Particular attention in the press was paid to besieged Leningrad and the image of a Leningrader, whose very life in a besieged city became a feat. The newspapers “Leningradskaya Pravda”, “On Guard of the Motherland”, and the youth newspaper “Smena” were published in the city, which published essays and articles about the defenders of Leningrad and the residents of the city.

“Pravda” and other central newspapers published “Leningrad Stories” by N. Tikhonov, telling about the heroic resilience of Leningraders. These stories are truthful and sincere to the extreme - after all, Tikhonov himself lived in Leningrad, he knew firsthand about the hardships of the blockade and the dedication of the city’s residents. Here are a few lines from his story “In the Iron Nights of Leningrad...”:

“Everything that happened was only the beginning of such trials that the residents of the city had never dreamed of. And these tests came!
Cars and trams were frozen into the ice and stood like statues on the streets, covered with white bark. Fires were burning over the city. Days have come that the most irrepressible science fiction writer could not have dreamed up. The pictures of Dante's Inferno faded because they were only pictures, but here life itself took the trouble to show the surprised eyes an unprecedented reality. She put a person on the edge of an abyss, as if she was testing what he was capable of, how he was alive, where he got his strength... It’s hard for anyone who hasn’t experienced it himself to imagine all this, it’s hard to believe that it happened like that...” .

In 1943 Tikhonov's essays were published in the collections "The Leningrad Year" and "Leningrad Takes the Battle."

On the postcard is an illustration by V. Morozov for Tikhonov’s book “The Leningrad Year”

And, although Tikhonov’s stories are not about military exploits, they are still about heroism - the heroism of ordinary residents of Leningrad, who had the strength to withstand inhuman tests. And the readers of these stories believed that the Soviet man would be able to overcome everything, that he would stand and not surrender to the enemy.

Nikolai Semenovich Tikhonov (1896-1979) - Russian Soviet poet. During the Great Patriotic War he worked in the Political Directorate of the Leningrad Front. He wrote essays and stories, articles and leaflets, poems and appeals. Poems from this period were included in the book “The Year of Fire” (1942), the most famous work of the war years is the poem “Kirov is with us.” For participation in the Great Patriotic War he received awards: Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree, medal “For the Defense of Leningrad”. He was awarded the Stalin Prize of the first degree (1942) - for the poem “Kirov is with us” (1941) and the poems “In the forests, in the mossy glades...”, “That whirlwind of national glory is growing and making noise...” and others.

Olga Berggolts also lived and worked in besieged Leningrad. She wrote, hosted radio broadcasts, and was called “the voice of besieged Leningrad,” “the muse of besieged Leningrad.” In 1942, Bergholz wrote two poems dedicated to the defenders of Leningrad: “February Diary” and “Leningrad Poem”. Olga spent all 900 days of the siege in Leningrad. In her work, she painted images of the city and its inhabitants, experiencing terrible hardships, but still unconquered:
No, we're not crying. Tears are not enough for the heart.
Hatred prevents us from crying.
For us, hatred has become the key to life:
unites, warms and leads.
(from the poem “February Diary”, January-February 1942)

Olga Fedorovna Berggolts (1910 -1975) - Russian Soviet poetess, prose writer. Since August 1941 she worked on radio. On June 3, 1942, Olga Berggolts was awarded the medal “For the Defense of Leningrad.”

Nikolai Tikhonov and Olga Berggolts are just two examples of many.
On Leningrad radio, which never stopped broadcasting for a day, Vs. Vishnevsky, A. Prokofiev, V. Sayanov, N. Tikhonov and many other cultural figures.
And not only the images they created, but they themselves were an example of heroic fortitude for the city residents and strengthened their faith in their own strength.

Toys of Leningrad children

125 grams of blockade bread...

Classes in a bomb shelter...

This year, January 27, marks 70 years since the siege of Leningrad was lifted. It lasted 872 long days and claimed the lives of one and a half million people. Surrounded by adults during these most difficult days for the city were 400 thousand children.

Start

The capture of Leningrad was one of the points of the German Barbarossa plan. The Nazis believed that during the summer and autumn the Soviet Union would be defeated and the city on the Neva would be taken. But their plans did not come true. The defenders of Leningrad managed to stop enemy troops 4-7 kilometers from the city. The city was not captured, but its inhabitants found themselves surrounded by a blockade, cut off from the outside world.

Hitler decided to wipe Leningrad off the face of the earth. To do this, fire at it from artillery and continuously bomb it, strangling it with hunger. On German maps, objects such as schools, hospitals, pioneer palaces, and museums were marked for bombing. In the fall of 1941 alone, about 100 raids were carried out on Leningrad and 65 thousand incendiary and 3055 high-explosive bombs were dropped.

The picture shows the toys of Leningrad children who were evacuated from Leningrad to the mainland on a barge. The transport with children was subjected to enemy bombing and was flooded. Tens of years later, these toys were found at the bottom of Lake Ladoga. None of the little owners of these dolls, bears, and rattles survived.

During the air raid, when city residents were hiding in bomb shelters, air defense fighters were on duty on the roofs of houses and schools. Children helped them. The “lighter,” which hissed and splashed, was quickly grabbed with long tongs and extinguished by putting it in a box of sand or throwing it down to the ground. We couldn’t miss a second, so we had to move quickly along the sloping and slippery roof. The nimble guys did it well. There could have been hundreds of times more fires if the children had not lubricated the wooden attic floors with a special anti-fire mixture developed by Leningrad scientists.

Blockade

But the death of civilians during shelling was only the beginning of the disasters that befell the city. The power plants stopped working and the city plunged into darkness.

The most difficult time began: the winter of 1941-1942. Leningrad was covered with snow and 40 degree frosts hit. The fuel ran out and the interior walls of the apartments were covered in frost. Leningraders began installing iron temporary stoves in their rooms. They burned tables, chairs, cabinets, and sofas. And then books.

Water and sewer pipes froze, leaving people without water. Now it could only be taken from the Neva and Fontanka.

“I was ten years old,” recalls one of the residents of the besieged city, A. Molchanov. - I went for water with a kettle. I was so weak that while I was fetching water, I rested several times. Previously, when climbing the stairs, I ran, jumping over the steps. And now, going up the stairs, he often sat down and rested. What I was most afraid of was that I might not be able to carry the kettle of water, I would fall and spill it.

We were so exhausted that when we went out to get bread or water, we didn’t know if we would have enough strength to return home. My school friend went for bread, fell and froze. It was covered with snow."

Hunger

Only three percent of lives were claimed by bombing and shelling. 97 percent of the inhabitants of the besieged city died of starvation.

The winter of 1941 was the hardest. Bread standards were constantly decreasing and reached their minimum in November. Workers received 250 grams, employees, dependents and children - 125 grams of bread. And this bread was very different from the current one. Only half of it consisted of flour, which was in very short supply at that time. Cake, cellulose, and wallpaper glue were added to it.

But for this small piece it was necessary to stand in a queue for many hours in the cold, which was occupied early in the morning. There were days when, due to constant bombing, bakeries did not work and mothers returned home with nothing, where hungry children were waiting for them.

There were practically no other products. People tore off the wallpaper, on the back of which there were remains of paste, and prepared soup from it. Jelly was made from wood glue. To fill empty stomachs, everything that could be eaten was taken from home medicine cabinets: castor oil, Vaseline, glycerin. Leather boots and shoes were cut into pieces and boiled.

“We live very poorly here,” a seven-year-old boy writes in block letters in a letter. - Hungry like wolves in winter. But my appetite is such that it seems that if they gave me three loaves of bread, I would eat it all.”

Children of that time did not dream of something tasty. The unattainable desire was that food, which they may have capriciously refused in times of peace.

Here is a note from Valya Chepko, which she called “the menu after the hunger strike, if I stay alive.” 1st course: potato, oatmeal soup...2nd. porridge: oatmeal, wheat, pearl barley, buckwheat...Cutlet with mashed potatoes, sausage with mashed potatoes. And a sad signature: I don’t even dream about this.

This modest menu remains a pipe dream. The girl died of starvation in 1942. During that first terrible winter of the siege, 2-3 thousand people died of hunger in the city every day.

Grief

During the siege, children had it much worse than adults. How to explain to kids why their lives have changed so terribly? Why does the siren howl and you have to run to a bomb shelter? Why is there no food? Why can't omnipotent adults fix anything?

The number of orphanages has increased sharply. If at the end of 41 there were 17 of them, then in the spring of 1942 there were 98. More than 40 thousand orphans were accepted into them.

Each such child - your peer - has his own terrible story of life in a besieged city. Often, remembering the blockade, they talk about Tanya Savicheva’s diary, and her famous phrase “there is only Tanya left.” But Tanya’s fate is one of the fates of many Leningrad boys and girls.

How much enormous grief is hidden in these children's lines, the authors of which are unknown. Today their letters are exhibits in the Museum of the Defenders of Leningrad.

"Greetings from Leningrad. Hello, dear aunt. You write that you do not receive news from us. Here it is.

And I was left alone".

Most of the children under the siege had parents who died before their eyes. These guys were used to shelling, and the sight of people dying on the streets was a common sight for them. But they all dreamed of a future, a future without war. And so, overcoming weakness, in the bitter cold, under shelling, they went to school.

SCHOOL

During the harshest days of the blockade in the winter of 1941-1942, 39 schools operated in the besieged city.

The classes took place in an unusual environment. Often during a lesson, a siren would sound, signaling another bombing or shelling. The students quickly descended into the bomb shelter, where classes continued.

In order not to run with elementary school students from class to bomb shelter and back, lessons for them were held only there. Here is an amazing copy of a textbook from that time. Written on it by a child's hand is not a school, but the serial number of a bomb shelter. This was only possible in Leningrad!

Studying in the harsh winter conditions was a feat. Teachers and students produced fuel themselves, carried water on sleds, and monitored the cleanliness of the school. The lesson lasted no more than 25 minutes; neither the teachers nor the students could stand it any longer. No records were kept, since in unheated classrooms not only hands froze, but also ink froze. Lessons were learned by heart. An excerpt from a schoolboy’s diary: “The temperature is 2-3 degrees below zero. It’s dim winter, the light timidly breaks through the only window. We sit in coats, galoshes, gloves and even hats...”

But, despite all the difficulties, the guys passed the exams, received grades and moved from class to class!

In September 1942, schools reopened in the city. There were fewer students in each class, many died from shelling and starvation. The schools became unusually quiet; exhausted, hungry children stopped running around and making noise during breaks. And the first time, when two boys fought during recess, the teachers did not scold them, but were happy. “So our children are coming to life.”

New Year

Although the situation in besieged Leningrad was very difficult, nevertheless, a decision was made to hold school Christmas trees in the winter of 1942. Music sounded in the frozen dark city, and artists performed for the children. But the main thing is that the invitation cards said that they would have lunch. The guys received a small portion of soup and porridge - luxurious food for that time. They also brought tangerines to the city and distributed them to children. This was the best gift from Santa Claus. They pressed him under their clothes and took him home - to his mother, younger brothers and sisters.

Little heroes

Suffering from hunger and cold, the residents - adults and children - did not sit idly by, did not wait for them to be freed, but fought as best they could for their hometown.

There were no such events in the besieged city in which young Leningraders did not participate. They stood at the factory machines, replacing adults who died or went to the front. At the age of 12-15, children made parts for machine guns, machine guns, and artillery shells. So that the guys could work at the machines, wooden stands were made for them. No one counted how long the working day would last.

Children, together with adults, extinguished fires and destroyed tens of thousands of incendiary bombs. They cleared away the rubble of destroyed buildings, clearing roads and tram tracks.

From spring to late autumn in 1942-44, schoolchildren worked in state farm fields to provide the city with vegetables. Vegetable gardens were also bombed. When the raid began, the teachers shouted and took off their panama hats and lay face down on the ground. There was everything: heat, rain, frost, and dirt. The guys exceeded the norm by two or three times and collected record harvests.

Schoolchildren came to the hospital to see the wounded. They cleaned the wards and fed the seriously wounded. They sang songs to them, read poems to them, and wrote letters under dictation. We prepared firewood for the hospital.

Since 1943, Timur teams were organized in the city. They visited the elderly, the sick, and delivered mail.

In the besieged city there was a conservatory, theaters gave performances, and films were shown. The city lived and survived, despite the main goal of the Germans to destroy it by shelling and starvation. And together with the adults, its young residents, who had matured so much during the 872 days of the siege, rejoiced at the lifting of the blockade in 1944. But they not only survived the blockade, but they, like their parents, helped the great city survive. They studied, fought, worked: 15 thousand schoolchildren were awarded the medal “For the Defense of Leningrad.”

Chronicle of the blockade

September 8: The encirclement around Leningrad closed when German troops reached the shores of Lake Ladoga.

“Hero City Sevastopol” - City of Russian glory. Icons of Sevastopol. Akhtiar. Three attacks on the city. The defenders of the city were constantly supported by naval ships. State of siege. Immortal feat. Enemy aircraft flew over 3,000 sorties. On June 21, 1942, the Nazis broke through to the Northern Bay. Sevastopol. Obelisk.

“Hero Cities” - In memory of the events of 1941-1945. Odessa. Kerch. Glory forever! Four defensive lines were created in the area. Minsk. Moscow. "Constellation of hero cities." But the city lived, worked, fought. On November 20, 1941, the blockade of Leningrad began. Leningrad. As a result of the battle, Hitler's plan for a “lightning war” was thwarted.

“Hero-cities of the Great Patriotic War” - Terespol Gate. Brest. Kholm Gate. Victory Monument. Mass graves. Kerch. Hitler ordered Leningrad to be wiped off the face of the earth. Hitler's armies. Stalingrad. Monument-ensemble to the heroes of the Battle of Stalingrad. The power is terrible. Kyiv. Our beautiful Kyiv on eternal steep slopes. A monument immortalizing the feat of Soviet tank crews.

“Hero Cities of the Second World War” - Kyiv. Development of interest. Brest. The youngest city is a hero. The Great Patriotic War. Saint Petersburg. Motherland at Piskarevskoye cemetery. Smolensk Crossword. Diagram. Murmansk. Moscow. Turkish fortress. Memorial Motherland. Tula. Greek colony. Coat of arms of Kyiv. City. Coat of arms of Novorossiysk. Novorossiysk.

“List of WWII hero cities” - Moscow. Leningrad. Defense of the Brest Fortress. Murmansk. Smolensk Brest Fortress. Novorossiysk. Tank T-34. Kerch. Kyiv. Volgograd. Odessa. Hero city. Monument. Tula. Hero cities. Hero cities of the Great Patriotic War. Sevastopol. Minsk.

“Cities of Military Glory” - The hero city of Novorossiysk. The Battle of Stalingrad lasted from July 17, 1942 to February 2, 1943. The Nazis were unable to break through to Moscow. In the spring of 1942, 25 of the 42 occupied regions were liberated. The siege of Leningrad was broken on January 18, 1943. Murmansk experienced 1,200 war days and nights.

There are a total of 23 presentations in the topic

Again war, again blockade...

Or maybe we should forget about them?

I sometimes hear:

"No need,

no need to reopen wounds..."

And it may seem:

The words are right and convincing.

But even if it's true

This truth is not right.

I have no reason to worry

So that that war is not forgotten:

After all, this memory is our conscience.

We need her as strength.

The Battle of Leningrad is perhaps the most heroic and tragic page not only of the Great Patriotic War, not only of the Second World War, but of all world history. Humanity does not know of another such example, when a huge city for almost 900 days was in the merciless ring of an enemy blockade and not only lived, but also courageously fought the enemy.
Many books, songs, and films have been made about the courage, fortitude, and dignity of the defenders and residents of besieged Leningrad...

Still walking through the horrors of war,

We have experienced everything, and to the fullest,

Descendants won't believe anyone

They won’t believe someone, but they should believe us!

Everyone should believe us, Leningraders,

And if necessary, having searched the whole world,

Learn heroism, gain courage,

Let's lift the veil of time, go back in time, and try to reconstruct the events of besieged Leningrad.

Siege times are unprecedented times. You can go into them as if into an endless labyrinth of sensations and experiences that today seem like a dream or a play of the imagination. Then this was life, this was what days and nights consisted of.

War broke out suddenly, and everything peaceful disappeared suddenly.

One day, sounds incomprehensible to the residents were heard in different parts of the city. These were the first shells exploding.

Then they got used to them, they became part of the life of the city, but in those first days they gave the impression of unreality.

Everything that happened was only the beginning of such trials that the inhabitants of the city had never even dreamed of. And these tests came!

The enemy insidiously used all means to strangle, destroy, break the population of Leningrad, and force them to surrender. The barbaric bombing and artillery shelling of the city lasted for 18 hours, severe famine and unprecedented cold set in in the winter of 1941-1942, city transport stopped, there was no electricity, fuel, water supply and sewerage.

But over all the tragic confusion of those terrible days, a proud spirit of resistance, hatred of the enemy, readiness to fight in the streets and in houses to the last bullet, to the last drop of blood, dominated.

Leningraders worked for days on end to supply the fighting troops with everything necessary for combat operations, did not leave the workshops for weeks, fainted from hunger, but did not leave their jobs. This was unparalleled unity in the history of wars between the army and the people, the unity of the country.

Hitler failed to take the city by storm, raze it to the ground and make it uninhabitable. And then he bet on hunger.

On August 30, the railway connection was interrupted, and the last thread, the last hope for help, was the “Road of Life” passing through Lake Ladoga.

The search began for something edible. At the mills they shook out the flour sacks and carefully collected the flour dust that had accumulated on them over the years from the walls. Under enemy fire, they dug potatoes, collected vegetables - everything down to the green cabbage leaf.

The grain quota was sharply reduced. From November 20, workers began to receive 250 g, and employees, dependents and children - 125 g each of a rancid, lumpy mass called bread.

I will remember the evening as a milestone:

I carried bread home in my hand,

And suddenly a neighbor came towards me.

“Change it for a dress,” he says.

If you don’t want to change, give it out of friendship,

It's been ten days since my daughter has been lying there.

I don’t bury her - she needs a coffin,

They will make it for us for bread.

Give it back, you gave birth yourself!”

And I said: “I won’t give it up”

And she squeezed the poor piece tighter.

“Give it back,” she asked, “you

She buried the child herself,

Then I brought flowers

So that you decorate the grave."

As if on the edge of the earth

Alone, in the darkness, in a fierce battle

Two women - we walked side by side:

Two mothers, two Leningraders.

And, possessed, she begged

Long, bitter, timid.

And I had enough strength

Don't give up my bread for the coffin.

And I had enough strength to bring

Her to herself, whispering gloomily:

“Here, eat a piece,

Eat, sorry

I don’t feel sorry for the living, don’t think so.”

Having lived through December, January, February,

I repeat with a shiver of happiness:

“I don’t feel sorry for anything alive -

no tears, no joy, no passion.”

During the blockade, about 800 thousand Leningraders died of hunger. Death was gathering its terrible harvest.

I freeze at this display case.
The blockade ice melted in her.
We are truly invincible.
Here are the toys of the days of the siege!
Cardboard airplanes
And a ragy big bear.
Funny kitten on plywood
And a drawing: “FASCISTS DEATH!”
In the pictures they indicated
Silhouettes of relatives' houses,
Where at every potbelly stove at night
There was a living spring of victory.
And above the city there are bomb carriers,
But they are being beaten by the “hawks” from above.
Tears froze during the blockade.
The frosts were falling on our shelves.
But almost in any apartment
(well, at least in any house!)
Someone lived simply in a children's world,
Navigating this world with difficulty.
Someone's Christmas decorations
He created colored paper from paper.
So, having destroyed the blockade ring,
The toys went into mortal combat!

Leningrad children became full-fledged defenders of the besieged city. They, together with adults, prepared their city for defense: they covered the windows with strips of paper “criss-cross”, cleared attics and basements of old rubbish, and dug shelters to hide in during artillery attacks.

Young Leningraders believed in inevitable victory. They didn’t know whether they would survive, and on the pages of their diaries they described life without any adjustments for what would happen.

On the banks of the Neva, in a museum building,

I keep a very modest diary.

It was written by Tanya Savicheva.

He attracts everyone who comes.

The Savichevs died. Everyone died. Only Tanya remains."

Leningraders, having destroyed all the plans of their enemies, turned out to be incredibly resilient and strong in spirit. The grapes of popular anger were ripening, and it already seemed that not today or tomorrow hatred of the fascists would spill out and fall upon them with enormous force. The hearts of Leningraders and the soldiers who defended the city lived with one thing: to quickly break the blockade of Leningrad.

At the beginning of December 1942, the Headquarters of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief approved the proposals of the military councils of the Leningrad and Volkhov fronts to conduct an offensive operation to break the blockade. The operation received the code name "Iskra". Having approved the operation plan, the Headquarters appointed two of its representatives to coordinate the actions of the front troops - Marshal of the Soviet Union K.E. Voroshilov, as well as Army General G.K. Zhukov, whofeature film "Blockade" based on the novel by Alexander Chakovsky Our famous fellow countryman played so talentedlyMikhail Alexandrovich Ulyanov.

The immediate breakthrough of the blockade of Leningrad began at 9:30 a.m. on January 12, 1943, with artillery and, in the Volkhov Front zone, with aviation preparations. At 11:45 a.m., when the artillery fire of the Leningrad Front reached its highest intensity, assault and barrage groups descended onto the ice of the Neva and quickly rushed to the opposite bank. The commander of the 268th Rifle Division (then Colonel, later Army General S.N. Shcheglov) wrote about it this way: “... the dead fell, and the wounded, those who could not stand on their feet, crawled, straining their last strength, trying to help their comrades . It seemed that all the pain of Leningrad, all its hatred for the enemy was bubbling in the hearts of these heroes, and there was no force that could stop them.”

On January 18, the enemy group in Shlisselburg was destroyed. The German units remaining in the forests and swamps were captured or defeated, and the southern coast of Lake Ladoga was cleared of the enemy.

66 years separate us from the time when our troops finally lifted the blockade of Leningrad, which lasted from August 8, 1941 to January 27, 1944.

Siege Leningrad... these are thousands, hundreds of thousands of the brightest examples of loyalty to the Fatherland. There are heroes who have become famous throughout the country,and our fellow countrymen, of whom we are very proud, because each of them courageously fulfilled his soldier’s duty.

Petr Iosifovich Rubanov

During his service at the front, he was a machine gunner, a mortar gunner, and a machine gunner.

Pyotr Iosifovich’s battle path also passed through the Leningrad Front. He remembers that military units constantly stood on the front line, giving the enemy no rest day or night.

Afanasy Grigorievich Konyaev

Petr Nikolaevich Kleshchev

Born in 1916. Lieutenant, platoon commander of the 48th artillery regiment. A veteran of war and labor, defender of the besieged Leningrad, Pyotr Nikolaevich Kleshchev shares his memories. “Before I was drafted into the army, I lived in the village of Kawaza, which is no longer in our area.

The service began when we, young guys, were sent to Omsk, and then to Barnaul to study to become commanders. After six months of studying and passing exams, he was awarded the rank of junior lieutenant, and then at the front he received lieutenant. They took us to the Chelyabinsk region, to the village of Cheberkul.

The time was difficult, we were traveling in terrible conditions. I was enlisted in the 5th Mortar Brigade, which was replenished and replenished with soldiers. At the end of 1941, we were sent to defend Leningrad, and the Germans were already approaching Kaliningrad. We passed the line at night, there were no casualties or wounded, but the first echelon came under fire. In winter they bombed cars, and in summer they bombed ships.

I still remember the lines in the Sinyavinsky swamps near the villages. The Germans held on to the Pulkovo Heights. We had a clear view, there was nowhere to hide. We saw enough of everything - peat bogs were burning, people fell into them and disappeared without a trace, even villages burned out. It was a terrible picture.

The entire Leningrad region was liberated. He fought until the blockade was lifted. As a defender, I then had the high honor of participating in the parade and saluting on the Champ de Mars. In the morning they lined us up at the station and sent us off in formation. We walked and sang: “There is a people’s war, a holy war...”. People were crying.

Tens of thousands of Leningraders took to the streets and squares of their rebellious city. The hour for fireworks has arrived. Silence broke the first salvo. The sky lit up with a thousand rockets and searchlights. The general rejoicing was boundless.

Although there was a victory in Leningrad, the war did not end for us warriors. Again the front, bloody battles... went beyond the borders of Russia. 30 German divisions were surrounded in East Prussia. In the morning they launched artillery bombardment and the Germans surrendered, hanging a white flag. Later he liberated Estonia, the islands of Dago and Ezel.

They are no longer alive - participants in those hostilities. The ranks of Great Patriotic War veterans are thinning. But time has no power over the bright human memory that those who did not live to see this day deserve. There are thousands of them - defenders and residents of the besieged city who died in that war and died later. Let's honor their memory.

Love for the Fatherland, great Russia, motivated the defenders of the city on the Neva and its residents, who, as one, stood up to defend their city. This is the main philosophical lesson of the Leningrad epic of courage, this is the golden formula given to us all as an inheritance by the front-line generation of compatriots.

72 years have passed, and more will pass, but the feat of Leningrad will forever remain in our memory and in the history of Russia.

On frosty winter days, as a result of fierce fighting, the enemy siege of the city on the Neva was completely lifted. On January 27, 1944, there was a fireworks display in Leningrad. The city survived, but at the cost of incredible casualties, the exact number of which is unknown. According to official data, 641,000 people died from hunger alone. A number of historians believe that much more died - up to one million. To this we must add those killed by enemy shelling and bombing and the soldiers who fell on the outskirts of the city.

To understand the course of these tragic events, you need to turn to the history of the Great Patriotic War.

Chronologically, the blockade of Leningrad by German, Finnish and Spanish (“Blue Division”) troops was carried out from September 8, 1941 to January 27, 1944. All this time, the city with its surroundings, which is more than 5,000 square kilometers, was cut off from the country. In the winter of 1941, there were 2 million 544 thousand people in the city (including 400 thousand children). There were another 343 thousand people in suburban areas.

In general, the German command attached great strategic, moral and political significance to the capture of Leningrad. The city on the Neva was rightfully considered the cradle of the revolution and the former capital of the Russian Empire and a powerful industrial center of the European part of the USSR. The German offensive against Leningrad began on July 10, 1941. In August, heavy fighting was already taking place on the outskirts of the city. On August 30, the enemy cut the railways connecting Leningrad with the country. On September 8, 1941, the Germans captured Shlisselburg and cut off Leningrad from land. Thus began an almost 900-day blockade of the city, communication with which was maintained only by Lake Ladoga and by air.

“The Fuhrer decided to wipe out the city of St. Petersburg from the face of the earth. After the defeat of Soviet Russia, the continued existence of this largest populated area is of no interest... It is planned to surround the city with a tight ring and, by shelling from artillery of all calibers and continuous bombing from the air, raze it to the ground. If, as a result of the situation created in the city, requests for surrender are made, they will be rejected, since the problems associated with the stay of the population in the city and its food supply cannot and should not be solved by us. In this war being waged for the right to exist, we are not interested in preserving even part of the population.”

According to the plan, the enemy began systematic barbaric bombing and artillery shelling of Leningrad. At the beginning of September, the first massive bombing of the city took place. About 200 fires broke out, one of them destroyed the Badayevsky food warehouses, where the bulk of the city's supplies were stored.

In September October, massive raids on the city took place several times a day. The goal was not only to destroy industrial enterprises, while the surrounded city continued to work, but also to have a moral impact on the residents. Of the 881 days of the siege, the city was subjected to barbaric shelling for 611 days. There were an average of 480 shells per 1 square kilometer of urban territory.

In September-December 1941, fascist artillery fired over 30 thousand shells into Leningrad. From September 4 to November 30, 1942, the enemy carried out 272 attacks with a total duration of 430 hours.

In September 1942, out of 2,712 fascist aircraft that took part in the raids, only 480 managed to break into the city, while 272 aircraft were shot down. On August 17, 1943, the longest shelling took place during all the years of the blockade, lasting 13 hours. 14 min. More than 2,000 shells exploded in the city. In July 1943, the average daily duration of shelling was 9 hours. 14 min.

On September 19, 1943, the heaviest bombing of the city took place - 528 high-explosive and 2,870 incendiary bombs were dropped.

It was later estimated that during the blockade, 30 thousand industrial buildings, workshops and sites were damaged. 840 industrial enterprises were disabled, 44 kilometers of water pipes and 75 kilometers of sewerage networks, 500 schools, and 170 medical institutions were destroyed. 3 thousand 174 buildings were destroyed and burned, 7 thousand 143 buildings were damaged, 9 thousand wooden houses were dismantled for fuel, in total the city lost over 5 million square meters. m of living space. 187 of the 210 buildings registered as architectural monuments were damaged, and suburban palace-museums were practically destroyed.

But most of the Leningraders died from hunger. Food supplies were rapidly dwindling. A card system for issuing food was introduced, which was constantly reduced, especially at first. Availability of basic food products on September 12, 1941: Bread grain and flour - 35 days; Cereals and pasta – for 30 days; Meat and meat products – for 33 days; Fats – 45 days; Sugar and confectionery – for 60 days.

Standards for the distribution of bread from July 18 to the end of September 1941: workers - 800 grams; employees - 600 grams; dependents and children – 400 grams.

Standards for the distribution of bread from October 1 to November 13, 1941: workers - 400 grams; employees - 200 grams; dependents and children – 200 grams.

Standards for the distribution of bread from November 20 to December 25, 1941: workers - 250 grams, employees and members of their families - 125 grams; personnel of the paramilitary guards, fire brigades, extermination squads, vocational schools and FZO schools, who were on boiler allowance - 300 grams.

Such norms led to a sharp jump in deaths from hunger.

In December 1941 alone, about 50 thousand people died.

At the end of December 1941, the norms for the distribution of bread were increased to 350 grams for workers and to 200 grams for other city residents (up to 60% of the bread consisted of practically inedible impurities added instead of flour). All other products have almost ceased to be issued.

In February 1942, the norms for the distribution of bread were: workers - 500 grams; employees - 400 grams; dependents and children – 300 grams.

The number of famine victims grew rapidly, with more than 4,000 people dying every day. There were days when 6-7 thousand people died. In January-February 1942, approximately 130,000 people died monthly in the city, in March 100,000 people died, in May - 50,000 people, in July - 25,000 people, in September - 7 thousand people.

In addition, at the end of March 1942, an epidemic of cholera, typhoid fever, and typhus broke out, but due to the professionalism and high qualifications of doctors, the outbreak was kept to a minimum.

Autumn - winter 1941-1942 was the worst time of the blockade. Early winter brought with it cold heating, there was no hot water, people began to burn furniture, books, and dismantled wooden buildings for firewood. The transport was standing still.

But Leningraders, exhausted from hunger and bombing, continued to work. Factories, institutions, printing houses, clinics, kindergartens, and theaters operated. In the difficult conditions of the blockade, the working people of the city provided the front with weapons, equipment, uniforms, and ammunition.

In the fall of 1941, 39 rocket launchers were manufactured at the city's enterprises, on the basis of which a rocket mortar regiment was formed on the Leningrad Front. In the second half of 1941, the enterprises produced 713 tanks, 480 armored vehicles, 58 armored trains, over 5 thousand regimental and anti-tank guns, about 10 thousand mortars, over 3 million shells and mines, more than 80 thousand rockets and bombs.

In 1942, Leningrad industry sent to the front 60 tanks, 692 guns, more than 150 mortars and 2,800 machine guns, about 35 thousand machine guns, up to 1.7 million. shells and mines Moreover, mostly teenagers and women worked in the factories. The mortality rate among men from hunger was much higher, and most of them were at the front. From the population of the city, 10 divisions of the people's militia were formed, 7 of which became personnel.

In 1942: 32,000 women and girls served as nurses, 600,000 children and teenagers constantly worked on defensive structures. They dug 700 kilometers of anti-tank ditches with just shovels and picks. They erected 300 kilometers of forest debris and built 5,000 dugouts.

The struggle for Leningrad was fierce. Over 4,100 pillboxes and bunkers were built on the territory of Leningrad, 22 thousand firing points were equipped in buildings, and over 35 kilometers of barricades and anti-tank obstacles were installed on the streets. Three hundred thousand Leningraders participated in the local air defense units of the city. Day and night they kept their watch at factories, in the courtyards of houses, on the roofs.

The only regular connection with the country was the legendary “Road of Life” through Ladoga. Under incessant German fire, thanks to the unparalleled courage of drivers and air defense fighters, it was possible to evacuate old people and children from the city and get some food.

This hell ended for the residents of the besieged city on January 27, 1944. Then, as a result of the Leningrad-Novgorod offensive, German troops were thrown back from Leningrad to a distance of 60,100 km.

The feat of the city’s defenders was highly appreciated: over 350 thousand soldiers, officers and generals of the Leningrad Front were awarded orders and medals, 226 of them were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. The medal “For the Defense of Leningrad,” which was established in December 1942, was awarded to about 1.5 million people. For courage, perseverance and unprecedented heroism in the days of the difficult struggle against the Nazi invaders, the city of Leningrad was awarded the Order of Lenin on January 20, 1945, and on May 8, 1965 received the honorary title “City Hero”.

The Federal Law “On Days of Military Glory and Memorable Dates of Russia” dated March 13, 1995 established January 27 as the Day of Military Glory of Russia, the Day of Lifting the Siege of the City of Leningrad.

The memorial ensembles of the Piskarevsky Cemetery and the Seraphim Cemetery are dedicated to the memory of the victims of the siege and the fallen participants in the defense of Leningrad; the Green Belt of Glory was created around the city along the former siege ring of the front.

And the “Seventh Symphony” written by Dmitry Dmitrievich Shostakovich, first heard on the radio in the besieged city on August 9, 1942, became a hymn to the unbroken city and the unparalleled courage of its inhabitants.

Vladimir Kazakov