Moabit notebooks - sheets of decayed paper, covered with small handwriting of the Tatar poet Musa Jalil in the dungeons of the Moabit prison in Berlin, where the poet died in 1944 (executed). Despite his death in captivity, in the USSR after the war, Jalil, like many others, was considered a traitor, a search case was opened. He was accused of treason and aiding the enemy. In April 1947, the name of Musa Jalil was included in the list of especially dangerous criminals, although everyone understood perfectly well that the poet had been executed. Jalil was one of the leaders of an underground organization in a fascist concentration camp. In April 1945, when Soviet troops stormed the Reichstag, in the empty Berlin Moabit prison, among the books of the prison library scattered by the explosion, the fighters found a piece of paper on which it was written in Russian: “I, the famous poet Musa Jalil, was imprisoned in the Moabit prison as a prisoner, who has been politically charged and will probably be shot soon…”

Musa Jalil (Zalilov) was born in the Orenburg region, the village of Mustafino, in 1906, the sixth child in the family. His mother was the daughter of a mullah, but Musa himself did not show much interest in religion - in 1919 he joined the Komsomol. He began to write poetry from the age of eight, before the start of the war he published 10 collections of poetry. When he studied at the Faculty of Literature of Moscow State University, he lived in the same room with the now famous writer Varlam Shalamov, who described him in the story “Student Musa Zalilov”: “Musa Zalilov was small in stature, fragile in build. Musa was a Tatar and, like any "nationalist", was received in Moscow more than affably. Musa had many virtues. Komsomolets - time! Tatar - two! Russian university student - three! Writer - four! Poet - five! Musa was a Tatar poet, muttered his verses in his native language, and this bribed Moscow student hearts even more.

Everyone remembers Jalil as an extremely cheerful person - he loved literature, music, sports, friendly meetings. Musa worked in Moscow as an editor of Tatar children's magazines, and was in charge of the literature and art department of the Tatar newspaper Kommunist. Since 1935, he has been called to Kazan - the head of the literary part of the Tatar Opera and Ballet Theater. After much persuasion, he agrees and in 1939 moved to Tatarstan with his wife Amina and daughter Chulpan. The man who occupied not the last place in the theater was also the executive secretary of the Union of Writers of Tatarstan, a deputy of the Kazan City Council, when the war began, he had the right to remain in the rear. But Jalil refused the armor.

July 13, 1941 Jalil receives a summons. First, he was sent to courses for political workers. Then - the Volkhov front. He ended up in the famous Second Shock Army, in the editorial office of the Russian newspaper Courage, located among swamps and rotten forests near Leningrad. “My dear Chulpanochka! Finally I went to the front to beat the Nazis,” he wrote in a letter home. “The other day I returned from a ten-day business trip to parts of our front, was at the forefront, carried out a special task. The trip was difficult, dangerous, but very interesting. He was under fire all the time. Three nights in a row did not sleep, ate on the go. But I saw a lot,” he wrote to his Kazan friend, literary critic Gazi Kashshaf in March 1942. Jalil's last letter from the front was also addressed to Kashshaf - in June 1942: “I continue to write poetry and songs. But rarely. Once, and the situation is different. We have fierce battles going on right now. We fight hard, not for life, but for death ... "

Musa with this letter tried to smuggle all his written poems to the rear. Eyewitnesses say that he always carried a thick, shabby notebook in his travel bag, in which he wrote down everything he composed. But where today this notebook is unknown. At the time he wrote this letter, the Second Shock Army was already completely surrounded and cut off from the main forces. Already in captivity, he will reflect this difficult moment in the poem “Forgive me, Motherland”: “The last moment - and there is no shot! My gun changed me ...”

First - a prisoner of war camp near the station of the Siverskaya Leningrad region. Then - the forefield of the ancient Dvina fortress. A new stage - on foot, past the destroyed villages and villages - Riga. Then - Kaunas, outpost No. 6 on the outskirts of the city. In the last days of October 1942, Jalil was brought to the Polish fortress of Demblin, built under Catherine II. The fortress was surrounded by several rows of barbed wire, guard posts with machine guns and searchlights were installed. In Demblin, Jalil met Gainan Kurmash. The latter, being the commander of scouts, in 1942, as part of a special group, was thrown behind enemy lines with a mission and was taken prisoner by the Germans. Prisoners of war of the nationalities of the Volga and Ural regions - Tatars, Bashkirs, Chuvashs, Maris, Mordvins, Udmurts - were collected in Demblin.

The Nazis needed not only cannon fodder, but also people who could inspire the legionnaires to fight against the Motherland. They were supposed to be educated people. Teachers, doctors, engineers. Writers, journalists and poets. In January 1943, Jalil, along with other selected "inspirers", was brought to the Wustrau camp near Berlin. This camp was extraordinary. It consisted of two parts: closed and open. The first was the camp barracks familiar to prisoners, however, designed for only a few hundred people. There were no towers or barbed wire around the open camp: clean one-story houses painted with oil paint, green lawns, flower beds, a club, a canteen, a rich library with books in different languages ​​​​of the peoples of the USSR.

They were also driven to work, but in the evenings classes were held in which the so-called educational leaders probed and selected people. Those selected were placed in the second territory - in an open camp, for which it was required to sign the appropriate paper. In this camp, the prisoners were led to the dining room, where a hearty lunch awaited them, to the bathhouse, after which they were given clean linen and civilian clothes. Then, classes were held for two months. The prisoners studied the state structure of the Third Reich, its laws, the program and the charter of the Nazi Party. German classes were held. For the Tatars, lectures were given on the history of Idel-Ural. For Muslims - classes in Islam. Those who completed the courses were given money, a civil passport and other documents. They were sent to work on the distribution of the Ministry of the Occupied Eastern Regions - to German factories, scientific organizations or legions, military and political organizations.

In the closed camp, Jalil and his associates carried out underground work. The group already included journalist Rakhim Sattar, children's writer Abdulla Alish, engineer Fuat Bulatov, and economist Garif Shabaev. All of them for the sake of appearance agreed to cooperate with the Germans, in the words of Musa, in order to "blow up the legion from the inside." In March, Musa and his friends were transferred to Berlin. Musa was listed as an employee of the Tatar Committee of the Eastern Ministry. He did not hold any specific position in the committee, he carried out separate assignments, mainly in cultural and educational work among prisoners of war.

Meetings of the underground committee, or Jalils, as it is customary among researchers to call Jalil's associates, took place under the guise of friendly parties. The ultimate goal was the uprising of the legionnaires. For the purposes of conspiracy, the underground organization consisted of small groups of 5-6 people each. Among the underground workers were those who worked in the Tatar newspaper published by the Germans for the legionnaires, and they were faced with the task of making the work of the newspaper harmless and boring, and preventing the appearance of anti-Soviet articles. Someone worked in the broadcasting department of the Ministry of Propaganda and organized the reception of reports from the Soviet Information Bureau. The underground workers also set up the production of anti-fascist leaflets in Tatar and Russian - they typed them on a typewriter, and then propagated them on a hectograph.

The activities of the Jalil people could not be ignored. In July 1943, the Battle of Kursk rumbled far to the east, ending in the complete failure of the German Citadel plan. At this time, the poet and his comrades are still at large. But for each of them, the Security Directorate already had a solid dossier. The last meeting of the underground took place on August 9th. On it, Musa said that communication with the partisans and the Red Army had been established. The uprising was scheduled for 14 August. However, on August 11, all the "cultural propagandists" were summoned to the soldiers' canteen - ostensibly for a rehearsal. Here all the "artists" were arrested. In the courtyard - for intimidation - Jalil was beaten in front of the detainees.

Jalil knew that he and his friends were doomed to execution. In the face of his death, the poet experienced an unprecedented creative upsurge. He realized that he had never written like this before. He was in a hurry. It was necessary to leave the thought and accumulated to the people. He writes at this time not only patriotic poems. In his words - not only homesickness, native people or hatred of Nazism. Surprisingly, they contain lyrics and humor.

"Let the wind of death be colder than ice,
he will not disturb the petals of the soul.
A proud smile shines again,
and, forgetting the vanity of the world,
I want again, without knowing the barriers,
write, write, write without getting tired.

In Moabit, with Jalil, Andre Timmermans, a Belgian patriot, was sitting in a “stone bag”. Musa cut off strips with a razor from the margins of the newspapers that were brought to the Belgian. From this he was able to sew notebooks together. On the last page of the first notebook with poems, the poet wrote: “To a friend who can read Tatar: this was written by the famous Tatar poet Musa Jalil ... He fought at the front in 1942 and was taken prisoner. ... He will be sentenced to death. He will die. But he will have 115 poems written in captivity and imprisonment. He worries about them. Therefore, if the book falls into your hands, carefully, carefully copy them out cleanly, save them and report them to Kazan after the war, publish them as poems of the deceased poet of the Tatar people. This is my testament. Musa Jalil. 1943 December.

The Dzhalilevites were sentenced to death in February 1944. They were executed only in August. During six months of imprisonment, Jalil also wrote poetry, but not one of them has come down to us. Only two notebooks have survived, containing 93 poems. Nigmat Teregulov took out the first notebook from prison. He handed it over to the Writers' Union of Tatarstan in 1946. Soon Teregulov was arrested already in the USSR and died in the camp. The second notebook, along with things, was sent to the mother by Andre Timmermans, through the Soviet embassy it was also transferred to Tatarstan in 1947. Today, real Moabit notebooks are kept in the literary fund of the Kazan Jalil Museum.

On August 25, 1944, 11 Dzhalilevites were executed in the Plötzensee prison in Berlin by guillotine. In the column "accusation" in the cards of the convicts, it was written: "Undermining the power, assisting the enemy." Jalil was executed fifth, the time was 12:18. An hour before the execution, the Germans arranged a meeting of the Tatars with the mullah. Memories recorded from his words have been preserved. Mullah did not find words of consolation, and the Jalilevites did not want to communicate with him. Almost without a word, he handed them the Koran - and all of them, putting their hands on the book, said goodbye to life. The Koran was brought to Kazan in the early 1990s and is kept in this museum. It is still not known where the grave of Jalil and his associates is located. This haunts neither Kazan nor German researchers.

Jalil guessed how the Soviet authorities would react to the fact that he had been in German captivity. In November 1943, he wrote the poem "Do not believe!", Which is addressed to his wife and begins with the lines:

“If they bring you news about me,
They will say: “He is a traitor! betrayed the motherland,
Don't believe me dear! The word is
Friends won't tell if they love me."

In the USSR in the post-war years, the MGB (NKVD) opened a search file. His wife was summoned to the Lubyanka, she went through interrogations. The name of Musa Jalil disappeared from the pages of books and textbooks. Collections of his poems were no longer in libraries. When songs were performed on the radio or from the stage to his words, it was usually said that the words were folk. The case was closed only after the death of Stalin for lack of evidence. In April 1953, six poems from the Moabit Notebooks were published for the first time in Literaturnaya Gazeta, on the initiative of its editor, Konstantin Simonov. The poems received a wide response. Then - Hero of the Soviet Union (1956), laureate (posthumously) of the Lenin Prize (1957) ... In 1968, the film "Moabit Notebook" was shot at the Lenfilm studio.

From a traitor, Jalil turned into one whose name has become a symbol of devotion to the Motherland. In 1966, a monument to Jalil, created by the famous sculptor V. Tsegal, was erected near the walls of the Kazan Kremlin, which stands there today.

In 1994, a bas-relief was opened nearby, on a granite wall, representing the faces of his executed ten comrades. For many years, twice a year - on February 15 (on the birthday of Musa Jalil) and on August 25 (the anniversary of the execution), solemn rallies with the laying of flowers are held at the monument. What the poet wrote about in one of his last letters from the front to his wife came true: “I am not afraid of death. This is not an empty phrase. When we say that we despise death, we actually do. A great feeling of patriotism, full awareness of one's social function dominates the feeling of fear. When the thought of death comes, you think like this: there is still life after death. Not the “life in the next world” that the priests and mullahs preached. We know it doesn't. And there is life in the minds, in the memory of the people. If during my life I did something important, immortal, then by doing this I deserved another life - “life after death”

Moabit is the oldest German prison. It is located in Berlin and built in 1889. The legendary leader of the German Communists Ernst Thalmann, Georgy Dimitrov, convicted of setting fire to the Reichstag building, the poet Musa Jalil, and later Erich Honecker and the all-powerful Stasi lava Erich Mielke were sitting in Moabit. But recently, photographs of the old prison again flashed on the front pages of German newspapers. The fact is that two Russian prisoners escaped from this strictly guarded prison, which alarmed respectable Germany a lot. And then the following happened.

Moabit is considered the most severe prison in Germany, although today it is not a prison at all, but a pre-trial detention center. The cells are designed for two people, but if desired, the person under investigation can live alone. There is a bunk bed against the wall, on the other side there is a table with chairs, a TV set, a refrigerator, a food cabinet. In the farthest corner - a toilet and a washbasin. Walking every day, every day you can visit the shower and the gym. In general, you can live. That is exactly what the defendant Nikolai Zeiss thought when he was brought directly from the police station to the pre-trial detention center.

A little background. Kolya was born in distant Kazakhstan in a family of Volga Germans. He graduated from an automobile technical school in Aktyubinsk, then served two years in the Soviet Army. True, in the construction battalion, since the Volga Germans were not called up for decent military branches. He returned home already in the midst of perestroika, got a job in a car service. When the Soviet Union collapsed, life in Kazakhstan became difficult. Therefore, at the family council, it was decided to leave for Germany, so to speak, to the homeland of their ancestors. However, life did not work out in the new place. In Germany, it was difficult for a person who spoke German with difficulty to get a normal job. Therefore, Kolya worked as a loader in a pharmacy warehouse, receiving mere pennies, then as a painter. And when acquaintances from the Russian diaspora suggested that he take up theft and dismantling of cars, Kolya did not hesitate for a long time. He was well aware that such a criminal business in Germany would not last long, but for two or three years he hoped to live beautifully. And then you can go to jail for the same two or three years. There is nothing in particular to lose. He will not be deprived of citizenship and will not be sent back to Kazakhstan. A beautiful life really lasted two years and ended with detention and arrest.

During an interview with the prison officer on duty, Kolya asked to be put in the same cell with a Russian person under investigation, so that it would be more fun. And soon regretted it. In the cell, he was met by a huge jock weighing about a hundred kilograms, who introduced himself as Vasily.

Judging by his habits, Vasya clearly belonged to the "Russian mafia", which has taken deep roots in modern Germany. In his youth, Vasya served his military service in the airborne troops. Then he was engaged in specific extortion and banditry, several times he sat in and on the zone. When the pressure of Russian law enforcement agencies became excessive, Vasya bought himself fake documents of a Russian German and emigrated to Germany. And here he took up the old. He landed in Moabit for causing grievous bodily harm to some businessman, also a native of Russia. In general, the story was very dark and muddy.

Vasily, without ceremony, assumed the duties of looking after the "hut" and importunately began to patronize his cellmate, teaching him all the wisdom of the prison. At the same time, he watered the Germans in every possible way for their tolerance, gentleness and gouging.

Once I was walking around the yard during the next walk, - Vasya said, freely lounging on the bottom bunk. - I look, a strawberry bush grows on a small lawn. And the berries have already appeared, completely red, ripe. I decided to have a little refreshment, tore off a bush and began to eat these berries. Of course, I did it in front of everyone, without hiding from anyone, but I'm not some kind of “rat”. Further events developed as follows.

Suddenly, three German guards ran out of the glass booth. They ran up to me and started shouting for me to immediately spit out these berries. But I fell into a state of prostration from such a zeher. The guards, seeing that I was not listening to them, put handcuffs on my hands, threw me to the ground, grabbed my head, and began to forcibly open my mouth. The police then called an ambulance. The sculptors gave me a high-quality gastric lavage with all the ensuing consequences. In the sense that I vomited well, and then I crap myself to a heap. After all, the doctors put a couple of injections in my ass and put me under a drip.

For three days he lay in the prison hospital. And then I was invited to a conversation about love and friendship with the head of the prison. There was also a doctor and an interpreter in the office. From the subsequent bazaar, I almost lost my mind.

The Germans were seriously trying to figure out why I wanted to poison myself and ate those poisonous berries. It turned out that in Germany, strawberries are considered very poisonous - like our wolfberry. To my answers that in Russia everyone without exception eats strawberries and no one has died yet, they did not react in any way.

The Fritz were firmly convinced that I had attempted suicide. And they were interested in the reasons why I committed suicide. They asked if I had any conflicts with the guards, cellmates. In the end, I spat and said that I was suffering from bouts of depression. The Germans smiled from ear to ear, and the conversation ended. I was credited with some kind of wheels and constant monitoring by a prison psychiatrist. In general, they are all goats, chewed fofans.

Nikolay jarred from such conversations, but he could do nothing. Asking for another “hut” was dumb and beyond my understanding. After all, Vasya did nothing wrong to him. And it is still unknown what opportunities the local “Russian mafia” has, they can take revenge for the fact that they “broke out” of the “hut” for no particular reason.

After a month of "pleasant" communication, the tone of Vasily's conversations changed. Behind bars he was tired and he began to yearn for the will. And then he started talking about. At first, Kolya thought that his cellmate was joking like that, but Vasya reasoned quite seriously. “From the air, Moabit resembles the US Department of Defense Pentagon,” the former paratrooper began to develop his idea. - Five narrow four-story buildings, each of which has up to two hundred cells, converge with rays to the central tower - a key place in the prison's security system. From here you can see all the prison galleries to the very end.

If necessary, the guard blocks the entrance doors and blocks, while maintaining a complete overview and, accordingly, control over what is happening. The prison is considered exemplary in terms of security. The territory is surrounded by a monolithic concrete fence seven meters high with barbed wire on top. But it's all bullshit. Let's make a rope and climb over the wall. The main thing is to quietly get into the courtyard.

Soon, Vasily moved from words to deeds. While walking, he noticed a small piece of concrete wall, which lay in the corner of the exercise yard, and his eyes lit up strangely.

Well, that's it, fraerok, we'll run tomorrow after a walk, - Vasily declared categorically after returning to the cell. - If you try to jump off, blame yourself, I warned you.

Kolya was covered with perspiration, but he did not dare to contradict his formidable cellmate.
The next day, before going for a walk, Vasily wrapped around himself all the sheets and duvet covers that were in the cell, and put on a wide jacket on top. During the walk, the escapees managed to separate from the main group of prisoners and hide in a secluded corner of the yard. Then Vasya quickly made a long rope with a cat, using sheets twisted into a rope. He managed to make an anchor out of a piece of concrete wall and a few spoons he grabbed from the dining room. Throwing a rope on the wall, the fugitives deftly climbed up it. They threw a thick jacket over the barbed wire so as not to cut themselves. Kolya climbed first, and then Vasya the paratrooper.

His guard from the tower had already noticed and opened fire from a machine gun, but missed. The fugitives managed to overcome the wall and jump into the street. Moabit's guards organized a chase.

Fleeing from her, the fugitives rushed through the unfamiliar streets of Berlin and jumped over another fence, finding themselves in the courtyard of some very respectable villa. By a bitter twist of fate, it turned out to be the residence of ... the President of Germany, which was guarded even more strictly than Moabit. A couple of hours later, both fugitives were caught and returned to their cells.

The escape of two "Russian prisoners" cost the German treasury three and a half million euros. That's how much the modernization of the Moabit security system cost. And Russian prisoners in German prisons after this escape became very respected.

(All names and surnames have been changed)

Andrey Vasiliev
According to the newspaper
"Behind Bars" (#2 2013)

Memoirs of the head of the organization "Berlin Committee" about the Tatar underground poet

Today, February 15, is the birthday of the great Tatar poet Musa Jalil. His "Moabite Notebook" became one of the most popular collections in the Soviet Union. The head of the Museum-Memorial of the Great Patriotic War of the Kazan Kremlin, our columnist Mikhail Cherepanov, in today's column written for Realnoe Vremya, cites letters about Jalil from prisoners who were imprisoned together with the poet-hero.

A lot has been written about the heroic deed of the poet-hero Musa Jalil. Including about the significance of his feat for the fate of the peoples of the Volga region, who escaped mass deportation. The famous writer Rafael Akhmetovich Mustafin also wrote about this in different years.

Mustafin bequeathed his correspondence with members of the anti-fascist Resistance, much that could not be published, to the author of these lines. The time has come to bring to the attention of readers the most interesting letters of the underground, which significantly complement the picture that the Jalilevists have recreated over the decades after the war.

Underground Bushman behind enemy lines. Official biography

I will begin publications with letters from Colonel Nikolai Stepanovich Bushmanov (1901-1977), head of the underground anti-Nazi organization "Berlin Committee of the CPSU (b)".

Briefly about him. A native of the Perm province. He joined the Red Army in 1918. During the Civil War, he was a platoon commander, fought against Kolchak and Wrangel, was wounded three times. In 1933 he was enrolled in the Military Academy. Frunze (Main Intelligence Directorate). Since 1937 he was a major, senior lecturer in tactics at the special faculty of the academy. Since January 1941 - Head of the Department of the History of the Civil War of the Academy, Candidate of Military Sciences. He spoke four languages.

In 1941 - head of the operations department of the headquarters of the 32nd Army. In October 1941 he was taken prisoner near Vyazma. The Germans knew who they were dealing with and put him in the Moabit prison. Bushmanov "agreed" to cooperation, taught at the courses of propagandists in Wulheide throughout 1942. Since March 1943, he served as assistant head of the Dabendorf school of the ROA (“Eastern Special Purpose Propaganda Department”). By the summer of 1943, he created a branched international underground organization "Berlin Committee of the CPSU (b)", which launched active work throughout Germany. Anti-fascists carried out sabotage and sabotage at German factories. Musa Jalil and the son of the Soviet biologist N.V., who worked in Germany, were associated with Bushmanov's organization. Timofeev-Resovsky Dmitry.

On June 30, 1943 he was arrested. With a death sentence, he was transferred to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, then again to the Moabit prison. In April 1945, he was sent on a "death march" to the coast of the Baltic Sea, where he was released by American troops. In the USSR, he was sentenced to 10 years in camps. On December 5, 1954 he was released, rehabilitated in 1958. He died in Moscow on June 11, 1977.

From the letters of R.A. Mustafin from N.S. Bushmanova

Dear comrade Mustafin!

<…>I was arrested by the Berlin Gestapo on June 30, 1943.<…>On July 16, I was transferred to Moabit at 3 Lerterstrasse, from whose windows the Lerterbahnhof was visible, and the railway tracks passed right next to the prison wall. The prison was an old building. My cell was on the 4th floor, No. 421, and my friend, Ivan Mikhailovich Kalganov, was sitting on the 1st floor. In the middle between us sat Jalil, with whom we had a roll call. We did not consider our conversations to be insured against eavesdropping, and therefore neither cell numbers, nor names and surnames were correctly called.

The guards who served here since the time of Wilhelm did not commit atrocities, but were diligent to the point of pedantry… Once every 10 days, we were given 1-2 books. German prisoners worked as peddlers of books, through them it was possible to transfer notes to any cell, especially if you had something to “thank” the librarian.

Once every 10 days they took me to the bathroom or shower and changed the bed linen.

There were iron beds in the cells. Cupboard with bowl, mug, spoon and water jug. A table chained to the wall and 2 stools are also chained. In the corner by the door there is an enameled or earthenware "bucket". The window is thick with a hand - bars. The floor is cement, the walls are brick meter thick, the plaster is cement.

Schedule.

Rise at 6.00. Toilet - charging in the cell until 7.00.

Breakfast - ½ liter of coffee and 250 grams of bread per day.

From 7 to 12 - time for walking. For each withdrawal - 30 min.

12.00-13.00 - lunch. 1 liter of gruel or unpeeled potatoes.

13.00-18.00 - time for walks. Many were taken out one at a time.

18.00-19.00 - dinner - coffee ½ liter or liquid vegetable soup - most often spinach broth.

22.00 - lights out.

From 19:00 to 22:00, only those on duty along the corridor remained in the prison, and during these hours our negotiations were going on.

I spent time in this prison until November 3, 1943. The time of the roll call with Jalil was approximately September-October 1943, and then he became inaudible, apparently, they were taken to another prison ... Refer to Devyataev M.P. He can tell you something about me."

<…>I don't know how to thank you for sending me a collection of selected poems by Musa Jalil. You can't imagine how it moved me and stirred up memories.<…>On the cover, the artist painted an eagle behind bars, apparently based on the text of the famous song "I'm sitting behind bars in a damp dungeon ...". It was the prisoners' favorite song, but it didn't always suit our mood. I mistook the eagle for a dove and resurrected the detail from the Moabite.

My involuntary mistake reminded me of how we created our poem "Dove" in September 1943.

Dove gray, sad friend,
Fly home to me.
Say goodbye hello
Poor mother dear.
Tell me about everything you saw
Through the prison window
About my longing and death
Shout to her at the same time.
Sit on the top of the roof
Look around the native land
Rise up then
And fly back.
You sit under my window,
And get some rest
Everything that you saw, you will retell.
And you bring me hello.
On the road faster, gray-winged,
Fly away to your native land
My hello to my dear friend
Pass it on quickly.

This is how the song was born. In my window, the top transom opened into the chamber. On it I sprinkled crumbs of bread for sparrows. It was funny to see these fighters ...

Once in September, a dove sat on the window bars and, bowing its head, looked into the camera. I froze with excitement. There is a belief among the prisoners that a dove is in the window - wait for good news. Although I did not believe in omens, but keep in mind that this was in solitary confinement, and in my file - a death sentence. After sitting on the grate, the dove flew away, and I immediately sketched a draft of an appeal to the dove on the newspaper. It was not the way it was presented, I didn’t get along with the rhyme, the meter was lame, but I could not resist and during the hours of conversation, I handed it to Kalganov. The program was heard by Jalil and on the second day he returned the song to me almost in the form in which I bring it. Vanya Kalganov also changed a few words. We liked the song, and we began to sing it to the motives “It’s not the wind that bends the branch” or “The country sends us to storm in the distant sea.”

Let me remind you that in 536 the Council of Constantinople officially proclaimed the dove as a symbol of the Holy Spirit. For many peoples, including the Slavic ones, the soul of the deceased turned into a dove. For Muslims, the dove is a sacred bird that carried water for washing to Muhammad in its beak.

In the Moabite cycle of Jalil there is a similar poem "Bird", the essence of which is the same.

“... And about one more poem, which also passed through our hands in September 1943. At the same time when "The Builder" was written by Musa.

"Prisoner's Dreams"

cirrus clouds
Float across the sky
Silver clear
Smooth hold the way.
In the blue of the sky
They are free to walk.
Wonderful earthly world
Watch from above.
From close bondage
I would like to go up to them.
And the path of heaven
Dash into the native land.
Circle over the garden
Mother dear
And take a look
Favorite corner.
Get down low
In the very hut.
And see up close
Sweet old lady.
Wind blow around
The hair is gray.
Gloomy dispel
Thoughts about son.
He will come - as before,
Because of that birch.
Just wait with hope
Without shedding tears.

At first, Vanya Kalganov scolded me for this verse: “Why such despondency. We'll still live." Jalil also joined him, but then he asked to repeat it and approved it, and the next day he made suggestions and amendments. I had a “wife”, he offered to change it to “mother”, brought in a “kindergarten”, I didn’t have it. In the last line, I had “yes you can through tears,” and he suggested “without shedding tears.”

I remember the beginning of the poem that Jalil read, and Kalganov and I made our own corrections. Was it preserved in Jalil's notes? Here is its beginning:

Storms are raging
over my country.
Day and night the enemies storm
My beloved land.
But the enemy force will not break
Our brothers never.
All fascists are waiting for the grave,
And victory is close to us.

Kalganov and I approved the poem, and Jalil said that he did not like it in translation, but it sounds better in Tatar.

... The newspaper had to be returned, but the warden collected them, not paying attention to their condition, checking the quantity. It was possible to write on newspapers, they were not punished for it, perhaps the authorities expected to find something interesting in the records. It was not allowed to keep writing materials in the cell, but you could get a pencil or ink from the duty officer for 2-3 hours. When exchanging books, you put a couple of cigarettes in the book, and the librarian "returned" the book to you with a pencil stub.

Musa had another opportunity - foreign prisoners with whom he was imprisoned. Westerners received parcels - transfers, in which there were paper and writing materials.

German and foreign prisoners performed various jobs and could carry small items into the cell, especially when they were late at work for a long time, and the convoy was in a hurry to hand over the prisoners as soon as possible. The search then was very superficial.

It was possible to drill a hole into the next cell near the iron loop, for which prisoners were chained for various offenses and violations of prison rules. This heavy iron hinge was built into the wall when the prison was being laid. The prisoners tried to loosen it, and in some places it succumbed to the buildup. The authorities strengthened it with cement, and it could be crumbled with wire or a small chisel.

Andrey and I, who was sitting nearby, managed to slip a wire found during a walk near the bracket, and we talked with the help of a matchbox, like on a telephone, even a whisper was heard.

Writing in the cell was allowed when writing materials were issued. At other times, it was not allowed to write, but they adapted like this: sitting on the floor near the door, you could hear the steps of the guard. A "hearer" was placed in the common cell.

It was harder and more dangerous to keep what was written. Searches in the cell were carried out frequently, carefully and always suddenly. All found records and notes were destroyed, and the culprit was declared a punishment cell - a bunker from 5 to 10 days. Regular or Strict. The bunker is a basement chamber without windows, without lighting, with a damp, cold floor. Food - every other day, and with strict arrest - once every three days and water - every other day. After the bunker is usually an infirmary or a cemetery.

What courage one had to have to write and keep what was written! I wrote a lot, but I did not risk keeping it, because it was impossible to hide anything in solitary confinement. After serving 5 days for the notes I found, I no longer risked it. Yes, and would hardly have endured a repetition.

I sketched out a diagram of the prison on Lehrterstrasse 3 as I remember it. In the exercise yard, I watched the prisoners every day from the cell window, without going up to the window, so as not to attract the attention of the guards and end up in the bunker. Jalil and his cellmates also walked here, but before meeting in the bathhouse, I did not know him by sight. I remember that he behaved more energetically than anyone on a walk and was the first to start physical exercises ... ”.

The "Berlin Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks" operated in Berlin in 1943. This is a fact established by the investigating authorities and the testimony of many. Journalist Konstantin Petrovich Bogachev from Novomoskovsk wrote about this<…>His article was in the newspaper Rodyanska Ukraina, an organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine No. 36, 14 February 1965. So it is called the "Berlin Committee of the CPSU (b)"<…>Yu.Korolkov in the book "Not missing" (ed. 1971) also talks about the committee. You must establish whether the committee had any connection with Jalil and the Jalil people. Personally, I had no connection, I had information only from Fyodor Chichvikov (died in the Gestapo) and from Andrei Rybalchenko.

About Rybalchenko.

Do not forget that it took place in the deep underground of Berlin in 1942-1944. We knew about each other's affairs only what we considered possible to communicate to the other. The work was always discussed in general terms, and no one got to the bottom of the details. To the best of their ability, they checked everyone's messages, but it was difficult. It makes no sense to check everything that Comrade wrote. Rybalchenko. I can only confirm with all responsibility that he was a member of the committee and had the task of external relations. He worked in the library of the Zarya newspaper, and this gave him the opportunity to supply us with Soviet newspapers and the latest information.

The library was at 10 Victoria Strasse, where many newspapers were placed, including Zarya. There, "newspapermen" of different tribes and editorial offices met. In the summer of 1943, Rybalchenko was arrested by the Gestapo, an investigation was carried out, he was in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp with me. I believe that you should treat his memoirs with confidence ...

With deep respect, Bushmanov"

More details with the correspondence of R.A. Mustafin can be found in the Museum-Memorial of the Great Patriotic War in the Kazan Kremlin.

Mikhail Cherepanov, illustrations provided by the author

Reference

Mikhail Valerievich Cherepanov- Head of the Museum-Memorial of the Great Patriotic War of the Kazan Kremlin; Chairman of the Association "Club of Military Glory"; Honored Worker of Culture of the Republic of Tatarstan, Corresponding Member of the Academy of Military Historical Sciences, Laureate of the State Prize of the Republic of Tatarstan.

• Born in 1960.
• Graduated from Kazan State University. IN AND. Ulyanov-Lenin with a degree in Journalism.
• Since 2007 he has been working at the National Museum of the Republic of Tatarstan.
• One of the creators of the 28-volume book "Memory" of the Republic of Tatarstan about those who died during the Second World War, 19 volumes of the Book of Memory of Victims of Political Repressions of the Republic of Tatarstan, etc.
• Creator of the electronic Book of Memory of the Republic of Tatarstan (a list of natives and residents of Tatarstan who died during the Second World War).
• Author of thematic lectures from the cycle "Tatarstan during the war years", thematic excursions "Feat of countrymen on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War".
• Co-author of the concept of the virtual museum "Tatarstan - Fatherland".
• Member of 60 search expeditions to bury the remains of soldiers who died in the Great Patriotic War (since 1980), board member of the Union of Search Teams of Russia.
• Author of more than 100 scientific and educational articles, books, participant of all-Russian, regional and international conferences. Columnist of Realnoe Vremya.

In the life of Berlin there is a lot of romantic and dramatic. Romance in general very often intersects with drama. And prison is both a drama of life and a test, which sooner or later acquires stories full of forbidden awe. However, the prison is the other world, and the experience gained there is added to the treasury of wisdom, the simplest of which is: do not renounce prison.

And we, the inhabitants of this city, do not promise. Moreover, one of the most famous prisons is located very close, in the center of Berlin, in the Moabit area.

Outside

The first inhabitants of this place on the right bank of the Spree River were French Huguenots, refugees, who gave the area the name "Moabite land" - by analogy with the biblical exodus of the Jews (Moabites, according to the Old Testament, are the descendants of Lot. - Ed.). A very long time ago, back in 1848, under the Prussian king Friedrich Wilhelm IV, by the way, mysticism and romance, the idea of ​​​​a model prison on the outskirts of the city arose.

From idea to execution, as you know, a huge distance. And only in 1888, according to the project of the architect Heinrich Hermann, the building was built. It accepted the first prisoners in 1890.

In 1905-1906, extensions were made to the prison, connecting the prison premises with the building of the Berlin Criminal Court, located on the neighboring Turmstrae. From the court there is a passage directly to the prison, so that you do not have to travel far.

In 1913, part of the building was rebuilt into a hospital; in 1930, the Criminological Institute of Prussia was established on the territory of the prison.

Moabit prison is a complex of five four-story buildings, resembling a starfish. Each has about two hundred cameras, which converge in beams to the central tower, the main place in the overall security system. From here you can see all the corridors to the very end. Guards can close the entrance doors to the blocks and at the same time maintain control over the situation. There are other buildings here, for example, a hospital and a women's block, which, however, is completely isolated from the rest of the territory.

There is also a kind of prison within the prison. This is a particularly strict compartment of twenty singles, reminiscent of the prison itself in configuration. It was built in the 70s for the terrorists from the Red Brigades, who were kept here in complete isolation from the world.

In general, many famous people were imprisoned in this prison. In 1911-1912 he was a scout, captain of the Russian General Staff Mikhail Kostevich, who was later exchanged for a German spy. In 1919 - Karl Radek, an Austrian citizen, a prominent figure in the Soviet and international communist movement. Since 1933, the head of the German Communist Party, Ernst Thalmann, was kept in Moabit for several years. The Bulgarian communist Georgy Dimitrov, who was accused of setting fire to the Reichstag, sat here until his expulsion to the USSR. In 1941-1945 - interned citizens of the USSR - diplomats, seconded specialists. One of the most famous prisoners was the Tatar poet-martyr Musa Jalil, who composed the famous “Moabit Notebook” in prison. Here he was executed. During the years of perestroika, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the former leader of the former GDR, Erich Honecker, and the head of his secret service, Erich Mielke, briefly came to Moabit.

Inside

Moabit is currently a pre-trial detention facility for males over the age of 21. Placed here by court order. The nominal capacity of Moabit is 1200 prisoners. But sometimes there is more. Administration and service personnel are civilians. "Moabit" is considered the most severe prison in Germany, although it is not a prison at all, but a pre-trial detention center.

The level of protection here is exemplary. The territory is surrounded by a monolithic concrete fence of seven meters, with barbed wire on top. Everything is traced by infrared rays and other devices that react to heat, movement, pressure on the soil, sound. The cells are designed for two people, if desired, the person under investigation can generally live alone, although this happens quite rarely.

In "Moabit" the prisoner is given visits once every two weeks (and in some cases more often). Permission is given by a judge or prosecutor. Conversations during a conversation with a lawyer and correspondence with him are not subject to censorship. However, letters to be released are reviewed by the decision of the court or the prosecutor's office. All prisoners are allowed to have a TV and radio. They can, within certain limits, even furnish and decorate their cell (with the exception of electrical and sanitary equipment), order books and periodicals at their own expense. Internal regulations are issued in many languages, including Russian.

The size of the cells reaches 30 square meters. They have wooden furniture, a TV, and often a refrigerator. Inside the prison there is a gym and even a tennis court. Although you can use them only on a special schedule, usually once a week. The life of those under investigation is strictly regulated. For example, according to the rules, prisoners are only entitled to one hour of walking around the prison yard. Parcels are allowed once or twice a month. The prison has a special service that looks through and probes tons of daily parcels. The cells are open during the daytime. Prisoners walk along the corridor, take a shower, communicate with neighbors ... Of course, the administration takes measures to exclude the possibility of contact between prisoners involved in the same case (places them in different buildings and floors).

There are about 400 jobs in the prison. We still have to fight for the right to sweep the yard. In the event that a prisoner has no funds and cannot be provided with a job, he can receive monthly pocket money from his will (of course, not in cash) in order to buy additional food, as well as things for personal consumption.

Some cameras have signs with red, green or yellow circles. This is to know who is who - maybe violent, maybe who has accomplices sitting here, in general, their own sign system.

The religious needs of those under investigation are respected: Muslims, for example, are given the opportunity to pray, and if necessary, even kosher meals are prepared.

If you want to visit a prison (and under certain conditions it is possible, for example, for journalists), then you need to apply in advance, explain the reason for the visit, hand over your mobile phone and passport at the entrance, go through a fairly strict personal control and get a visitor card. If you lose her, then they will not be released from prison until the identity is clarified. And in the current tense conditions caused by the terrorist threat, this can take quite a long time.

Of course, the prison is not the best place for excursions. However, the building, located very close to the presidential palace, is not only a functioning object of the German legal system, but also an architectural monument. And this combination is interesting in itself.

What do you associate the word "Moabit" with? I have - of course, with the Tatar poet Musa Jalil and his cycle of poems "Moabit Notebook", written by him in the Moabit prison in Berlin. We studied the poems of Musa Jalil at school, his name is known to every citizen of Kazan. Those who have been to Kazan are more familiar with the monument to the poet (a hero escaping from the barbed wire) in front of the Kremlin.

Musa Jalil was executed in the Plötzensee prison, there is now a museum that we did not get to (and we ended up in Moabit by accident).

In 1946, a former prisoner of war, Nigmat Teregulov, brought a notebook with six dozen poems by Jalil to the Writers' Union of Tatarstan. A year later, a second notebook arrived from the Soviet consulate in Brussels. The Belgian patriot Andre Timmermans took her out of the Moabit prison and, fulfilling the last will of the poet, sent the poems home.

The Moabit prison was destroyed in 1958, a park was laid out in its place, walls and foundations of buildings were left. On the wall is a quote from Albrecht Haushofer's Moabite Sonnets: "Von allem Leid, das diesen Bau erfüllt, ist unter Mauerwerk und Eisengittern ein Hauch lebendig, ein geheimes Zittern".