKVD testify to the fact that the famine took absolutely incredible forms. Cases of cannibalism began, and many researchers believe that no more than a third of them were officially recorded.

Children were especially bad at that time. Many of them were forced to stay alone for a long time in empty, cold apartments. If their parents died of starvation at work or if they died during constant shelling, the children spent 10-15 days in complete solitude. More often than not, they also died. Thus, the children of the blockade of Leningrad endured a lot on their fragile shoulders.

Front-line soldiers recall that it was Leningraders who always stood out among the crowd of seven-eight-year-old teenagers in the evacuation: they had creepy, tired, and too adult eyes.

By the middle of the winter of 1941, there were no cats and dogs left on the streets of Leningrad, there were practically no even crows and rats. Animals have learned that it is better to stay away from hungry people. All the trees in the city squares lost most of their bark and young branches: they were collected, ground and added to flour, just to slightly increase its volume.

The blockade of Leningrad lasted less than a year at that time, but during the autumn cleaning, 13 thousand corpses were found on the streets of the city.

The road of life

The real “pulse” of the besieged city was the Road of Life. In summer it was a waterway through the waters of Lake Ladoga, and in winter this role was played by its frozen surface. The first barges with food passed through the lake already on September 12th. Navigation continued until the thickness of the ice made it impossible for ships to pass.

Each flight of sailors was a feat, as German planes did not stop hunting even for a minute. I had to go on flights every day, in all weather conditions. As we have already said, the cargo was first sent over the ice on November 22. It was a horse carriage. After just a couple of days, when the thickness of the ice became more or less sufficient, the trucks also set off.

No more than two or three bags of food were put on each car, since the ice was still too unreliable and cars constantly sank. Deadly flights continued until the spring. Barges took over the “watch”. The end of this deadly carousel was put only by the liberation of Leningrad from the blockade.

Road number 101, as this road was then called, made it possible not only to maintain at least the minimum food ration, but also to take many thousands of people out of the blockaded city. The Germans constantly tried to interrupt the message, not sparing for this shells and fuel for aircraft.

Fortunately, they did not succeed, and today the Road of Life monument stands on the shores of Lake Ladoga, as well as the Museum of the Siege of Leningrad, which contains many documentary evidence of those terrible days.

In many respects, the success with the organization of the crossing was due to the fact that the Soviet command quickly attracted fighter aircraft to defend the lake. In winter, anti-aircraft batteries were mounted directly on the ice. notice, that Taken measures gave very positive results: for example, on January 16, more than 2,500 tons of food were delivered to the city, although only 2,000 tons were planned.

The Beginning of Freedom

So when did the long-awaited lifting of the blockade of Leningrad take place? As soon as near Kursk german army the first major defeat was inflicted, the country's leadership began to think about how to free the imprisoned city.

The actual lifting of the blockade of Leningrad began on January 14, 1944. The task of the troops was to break through the German defense in its thinnest place to restore the land communication of the city with the rest of the country. By January 27, fierce battles began, in which the Soviet units gradually gained the upper hand. It was the year of lifting the blockade of Leningrad.

The Nazis were forced to start a retreat. Soon the defense was broken through in a section about 14 kilometers long. Along this path, columns of trucks with food immediately went into the city.

So how long did the blockade of Leningrad last? Officially, it is believed that it lasted 900 days, but the exact duration is 871 days. However, this fact does not in the least detract from the determination and incredible courage of its defenders.

Liberation Day

Today is the day of lifting the blockade of Leningrad - this is January 27th. This date is not a holiday. Rather, it is a constant reminder of the horrifying events that the inhabitants of the city were forced to go through. In fairness, it should be said that the real day of lifting the blockade of Leningrad is January 18, since the corridor we were talking about was broken through on that very day.

That blockade claimed more than two million lives, and mostly women, children and the elderly died there. As long as the memory of those events is alive, nothing like this should be repeated in the world!

Here is the entire blockade of Leningrad briefly. Of course, that terrible time can be described quickly enough, only the blockade survivors who were able to survive it remember those horrific events every day.

When the blockade ring was closed, in addition to the adult population, 400 thousand children remained in Leningrad - from infants to schoolchildren and adolescents. Naturally, they wanted to save them in the first place, they tried to hide them from shelling and bombing. Comprehensive care for children and in those conditions was feature Leningraders. And she gave special strength to adults, raised them to work and fight, because it was possible to save children only by defending the city ...

Alexander Fadeev in travel notes " During the blockade" wrote:

“Children of school age can be proud that they defended Leningrad together with their fathers, mothers, older brothers and sisters.

The great work of protecting and saving the city, serving and saving the family fell to the lot of Leningrad boys and girls. They put out tens of thousands of lighters dropped from planes, they put out more than one fire in the city, they were on duty on the watchtowers on frosty nights, they carried water from an ice-hole on the Neva, they stood in lines for bread ...

And they were equal in that duel of nobility, when the elders tried to quietly give their share to the younger ones, and the younger ones did the same in relation to the elders. And it's hard to understand who died more in this fight".

The whole world was shocked by the diary of a little Leningrad girl Tanya Savicheva: “Grandmother died on January 25 ...”, “Uncle Alyosha on May 10 ...”, “Mom on May 13 at 7.30 in the morning ...”, “Everyone died. Only Tanya remained. The notes of this girl, who died in 1945 in the evacuation, became one of the formidable accusations against fascism, one of the symbols of the blockade.

They had a special, war-scorched, blockade childhood. They grew up in conditions of hunger and cold, under the whistle and explosions of shells and bombs. It was its own world, with special difficulties and joys, with its own scale of values. Open today the monograph "Children of the Blockade Draw".

Shurik Ignatiev, three and a half years old, May 23, 1942 kindergarten He covered his paper with chaotic pencil scribbles with a small oval in the center. "What did you draw!" the teacher asked. He replied: "This is a war, that's all, but in the middle of the roll. I don't know anything else." They were just as blockaders as adults.” And they died the same way.

The only transport highway connecting the city with the rear regions of the country was the "Road of Life", laid across Lake Ladoga. During the days of the blockade along this road from September 1941 to November 1943, 1 million 376 thousand Leningraders, mostly women, children and the elderly, were evacuated. The war scattered them different corners Union, their destinies developed differently, many did not return.

Existence in a besieged city was unthinkable without hard, everyday work. The children were also workers. They managed to distribute their forces in such a way that they were enough not only for family, but also for public affairs. Pioneers delivered mail to homes. When the bugle sounded in the yard, it was necessary to go down for the letter. They sawed firewood and carried water to the families of the Red Army. Mended linen for the wounded and performed before them in hospitals. The city could not save children from malnutrition, from exhaustion, but nevertheless everything that was possible was done for them.

Despite the harsh conditions of the front-line city, the Leningrad City Party Committee and the City Council of Working People's Deputies decided to continue educating children. At the end of October 1941, 60,000 schoolchildren of grades 1-4 began their studies in the bomb shelters of schools and households, and from November 3, more than 30,000 students of grades 1-4 sat down at their desks in 103 schools in Leningrad.

Under the conditions of besieged Leningrad, it was necessary to link education with the defense of the city, to teach students to overcome the difficulties and hardships that arose at every step and grew every day. And the Leningrad school coped with this difficult task with honor. Classes were held in an unusual setting. Often during the lesson, a siren was heard announcing the next bombing or shelling.

The students quickly and orderly descended into the bomb shelter, where classes continued. The teachers had two lesson plans for the day: one for working under normal conditions, the other in case of shelling or bombing. The training took place on a reduced curriculum, which included only the main subjects. Each teacher sought to conduct classes with students as accessible, interesting, and meaningful as possible.

"I am preparing for the lessons in a new way,” wrote K.V. Polzikova - Nothing superfluous, a mean, clear story. It is difficult for children to prepare lessons at home; so you need to help them in class. We do not keep any notes in notebooks: it is hard. But the story must be interesting. Oh, how it is necessary! Children have so much heavy hearts, so many worries, that they will not listen to dull speech. And you can't show them how hard it is for you either.".

Studying in the harsh conditions of winter was a feat. Teachers and students themselves produced fuel, carried water on sleds, and kept the school clean. The schools became unusually quiet, the children stopped running and making noise during breaks, their pale and haggard faces spoke of severe suffering. The lesson lasted 20-25 minutes: neither the teachers nor the schoolchildren could stand it anymore. No records were kept, because in the unheated classrooms, not only thin children's hands froze, but ink also froze.

Talking about this unforgettable time, the 7th grade students of the 148th school wrote in their collective diary:

"The temperature is 2-3 degrees below zero. Dim winter, the light timidly breaks through the only small glass in the only window. The students huddle against the open door of the stove, shivering from the cold, which in a sharp frosty stream breaks from under the cracks of the doors, runs through the whole body. A persistent and evil wind drives the smoke back, from the street through a primitive chimney straight into the room... Your eyes water, it's hard to read, and it's completely impossible to write. We sit in coats, galoshes, gloves and even headdresses... "

Pupils who continued to study in the harsh winter of 1941-1942 were respectfully called "winterers".

In addition to the meager bread rations, the children received soup at school without cutting coupons from the ration card. With the beginning of the operation of the Ladoga ice track, tens of thousands of schoolchildren were evacuated from the city. The year 1942 came. Vacations were announced in schools where classes did not stop. And on unforgettable January days, when the entire adult population of the city was starving, in schools, theaters, concert halls Christmas trees were organized for children with gifts and a hearty lunch. For little Leningraders it was a real big holiday.

One of the students wrote about this New Year's tree: "January 6. Today there was a tree, and what a magnificent one! True, I hardly listened to the play: I kept thinking about dinner. The dinner was wonderful. The children ate slowly and with concentration, without losing a crumb. They knew the price of bread, for dinner they gave noodle soup, porridge, bread and jelly, everyone was very pleased. This Christmas tree will remain in memory for a long time."

There were new Year gifts, the participant of the blockade P.P. Danilov: "From the contents of the gift, I remember linseed cake sweets, a gingerbread and 2 tangerines. At that time it was a very good treat."

For students in grades 7-10, Christmas trees were arranged in the premises of the Drama Theater. Pushkin, the Bolshoi Drama and the Maly Opera Theatres. The surprise was that all theaters had electric lighting. Brass bands played. At the Drama Theatre. Pushkin was given a performance " Noble Nest", in the Bolshoi Drama Theater - "The Three Musketeers". In the Maly Opera Theater, the holiday opened with the play "The Gadfly".

And in the spring the "garden life" began for schoolchildren. In the spring of 1942, thousands of children and teenagers came to the empty, depopulated workshops of enterprises. At the age of 12-15, they became machine operators and assemblers, produced submachine guns and machine guns, artillery and rockets.

So that they could work at machine tools and assembly workbenches, wooden stands were made for them. When on the eve of breaking the blockade, delegations from front-line units began to arrive at the enterprises, experienced soldiers swallowed tears, looking at the posters over the workplaces of boys and girls. It was written there by their hands: "I will not leave until I fulfill the norm!"

Hundreds of young Leningraders were awarded orders, thousands - medals "For the Defense of Leningrad". Through the whole many months of the epic of the heroic defense of the city, they passed as worthy comrades-in-arms of adults. There were no such events, campaigns and cases in which they did not participate.

Clearing attics, fighting lighters, putting out fires, removing rubble, clearing the city of snow, caring for the wounded, growing vegetables and potatoes, working on the production of weapons and ammunition - children's hands were everywhere. On an equal footing, with a sense of accomplishment, Leningrad boys and girls met with their peers - the "sons of the regiments" who received awards on the battlefields.

Photos of children - blockade