March 5, 1953 is a date that all the inhabitants of the Soviet Union knew well. On this day, the Soviet Generalissimo Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin died. After that, a fundamentally new history began in the country, the political repressions that had been in force for many years were stopped, and soon a large-scale campaign to debunk the personality cult of the head of state began.
Disease development
March 5, 1953 the generalissimo died. A few days before this, Stalin was found unconscious on the floor in a small dining room in the Middle cottage. It was one of the residences of the head of state. On March 1, he was found by a guard named Lozgachev.
The next day, doctors arrived at the residence, who diagnosed the ruler with complete paralysis of the right side of the body. Only on March 4, Stalin’s disease was announced publicly. Relevant messages were broadcast on the radio. They mentioned that the Secretary General is in serious condition, he lost consciousness, he was diagnosed with a stroke, body paralysis, the so-called agonal breathing.
March 5, 1953, Stalin died. This happened at 21 hours 50 minutes. The next day, at 6 a.m., the death of the Generalissimo was announced on the radio.
The diagnosis of doctors
Doctors concluded that Stalin's death on March 5, 1953 occurred as a result of a brain hemorrhage. Later, more detailed details about the leader’s illness, the course of its treatment, as well as the official autopsy results became known from the book of the academician of medical sciences Myasnikov.
Farewell to Stalin was scheduled for several days. It lasted from March 6 to 9. March 5, 1953 for a long time remained in the memory of many Soviet people. Because of his death, official mourning was declared throughout the country. The coffin with the body of the deceased was installed in the House of Unions. The funeral was held on March 9th. Now you know who died on March 5, 1953.
The riddle of the death of the leader
The health status of the generalissimo has been of interest to many historians and researchers for many years. They tried to understand what led to the tragic events of March 5, 1953.
The famous historian Zhores Medvedev in his essay "The Mystery of the Death of Stalin" cites information previously unknown to a wide circle of people about the health of the head of the Soviet state. They relate to the period from 1923 to 1940. It is alleged that the first symptoms of a really serious illness appeared in Stalin in October 1945.
In 1952, people in his inner circle knew that Stalin's health had deteriorated significantly. Doctors did everything in their power to stabilize the patient. But according to the memoirs of many of his contemporaries, Stalin was very neglectful of medicine. In all likelihood, this also played a role in the stroke that led to the death of Stalin on March 5, 1953.
Was there a conspiracy?
Restoring the events of March 5, 1953, many are asking a reasonable question about whether this was a conspiracy. These thoughts are prompted by the fact that Stalin unconsciously lay for several hours on the floor in his residence, and the doctors did not come to his aid.
Malenkov, Beria, and Khrushchev, who knew what had happened, simply did not rush to call doctors. All this leads many researchers to the idea that what happened was a conspiracy against the generalissimo, who actually usurped power in the country.
Avtorkhanov hypothesis
For the first time, the version that Stalin's death was violent received publicity in 1976. This version was put forward by the historian Avtorkhanov in his book "The riddle of the death of Stalin: the conspiracy of Beria." The author had little doubt that the leaders of the Politburo were behind the murder of the leader.
All versions of what happened in one book were collected by Rafael Grugman. It is called "The Death of Stalin: All Versions and Another." Among them are those that Avtorkhanov cited, as well as hypotheses put forward by Glebov, Radzinsky, Kamenev. Among them there is a version of natural death, which provoked a third stroke, as well as a version of the conflict with his daughter, which could play a fatal role.
Other versions
Discussing what happened on March 5, 1953, put forward a variety of versions. They suggest that death itself was not natural, and also that the leader’s environment was involved in it.
So, Radzinsky believes that the death of the generalissimo was facilitated by Khrushchev, Beria and Malenkov, who played a fatal role, without providing the patient with timely medical care.
There are many dubious and even provocative versions. So, in 1987 in New York, the book of Stuart Kagan in English was published. In it, the author claimed to be Kaganovich’s nephew.
In fact, Kagan repeated the main provisions that were set out in the "Protocols of the Zion of the Sages." He claimed that he secretly visited his uncle Lazar Kaganovich in Moscow, and he told him that he was among the organizers of a conspiracy against Stalin, in which Molotov, Mikoyan and Bulganin also participated.
American publishers, after some time, came to the conclusion that she was a fake. However, in Russia the book was still published in 1991. Today, a detailed account of this version can be found in the English Wikipedia.
Reaction to the death of the leader
The event of March 5, 1953 was a real shock and shock for many. Many representatives of creative professions responded in verse to the death of the Generalissimo. Among them were Berggolz, Twardowski, Simonov.
Representatives of the world communist movement also expressed deep sorrow and sympathy for the death of Stalin. For example, the representative of the British Communist Party, Palm Dutt, wrote that for many years this man guided the symbolic ship of human hopes and aspirations, acting with unshakable stamina, being as self-confident as possible.
Some poets, in connection with the death of Stalin, embarked on completely phantasmagoric metaphors. For example, the poet Joseph Noneshvili wrote that if the Sun went out, then people would not even grieve as much as now, after the leader’s death. He even found a justification for this statement. Noneshvili wrote that the sun shines for both good and bad people, and Stalin spread his light only to good people, so this loss is irreparable.
But for the Gulag prisoners, who learned that Stalin had died on March 5, 1953, the news became joyful. One of them recalled that, having heard about the diagnosis of Cheyne-Stokes breathing, they immediately rushed to the medical unit, where they demanded that the doctor, on the basis of the information that became known, would tell the doctors what the outcome might be.
Farewell to the leader
For farewell, Stalin's body was exhibited on March 6 in the columned hall of the House of Soviets. The first people began to stay about 16 hours. Stalin was in a coffin on a high pedestal, around him there were a large number of roses, red banners and green branches. He was dressed in his favorite everyday uniform, since he did not like to stand out in his full dress. General's buttonholes were sewn on it.
Crystal chandeliers in a sign of mourning pulled a black crepe. And on the white marble columns secured 16 velvet panels of scarlet color. All of them were bordered with black silk and the arms of the Union republics. At the head of the leader was a huge banner of the Soviet Union. During farewell, the farewell melodies of Beethoven, Tchaikovsky and Mozart were played.
Muscovites and residents of other cities alternately approached the coffin, members of the government stood on guard of honor. On the streets turned on powerful spotlights, which are installed on trucks. They lit up thousands of columns of people who were moving to the House of Unions. In addition to the inhabitants of the country of Soviets, many foreigners also took part in the farewell ceremony.
Farewell lasted three days and three nights. Only by midnight on March 8, the ceremony was officially over.
Funeral ceremony
The leader’s funeral took place on March 9 in Red Square. At about 10 a.m. a funeral procession began to line up. Beria, Malenkov, Molotov, Khrushchev, Kaganovich, Mikoyan, Bulganin and Voroshilov lifted the coffin with the body of Stalin and carried him to the exit. After this, the procession moved to the mausoleum.
At 10.45, the coffin was installed on a pedestal near the mausoleum. A huge number of people gathered on Red Square. Among them were representatives of workers, leaders of republics, regions and territories, delegations of foreign states, who were also considered adherents of socialism.
Salute and moments of silence
At 11.45 a mourning rally was declared closed. An artillery salute thundered over the Kremlin at noon. Then the beeps of metropolitan industrial enterprises were heard, and after that 5 minutes of silence were announced throughout the country. When they ended, the anthem of the Soviet Union sounded.
Troops marched along Red Square, and airplanes flew in solemn order in the sky. At the mourning rally, many solemn speeches were made, which later formed the basis of the film "The Great Farewell."
Stalin's body was embalmed and exhibited in the mausoleum. Until 1961, the mausoleum officially bore the name of Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin.
Died on the same day as Stalin
It is widely known that on the same day as Stalin another famous person died. The composer and conductor, People's Artist of the RSFSR Sergey Prokofiev, died. He was 61 years old.
On March 5, 1953, he suffered a hypertensive crisis in his communal apartment in Moscow, which was located on Kamergersky Lane. Due to the fact that this death coincided with the death of the head of state, the death of Prokofiev remained almost unnoticed. During the organization of the farewell and funeral ceremonies, the composer's family and friends faced a lot of difficulties.
As a result, a popular Soviet artist was buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery.
Indirectly with the death of Stalin is the death of Czechoslovak President Clement Gottwald. He was 56 years old, he was known as a consistent Stalinist who was hard pressed for the death of the Soviet Generalissimo. Returning from the USSR from Stalin's funeral, he died a few days later from rupture of the aorta.
It is noteworthy that his body was also embalmed and put on public display on Prague's Vitkov Hill. But the embalming did not last long, which led to the appearance of a conspiracy theological version that Gottwald was in fact poisoned, because when he saw Stalin in the grave, he doubted the naturalness of his death. The fact is that the corpse of a poisoned person cannot be embalmed qualitatively.
In the early 60s, it became apparent that the body of the Czechoslovak president was decomposing. At the same time, the debunking of the personality cult began in the USSR. As a result, the mausoleum was closed, and the remains of Gottwald were cremated.