Berlin is rightfully considered one of the greenest European capitals. Extensive parks for the rest of the townspeople began to be laid out here in the century before last, in accordance with all the rules landscape gardening art and in accordance with the master plan for the development of the city. Perhaps the most famous of them is the Tiergarten (Tiergarten), adjacent to the government quarter with the Reichstag in the central district of Berlin-Mitte (Berlin-Mitte). Tourists can neither pass by the Tiergarten nor drive ...
Around the same time with him (1876-1888), another large park was laid - in the Treptow region. Now its name is both in Germany and in the republics former USSR, and in other countries of the world is firmly associated with the memorial complex located here. It is dedicated to the Red Army soldiers who fell in the battles for Berlin at the end of World War II. About seven thousand of them are buried in this park alone - out of more than 20 thousand Soviet soldiers who died during the liberation of the city at the very end of the war.
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Memorial in Treptow Park
The memorial in Treptow Park was erected in 1947-1949. The main monument is set on a hill with a mausoleum.
Memorial in Treptow Park
Soldiers' military cemetery in Berlin
A warrior-liberator with a rescued girl in his arms is the central monument of the memorial in Treptow Park.
Memorial in Treptow Park
Soldiers' military cemetery in Berlin
Monumental mosaic in the mausoleum.
Memorial in Treptow Park
Soldiers' military cemetery in Berlin
Bas-relief depicting the Order Patriotic War at the entrance to the memorial in Treptow Park.
Memorial in Treptow Park
Soldiers' military cemetery in Berlin
Memorial field with mass graves, bowls for eternal fire and two red banners made of granite.
Memorial in Treptow Park
Soldiers' military cemetery in Berlin
Bas-relief with attacking soldiers on one of the sarcophagi.
Memorial in Treptow Park
Soldiers' military cemetery in Berlin
"Everything for the front! Everything for victory!" - a bas-relief dedicated to the support of the army in the rear.
Memorial in Treptow Park
Soldiers' military cemetery in Berlin
Stalin quote.
Memorial in Treptow Park
Soldiers' military cemetery in Berlin
Sculpture of a grieving woman.
Memorial in Treptow Park
Soldiers' military cemetery in Berlin
A kneeling soldier near a granite red banner.
From the center of Berlin to the park is conveniently accessible by railway with one change - first by train S7 or S9 to Ostkreuz, and then - by circle line Ringbahn S41/42. Lines S8 and S9 also pass here. The stop is called Treptower Park. Travel time is about 20 minutes. Then it remains to walk a little, following the signs to the shady Pushkin Alley (Puschkinallee).
The war memorial in Treptow Park is the largest of its kind outside the former Soviet Union and the most famous in the world along with Mamaev Kurgan in Russia. A young soldier with a rescued German girl in his arms and a sword cutting through a fallen swastika rises above the crowns of old trees on a grave hill.
In front of the bronze soldier there is a memorial field with other mass graves, sarcophagi, bowls for eternal fire, two red banners made of granite, sculptures of kneeling soldiers - very young and older. Granite banners have inscriptions in two languages: "Eternal glory to the soldiers of the Soviet Army who gave their lives in the struggle for the liberation of mankind." The sarcophagi themselves are empty, the soldiers are buried in the ground along the edges of the alley of honor.
At the entrance, decorated with granite portals, visitors are greeted by the Motherland, grieving for her sons. She and the soldier-liberator are two symbolic poles that define the dramaturgy of the entire memorial, which is framed by weeping birches, specially planted here as a reminder of Russian nature. And not only about nature.
Guidebooks and other descriptions of Treptow Park certainly mention all sorts of detailed parameters - the height and weight of a bronze statue, the number of segments of which it consists, the number of sarcophagi with bas-reliefs, the area of \u200b\u200bthe park ... But when you are on the spot, all this statistical accounting is no doesn't matter.
Versions are also retold about who exactly was the warrior who, in April 1945, risking his life, saved a German girl. However, the author of the monument, sculptor and front-line soldier Yevgeny Vuchetich, emphasized that his soldier-liberator had symbolic meaning, and does not talk about a specific episode. He emphasized this in an interview with the Berliner Zeitung in 1966.
The feat of Nikolai Masalov
The most common version is that the soldier Nikolai Masalov (1921-2001) was the historical prototype for the monument. A three-year-old girl wept beside her murdered mother in the Berlin ruins. Her voice was heard by the Red Army during a short lull between attacks on Hitler's Reich Chancellery. Masalov volunteered to pull her out of the shelling zone, asking her to cover him with fire. He saved the girl, but was wounded.
In 2003, a plaque was erected on the Potsdamer Bridge (Potsdamer Brücke) in Berlin in memory of the feat accomplished in this place.
Sowjetisches Ehrenmal im Treptower Park
puschkinallee,
Berlin 12435
The story is based primarily on the memoirs of Marshal Vasily Chuikov. The very fact of Masalov's feat is confirmed, but during the GDR, eyewitness accounts were collected about other similar cases throughout Berlin. There were several dozen of them. Before the assault, many inhabitants remained in the city. The National Socialists did not allow the civilian population to leave it, intending to defend the capital of the "Third Reich" to the last.
Portrait likeness and historical quotations
The names of the soldiers who posed for Vuchetich after the war are precisely known: Ivan Odarchenko and Viktor Gunaz. Odarchenko served in the Berlin commandant's office. The sculptor noticed him during sports competitions. After the opening of the Odarchenko memorial, it happened to be on duty near the monument, and many visitors, who did not suspect anything, were surprised at the obvious portrait resemblance. By the way, at the beginning of work on the sculpture, he held a German girl in his arms, but then she was replaced by the little daughter of the commandant of Berlin, Major General Alexander Kotikov.
The sword that cuts the swastika is a copy of the sword owned by the first Pskov prince Vsevolod-Gavriil, the grandson of Vladimir Monomakh. Vuchetich was offered to replace the sword with a more modern weapon - an assault rifle, but he insisted on his original version. They also say that some military leaders proposed to place in the center of the memorial complex not a soldier, but a giant figure of Stalin. This idea was abandoned, since, apparently, it did not find support from Stalin himself.
The "Supreme Commander" is reminiscent of his numerous quotes carved on symbolic sarcophagi in Russian and German. After the reunification of Germany, some German politicians demanded their removal, referring to the crimes committed during the Stalinist dictatorship, but the entire complex, according to interstate agreements, is under state protection. No changes without the consent of Russia are unacceptable here.
Reading Stalin's quotes today evokes ambiguous feelings and emotions, makes us remember and think about the fate of millions of people in Germany and the former Soviet Union who died in Stalin's times. But in this case, the quotes should not be taken out of the general context, they are a document of history necessary for its understanding.
From the granite of the Reich Chancellery
The memorial in Treptow Park was erected immediately after the end of World War II, in 1947-1949. The remains of soldiers temporarily buried in various city cemeteries were transferred here. The place was chosen by the Soviet command and enshrined in order number 134. Granite from Hitler's Reich Chancellery was used for the construction.
The art competition, which was organized by the Soviet military command in Berlin, involved several dozen projects. The winners are joint sketches by architect Yakov Belopolsky and sculptor Evgeny Vuchetich.
60 German sculptors and 200 masons were involved in the manufacture of sculptural elements according to Vuchetich's sketches, and a total of 1,200 workers participated in the construction of the memorial. All of them received additional allowances and food. The German workshops also made bowls for the eternal flame and a mosaic in the mausoleum under the sculpture of the warrior-liberator. The main statue was cast in Leningrad and delivered to Berlin by water.
In addition to the memorial in Treptow Park, monuments to Soviet soldiers were erected in two more places immediately after the war. Around 2,000 fallen soldiers are buried in the Tiergarten park in central Berlin. There are over 13,000 in the Schönholzer Heide park in Berlin's Pankow district.
During the GDR memorial Complex in Treptow Park served as a venue for various kinds of official events, had the status of one of the most important state monuments. On August 31, 1994, a thousand Russian and six hundred German soldiers participated in the solemn verification dedicated to the memory of the fallen and the withdrawal of Russian troops from united Germany, and Federal Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Russian President Boris Yeltsin took part in the parade.
The status of the monument and all Soviet military cemeteries is enshrined in a separate chapter of the agreement concluded between the FRG, the GDR and the victorious powers in World War II. According to this document, the memorial is guaranteed an eternal status, and the German authorities are obliged to finance its maintenance, ensure integrity and safety. What is done most in the best way.
See also:
Graves of Soviet prisoners of war and forced laborers
17 frames of spring
Between Düsseldorf and Bonn
DW has repeatedly written about the database, which contains information about burial places and memorials of Soviet citizens in Germany. The DW correspondent visited some of them - between Düsseldorf and Bonn, taking a camera and a dozen Red roses.
17 frames of spring
The day began near Düsseldorf, where the remains of a thousand and a half people who died here in the infirmary are buried in the fraternal cemetery. It was opened in 1940 for prisoners of war from different countries. The French were the first, and then Soviet soldiers began to come here - from forced labor in the surrounding labor camps. Address: Luckemeyerstraße, Düsseldorf.
17 frames of spring
Address: Mülheimer Straße 52, Leverkusen.
17 frames of spring
The next cemetery is a fraternal one. It is located in the Wahn Heath (Wahner Heide) near Cologne/Bonn Airport in the city of Rösrath.
17 frames of spring
Most of the 112 graves in the Van wasteland are unmarked burials of Soviet soldiers. There are also several graves of Polish citizens and victims of National Socialism from other countries. They all died in the labor camp.
The monument erected in Germany to the Soviet soldier-liberator, who carries a little rescued girl in his arms, is one of the most majestic symbols of the Victory in the Great Patriotic War.
warrior hero
The outer one was originally conceived by the artist A.V. Gorpenko. However, the key author of the monument to the warrior-liberator, E. V. Vuchetich, was able to bring his idea to life only thanks to the decisive word of Stalin. The installation was decided to coincide with May 8, 1949.
The architect Ya. B. Belopolsky and the engineer S. S. Valerius made the main sketches of the future sculpture, but the key part of the work fell on the shoulders of the sculptor E.V. Vuchetich, admired by the feat of the soldier Nikolai Maslov, who selflessly fought against the German invaders up to the capital of the Nazi Reich.
It was the feat of an ordinary soldier, who was not afraid to go under the explosions of shells and bullets flying from all sides in order to save a little German girl, that played a decisive role in the creation of a monument to Soviet soldiers in Berlin. A monument to such an outstanding person should have been created only by an equally non-standard personality. It was decided to install a sculpture in Treptow Park as a symbol of victory over fascism.
The best of the best
In order to show the whole world the heroic deed of our soldiers, the Soviet government allowed a monument to Russian soldiers to be erected in Berlin. Treptow Park received the eternal decoration in the form of a memorial complex only after the competition, which was attended by about 33 individual projects The best of the best have been selected. And in the end, only two of them reached the leading position. The first one belonged to E.V. Vuchetich, and the second - Ya.B. Belopolsky. In order for the monument to Russian soldiers in Berlin to be erected in compliance with all ideological norms, the 27th Directorate, which is responsible for the army defense installations of the entire Soviet Union, had to follow.
Since the work was difficult and painstaking, it was decided to involve more than 1,000 German soldiers serving sentences in Soviet prisons, as well as more than 200 workers from the German Noack foundry, the Puhl & Wagner mosaic and stained glass workshop, and gardeners working in the Spathnursery partnership.
Manufacturing
Soviet monuments in Berlin were supposed to constantly remind German citizens what awaits their people in the event of a repetition of such terrible acts. It was decided to make the monument at the Monumental Sculpture factory, located in Leningrad. The monument to Russian soldiers in Berlin exceeded the mark of 70 tons, which made it difficult to transport it.
Because of this, it was decided to divide the structure into 6 main components and thus transport them to Treptow Park in Berlin. The hard work was completed in the first days of May under the tireless guidance of architect Ya. B. Belopolsky and engineer S. S. Valerius, and already on the 8th of May the monument was presented to the whole world. The monument to Russian soldiers in Berlin reaches a height of 12 meters and is today a key symbol of the victory over fascism in Germany.
The opening of the memorial in Berlin was led by A. G. Kotikov, who was a major general in the Soviet army and at that time acting as a city commandant.
By mid-September 1949, the monument to the soldier-liberator in Berlin came under the control of the Soviet military commandant's office of the magistrate of Greater Berlin.
Restoration
By the fall of 2003, the sculpture had become so dilapidated that the leadership of the Federal Republic of Germany decided that it was necessary to carry out during which the monument to the liberator soldier in Berlin was dismantled and sent for modernization. It took almost six months, as a result of which, in May 2004, the renewed figure of the Soviet hero returned to its original place.
Author of the monument "Warrior-Liberator"
The sculptor of the monument, Viktorovich Vuchetich, is by far the most famous muralist of the Soviet era.
Who is he, a hero?
The monument in Berlin was made using the figure of a Soviet soldier - the hero Nikolai Maslov, a native of the village of Voznesenka. This heroic man lived in the Tula region Kemerovo region. He managed during the storming of Berlin in April 1945 to save a little German girl. During the operation to liberate Berlin from the remnants of fascist formations, she was only 3 years old. She sat in the ruins of the building near the body of her dead mother and wept bitterly.
As soon as a slight lull formed among the bombings, the crying was heard by the Red Army. Maslov, without hesitation, made his way through the shelling zone behind the child, asking his comrades to cover him, if possible, with the help of fire support. The girl was saved from the fire, but the hero himself received a very serious injury.
The German authorities have not forgotten about generosity Soviet man and in addition to the monument, they immortalized his memory by hanging a tablet on the Potsdam Bridge, detailing his feat for the sake of a German child.
Bio details
Nikolai Maslov spent most of his adult life in harsh Siberia. All men in his family were hereditary blacksmiths, so the boy's future was considered predetermined from the beginning. His family was quite large, given that, in addition to him, his parents had to raise five more children - 3 boys and 2 girls. Until the outbreak of hostilities, Nikolai worked as a tractor driver in his native village.
As soon as he turned 18, he was drafted into the ranks of the Soviet army, where he graduated with honors preparatory school mortars. Exactly one year after he first joined the army, his regiment first encountered military realities, coming under German fire on the Bryansk front near Kastorna.
The battle was very long and hard. Soviet soldiers managed to break out of the fascist encirclement three times. Moreover, it is necessary to pay attention to the fact that even in such a difficult situation, the soldiers managed to save at the cost of many human lives the banner that they received in Siberia in the first days of the regiment's creation. The guys managed to get out of the encirclement as part of only 5 people, one of whom was Maslov. All the rest consciously gave their lives for the life and freedom of the Fatherland.
Successful career
The survivors were reorganized, and Nikolai Maslov ended up in the legendary 62nd Army under the command of General Chuikov. Siberians managed to win on Mamaev Kurgan. Nikolai and his closest comrades were repeatedly bombarded with debris from the dugout mixed with clods of earth flying from all sides. However, colleagues returned and dug them up.
After participating in the Stalingrad battles, Nikolai was appointed as an assistant in the banner factory. No one could even imagine that a simple rural guy would reach Berlin itself in pursuit of the Nazis.
For all the years of his stay in the war, Nikolai managed to become an experienced warrior, fluent in weapons. Having reached Berlin, he and his comrades took the city into a tight ring. His 220th regiment advanced along the government office.
When there was about an hour left before the start of the assault, the soldiers heard crying from under the ground. There, on the ruins of an old building, clinging to the corpse of her mother, sat a little girl. All this Nikolai learned when, under the cover of his comrades, he was able to break through to the ruins. Grabbing the child, Nikolai ran back to his own, receiving a serious wound along the way, which did not prevent him from performing a truly heroic feat on an equal footing with everyone else.
Description of the monument "Warrior-Liberator"
As soon as the last stronghold of fascism was taken by Soviet soldiers, Yevgeny Vuchetich met with Maslov. The story about the rescued girl prompted him to create a monument to the liberator in Berlin. It was supposed to symbolize the selflessness of the Soviet soldier, who protects not only the whole world, but also each individual person from the threat of fascism.
The central part of the exposition is occupied by the figure of a soldier holding a child with one hand and a sword lowered to the ground with the other. Fragments of a swastika lie under the feet of the hero of the Soviet Union.
The park in which the memorial was erected is already famous for the fact that more than 5,000 Soviet soldiers were buried there. According to the initial idea, on the site where the monument to the liberator soldier stands, a sculpture of Stalin holding a globe in his hands was to be installed in Berlin. Thus, symbolizing that the Soviet government keeps the whole world under its control and will never again allow the threat of fascism.
Additional facts
It would not be superfluous to note also the fact that, as a sign of victory over Nazi Germany Soviet Union issued a coin with a face value of 1 ruble, on the reverse side of which was depicted the work of Yevgeny Vuchetich - "Warrior-Liberator".
This idea belonged directly to the famous marshal-hero. As soon as the Potsdam Conference came to an end, he summoned a sculptor and asked him to create a sculpture that would show what the world had cost and what awaited anyone who would ever encroach on its integrity.
The sculptor agreed, but decided to play it safe and created additional option sculptures of a Soviet soldier with a machine gun and a child in his arms. Stalin approved this particular option, but ordered the machine gun to be replaced with a sword, with which a simple soldier would cut the last symbol of fascism, the role of which was played by the swastika.
It cannot be said that the monument to the soldier-liberator in Berlin is just a prototype of Nikolai Maslov. This is an integral, collective image of all the soldiers who selflessly defended their homeland.
After work on the creation of the figure was in full swing for half a year, the “Warrior-Liberator” began to rise in Treptow Park, and you can see it because of its significant height anywhere in the park.
69 years ago, on May 8, 1949, the Monument to the Liberator in Treptow Park. This memorial was erected in memory of 20 thousand Soviet soldiers who died in the battles for the liberation of Berlin, and became one of the most famous characters Victory in the Great Patriotic War. Few people know that the idea for the creation of the monument was real story, and the main character of the plot was a soldier Nikolai Masalov whose feat long years was undeservedly forgotten.
The memorial was erected at the burial place of 5 thousand Soviet soldiers who died during the capture of the capital Nazi Germany. Along with the Mamaev Kurgan in Russia, it is one of the largest and most famous of its kind in the world. The decision to build it was made at the Potsdam Conference two months after the end of the war.
The idea for the composition of the monument was a real story: on April 26, 1945, Sergeant Nikolai Masalov, during the storming of Berlin, carried a German girl out of the shelling. He himself later described these events as follows: “Under the bridge, I saw a three-year-old girl sitting next to her murdered mother. The baby had blond hair, slightly curled at the forehead. She kept fiddling with her mother's belt and calling: "Mutter, mutter!" No time to think here. I am a girl in an armful - and back. And how she sounds! I'm on the go and so and so I persuade: shut up, they say, otherwise you will open me. Here, indeed, the Nazis began to shoot. Thanks to our people - they helped us out, opened fire from all trunks. The sergeant was wounded in the leg, but the girl was reported to his own. After the Victory, Nikolai Masalov returned to the village of Voznesenka, Kemerovo Region, then moved to the city of Tyazhin and worked there as a supply manager in a kindergarten. His feat was remembered only after 20 years. In 1964, the first publications appeared about Masalov in the press, and in 1969 he was awarded the title of Honorary Citizen of Berlin.
The prototype of the Warrior-Liberator was Nikolai Masalov, but another soldier, Ivan Odarchenko from Tambov, who served in the Berlin commandant's office, posed for the sculptor. Vuchetich noticed him in 1947 at the celebration of the Day of the Athlete. Ivan posed for the sculptor for six months, and after the monument was erected in Treptow Park, he stood guard near him several times. They say that people approached him several times, surprised by the similarity, but the private did not admit that this similarity was not at all accidental. After the war, he returned to Tambov, where he worked at a factory. And 60 years after the opening of the monument in Berlin, Ivan Odarchenko became the prototype of the monument to the Veteran in Tambov.
The model for the statue of a girl in the arms of a soldier was supposed to be a German woman, but in the end, the Russian girl Sveta, the 3-year-old daughter of the commandant of Berlin, General Kotikov, posed for Vuchetich. In the original version of the memorial, the warrior held a machine gun in his hands, but it was decided to replace it with a sword. It was an exact copy of the sword of the Pskov prince Gabriel, who fought together with Alexander Nevsky, and this was symbolic: Russian soldiers defeated the German knights on Lake Peipsi, and after several centuries defeated them again.
Work on the memorial was carried out for three years. Architect Y. Belopolsky and sculptor E. Vuchetich sent a model of the monument to Leningrad, and a 13-meter figure of the Liberator Warrior weighing 72 tons was made there. The sculpture was transported to Berlin in parts. According to Vuchetich, after it was brought from Leningrad, one of the best German casters examined it and, finding no flaws, exclaimed: “Yes, this is a Russian miracle!”
Vuchetich prepared two drafts of the monument. Initially, it was planned to place a statue of Stalin with a globe in his hands as a symbol of conquering the world in Treptow Park. As a fallback, Vuchetich proposed a sculpture of a soldier with a girl in his arms. Both projects were presented to Stalin, but he approved the second one.
The memorial was solemnly opened on the eve of the 4th anniversary of the Victory over fascism, May 8, 1949. In 2003, a plaque was erected on the Potsdam Bridge in Berlin in memory of the feat of Nikolai Masalov accomplished in this place. This fact was documented, although eyewitnesses claimed that during the liberation of Berlin there were several dozen such cases. When they tried to find that very girl, about a hundred German families responded. The rescue of about 45 German children by Soviet soldiers was documented.
At the Motherland with propaganda poster during the Great Patriotic War, there was also a real prototype: .
... And in Berlin on a festive date
Was erected to stand for centuries,
Monument to the Soviet soldier
With a rescued girl in her arms.
It stands as a symbol of our glory,
Like a beacon glowing in the dark.
He is the soldier of my state -
Keeping peace throughout the world!
G. Rublev
On May 8, 1950, one of the most majestic symbols of Great Victory. A warrior-liberator with a German girl in his hands climbed to a multi-meter height. This 13-meter monument has become epochal in its own way.
Millions of people visiting Berlin try to visit this place in order to bow to the great feat of the Soviet people. Not everyone knows that, according to the original idea, in Treptow Park, where the ashes of more than 5 thousand Soviet soldiers and officers are buried, there should have been a majestic figure of Comrade. Stalin. And in the hands of this bronze idol was supposed to hold a globe. Like, "the whole world is in our hands."
This is exactly the idea that the first Soviet marshal, Kliment Voroshilov, imagined when he called the sculptor Yevgeny Vuchetich to himself immediately after the end of the Potsdam Conference of the Heads of the Allied Powers. But the front-line soldier, the sculptor Vuchetich, just in case, prepared another option - an ordinary Russian soldier, who stomped from the walls of Moscow to Berlin, who saved a German girl, should pose. They say that the leader of all times and peoples, having looked at both proposed options, chose the second one. And he only asked to replace the machine gun in the hands of a soldier with something more symbolic, for example, a sword. And for him to cut the fascist swastika ...
Why a warrior and a girl? Evgeny Vuchetich was familiar with the story of the feat of Sergeant Nikolai Masalov ...
A few minutes before the start of a furious attack on German positions, he suddenly heard, as if from under the ground, a child's cry. Nikolai rushed to the commander: “I know how to find a child! Permit! And a second later he rushed in search. Weeping came from under the bridge. However, it is better to give the floor to Masalov himself. Nikolai Ivanovich recalled this: “Under the bridge, I saw a three-year-old girl sitting next to her murdered mother. The baby had blond hair, slightly curled at the forehead. She kept fiddling with her mother's belt and calling: "Mutter, mutter!" No time to think here. I am a girl in an armful - and back. And how she sounds! I'm on the go and so and so I persuade: shut up, they say, otherwise you will open me. Here, indeed, the Nazis began to shoot. Thanks to our people - they helped us out, opened fire from all trunks.
At this moment, Nikolai was wounded in the leg. But he didn’t leave the girl, he informed his friends ... And a few days later the sculptor Vuchetich appeared in the regiment, who made several sketches for his future sculpture ...
This is the most common version that the soldier Nikolai Masalov (1921-2001) was the historical prototype for the monument. In 2003, a plaque was erected on the Potsdamer Bridge (Potsdamer Brücke) in Berlin in memory of the feat accomplished in this place.
The story is based primarily on the memoirs of Marshal Vasily Chuikov. The very fact of Masalov's feat is confirmed, but during the GDR, eyewitness accounts were collected about other similar cases throughout Berlin. There were several dozen of them. Before the assault, many inhabitants remained in the city. The National Socialists did not allow the civilian population to leave it, intending to defend the capital of the "Third Reich" to the last.
The names of the soldiers who posed for Vuchetich after the war are precisely known: Ivan Odarchenko and Viktor Gunaz. Odarchenko served in the Berlin commandant's office. The sculptor noticed him during sports competitions. After the opening of the Odarchenko memorial, it happened to be on duty near the monument, and many visitors, who did not suspect anything, were surprised at the obvious portrait resemblance. By the way, at the beginning of the work on the sculpture, he held a German girl in his arms, but then she was replaced by the little daughter of the commandant of Berlin.
Interestingly, after the opening of the monument in Treptow Park, Ivan Odarchenko, who served in the Berlin commandant's office, guarded the "bronze soldier" several times. People approached him, marveling at his resemblance to a warrior-liberator. But modest Ivan never told that it was he who posed for the sculptor. And the fact that the original idea to hold a German girl in her arms, in the end, had to be abandoned.
The prototype of the child was 3-year-old Svetochka, daughter of the commandant of Berlin, General Kotikov. By the way, the sword was not at all far-fetched, but an exact copy of the sword of the Pskov prince Gabriel, who, together with Alexander Nevsky, fought against the “knight dogs”. The weight of this sword was about two pounds.
It is interesting that the sword in the hands of the "Warrior-Liberator" has a connection with other famous monuments: it is understood that the sword in the hands of the soldier is the same sword that the worker passes to the warrior depicted on the monument "Rear to the Front" (Magnitogorsk), and which then raises the Motherland on Mamaev Kurgan in Volgograd.
The "Supreme Commander-in-Chief" is reminiscent of his numerous quotes carved on symbolic sarcophagi in Russian and German. After the reunification of Germany, some German politicians demanded their removal, referring to the crimes committed during the Stalinist dictatorship, but the entire complex, according to interstate agreements, is under state protection. No changes without the consent of Russia are unacceptable here.
Reading Stalin's quotes today evokes ambiguous feelings and emotions, makes us remember and think about the fate of millions of people in Germany and the former Soviet Union who died in Stalin's times. But in this case, the quotations should not be taken out of the general context, they are a document of history, necessary for its comprehension.
After the Battle of Berlin, the sports park near Treptower Allee became a military cemetery. The mass graves are located under the alleys of the memory park.
The work began when the Berliners, not yet separated by a wall, were rebuilding their city from the ruins brick by brick. Vuchetich was assisted by German engineers. The widow of one of them, Helga Köpfstein, recalls that many things about this project seemed unusual to them.
Helga Köpfstein, tour guide: “We asked why a soldier does not have a machine gun in his hands, but a sword? We were told that the sword is a symbol. A Russian soldier defeated the Teutonic Knights on Lake Peipsi, and a few centuries later he reached Berlin and defeated Hitler.
60 German sculptors and 200 masons were involved in the manufacture of sculptural elements according to Vuchetich's sketches, and a total of 1,200 workers participated in the construction of the memorial. All of them received additional allowances and food. The German workshops also made bowls for the eternal flame and a mosaic in the mausoleum under the sculpture of the warrior-liberator.
Work on the memorial was carried out for 3 years by the architect Y. Belopolsky and the sculptor E. Vuchetich. Interestingly, granite from the Reich Chancellery of Hitler was used for the construction. 13 meter figure Warrior Liberator was made in St. Petersburg and weighed 72 tons. She was transported to Berlin in parts by water. According to Vuchetich, after one of the best German foundry workers in the most accurate way examined the sculpture made in Leningrad and made sure that everything was done flawlessly, he approached the sculpture, kissed its base and said: “Yes, this is a Russian miracle!”
In addition to the memorial in Treptow Park, monuments to Soviet soldiers were erected in two more places immediately after the war. Around 2,000 fallen soldiers are buried in the Tiergarten park in central Berlin. There are over 13,000 in the Schönholzer Heide park in Berlin's Pankow district.
During the GDR, the memorial complex in Treptow Park served as a venue for various kinds of official events and had the status of one of the most important state monuments. On August 31, 1994, a thousand Russian and six hundred German soldiers participated in the solemn verification dedicated to the memory of the fallen and the withdrawal of Russian troops from united Germany, and Federal Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Russian President Boris Yeltsin took part in the parade.
The status of the monument and all Soviet military cemeteries is enshrined in a separate chapter of the agreement concluded between the FRG, the GDR and the victorious powers in World War II. According to this document, the memorial is guaranteed an eternal status, and the German authorities are obliged to finance its maintenance, ensure integrity and safety. Which is done in the best way.
It is impossible not to tell about the further fate of Nikolai Masalov and Ivan Odarchenko. Nikolai Ivanovich, after demobilization, returned to his native village of Voznesenka, Tisulsky district, Kemerovo region. Unique case- his parents escorted four sons to the front and all four returned home with a victory. Nikolai Ivanovich could not work on a tractor due to shell shocks, and after moving to the city of Tyazhin, he got a job as a supply manager in Kindergarten. This is where the journalists found him. 20 years after the end of the war, fame fell upon Masalov, which, however, he treated with his usual modesty.
In 1969 he was awarded the title Honorable Sir Berlin. But talking about his heroic deed, Nikolai Ivanovich never tired of emphasizing: what he accomplished was no feat, many would have done the same in his place. So it was in life. When the German Komsomol members decided to find out about the fate of the rescued girl, they received hundreds of letters describing such cases. And the rescue of at least 45 boys and girls by Soviet soldiers was documented. Today Nikolai Ivanovich Masalov is no longer alive ...
But Ivan Odarchenko still lives in the city of Tambov (information for 2007). He worked in a factory and then retired. He buried his wife, but the veteran has frequent guests - his daughter and granddaughter. And Ivan Stepanovich was often invited to parades dedicated to the Great Victory to portray a liberator with a girl in his arms ... And on the 60th anniversary of the Victory, the Memory Train even brought an 80-year-old veteran and his comrades to Berlin.
Last year, a scandal broke out in Germany around the monuments to Soviet soldiers-liberators, installed in Berlin's Treptow Park and the Tiergarten. In connection with the recent events in Ukraine, journalists from popular German publications sent letters to the Bundestag demanding that the legendary monuments be dismantled.
One of the publications that signed the frankly provocative petition was the newspaper. Journalists write that Russian tanks have no place near the famous Brandenburg Gate. “As long as Russian troops threaten the security of a free and democratic Europe, we do not want to see a single Russian tank in the center of Berlin,” angry media workers write. In addition to the authors of Bild, this document was also signed by representatives of the Berliner Tageszeitung.
German journalists believe that Russian military units located near the Ukrainian border, threaten the independence of a sovereign state. “For the first time since the end of the Cold War, Russia is trying by force to suppress a peaceful revolution in Eastern Europe", - write German journalists.
The scandalous document was sent to the Bundestag. By law, the German authorities must consider it within two weeks.
This statement by German journalists caused a storm of indignation among the readers of Bild and Berliner Tageszeitung. Many believe that the newspapermen deliberately escalate the situation around the Ukrainian issue.
For sixty years, this monument has truly become accustomed to Berlin. It was on postage stamps and coins, in the days of the GDR here, probably, half of the population of East Berlin was accepted as pioneers. In the nineties, after the unification of the country, Berliners from the west and east held anti-fascist rallies here.
And neo-Nazis have repeatedly beaten marble slabs and painted swastikas on obelisks. But every time the walls were washed, and the broken slabs were replaced with new ones. The Soviet soldier in Treptover Park is one of the most well-kept monuments in Berlin. Germany spent about three million euros on its reconstruction. Some people were very annoyed.
Hans Georg Büchner, architect, former member Senate of Berlin: “What is there to hide, we had one deputy of the Berlin Senate in the early nineties. When your troops were withdrawn from Germany, this figure shouted - let them take this monument with them. Now no one even remembers his name.”
A monument can be called a national one if people go to it not only on Victory Day. Sixty years have changed Germany a lot, but they have not been able to change the way Germans look at their history. And in the old GDR guidebooks, and on modern travel sites - this is a monument to the "Soviet soldier-liberator". To the common man who came to Europe in peace.
A small German girl is frightened pressed against the chest of a Soviet soldier who is standing on the fragments of a swastika with a lowered sword. This is the world-famous monument to the Liberator Warrior in Berlin's Treptow Park. The memorial was officially opened on May 8, 1949. The group of authors was headed by architect Yakov Belopolsky and sculptor Evgeny Vuchetich.
Not everyone knows that according to the original idea, in Treptow Park, where the ashes of more than 5 thousand Soviet soldiers and officers are buried, there should have been a majestic figure of Stalin with a globe in his hands. This is exactly how the first Soviet marshal, Kliment Voroshilov, imagined the monument when, immediately after the end of the Potsdam Conference of the Heads of the Allied Powers, he summoned the sculptor Yevgeny Vuchetich to his place. However, the front-line soldier Yevgeny Vuchetich, just in case, made the second option - with a Red Army soldier holding a German girl in his arms. Both projects were presented to Stalin, and he chose the "fallback" option.
The prototype of the "Warrior-Liberator" was Sergeant Nikolai Masalov, who on April 26, 1945, during the battle, carried a three-year-old German girl out of the firing zone. The hero himself recalled his feat in this way: “Under the bridge, I saw a three-year-old girl sitting next to her murdered mother. The baby had blond hair, slightly curled at the forehead. She kept fiddling with her mother's belt and calling: "Mutter, mutter!" No time to think here. I am a girl in an armful - and back. And how she sounds! I persuade her on the go, and so, and so I persuade: shut up, they say, otherwise you will open me. Here, indeed, the Nazis began to shoot. Thanks to our people - they helped us out, opened fire from all trunks.
Marshal Chuikov was the first to tell about the feat of Masalov. The very fact of Masalov's feat is documented, but during the GDR, eyewitness accounts were collected about dozens of other similar cases throughout Berlin. Before the assault, many inhabitants remained in the city. The National Socialists did not allow the civilian population to leave it, intending to defend the capital of the "Third Reich to the last." After the war, Yevgeny Vuchetich met with Nikolai Masalov, whose feat prompted him the key idea of the monument in Treptow Park: saving a girl, a soldier protects peace and life.
However, Vutechich chose a completely different person as a sitter. At the celebration of the Day of the athlete, the sculptor noticed 21-year-old private Ivan Odarchenko, who participated in running competitions. It is curious that Odarchenko, who served in Berlin, was on guard of the monument to the “Liberator Warrior” several times. People constantly approached Ivan and were amazed at the resemblance to the monument, but the private guard did not reveal to the visitors the secret of this resemblance. According to the memoirs of Ivan Odarchenko, the model for the statue of the girl that the warrior holds in his arms was first a German girl, and then a Russian - 3-year-old Sveta - the daughter of the commandant of Berlin, General Kotikov.
Many believed that the sword was out of place in the statue of the Liberator Warrior, and advised the sculptor to change it to some modern weapon, for example, to a machine gun. But Vuchetich insisted on the sword. In addition, he did not make a sword at all, but exactly copied the sword of the Pskov prince Gabriel, who, together with Alexander Nevsky, fought for Russia against the “knight dogs”.
Work on the memorial was carried out for 3 years. Interestingly, granite from the Reich Chancellery of Hitler was used for the construction. The 13-meter bronze figure of the "Warrior-Liberator" was made in St. Petersburg and weighed 72 tons. In Berlin, it was transported in parts by sea.
In the autumn of October 1, 2003, the sculpture of the warrior was dismantled and sent for restoration. In the spring of 2004, the monument to the soldiers of the Soviet Army who fell in the battles against fascism in Berlin was returned to its original place.
The status of the monument and all Soviet military cemeteries is enshrined in a separate chapter of the "two plus four" unification agreement concluded between the FRG, the GDR and the victorious powers in World War II. According to this document, the memorial is guaranteed an eternal status, and the German authorities are obliged to finance its maintenance, ensure integrity and safety. Which is done in the best way.
