His son, Lev Finikov, tells about his father, military photojournalist Nikolai Finikov.
In the book “I didn’t return to the editorial office ...” there is an essay about the military journalist Malibashev Alexander Mikhailovich. And on the free lower part of the final page, it is written in the hand of the pope that Sasha Malibashev worked in our military newspaper “Krasnoarmeyets” of the Volga Military District in 1930, and with his signature I have kept since then a certificate of cooperation as a photojournalist in this newspaper.
From September 1941, for a whole year, the commander of the 21st Army was General Gordov V.N. During this period, the army with heavy fighting retreated from the Akhtyrka region through Kharkov and Belgorod to the steppe interfluve of the Don and Volga near Stalingrad, starting long defensive battles. In October of the forty-second year, General Chistyakov Ivan Mikhailovich was appointed commander of the 21st Army, who went with this army for almost three years, i.e. before the Victory, which for wartime was more rare than the rule.
Hitler's armies advanced towards Stalingrad, destroying our cities and villages on their way, brutally destroying the civilian population, not sparing small children and the elderly. From the Siberian and Far Eastern regions of the country, our armies received reinforcements in manpower and military equipment.
Photos of the Battle of Stalingrad by N. Finikov were also published during this period in the central newspapers Krasnaya Zvezda and Pravda.
At the end of 1942, he was awarded the medal "For Military Merit" and the medal "For the Defense of Stalingrad".
Here is an interesting verse work on four pages, printed on December 15, 1942 in the printing house of the "Combat Onslaught", under the title "Table Word", which is dedicated to the five hundredth issue of the newspaper. The author of his own - Leonid Katsnelson. It was made in the form of personal four-line dedications to many people associated with the release of the native newspaper. Here are some of them:
Well, let's remember how we can
How death looked into our eyes
And the Gomel epic,
And Belarusian forests.
And the Dnieper, and the steppes of Ukraine,
And the quiet town of Oskol,
All the way, where in a long string
To the soldiers in the trenches "Onslaught" went.
And the rumble of battles, and the smoke of fires ...
And we, gathered at this hour,
Let's be sad that Sasha is our Makarov
Not here at our feast.
You, who is always in a passionate rage
Anatoletti is ready to sing -
Ruler of thoughts, the storm of all Fritz
Inexhaustible Goryunov!
Friends, raise your stacks higher
For our glorious masters,
For you, Chukhlantsev and Tertyshnik,
And you, seething Myasnikov!
... But who, worthy of attention,
Will I still not be remembered?
Hello, Sanya Astafiev,
Invincible reporter.
Honor to you, Volodya Klyuzhev,
Throwing "Fuse" at Hitler.
More than once the fascists lived worse,
When you drove a pen into them.
And you, with brilliant dexterity,
Creating the old "watering can" class,
Soldier in battles you glorify
Thunderous Nicholas!
You who have worked hard
All year, tirelessly, -
You, Marusya Goncharenko
And other fighting girlfriends!
But the joke is an hour, and the case is time.
Gathered here briefly
We are at this moment with all the fighters
We stand with our weapons in our hands.
And now, leaving the five hundredth
Whistling, furious projectile,
We swear to settle scores with the enemy,
In the battles for the proud Stalingrad.
Fighter, when near Stalingrad
For the Motherland you go into battle,
Walks next to you on the assault
Our glorious Onslaught of Battle.
After the end of the fiercest Stalingrad battles, the editorial staff of the newspaper warmly said goodbye to their beloved editor, Lieutenant Colonel P.P. Yakhlakov - he was transferred to the military department of the central newspaper Pravda.
August 1943 6th Guards Army.
After the Battle of Kursk, when the former editor P. Yahlakov came.
In the picture (from left to right): below - L. Katsnelson, I. Davydov, A. Astafiev, A. Poltoratsky; above - I. Pereguda, B. Myasnikov, P. Yahlakov, N. Finikov, G. Tertyshnik.
(Who was at that time in the editorial office of the "Combat Onslaught").
A new editor was appointed to us - Major V.A. Bobylev.
And already in the summer, during the Kursk-Prokhorov hostilities, the deputy head of the military department of the Pravda newspaper, Lieutenant Colonel P.P., came to the army and to our editorial office. Yakhlakov. One of the photographs shows a meeting between two editors of the Combat Onslaught.
In his book “Serving the Motherland”, the army commander, Colonel-General, Hero of the Soviet Union, I.M. Chistyakov speaks warmly about the role of the newspaper and its journalists: “The military newspaper Boevoy Onslaught provided enormous assistance to political workers and commanders. Newspapermen, as they say, crawled through any gap during the battle, they noticed everything. Army soldiers - soldiers, sergeants, officers and generals loved their newspaper, always looked forward to it. From the newspaper they learned about the heroic deeds of their comrades, about the events in their sector, about the situation on the fronts. On the pages of the newspaper, they shared their experience of fighting the enemy. The newspaper at the front was a faithful teacher and assistant to the Soviet soldiers.
After the Prokhorov battles on the way to another combat position near Bogodukhov - August 1943, the editorial car came under fire from the fascist ace on its second run - on the first run, we managed to jump out and lie down in a side ditch. Here's what's left of my "layba".
N. Finikov.
The successful completion of hostilities in the summer of 1943 in the areas of Prokhorovka, Belgorod, Kharkov was highly appreciated in the multi-volume work "History of the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union 1941 - 1945": "In these battles, the best formations of the Nazi army were opposed by one of the most experienced Soviet armies - the 6th Guards, the former 21st Army.
Fifty days lasted the Battle of Kursk - one of the greatest battles of World War II.
The German army suffered a defeat from which it could no longer recover until the very end of the war. The historic victory at Kursk demonstrated the increased power of the Soviet state and its Armed Forces. It was forged at the front and in the rear by all Soviet people.
The further path of the editors of the "Combat Onslaught" along with the army lay in the direction of Nevel, Polotsk and Daugavpils.
On April 22, 1943, for heroic deeds and excellent military operations in the encirclement and defeat of the Nazi troops near Stalingrad, by the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, the 21st Army was transformed into the 6th Guards Army.
Since that time, on the front side of the newspaper "Combat Onslaught" in front of the name, a guards sign appears, and on the right side of the gymnasts of military journalists of the newspaper, a beautiful metal sign "Guards" is firmly screwed.
I still have the certificate of the guardsman in the name of the guard captain N. Finikov.
But back in late 1942 and early 1943, eight formations of our 21st Army received the title of Guards.
"Who said that you have to give up songs in the war?"
I want to start this part with the memoirs of Major G.N. Kovtunov, chief of staff of the 138th Guards Artillery Regiment, about the events in the area of the villages of Cherkasskoye and Korovino in early July of the forty-third year.
“Heavy battles were going on with the Nazi tank units. The second battery, commanded by Guard Captain G.M., found itself in a particularly difficult situation. Vasiliev. We didn't have any information about them. Somewhere around midnight, two Red Army soldiers were brought to the headquarters dugout. Bloody bandages, faces black with soot, tunics and trousers torn to shreds, some object that vaguely resembles a suitcase in his hands.
Who are they?
We are from the second, - one of the fighters answered muffledly and, staggering, grabbed the door frame.
Everyone who was in the dugout at that moment turned to them at once.
Medics here! Bullet! And quickly think of something hot ...
And I couldn’t take my eyes off the suitcase that was left standing by the door. I immediately recognized that this was not a suitcase, but a case from Vasiliev's button accordion, with which he never parted ... And a bitter foreboding seized my soul, crowding out the still glimmering hope.
At the bottom of the accordion case was a note: “I know very well that there are almost no chances for life. It's a pity, of course, but there is no fear. I swear that I will fight the enemy to the last drop of blood and will not take a single step back. Vasilyev.
The head of the political department of the 67th Guards Rifle Division, Colonel Mikhail Maksimovich Bronnikov, said that the button accordion of the battery commander should be preserved by all means, and after the war we would give it to the museum.
In some notes of the newspaper "Combat Onslaught" the fighters of our division were also mentioned. It was told, for example, about the Komsomol guard sergeant V.S. Rublevsky. His older brother died a heroic death while defending the Brest Fortress back in forty-one. Vladimir took his place in the battle formation. He participated in the battles near Stalingrad. On the Kursk Bulge, he already headed the machine-gun squad. Near the village of Cherkasskoye, in just one day, he took part in repelling ten enemy attacks.
There was a note in the newspaper about our gun crew, which was commanded by Senior Sergeant Kaurbek Temirbulatovich Toguzov. During the first two days of fighting with the Nazis on the Kursk Bulge, the gun knocked out two Tigers and five Ferdinands and Panthers.
In conclusion, I will quote the famous Soviet writer and playwright, military journalist Konstantin Simonov:
“We (correspondents) can write down two or three words in a notebook and then unfold a picture from this. They (photojournalists) cannot shoot later. They can only withdraw at this point. The tank that is coming at them, and the attack that they see, and the disaster that they have witnessed. What remains on the film is their memory of the war, and at the same time it is no longer their memory. It has become the memory of mankind.”
Recently, acquaintances of my dad brought me a clipping from the newspaper "Volzhskaya Kommuna" dated May 9, 1992 (page 2), the existence of which I did not know.
Since September 1944, N. Finikov was transferred as a military photojournalist to the main newspaper of the country - Pravda - and he was assigned to the 3rd Belorussian Front, which during this period had the task of speeding up the offensive of our troops in the region of East Prussia and thereby delaying the significant forces of Hitler's armies so that they could not be recruited for the defense of Berlin.
During this period, the commander of the 3rd Belorussian Front was the youngest of the outstanding Soviet front commanders, General of the Army Ivan Danilovich Chernyakhovsky. He was 36 years old. Despite his youth, he went through the war from its first days, being in various positions in the defense of the Soviet western borders and ancient Novgorod, in the offensive on the Kursk Bulge and during the crossing of the Dnieper.
In the midst of the battles for East Prussia, the Soviet Army on February 18, 1945 lost the commander of the 3rd Belorussian Front. He was hit by a fragment of a heavy projectile that hit the heart.
Marshal of the Soviet Union A.M. was appointed to the command of the 3rd Belorussian Front. Vasilevsky.
On April 10, the main fortress city and important port of East Prussia, Königsberg, was taken by storm.
Berlin was ahead
This period of hostilities of the Soviet troops is captured in photographs of the guard captain N. Finikov, which were published in the newspapers Pravda, Krasnaya Zvezda, and later used in magazines, encyclopedias, books (Storm of Königsberg).
The Military Council of the 3rd Belorussian Front in April 1945 awarded Captain N. Finikov the Order of the Patriotic War II degree.
On May 5, 1945, on the day of the Soviet press, the first commandant of Berlin, Guards Colonel-General, Hero of the Soviet Union, N.E. Berzarin gathered on the square in front of the destroyed Reichstag a large group of war correspondents, cameramen from different fronts. Kuibyshev residents N. Finikov and documentary cameraman N. Kiselev took part in this meeting. Photos from this meeting in different versions of the group have survived to this day.
Here are some of them:
Latest reports of the war
Now I will tell about the fate of the latest military reports of two war correspondents of the Pravda newspaper, who on the night of May 8-9 received an urgent task from the editorial office of the newspaper.
The capital of Czechoslovakia, Prague, was still under the German fascists. Active citizens of Prague raised an uprising against them and asked the Soviet Army to help them liberate the city. The famous Soviet writer Boris Nikolaevich Polevoy, being a military correspondent with the rank of lieutenant colonel, receives permission in Berlin from the commander of the 1st Ukrainian Front, Marshal of the Soviet Union Konev Ivan Stepanovich by plane to urgently get to Prague. At 7 am on May 9, 1945, this plane lands on the field of one of the city stadiums in Prague. N. Finikov arrives here by the next plane.
This picture shows the meeting of the second plane by the citizens of Prague:
And in this picture, the population of Prague welcomes the Soviet liberators on the Charles Bridge:
The Samara photojournalist, who received his first skills and lessons in using photographic equipment at the Samara newsreel studio at the end of the twenties of the last century, visited the capitals of two European states in one night: defeated Germany and liberated Czechoslovakia. The first and only photograph from liberated Prague, published in the Pravda newspaper, belongs to the guard captain N. Finikov (May 14, 1945).
Boris Polevoy titled his article about the events in Prague “The last military report”.
In June 1945, the Samara photojournalist, Captain N. Finikov, was awarded by the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR with medals "For the Capture of Königsberg", "For the Capture of Berlin", "For the Liberation of Prague".
Another episode of the near post-war period. On May 17, 1945, Marshal of the Soviet Union I.S. Konev in the West German resort town of Bad Wildungen met with the commander of the American group of troops, General O. Bradley. On behalf of the Soviet government, the marshal presented the American general with our highest military award, the Order of Suvorov, First Class.
Dozens of Soviet and American photographers and cameramen filmed this scene. From the Pravda newspaper at this meeting there are war correspondents B. Polevoy and N. Finikov, whose materials - an article and a photograph - are posted on the second page of the newspaper for May 21, 1945.
This visit of Marshal Konev to the American General Bradley was a return visit. And the reason for these meetings was that at the end of April, one of the significant events of the war took place near the German town of Torgau. The troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front, having broken through to the Elbe with a fight, met for the first time with units of the 12th Allied Army Group. Shortly thereafter, Marshal Konev was visited by the American General Bradley and, on behalf of the government of the United States of America, presented him with the highest American military order. In those May days, this visit was a vivid demonstration of friendship, sealed by the blood shed together in this war.
Here are some photos from that memorable meeting:
Twenty-five more days of war...
But the participation of N. Finikov in World War II did not end there.
To 1418 days of the Great Patriotic War, 25 combat days were added in the Far East, from August 9 to September 2, the only Samara photojournalist who participated in the war with militaristic Japan. Here there was participation in the first assault landing groups to liberate the capital of North Korea - Pyongyang and the city of Russian glory - Port Arthur. The final chord of this war is the photo “And they finished their campaign in the Pacific!”, Which was published in the Red Army Illustrated Newspaper in September 1945.
This photo I remember literally from that time.
On the rocky seashore near Port Arthur, soldiers from the guard unit of Captain Grigory Antonovich Alexandrov settled down to rest. Forty years ago, here, in Port Arthur, his father, a peasant of the Tver province, Anton Alexandrov, heroically fought with the Japanese.
And this is a unique photograph, in which a wreath from the Red Army soldiers is on the way to be laid at the monument to Russian soldiers who died in the war with Japan in 1904, at the Russian military cemetery in Port Arthur.
Prepared by Veronika Sevostyanova
Lesson topic:
The role of military journalists and correspondents during the Second World War
Lesson type:
Integrated (research-creative)
Form of work: group
Goals:
- Educational-To acquaint students with the tragic events of WWII.
- Educational- To form the ability to work with a historical document, to promote the development of logical skills: to compare, analyze, generalize.
- Educational- Describe the heroism of Soviet people of different professions.
Problem question:
In the form of conclusions, name all the functions that war correspondents performed?
During the classes
I. Organizational moment
II. Teacher: The Great Patriotic War…
No matter what they say or write, time will not erase from the memory of the people the most difficult of all wars in the history of mankind, especially in the history of our Motherland.
This year our country is celebrating the seventieth anniversary of the Great Victory. The Second World War forced all aspects of the life of the Soviet people to be reorganized on a military footing. Civilians dressed in military uniforms and took up arms. Those whom life has awarded with the greatest gift of eloquence did not stand aside.
"War does not exist if nothing is known about it." Yes, we will shine this lesson on all front-line and rear correspondent journalists of the Great Patriotic War. They did not think that they were doing a feat, they were just doing their job.
The task of your research work is to show and tell about the exploits of these people.
III. The first group of students– The first war correspondents in Russia appeared during the Caucasian War (1817-1864). The newspaper "Kavkaz" published in Tbilisi truthfully described the events, and the authors were published under a pseudonym, because the authorities did not want publicity. On this occasion, in the Russian Word, Nemirovich Danchenko wrote: “many journalists asked for instructions on what to write about.” Thanks to such courageous correspondents as Vsevolod Garshin, Vsevolod Krestovsky and the famous artist Vasily Vereshchagin, residents of Tsarist Russia received reliable information about the Russian-Japanese war .
The formidable whirlwind of events, the onslaught of armor and steel, bringing death and destruction, was a test of strength not only for the Soviet defense and political system, skill and valor of the Soviet army, but also for the spiritual strength of the people, a test of their patriotism and devotion to the Motherland, will and vitality , courage and strength of human hearts. Millions of people, having taken up rifles and machine guns, became warriors. Writers, poets, publicists and journalists also entered the bitter and bloody road of war, whose weapons were not only a pen, which smashes the enemy no less effectively than a lead hail, but also a bayonet. The Soviet press, radio, literature and art were directed to ensure the defeat of the enemy.
Slide #1
It is especially important to note the role of the periodical press during the Second World War. The morning of the first day of the Second World War was met by Soviet residents in different ways. The first to be baptized by fire were the workers of the newspapers of the frontier formations. Together with the fighters of the front line, they entered the battle with the enemy, while in the editorial offices of the rear newspapers the numbers signed for printing were re-edited. Instead of peaceful Sunday headlines, “hats” appeared on the newspaper pages, calling the Soviet people to a holy war: “Fascist Germany treacherously attacked us!”, “Fascist Germany will be defeated!”. One of the leading places in this area was played by the newspaper Pravda. The newspaper was a powerful conductor of ideological influence, since in a country where ideology played a key role, it was very important to mobilize spiritual potential in order to compensate for the failures of the first days of the war, the lack of weapons.
The writer Pyotr Pavlenko said that the newspaper at the front is that obligatory meal of spiritual food. That inviolable reserve of vigor, without which the Soviet soldier cannot do in the most bleak hours of hard trials. Analyzing the facts about the periodical press, we can say that it also personified one of the clearest examples of solidity, unity and brotherhood of the peoples of the Soviet Union.
Slide 2:
During the Second World War, it was very important to raise the whole country, the entire multinational people to defend the Motherland. This problem could be solved only with the help of the press. Friendly, close-knit teams of front-line newspapers, where the sons of the multinational Soviet people wrote their essays: Russian, Ukrainian, Georgian, Belarusian, Armenian, Kazakh correspondents. Of course, it is impossible to name all the names. These are Alexander Anokhin, correspondent of the Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper, who died near Velikiye Luki in February 1943, Pavel Apryshkov, an employee of the Krasnodar regional newspaper Komsomolets, part-time guards sergeant, intelligence officer, Aman Berdyev, writer, journalist of the Turkmen newspaper Yash Kommunist died at the front in the performance of professional duties. Grigor Zohrabyan is a journalist, at the front he was a deputy company commander, then an employee of a large-circulation newspaper of the 89th Taman Rifle Division. Abdulla Sharafutdinov, a journalist for the front-line newspaper Krasnoarmeyskaya Pravda, who published special issues for Uzbek soldiers, died in January 1945.
IV (second group)
slide 3
Very often, journalists found themselves face to face with fire and death, along with the heroes of their essays and articles. For example, when our troops stormed the famous Sapun Mountain near Sevastopol, through a furious downpour of fire, infantryman Ivan Yatsunenko was the first to reach the rocky peak and hoisted a red banner. The Golden Star of the Hero crowned the feat of the soldier, the whole country learned about him, but few people know that the young correspondent Nikolai Vorontsov climbed the mountain together with the hero, who spoke about the feat of Yatsunenko in his divisional newspaper.
Creative group - Again the war, again the Blockade ... (Yu. Voronov)
War again
Again blockade, -
Or should we forget about them?
I hear sometimes:
"No need,
There is no need to open wounds.
It's true that we're tired
We are from stories of war.
And flipped through the blockade
The lyrics are enough."
And it may seem:
Rights
And persuasive words.
But even if it's true
Such a truth
Wrong!
I don't need to worry
So that that war is not forgotten:
After all, this memory is our conscience.
We need her as a force.
slide 4
The role of Soviet journalism, including the deeply peripheral “district”, in the system of ideological education of the home front during the Second World War was obvious. In the newspaper "Bolshevik", edited by Ivan Yudin, his essay "In the footsteps of the fascist beast" was published. During the occupation, Kuban journalists published "avenging newspapers" behind enemy lines. The party leadership paid a very large role to regional newspapers. In the Kuban, at the beginning of the Second World War, 154 newspapers were published. The most famous were considered "Soviet Cossacks", "Stalinets". Instructing journalists to conduct patriotic education, the Soviet leadership even had to remember the Cossacks and their military-patriotic traditions. First of all, it was announced that all the Cossacks became Soviet. Even one of the regional newspapers was renamed "Soviet Cossacks". The most popular topic was the military chronicle "from the Soviet information bureau."
slide 5
The exploits of famous Soviet writers - Angelina
It is impossible not to admire the exploits of Soviet writers. Without exaggeration and excessive pathos, we can say that these talented people, spokesmen for the thoughts and aspirations of the people, fought in the first echelon, generously giving their talent and spiritual potential to the Motherland. Their songs, poems, poems were read in trenches and dugouts, behind enemy lines, from the Baltic to the Black Sea. In museums there are quite a few books stained with blood and pierced by bullets. Some of them are accompanied by letters from soldiers and officers, speaking of their love for literature. One of these letters reads: “Your book (it was about M.A. Sholokhov’s book “They Fought for the Motherland”) I am ours, just like my comrades, always with me in my bag. She helps us to live and fight. We need your book. During the Second World War, M. Sholokhov was a military journalist for Pravda and Krasnaya Zvezda, often went to the front. His essay "On the Smolensk Direction" was published in various publications, and inspired the soldiers to feats of arms. Lines from the poem "The Book of a Fighter" by A. Tvardovsky were published in Krasnoarmeyskaya Pravda and became a prayer for many soldiers:
"I will peep, howl in pain
Dying in the field without a trace
But you are willing
I will never give up."
Slide 6 (second creative group) -The military merits and labor prowess of journalists and writers were highly appreciated by the Soviet government. On the chest of many journalists, the orders of the Red Banner, the Patriotic War, the Red Star, the medals "For Courage", "For Military Merit" that they deserved sparkled. One can talk endlessly about these brave and daring masters of the word. They composed, compose poems, poems, prose, songs. But it seems to us that the "Song of War Correspondents" is and will remain for all time the anthem of all journalists.
V (The whole group sings)
From Moscow to Brest
There is no such place
Wherever they wander
We are in the dust.
With a watering can and with a notepad,
And even with a machine gun
Through the fire and cold, we passed.
]
Monument to the dead journalists
On the fronts of the Great Patriotic War, 1,500 representatives of our workshop died. Among them are the Heroes of the Soviet Union - Musa Jalil, a famous poet, journalist, who worked in Moscow before the war, an employee of the army newspaper Courage, who was executed in the Moabit fascist prison in March 1944.
Caesar Kunikov, Moscow journalist (commander of a detachment of paratroopers, died in the battle for Novorossiysk in February 1943). Petr Nazarenko, a correspondent for the Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper, later head of the division's artillery, died in April 1944 on the right bank of the Dniester. And many, many more...
The Soviet press was the tool that convinced, mobilized people for heroic deeds, for self-sacrifice, for overcoming difficulties. The best journalistic and literary forces were placed at the service of the Motherland, they talentedly, ardently and sincerely wrote about the exploits and heroism of soldiers, about the difficulties and courage of people, about their stamina and love for the Motherland. And the journalists themselves often risked their lives, especially photojournalists and cameramen, in order to fulfill the task of the editors, it happened that they died.
Writers M. Sholokhov, A. Fadeev, E. Petrov visiting the commander of the Western Front, Lieutenant-General I. S. Konev (far left).
All media during the Great Patriotic War worked in a special mode. The most important role was played by wired radio. It transmitted a government statement about Germany's perfidious attack on the USSR at 12 o'clock on June 22. And after 45 minutes, the first military “Latest News” was transmitted. On June 24, the Sovinformburo was created, the most important task of which was to present reports on military operations and front-line messages. From that time until the end of the war, every day of millions of people began and ended with reports from the Sovinformburo. Then the whole country knew the name of the main announcer who read these reports, Yuri Levitan. In total, during the war years, more than two thousand daily reports and 122 messages “At the last hour” were heard. The work of all the media was rebuilt in a military way. Military departments appeared in the newspapers and on All-Union Radio. Their main task was to show the insidious plans of the enemy, to reveal his plans of conquest in relation to the peoples of the USSR, and also to explain to the population and soldiers that the war is fair for our people, because it is called upon to defend the Fatherland from perfidious invaders.
Frontline operator N. Kiselev.
The structure of the media was restructured. The number of central newspapers was halved (to 18), and their circulation decreased. Many specialized, sectoral, and also Komsomol publications have ceased to appear. The local press has also shrunk. But instead, a network of new publications was created, primarily front-line newspapers. These were newspapers of military units of all levels - army, brigade, rifle, tank, combined arms formations, air defense troops. In total, about 700 such newspapers were created by the end of 1942. To work in them, special mobilizations of journalists were carried out in accordance with the directives of party organs. Five central newspapers were published in the army and navy. The main one is the “Red Star”. With the beginning of the war, famous writers A. Surkov, V. Grossman, K. Simonov, A. Tolstoy, I. Ehrenburg and others began to be published in it. 1200 issues of this wartime newspaper are a heroic chronicle of the growing power of the army and the military art of its commanders. The central organ in the fleet was the newspaper Krasny Fleet, and at the end of 1941 a special newspaper for the personnel of the air force, Stalin's Falcon, began to be published. Then "Red Falcon" - for long-range aviation personnel. There were also magazines (20) for the army and navy, political, literary and artistic trends.
An important role was played by the rear newspapers, which wrote about the situation at the front, about the heroism of the fighters, but most importantly, they called on those who remained in the rear to do everything possible and impossible in order to provide them with everything they needed. “All for the front, all for victory!” - this slogan determined the main meaning of the publications of these publications. In addition to front-line newspapers, there were also underground (about 200 in 1944) and partisan publications published in the occupied territory. Their task is to fight the enemy in his rear.
Part of the Soviet film group before signing the surrender in Berlin (May 8, 1945)
Publicism during the war is very diverse. She knew no equal in world history and was born from a fusion of the talent of journalists, their personal conviction in the need to fight for the freedom of the Motherland and their connection with real life. The newspapers of that time published many letters from workers, army soldiers, home front workers, this created a feeling of unity among the people in the face of a common enemy. From the very first days of the war, outstanding publicists M. Sholokhov, A. Tolstoy, N. Tikhonov, K. Simonov, B. Gorbatov, L. Leonov, M. Shaginyan and others began to write about the war for newspapers. They created strong works that convinced people of the coming victory, gave rise to patriotic impulses in them, supported faith and confidence in the invincibility of our army. In the first years of the war, these works called people to defend the fatherland, to overcome obstacles and hardships, to fight the enemy. The works of these authors were published in many front-line newspapers. The correspondence of war correspondents also played an important role.
One of the most famous was K. Simonov. He walked thousands of kilometers along military roads, and described his impressions in numerous essays, stories, novels, poems. His sternly restrained manner of writing pleased readers, inspired confidence, inspired faith and hope. His essays were also heard on the radio, distributed through the channels of the Soviet Information Bureau. His famous poems “Wait for me” became a kind of spell for most people on the eve of the war.
Poet Yevgeny Dolmatovsky in Berlin, 1945
Publicism also used satirical genres. Pamphlets, cartoons, feuilletons were widely used in newspapers and magazines. Specialized satirical publications “Front Humor”, “Draft” and others were published. The most important place in the journalism of the war years was occupied by photojournalism. Photojournalists captured, conveyed to contemporaries and preserved for posterity the heroism and everyday life of that time. Since 1941, a special magazine “Front-line photoillustration” and “Photogazeta” have been published.
Yevgeny Khaldei near Hermann Goering at the Nuremberg Trials
At the Nuremberg trials, one of the material evidence was photographs of Yevgeny Khaldei, Davidzon and many, many Soviet photographers who recorded traces of Nazi crimes.
Therefore, the feat of journalists who fought with a pen and a camera and also contributed to our Victory is invaluable!
"the correspondent, as soon as he showed his little book, was already accepted as an important boss, as having the right to give directions. He could get the right information, or he could get it wrong, he could report it to the newspaper on time or late - his career depended not on this, but on the correct worldview. Having the right worldview, the correspondent did not have much need to climb into such a springboard or into such hell: he could write his correspondence in the rear".
A. S. Solzhenitsyn "In the first circle"
I dedicate this post to the feat of L.I. Lagashina! heroically
War correspondents have always been in demand in their specialty. However, the profession became especially popular during the Great Patriotic War. It was then that many correspondents, photographers, announcers signed up as volunteers and went to the front to tell and show people how hard every inch of the reclaimed land gets. NTV recalls famous military journalists who were able not only to objectively tell about what was happening on the battlefields, but also to risk their lives for the sake of a common victory and become Heroes of the Soviet Union.
Read below
Who are military journalists?
A war correspondent can be called a journalist who accompanies the army, air force and navy during hostilities and covers the events of the war in the press.
Yuri Levitan
Yuri Borisovich Levitan (at birth his name was Yudka Berkovich Levitan) was born in 1914 in Vladimir. Interestingly, from childhood, the future famous announcer had a stentorian and loud voice. Even then he was called the "Pipe", and his voice, similar in strength to a megaphone, could be carried over long distances.
Despite his natural talent and special timbre, Yuri Levitan was reluctantly taken on the radio because of his strong provincial dialect. No one knows how his career could have developed if not for Stalin's call. It was the Supreme Commander in 1934 who heard one night how an announcer unknown to him was reading the news of the Pravda newspaper on the air. Stalin immediately called the Radio Committee and said that the text of his report at the 17th Party Congress should be read only by "this voice."
In the fall of 1941, Yuri Levitan was evacuated to Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg) due to the fact that it was impossible to broadcast from the capital: all Moscow radio towers were dismantled, as they were landmarks for enemy bombers. The studio was located in the basement, and the announcer himself lived in a barracks in difficult conditions and in complete secrecy.
Special security measures were also taken because Hitler himself promised 250,000 marks to anyone who brought him Levitan's head - he was so disgusted by the voice that announced the military victories of the Soviet Union to the whole world.
In March 1943, Levitan secretly moved to Kuibyshev (now Samara), where the Radio Committee was stationed on a permanent basis.
Throughout the Great Patriotic War, Yuri Levitan read the reports of the Soviet Information Bureau and Stalin's orders, and his voice was known to every inhabitant of the country. Yuri Levitan was entrusted with announcing the capture of Berlin and the Victory.
The famous announcer died in 1983 in the Belgorod region during a meeting with veterans of the Battle of Kursk. He was buried in Moscow at the Novodevichy Cemetery.
Musa Jalil
Musa Jalil was not only a well-known poet and journalist in the USSR, but also a participant in the Great Patriotic War, a Hero of the Soviet Union.
Musa Mustafovich Zalilov was born in 1906 in the Orenburg region. In 1919 he began his studies at the Literary Faculty of Moscow State University, worked as an editor in children's magazines. The first collection of his poems “We are going” was published in 1925, and 10 years later two more collections, “Poems and Poems” and “Order-bearing millions”, saw the light of day.
Photo: TASS
In 1941, Musa Jalil was one of the first to go to the front, he worked there as a war correspondent. A year after the start of the war, he was captured and transferred to the Spandau concentration camp. Even in those monstrous conditions, he did not stop writing poems. In the concentration camp, Jalil organized an underground that was preparing a mass escape of prisoners. He was executed in 1944 for his work in this underground. He received the title of Hero of the USSR posthumously twelve years later.
Konstantin Simonov
"Wait for me and I will come back,
All deaths out of spite.
Who did not wait for me, let him
He will say: Lucky.
Do not understand those who did not wait for them,
Like in the middle of a fire
Waiting for your
You saved me
How I survived, we will know
Only you and I -
You just knew how to wait
Like no one else"
Photo: TASS, Mastyukov Valentin
This famous poem was written by Konstantin Simonov in July-August 1941. The writer graduated from the Literary Institute. Gorky, during the war he studied at the courses of war correspondents, and then worked with the front line for the newspapers Krasnaya Zvezda and Battle Banner. Even during the difficult war years, he continued to create literary works.
In the summer of 1941 he worked as a war correspondent in captured Odessa. Already in 1942 he was awarded the rank of senior battalion commissar, and in 1943 the rank of lieutenant colonel. As a journalist, he visited all fronts of the Great Patriotic War, was in Romania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Poland, Germany, described what was happening in the last battles for Berlin.
In 1944, Konstantin Simonov was awarded the medal "For the Defense of the Caucasus". After the war, he worked as a war correspondent in the USSR, the USA and Japan. He was the editor-in-chief of the Literaturnaya Gazeta. He died in 1979, leaving admirers of his talent a rich literary heritage.
Lev Ozerov
Lev Adolfovich Ozerov (real name Goldberg) was an outstanding Russian poet, translator and war correspondent.
Born in 1914 in Kyiv, in 1939 he graduated from the Moscow Institute of Philosophy, Literature and History.
Photo: er3ed.qrz.ru
At the very beginning of the war, he signed up as a volunteer and went to the front to work as a war correspondent. On the battlefields he did not stop writing, and since 1943 he was a teacher at the Literary Institute. Later he received a doctorate in philology.
The famous quatrain presented below also belongs to Lev Ozerov.
"Neglecting words,
Life convinces us again:
Talents need help
Mediocrity will break through themselves "
Mikhail Sholokhov
The world-famous writer during the Great Patriotic War also worked as a war correspondent.
Mikhail Sholokhov was born in 1905 in the Rostov region. He studied at the parochial school, and then at the gymnasium. He could not get a special education because of the outbreak of the revolution and the civil war. In 1922 he came to Moscow and firmly decided to become a writer. At that time, Sholokhov worked as a loader, a bricklayer, an accountant, and in 1923 he was able to publish his first literary work, a feuilleton.
Photo: TASS, Stupakov V.
In 1926, he began working on the novel Quiet Flows the Don.
During the Great Patriotic War, he left literary activity and became a war correspondent for two newspapers at once: Pravda and Krasnaya Zvezda. Very often went to the front line, wrote many essays and stories. In the last years of the war, he published the story "The Science of Hate" and chapters from the novel "They Fought for the Motherland."
After the war, the writer was engaged not only in literary, but also in social activities. Mikhail Sholokhov published the second book of the novel "Virgin Soil Upturned", a continuation of the book "They Fought for the Motherland". In 1965, Sholokhov received the Nobel Prize for his novel The Quiet Flows the Flows. All his life, with the exception of the war years, he lived in his village, where he died in 1984.
NTV will follow the celebrations on Victory Day throughout the holiday. Spectators will see not only the parade on Red Square, but also. In addition, anyone can support a patriotic action invented by a Crimean schoolgirl.
photographs of Prokhanov during the wars burst out with envious-hissing Solzhenitsyn senile lines from the novel "In the First Circle", calling it "our conscience":
"the correspondent, as soon as he showed his little book, was already accepted as an important boss, as having the right to give directions. He could get the right information, or he could get it wrong, he could report it to the newspaper on time or late - his career depended not on this, but on the correct worldview. Having the right worldview, the correspondent did not have much need to climb into such a springboard or into such hell: he could write his correspondence in the rear".
Let me remind you what front-line and military journalists really did and how many of them died during the Great Patriotic War.
Monument to the dead journalists
On the fronts of the Great Patriotic War, 1,500 representatives of our workshop died. Among them are the Heroes of the Soviet Union - Musa Jalil, a famous poet, journalist, who worked in Moscow before the war, an employee of the army newspaper Courage, who was executed in the Moabit fascist prison in March 1944.
Caesar Kunikov, Moscow journalist (commander of a detachment of paratroopers, died in the battle for Novorossiysk in February 1943). Petr Nazarenko, a correspondent for the Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper, later head of the division's artillery, died in April 1944 on the right bank of the Dniester. And many, many more...
The Soviet press was the tool that convinced, mobilized people for heroic deeds, for self-sacrifice, for overcoming difficulties. The best journalistic and literary forces were placed at the service of the Motherland, they talentedly, ardently and sincerely wrote about the exploits and heroism of soldiers, about the difficulties and courage of people, about their stamina and love for the Motherland. And the journalists themselves often risked their lives, especially photojournalists and cameramen, in order to fulfill the task of the editors, it happened that they died.
Writers M. Sholokhov, A. Fadeev, E. Petrov visiting the commander of the Western Front, Lieutenant-General I. S. Konev (far left).
All media during the Great Patriotic War worked in a special mode. The most important role was played by wired radio. It transmitted a government statement about Germany's perfidious attack on the USSR at 12 o'clock on June 22. And after 45 minutes, the first military “Latest News” was transmitted. On June 24, the Sovinformburo was created, the most important task of which was to present reports on military operations and front-line messages. From that time until the end of the war, every day of millions of people began and ended with reports from the Sovinformburo. Then the whole country knew the name of the main announcer who read these reports, Yuri Levitan. In total, during the war years, more than two thousand daily reports and 122 messages “At the last hour” were heard. The work of all the media was rebuilt in a military way. Military departments appeared in the newspapers and on All-Union Radio. Their main task was to show the insidious plans of the enemy, to reveal his plans of conquest in relation to the peoples of the USSR, and also to explain to the population and soldiers that the war is fair for our people, because it is called upon to defend the Fatherland from perfidious invaders.
Frontline operator N. Kiselev.
The structure of the media was restructured. The number of central newspapers was halved (to 18), and their circulation decreased. Many specialized, sectoral, and also Komsomol publications have ceased to appear. The local press has also shrunk. But instead, a network of new publications was created, primarily front-line newspapers. These were newspapers of military units of all levels - army, brigade, rifle, tank, combined arms formations, air defense troops. In total, about 700 such newspapers were created by the end of 1942. To work in them, special mobilizations of journalists were carried out in accordance with the directives of party organs. Five central newspapers were published in the army and navy. The main one is the “Red Star”. With the beginning of the war, famous writers A. Surkov, V. Grossman, K. Simonov, A. Tolstoy, I. Ehrenburg and others began to be published in it. 1200 issues of this wartime newspaper are a heroic chronicle of the growing power of the army and the military art of its commanders. The central organ in the fleet was the newspaper Krasny Fleet, and at the end of 1941 a special newspaper for the personnel of the air force, Stalin's Falcon, began to be published. Then "Red Falcon" - for long-range aviation personnel. There were also magazines (20) for the army and navy, political, literary and artistic trends.
An important role was played by the rear newspapers, which wrote about the situation at the front, about the heroism of the fighters, but most importantly, they called on those who remained in the rear to do everything possible and impossible in order to provide them with everything they needed. “All for the front, all for victory!” - this slogan determined the main meaning of the publications of these publications. In addition to front-line newspapers, there were also underground (about 200 in 1944) and partisan publications published in the occupied territory. Their task is to fight the enemy in his rear.
Part of the Soviet film group before signing the surrender in Berlin (May 8, 1945)
Publicism during the war is very diverse. She knew no equal in world history and was born from a fusion of the talent of journalists, their personal conviction in the need to fight for the freedom of the Motherland and their connection with real life. The newspapers of that time published many letters from workers, army soldiers, home front workers, this created a feeling of unity among the people in the face of a common enemy. From the very first days of the war, outstanding publicists M. Sholokhov, A. Tolstoy, N. Tikhonov, K. Simonov, B. Gorbatov, L. Leonov, M. Shaginyan and others began to write about the war for newspapers. They created strong works that convinced people of the coming victory, gave rise to patriotic impulses in them, supported faith and confidence in the invincibility of our army. In the first years of the war, these works called people to defend the fatherland, to overcome obstacles and hardships, to fight the enemy. The works of these authors were published in many front-line newspapers. The correspondence of war correspondents also played an important role.
One of the most famous was K. Simonov. He walked thousands of kilometers along military roads, and described his impressions in numerous essays, stories, novels, poems. His sternly restrained manner of writing pleased readers, inspired confidence, inspired faith and hope. His essays were also heard on the radio, distributed through the channels of the Soviet Information Bureau. His famous poems “Wait for me” became a kind of spell for most people on the eve of the war.
Poet Yevgeny Dolmatovsky in Berlin, 1945
Publicism also used satirical genres. Pamphlets, cartoons, feuilletons were widely used in newspapers and magazines. Specialized satirical publications “Front Humor”, “Draft” and others were published. The most important place in the journalism of the war years was occupied by photojournalism. Photojournalists captured, conveyed to contemporaries and preserved for posterity the heroism and everyday life of that time. Since 1941, a special magazine “Front-line photoillustration” and “Photogazeta” have been published.
Yevgeny Khaldei near Hermann Goering at the Nuremberg Trials
At the Nuremberg trials, one of the material evidence was photographs of Yevgeny Khaldei, Davidzon and many, many Soviet photographers who recorded traces of Nazi crimes.
Therefore, the feat of journalists who fought with a pen and a camera and also contributed to our Victory is invaluable!
