Childhood
Vasily was born in 1921. At that time, Joseph Stalin was the People's Commissar for Nationalities. The Civil War was ending in the country, and a bureaucratic struggle broke out in the echelons of power to replace the dying Lenin. Joseph Stalin also took an active part in it, which is why he had no time for his family.
Nevertheless, Vasily had a sister, Svetlana, born in 1926, as well as an older half-brother, Yakov, who remained from his first marriage. In addition, Stalin had an adopted son, Artem Sergeev, left behind by the deceased famous revolutionary and taken under the patronage of the People's Commissar. Vasily studied and was brought up with him.
In 1932, the child’s mother, Nadezhda Alliluyeva, died tragically. She committed suicide. In recent years, she had a painful relationship with Joseph Stalin. After this, Vasily remained to live at his father’s dacha under the supervision of a large number of servants. Joseph almost stopped visiting this place, remaining in Moscow for work.
Stalin's wife Nadezhda Alliluyeva biography
Who is the girl who died so many years ago, and secrets and fantasies are still circulating; to reveal the secret, we suggest that you familiarize yourself with her biography. Many historians and scientists believe that Alliluyeva was insane and suffered from serious psychological illnesses. But that’s not about that now, let’s start with how it all began.
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The girl was born in 1901 on September 9 in Baku. The family of a simple worker who was a gypsy. Alliluyeva's mother was a native German. Party leader Enukidze baptized the girl and became her godfather. Nadezhda grew up with her younger brother Pavel. Afterwards, the whole family moves to Petrograd, where Nadya from a young age works in the People's Commissariat for National Affairs. She took an active part in the development of the magazine “Revolution and Culture” and wrote a column in the newspaper “Pravda”. For unknown reasons, after working in the editorial office for several years, she was expelled. Inexplicably, 4 days after her dismissal, Nadezhda again becomes a candidate member of the Revolutionary Communist Party.
Since it was not possible to get an education in her youth, Nadezhda decides to study at the Industrial Academy, at the Faculty of Textile Industry. There she makes many influential acquaintances, behaves openly and quite boldly. The story mentions an unpleasant incident during school, as a result of which 8 of Nadya’s friends were arrested. Alliluyeva tried to take the situation into her own hands, in order to rescue her classmates, she turned to the head of the united state political administration, Genrikh Yagoda. At that time, he was such an influential and intimidating politician and revolutionary that Nadya’s act surprised and amazed all the people who knew her. Unfortunately, it was not possible to save the friends - they soon died from an infectious disease while they were in places for prisoners. But Alliluyeva showed herself to be a fearless and disruptive person in difficult times for everyone. It is also noted that she was a classmate of Khrushchev, and in the future she introduced her husband to him.
War
After school, the young man entered an aviation school. Despite his dislike for theoretical studies, he did an excellent job with the practical part. He became an officer after completing courses in Lipetsk on the staff of the Air Force Academy. Zhukovsky. In 1939 he became a graduate.
When the Great Patriotic War began, Vasily began to beg his father to let him go to the front. However, for the first year he remained at the headquarters of the air force of the workers' and peasants' army and was a flight inspector.
Finally, in 1942, he managed to get into the combat arena. In one of the battles he managed to shoot down an FW-190. However, he was soon wounded in the leg, after which he was forbidden to fly, as his father was afraid of losing his last son. In addition, the Germans, having learned that Stalin was at the front, began a targeted hunt for him. At this time, the elder brother Yakov was captured, where he died in 1943.
Nevertheless, Vasily returned to the war, but as a staff officer. He led on the Baltic front, where he managed to pass through Minsk, Vilna, Grodno, and Jelgava. In 1942 he became a colonel. After the war, he received the rank of major general, and in 1947 - lieutenant general.
The mystery of life and the mystery of death of Stalin's wife
Fate gave Nadezhda Alliluyeva 31 years, thirteen of which she was married to someone whom many consider the embodiment of evil
None of those with whom she studied and worked, with whom she communicated daily, had any idea who she really was. Only relatives and those closest to her circle knew that Nadezhda Alliluyeva was the wife of the most powerful man in the country. They started talking about her when she died, and her death, without revealing the secrets of her life, became a new mystery for everyone.
I can't bear to get married
She was just a baby when she met Soso (short for Joseph ) Dzhugashvili . Or rather, he met her: he saved her, two years old, who accidentally fell from the embankment into the sea. It was in Baku, where Nadya was born on September 22 (old style - September 9), 1901. Her family was closely connected with the revolutionary movement, her father Sergei Yakovlevich Alliluyev was one of the first worker Social Democrats, and the young Georgian Dzhugashvili was his close friend. So close that it was with the Alliluyevs that he settled in 1917, returning from exile.
Sergei Alliluev. wikimedia
According to Stalin's daughter Svetlana Alliluyeva , the grandfather was half gypsy, and the grandmother, Olga Evgenievna Fedorenko , was German. The youngest in the family, Nadenka had a pronounced independent and hot-tempered character. She did not listen to her parents when, at the age of 17, having joined the Bolshevik Party, she decided to throw in her lot with Joseph. Her mother warned her to get married when there was a 22-year age difference; her father was against the marriage because he believed that such an immature wife with an uneven character was clearly not suitable for an active revolutionary. But in 1919 they finally got married and at first lived, as they say, in perfect harmony.
Kremlin orphanage
The family moved to Moscow. After completing the typist course, Nadezhda began working in the secretariat of V.I. Lenin . In 1921, the first-born son Vasily . Her husband insisted that she leave work and take care of the house and child. Moreover, at Nadezhda’s suggestion, Yakov , Stalin’s son from his first marriage to Ekaterina Svanidze , who died of typhus in 1907, also moved in with them. Yakov was only seven years younger than his stepmother, and they talked for a long time, which greatly irritated her husband.
However, Nadya did not want to leave work, and then Vladimir Ilyich helped her: he himself settled this issue with Stalin. It is curious that in 1923 an orphanage was specially opened for the children of senior government officials on Malaya Nikitskaya, since their parents were too busy at work. There were 25 children from the Kremlin elite and exactly the same number of real street children.
They raised them together, without making differences. Stalin's adopted son, the same age as Vasily, Artillery Major General Artem Sergeev , who ended up in the leader's family after the death of his father, the famous Bolshevik Fyodor Sergeev , who had been friends with Stalin for many years, spoke about this. She and Vasya Stalin stayed in this orphanage from 1923 to 1927. And the co-directors of this house were Nadezhda Alliluyeva and Artem’s mother Elizaveta Lvovna.
Stalin's adopted son A.F. Sergeev
Love on "you"
Year after year, the differences became more and more noticeable. The husband was often just as harsh and sometimes rude with his young wife as with his associates. Once Stalin did not speak to his wife for almost a month. She didn’t know what to think, but it turned out that he was unhappy: his wife calls him “you” and by his first name and patronymic. Did Stalin love her? Obviously, he loved her, at least in his letters from vacation spots he called her Tatka and invited her to come to him if he found a few free days.
Nadezhda tried to be a caring mother and wife, but she did not like life in domestic captivity. Young, energetic, she loved freedom, the feeling of being useful, but she was offered to sit almost locked up, where every step was controlled by security, where she could communicate only with a narrow circle of trusted people, by the way, almost always older than her.
The husband has his own concerns: after Lenin’s death, there was a fierce internal party struggle for power, either the Trotskyists or the “right deviation.” Nadezhda did not delve into the vicissitudes of the political struggle. I just felt that the more power in the country Stalin took into his own hands, the stronger the household shackles became. That is why she so valued any opportunity to escape from home, into the big world filled with events. Her education was minimal: six classes at the gymnasium and secretarial courses, but she went to work at the magazine “Revolution and Culture” and began to master the editorial business. Even the birth of her daughter Svetlana in 1926 could not firmly tie her to home.
Vasily, Svetlana and Joseph Stalin. author unknown
I was friends with the wrong people
All around, people flocked to workers' schools, everyone studied, received working specialties, and graduated from institutes. Nadezhda also went to study. The husband stubbornly objected to this step; he did not want her to leave the children with nannies. But still he was persuaded, and in 1929 Alliluyeva became a student at the Industrial Academy to obtain a specialty as a chemical engineer. Only the rector knew who this student was. She was not driven to the doors of the academy: she got out of the Kremlin car a block away, dressed discreetly, and behaved modestly.
It was interesting to study. Moreover, the home environment was not pleasing. Nadezhda was jealous of her husband for other women to whom he showed attention, sometimes not embarrassed by her presence. She tried to avoid feasts that were held at home: she did not tolerate drunks and did not drink herself, since she suffered from terrible headaches.
And it so happened that she was friends mainly with those who did not favor her husband. She was impressed by polite, intelligent people, such as Lev Kamenev and Nikolai Bukharin . Several times Nadezhda even left her husband to go to her parents. But then she returned: either he asked, or she decided so. And where could she run away from Stalin?
Kamenev and Lenin. Photo by M.I. Ulyanova
He tortured her and all the people
At the end of 1930, the trial of the Industrial Party was underway. Many engineers and scientists were arrested and accused of opposing the course of industrialization. Those who criticized the pace and forms of collectivization also paid the price. All this became known to Nadezhda Alliluyeva. After all, even at the academy where she studied, many teachers and students were arrested.
Nadezhda argued with her husband, sometimes provoked him into a scandal in the presence of others, and accused him of torturing her and “the whole people.” Stalin was angry - why was he interfering in state affairs, called her names, and rudely interrupted her hysterics.
Where did that girl go who unconditionally went into the revolution with him and was a real fighting friend? It seemed to him that she had completely abandoned the children; instead of an understanding and sympathetic woman, he sometimes saw in her a supporter of his enemies.
...On November 7, 1932, when people gathered in Kliment Voroshilov to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the October Revolution, a breakdown occurred. Everyone drank, except Nadezhda, and Stalin, having rolled a bread ball, threw it towards his wife with the words: “Hey, drink!” Indignant, she got up from the table and answered him: “I’m not hey to you!”, She left the feast. With Polina Zhemchuzhina Molotov's wife , they walked around the Kremlin, and Nadezhda complained about her life and her husband, and in the morning she was found in a pool of blood, with a Walter lying next to her, given by her brother.
Polina Molotova-Zhemchuzhina
Who shot?
75 years have passed since the death of Nadezhda Sergeevna Alliluyeva, and the debate about how she passed away still does not subside. Was she killed by someone or did she commit suicide? If she was killed, then perhaps by Stalin himself - out of jealousy (allegedly for an affair with her stepson Yakov) or for having contacted his political opponents. Perhaps she was killed not by Stalin himself, but on his orders - by the guards as an “enemy of the people.”
Shot yourself? Probably out of jealousy. Or maybe she wanted to take revenge on him for his rudeness, drunkenness and betrayal?
But here is another – medical – version that appeared after the autopsy. Nadezhda Alliluyeva suffered from an incurable disease: a pathology of the structure of the cranial bones. That is why she suffered so much from headaches, from which even the best doctors in Germany, where she went for treatment, could not relieve her. Probably, stress caused a severe attack and Alliluyeva could not stand it - she committed suicide, which, by the way, often happens with such an illness. It’s not called the “suicide skull” for nothing.
How did Stalin react to the death of his wife? Everyone agrees on one thing - he was in shock. Relatives testify that his wife left a note for him, which he read, but did not share its contents with anyone. However, it was clear that she made a strong impression on him.
Svetlana, Alliluyeva’s daughter, reported in her book that at a civil funeral service, Stalin approached his wife’s coffin and suddenly pushed it away with his hands, turned away and left. I didn't even go to the funeral. But Artem Sergeev, who was present at the funeral, reported that the coffin was placed in one of the premises of GUM, and Stalin stood in tears near his wife’s body, and his son Vasily kept repeating: “Dad, don’t cry!” Then, at the Novodevichy cemetery, where Nadezhda Alliluyeva was buried, Stalin followed the hearse and threw a handful of earth into her grave.
Stalin never married again, and witnesses say that during the war he came to the cemetery at night and sat alone for a long time on a bench near his wife’s grave.
Grave of N.S. Alliluyeva at Novodevichy Cemetery
After the war
With the onset of Victory, Vasily was briefly in the group of Soviet troops in Germany. In 1948, he was appointed commander of the air forces in the Moscow Military District. The career continued, to which Vasily Stalin put all his efforts. Biography, personal life and much more were subordinated to his status as the son of a leader. However, even despite this, he managed to devote time to his hobbies.
First of all, it was a sport. In particular, Vasily led the creation of a community of Air Force clubs on the army base. They played sports like football, hockey and basketball. In addition, Vasily became the head of the Equestrian Federation of the Soviet Union.
He remained in the Moscow Military District until his lifestyle caused his dismissal. He drank a lot. Once in 1952, at a government reception, while intoxicated, Stalin caused a scandal and insulted Pavel Zhigarev, the commander-in-chief of the air force. The father of the offender did not feel sorry for him and immediately fired him. Such a failure disabled Vasily’s entire life. However, things only got worse from there.
Captivity
When the war broke out, Yakov was among the first to go to the front. His father, of course, a priori could have given him a staff position. But he did not do this.
Dzhugashvili found himself in the thick of it - near Vitebsk. He took part in one of the major tank battles. He was even nominated for an award. However, he did not manage to receive it...
The fact is that his battery broke out of the encirclement twice. But the third time Yakov failed to do this. He was captured.
For two years the Germans tried to persuade him to cooperate. But Yakov categorically refused. At the same time, during interrogations, he spoke about the deep disappointment associated with the unsuccessful actions of the Soviet troops at the beginning of the war. But he did not provide the information necessary for the Nazis. In addition, he never said anything bad about his homeland and the political system.
The Germans offered Stalin to exchange his son for one of the major German officers. But the leader was adamant.
...Yakov passed away in mid-1943. He was shot by a sentry in one of the death camps.
Stalin's children and their fate, photos from the archives - all this is of interest to those people who are not indifferent to our history. So we will continue.
Father's death
The elder Stalin died in March 1953. Vasily was summoned by Defense Minister Nikolai Bulganin and demanded that he leave the capital for a provincial position. He did not listen and was stripped of his military rank. However, the dark streak did not end there either. The impulsive Stalin turned to the Chinese embassy with a request to give him asylum and assurances that his father had been poisoned by enemies.
The new leaders of the country could not stand this. Stalin was arrested and sent to court. There he was given a sentence for anti-Soviet propaganda under the famous 58th political article. The famous prisoner was kept in the Vladimir Central Prison, where he received the secret surname Vasiliev and became seriously ill, becoming disabled. In prison he was a mechanic. Letters were sent from prison to Khrushchev and Molotov, which were written by Vasily Stalin. Biography, personal life and much more did not give him a chance for release.
Death
The death of Vasily Stalin (Dzhugashvili) occurred on March 19, 1962. For some it was unexpected, for others it was predictable. The official cause of death of Stalin's youngest son was recognized as alcohol poisoning.
Initially, Vasily Iosifovich was buried in Kazan at the Arskoye cemetery. After all charges were dropped posthumously in 2002, his body was reburied at the Troekurovskoye cemetery in the capital of the Russian Federation.
Last years
However, he got his chance. Nikita Khrushchev personally summoned him and canceled his sentence. It seemed that everything had worked out, but the leader’s son again ended up in the KGB, from where he was sent into exile in Kazan. It was a closed city where foreigners could not enter.
To depersonalize the exile, he was forbidden to bear the surname Stalin and was given a passport with the real surname of his father Dzhugashvili. His health was undermined. In addition, alcohol was still in use, without which Vasily Stalin could not live. Biography, personal life, plans and everything else collapsed in March 1962, when he died of alcohol poisoning.
Stalin's wife biography personal life
Age 16 years. Even 100 years ago, girls got married at the age of 14-16, and fell in love with young guys much earlier than the current generation. This is what happened to young Nadya, who fell in love for the first time at 16. This was the future ruler of the USSR, Joseph Stalin. He barely had time to return from Siberia to Petrograd when he met Alliluyeva. Most of all, such love killed Nadezhda’s father. He was very worried because the chosen one was 21 years older than his daughter. Moreover, the father was embarrassed that Stalin had been sent into Siberian exile more than once, and he was afraid that the girl would not fall under the good influence of the middle-aged guy. Everyone around Nadya was alarmed, believing that she would do something stupid by being with him. And so it happened.
Joseph took a young girl to the front of the First World War. In 1918, a year-long romance blossomed into marriage, and they became engaged. But the marriage registration took place in March 1919, after the war. An unsurprising fact, but a fact - Alliluyeva refused to take her husband’s last name, keeping hers with her until the end of her days. Experts decipher this decision as an inner core that Nadya did not want to lose by taking her husband’s last name. Stalin reacted to her action with respect and calm.
In 1921, at the age of 21, a married couple who had lived together for two years had their first child, Vasily. In the future he will become a famous Soviet pilot, bearing the rank: Lieutenant General of Aviation. The guy’s career will turn out badly, because after World War II he will start drinking alcohol constantly and will spend 8 years in prison. And already in 1962 he died from alcohol poisoning. 6 years after the birth of their son, a daughter, Svetlana, will appear in the family. Due to the early death of her mother, the baby will suffer the most. Her father will treat her abusively and see her less and less, hiring nannies while he works. But it is the nanny who will make the girl’s life happy and thanks to her, Svetlana will become a philologist and live for 85 long years, until 2011.
Personal life
In 1940, Vasily met Galina Burdonskaya, who was a student at the Printing Institute. In addition, she was the daughter-in-law of Vladimir Menshikov, a famous bandy player. However, the status of the leader's son did the trick. The couple soon got married, but the marriage was unhappy and short-lived.
Vasily Stalin, biography, personal life and children - all this is of interest even now. His first wife gave birth to his son Alexander and daughter Nadezhda. They separated during the war, when the family lived in evacuation. Daughter Nadezhda, when she grows up, will marry the adopted son of the famous Soviet writer Alexander Fadeev.
It is believed that the cause of the breakup was the violence perpetrated by Vasily Stalin. The biography and personal life of this man continued to unfold sharply. In 1946, he married Ekaterina, the daughter of Semyon Timoshenko, Marshal of the Soviet Union. Their son Vasily will die in his youth from a drug overdose while studying at the university. The couple also had a daughter, Svetlana. The marriage lasted three years and ended in 1949.
Kapitolina Vasilyeva became the third wife that Vasily Stalin received. Biography, personal life, his children remained under the radar of the authorities, but he still adopted his wife’s daughter from his first marriage. Kapitolina was a famous athlete - a swimmer who became the champion of the USSR. They lived together from 1949 to 1953.
Stalin's second wife, another version of her death
- It is believed that Nadezhda’s death is not suicide, but murder at the hands of her own husband. Or rather, on his orders. And, in principle, knowing the cruelty of this person, no one can cancel this reason. As many sources write, Stalin shot his wife, knowing that she was connected with enemies. But such a blatant fact would have surfaced in history, and would have been based on the main one. Then there would be no need to come up with new versions and talk about suicide. But there are versions and they sound more truthful, especially if Alliluyeva really had mental problems.
- Stalin disgraced Nadezhda to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the October Revolution; the woman, unable to bear the shame, killed herself. But there are too many discrepancies, since many, including Alexandrov, claim that she was not present at the dacha that evening.
These 3 versions are considered the most plausible and probable. The rest, illiterate historians, continue to invent everything. Claiming that she cheated on Stalin with his son. She was his daughter, and he loved her mother, who died long before they even met. But all this is just gossip, guesswork and unacceptable nonsense, since they are interrupted by historical facts and the chronology of events. Also, a close friend of Nadezhda writes in her diary that Alliluyeva had a “suicide skull”; this could have been influenced by early menopause, along with headaches.
A rather confusing and difficult story to understand, which may have had completely different reasons for the death of Stalin’s wife. But they are voiced and sound true. Understanding the actions committed almost 100 years ago is not so easy, but thanks to competent historians, we, the readers, can study and know information that will be useful for our reports, works, practices, as well as remember and know the history of our country .
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Last wife
There was another marriage that Vasily Stalin decided on. Biography, personal life, photos - all this haunts researchers, which is not at all surprising. The last wife was Maria Nusberg. Two daughters from his first marriage were also adopted by Vasily. The union was registered shortly before the pilot's death in 1962. All adopted children received the surname Dzhugashvili.
Vasily Stalin died soon after. Biography, personal life, wives, children - all this ended completely unexpectedly. His personality remains an object of study by the Stalinists to this day.
Alliluyeva's suicide letter to Stalin, what kind of correspondence was conducted between them?
Let's return to our Sochi historian, Alexandrov, who put forward the most plausible version of Nadya's death. He concluded that Nadezhda was very jealous and worried, knowing that Stalin was cheating on her while he was on business trips for a long time.
At that time there were no SMS or mobile phones - people communicated by letters. And, oddly enough, the correspondence between Stalin and Alliluyeva has been preserved. It was carried out while Stalin was on vacation in Sochi in 1929-1931; why he spent his vacation without his wife is unknown. Experts found 17 letters from Joseph and 13 from Nadezhda. Initially, the husband, in his letters, asked his wife to come to Sochi for 1 week, affectionately calling her “Tatka”. But in response I received a request to send 50 rubles. Having sent 120 rubles to my wife and 2 children, then there was silence. A few months later, Alliluyeva writes to Stalin that they tell her that he looks very bad, and how she could allow her husband to be in such a state. The correspondence develops into no matter what tension on Alliluyeva’s part. Stalin still calmly answers and reassures her, urging her not to pay attention to what others are talking about. Clarifying that he loves her madly. Afterwards, their correspondence is again interrupted for a long time. Soon, a letter arrives from Alliluyeva, she reproaches that Stalin does not write to her, citing his laziness. She also claims that she heard about him from some woman who said: “my husband looks great.” She suggests betrayal during Joseph's journey, reproaching him for actions he did not commit. The fact that this did not happen can be found in the subsequent letter from Stalin, where he stipulates: “I inform you that I have not gone anywhere, and I am not going to go….I kiss you deeply.”
Then, readers ask the historian a direct question: “Did she commit suicide because of jealousy?” - he gives the following answer. Alliluyeva was very jealous, not missing a single glance from women at her husband. She was jealous of Stalin's colleagues, the hairdresser, the waitresses and everyone who simply looked at the party leader. Also, Khrushchev said that during the celebration of the 15th anniversary of the October Revolution, Stalin did not come to spend the night. The wife called the dacha where the celebration was taking place, and she was told that Joseph was in company with a beautiful woman. After hearing this, she committed suicide. Already in 1932, Stalin was often seen with the opera singer Davydova, for whom he is believed to have built an opera house in Sochi.
It would seem that everything fits together, her husband’s constant infidelities, Alliluyeva’s obsession with infidelity, the cause of death is jealousy. But no. The historian reveals another version of why Nadezhda said goodbye to life. It was all in the book. Alexandrov talked with Stalin’s daughter, Svetlana, who told him that in the last years of his life, his father often wondered: “What did I do to her? Didn’t I respect her as a wife and a person?” And in dialogues he often spoke about the book - Nadezhda read it shortly before her death. She was called “Green Hat”, he thought that it was for her that his wife wrote to him in the last letter, but no.
Dmitrovsky published the book “About Stalin and Lenin”, where Stalin revealed himself as a terribly lonely, angry and merciless man who had support only from his wife. It talks about Stalin's repressions. In the eyes of Alliluyeva, her loving husband became a tyrant to whom she gave the best years of her life. Dvinsky was supposed to give the book to Joseph, but after seeing the consequences and death of Nadezhda, he did not do this. And after the funeral he never appeared in the Kremlin again; no one found out his whereabouts.
