The documents were unreliable, but she decided to take a risk. What Vera Khoruzhaya did in occupied Vitebsk

"The city is not subject to restoration" - this was the verdict issued to Vitebsk by the Red Cross commission in September 1944. Over 1083 days of occupation, the northern capital was destroyed by more than 90%. It was proposed to rebuild the regional center in a new location, but the residents, with incredible effort, managed to revive it. With the same persistence, they fought during the Great Patriotic War. A huge network of underground organizations operated in Vitebsk. Unfortunately, almost none of the underground fighters survived the war. When the Red Army soldiers entered the city, they were met by only 118 people.

The city was defended by everyone

The Nazi command attached great importance to the capture of Vitebsk, as the city opened the way to Smolensk and Moscow. Soviet troops held back the enemy as best they could, but the forces were unequal.

- Defensive battles in Vitebsk and its surroundings continued from July 9 to 11. The main task of defending the city fell on the soldiers of the 153rd Rifle and 220th Motor Rifle Divisions. The people's militia, consisting mainly of factory and plant workers and youth, also took an active part. Four battalions were formed, comprising about two thousand people, - notes Denis Yakovlev, chief custodian of the funds of the Vitebsk Regional Museum of the Hero of the Soviet Union M. F. Shmyrev.

Fierce battles raged on the factory grounds and city streets, with militiamen desperately repelling attempts by the Hitlerites to cross the river. At dawn on July 10, enemy troops nevertheless forced the Western Dvina River on rafts, although the militiamen managed to destroy about two hundred enemy soldiers. The fighting for the city continued until the end of the day. But in the end, units of the Red Army and the surviving militiamen were forced to retreat. Thus, on July 11, 1941, the occupation of Vitebsk began, which lasted 1083 days.

Vitebsk turned into a place of execution

With the beginning of the occupation, the Hitlerites established their own governing bodies.

- Since Vitebsk was part of the rear area of Army Group Center, all power was concentrated in the hands of the military leadership. The Germans, due to the intensification of the partisan movement, needed to guard their rear units, communication lines, and railway tracks, explains Denis Yakovlev. - In Vitebsk and other large settlements, many punitive bodies were concentrated, including the Security Service (SD), the Secret Field Police, the Feldkommandantur, and Abwehr groups. All of them were aimed at combating Soviet patriots and implementing a policy of genocide.

In different parts of the city, German observation posts and guard posts were established. Most of the administrative buildings and houses were destroyed, and those that survived were adapted for enemy barracks, headquarters, and warehouses. One of the manifestations of the "new order" was the organization of public executions. The entire city was turned into a place of execution. One of the gallows was located near the city hall building, another near the Smolensk market. People were hanged not only there, but also on poles and even trees. The bodies were not removed for several weeks – as a warning to those who dared to go against the occupiers.

For the local population, taxes, fees, and duties were imposed, for non-payment and non-fulfillment of which they were fined or arrested. It was especially hard for children and the elderly. To survive somehow, many were forced to beg. There are known cases when Hitler's men used children and adolescents to collect unexploded shells.

People didn't even notice they were being eaten

Together with Elizaveta Zablotskaya, a researcher at the Vitebsk Regional Museum of Local Lore, we approach the building of the theological seminary. This place in the center of the city holds the memory of perhaps the most terrible events of the Great Patriotic War in the Vitebsk region. From August 1941 to December 1943, the operational team of the security service was located here. Interrogations were conducted on the upper floors, and the basements served as prison cells. Thousands of people passed through the dungeons of the SD, many were underground fighters. Only a few managed to survive.

The first underground groups in Vitebsk began to be formed as early as July 1941. They carried out sabotage on the railway and airfield, obtained weapons and medicines, and conducted reconnaissance. By the end of the year, more than 20 groups were engaged in underground struggle in the city, and in 1942 – already 56. They had dozens of clandestine apartments and meeting places in different districts of Vitebsk. It was with the help of underground fighters in the winter of 1941-1942 that about three thousand prisoners escaped from a POW camp called the Fifth Regiment.

To strengthen the party leadership of the underground and coordinate the actions of patriots, in September 1942, the Central Committee of the CP(b)B sent a group to Vitebsk headed by the experienced underground fighter Vera Khoruzhaya.

- Khoruzhaya's group entered Biryulin's partisan detachment through the Surazh Gate, from where they were supposed to cross over to Vitebsk. But it turned out that the documents in the name of Anna Sergeevna Kornilova were unreliable (Khoruzhaya's pseudonym consisted of her deceased husband's surname and her children's first names): the entries in her passport were written twice in Russian, although one of the entries was required in Belarusian. The operation was at risk of failure, but Vera decided to take a chance, - notes Elizaveta Zablotskaya.

In just a few weeks, Khoruzhaya managed to establish the operations of the Vitebsk underground. Thanks to the intelligence gathered, Soviet pilots carried out strikes on enemy barracks and ammunition depots, while the underground members themselves carried out sabotage and rescued prisoners.

- Many local residents worked for Khoruzhaya, including Matryona Osker. This disabled elderly woman, who lived near the train station, often sold goods on the street. The Hitlerites passing by paid no attention to her – and in vain! Being fluent in German, she listened to and remembered everything they said, and then passed the information to the underground members, - says Elizaveta Zablotskaya.

From Vitebsk, Khoruzhaya managed to send 12 reports. She wrote about military targets, the successes of Soviet aviation bombing the city, the moods of the occupiers, and the patriotism of the local residents. Unfortunately, on November 13, 1942, Vera Zakharovna, along with Sofia Pankova and several other underground members, were captured at a safe house. They were all sent to the SD prison.

- The acoustics in the building were excellent, so people in the basements could hear the screams and groans of those being interrogated upstairs. After torture, they were returned to their cells, mutilated. The smell of blood and decaying bodies attracted rodents, and the weakened people could not drive them away. Many experienced such pain that they didn't notice they were being eaten. When prisoners were taken out of their cells, they often had no fingers or toes, and their cheeks and noses showed signs of bites, – says Elizaveta Zablotskaya, inviting us to enter the cell where the famous underground fighter spent her last days. In the damp, cold room, inscriptions can be seen on the walls – names, surnames, dates of death…

The last person to see Vera Khoruzhaya alive was Annaitasheva from Vitebsk. She herself miraculously managed to escape from the SD prison. Here's what she said about her time in the cell: "When my eyes got used to the darkness, I saw people. There were about 20-25 of them. All of them were terribly beaten after interrogations... When they brought the prison gruel, a dim light bulb flickered on in the cell. I couldn't eat this food. Instead, I looked at my fellow sufferers. My attention was drawn to a very thin middle-aged woman with a slender neck, dressed in a dark skirt and a yellow blouse, whom everyone called Anna. She looked terrible. Her whole body and legs were covered in bruises and abrasions, her face was swollen from beatings. Anna lay motionless and moaned quietly, often asking for water. An older woman, dressed all in dark, with short black hair, took care of her... Early in the morning of December 4, 1942, the cell doors opened with a bang, and we saw gendarmes with dogs. They started calling people by lists. Soon the cell was empty, only I was left. After that, it became even scarier."

Annaitasheva only learned that the described women were Vera Khoruzhaya and Sofia Pankova after the war, when she saw their photographs.

- The Kimstach family also became prisoners of this prison. Nikolai, who was a signalman and worked with the Lepel partisans, was captured along with his wife Vera and three-year-old son Anatoly. The woman was brutally tortured in front of her husband and child: muscles of her arms, cheeks, and chest were cut out, her tongue was cut off. Only when she died, Anatoly was brought to the cell, and his father continued to be tortured, after which he was shot. The boy miraculously survived, – says Elizaveta Zablotskaya.

Another famous Vitebsk underground fighter is Radimir Makhnov. Being a sanitary doctor, he visited prisoner-of-war camps, found Red Army officers, and under the guise of typhus patients, placed them in hospitals. And then, after reporting their deaths, he sent them to the partisans. But traitors were found in his circle as well. Radimir Makhnov was hanged. In the same week, his twin brother also died - Gavriil was killed near Moscow.

The underground continued to operate actively even after the destruction of Khuruzhaya's group. Starting from February 1943, the Nazis began to infiltrate provocateurs into the groups. In April-May, 72 underground fighters were arrested, and in November, more than 60 more people. More than half of them were shot. From the autumn, underground groups began to leave the city and join partisan detachments. In total, 66 underground groups operated in the city and suburbs during the occupation, uniting about 1500 people.

Hunger, fear, and daily executions

During the occupation, there were several death camps in Vitebsk. The largest in the city and the second largest in Belarus was located on the territory of the former 5th railway regiment (the end of modern Titov Street). Created in 1941 as a camp for prisoners of war, up to 40,000 people were placed here. Every day, about 150 people died from illness and hunger, and another approximately 200 were shot. By 1943, almost all prisoners of war were exterminated.
When the Red Army began to liberate the first districts of the Vitebsk region, up to 20,000 local residents were placed in the camp, and by March-April 1944, almost all remaining townspeople were taken there. From the territory of the Fifth Regiment, they were sent to the front line – to the 8,000-strong camp in Maryanovo, Liozno district. In total, in the Fifth Regiment camp during the years of occupation, ...

From July to October 1941, the quarter in the area of ​​the current Kirov, Ilyinsky, Engels, and Komsomolskaya streets was occupied by a ghetto, in which about 20,000 people were held and died. By the end of 1941, not a single Jew officially lived in Vitebsk.

In the building of the mirror factory on Zadunavskaya Street (the beginning of the modern Frunze Avenue) in 1941, a labor camp was created, which existed until 1944. Prisoners worked here for 11 hours, unloading wagons, repairing roads, and dismantling destroyed buildings. And in the camp "Archiepiscopal Dacha," created in 1941 in the village of Luchesa, mainly commanders and political workers of the Red Army, army and partisan scouts were placed. The conditions of detention here were particularly brutal. Prisoners were practically not fed, and were shot almost daily.

In May 1944, near the Kryнки station, the Nazis placed over 12,000 people outdoors, brought from the "Fifth Regiment" camp. The prisoners were used as a human shield during the retreat. 4,000 people died in the camp, the remaining 8,000 were liberated by the Red Army.

Hold Until the Last Man
Attaching great military importance to Vitebsk, Hitler declared it a fortress and ordered it to be held until the last man. The city was liberated from the Nazi invaders only on June 26, 1944, during Operation Bagration.

The Red Army soldiers who occupied the city on that day witnessed a terrible scene. Destruction, fires, and an almost complete absence of residents. In the pre-war city of 180,000 people, only 118 survivors met the soldiers.

In the first post-war years, residents had to rebuild Vitebsk practically from scratch. According to residents' memories, one one-room apartment housed 20 people at once! Many lived in makeshift shelters and basements, and several families had to settle in the city hall building.

One of the streets in Vitebsk is named after five people at once: Marfa Kalinovna Svechkina (Blokhina), her brothers Ivan and Anatoly, and their wives Olga and Alexandra. All of them were participants in the Vitebsk patriotic underground. The Svechkin house served not only as a storage for medicines and ammunition but also as a base for partisan couriers.
The exhibition "In Memory of the Patriots of Vitebsk Region 1941-1945" is unique. It is the only place in the post-Soviet space that actually served as an SD prison and where a museum was later opened. According to incomplete data, from July 18 to December 18, 1942, alone, 3026 people passed through the SD torture chambers.

Streets Named After Them

Khoruzhey St.
A partisan activist, a liaison between the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Belarus and the front command. In 1942, she led a group of underground fighters who were transferred across the front line to Vitebsk. Her group carried out many sabotage operations on railways and at factories, and gathered intelligence for the command of the Soviet troops. The Nazis took all measures to capture the underground fighters. In November 1942, the Hitlerites tracked down the group; Vera Khoruzhaya, along with her comrades, was captured and executed. The title of Hero of the Soviet Union was awarded posthumously on May 17, 1960. One of the streets in Vitebsk, as well as in other cities of Belarus, is named after her.
Belokhvostikov St.

Deputy Commander of the 48th Guards Rifle Regiment, Guards Lieutenant Colonel Smetanin Vladimir. On June 25, 1944, the regiment under Smetanin's command reached the Western Dvina, broke through the enemy's defenses, and in the area of Rudaki village, closed the encirclement ring of the Vitebsk enemy grouping. During the fighting, Smetanin was wounded and captured. The next day, Soviet troops drove the enemy out of the positions occupied the day before and found the body of Lieutenant Colonel Smetanin with signs of torture. On March 24, 1945, he was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. One of the streets in the regional center bears his name.