Personal life of Joseph Stalin. Stalin's femme fatales

Few people know that the leader Soviet Union, Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, had three wives, and two of them tragically left this world. The saddest story was related to last wife- Nadezhda Alliluyeva. What did the woman have to endure “in the arms of the devil?” What would her fate have been like if she had not met Joseph Stalin?

Joseph Dzhugashvili

Soso Dzhugashvili was born in poor family small town Gori, in 1878. His father Vissarion was a shoemaker (like his mother Keke). The parents of the future leader were born into families of serfs. Little Soso had a difficult childhood, his father drank and constantly beat him and his mother. At the age of 10 Joseph (to great joy mother) enters theological school. In 1894, Dzhugashvili graduated from college with honors and entered the seminary. At the age of 15, the future revolutionary became interested in the Marxist movement. He actively participates in the underground life of revolutionaries. As a result, he was expelled from the seminary for promoting Marxism in 1899.

Joseph Dzhugashvili takes the nickname Koba and begins to actively participate in revolutionary movements, strikes, and demonstrations. As a result, a flurry of activity leads to the first exile. He will spend the next 17 years of his life in constant arrests.

Stalin's wives

Koba met his first wife, Ekaterina, in Tiflis. Revolutionary Alexander Svanidze introduced him to his sister. Katya was very beautiful, modest and submissive, and the sister of a revolutionary! They got married secretly. Despite Dzhugashvili’s poverty, constant arrests, lack of work and completely unassuming appearance, Katya saw in him loving man. Indeed, in those years, young Soso dreamed of a real family, which he never had. Katya did everything that depended on her; they rented a small room in the fields. Soon a son, Yakov, is born into the family. But there is still no money, the husband sends all the money he got to Lenin. He was fanatical in his belief in the revolution. Soon Katya will get sick and die; the family did not have money for her treatment. The newborn baby remains with sister Katerina, his father will take him to Moscow only in 1921.

In 1910, Koba was sent into exile for the third time in the same city of Salvychegorsk, where he lived with the widow Matryona Prokopyevna Kuzakova. This woman can be called common-law wife Stalin, because during their cohabitation their son Konstantin was born. Later this fact will be proven by DNA analysis on the federal channel.

After the end of his exile, Stalin settled in Vologda. And then he will go to St. Petersburg to prepare a coup, he will do this in the direction of Lenin himself. In St. Petersburg, Stalin meets his last wife, Nadezhda Alliluyeva. The following is the story of Stalin's wife, biography and personal life.

Nadezhda Alliluyeva

Nadezhda Sergeevna Alliluyeva was born in Baku. The life of Stalin's wife was spent surrounded by revolutionaries. Her father Sergei Yakovlevich and mother Olga Evgenievna were ardent communists. For this reason, they move to St. Petersburg with the whole family. Nadya had a sister Anna and brothers Pavel and Fedor.

Nadezhda grew up as a determined and courageous child. She was interested in everything, she became interested in politics early, sharing the interests of her revolutionary parents. Nadya was hot-tempered and stubborn, with such a fighting character it is not surprising that she was carried away by the old revolutionary Koba.

She was 16 years old when the no longer so young Stalin appeared in their house. 23 years older than the girl, he became an idol for her. Further biography future wife Stalin and her personal life will look like a complete nightmare.

Married to the leader

Nadezhda has always been very active. After graduating from high school, she began working at the People's Commissariat for Nationalities Affairs, in the secretariat of V.I. Lenin. She was involved in the magazines “Revolution and Culture” and in the newspaper “Pravda”. Having given birth to Stalin's two children, Vasily and Svetlana, she really wanted to return to public life. But my husband didn’t like this, and as a result, frequent quarrels arose in the family. Alliluyeva, Stalin's wife, often argued with her husband.

Quarrels generally accompanied them throughout life together. A struggle of characters, and later an open misunderstanding of Stalin’s actions. When Nadezhda’s eight classmates were arrested, it was too late to do anything; they all died. Later, she repeatedly encountered injustice, which she tried in every possible way to correct, but it was all in vain. People were dying all around, it was impossible to worry about it calmly. In addition, Stalin was often rude and could publicly insult his wife. Eyewitnesses of those years remember this.

In one of the next quarrels, on November 9, 1932, she ran away from a banquet celebrating the revolution and then shot herself in the heart. This is how the biography of Stalin's wife ends.

The mystery of death, the fate of the family

The question of the reasons for the suicide of Stalin's wife still remains open. There are two main versions. The first is political. Nadezhda could not come to terms with her husband’s aggressive policy. The remark allegedly uttered by Nadezhda in a quarrel: “You tortured me and tortured the whole people,” was the basis for thinking so.

Another reason, according to historians, is illness. Nadezhda was ill for a long time. From the memoirs of her compatriots and letters from her mother, we know that she constantly suffered from headaches. These pains drove her crazy, perhaps they were the reason for suicide. In addition, she had an intestinal disease; her husband even sent her to Germany for treatment. Vasily, who was 11 years old at the time of her death, recalls this physical suffering of his mother.

Nadezhda Alliluyeva was buried at Novodevichy Cemetery.

After Nadezhda’s death, a series of repressions began against her family. In 1938, brother Pavel died of a broken heart. There are a lot of rumors that it was poisoning. On the day of Pavel's funeral, Nadya's sister's husband is arrested. He will be shot in 2 years. Anna will also be arrested, but much later. She will be arrested for (allegedly) anti-Soviet propaganda. Anna will be released only after Stalin's death, in 1954.

Conclusion

Today, many memoirs, books, and autobiographical works have been written about the life of Stalin’s wife Nadezhda, but what was going on in the soul of the young girl, the mother of two children, cannot be known for sure.

Stalin was and remained one of the most closed leaders of the party and state. He carefully ensured that his biography was canonical in nature, and true facts were hidden. "Komsomolskaya Pravda" publishes a large material by Olga Kuchkina "Women of Stalin", designed to eliminate the gaps in our knowledge about the personal life of the dictator.

When Stalin's wife Nadezhda Alliluyeva shot herself, his six-year-old daughter Svetlana remained his most beloved woman. He called her Mistress. And he had to obey the Mistress. “I order you to allow me to go with you to the theater or cinema.” Signed: “Mistress Setanka”. Address - “To my 1st secretary comrade. Stalin." It was a game that awaits further psychoanalytic interpretations.

Housekeeper Carolina Vasilievna Til was the first to see Alliluyeva covered in blood on the floor by the bed. A small Walther pistol lay next to the lifeless body. The author of the article knows the story of the suicide of the 30-year-old wife of 55-year-old Stalin on the night of November 9, 1932 from family stories: Til is “the relatives of my father-in-law, who was friends with Nadezhda Alliluyeva,” the author writes. Reasons for suicide: psychological and ideological differences, but there was also a secret about which there were persistent rumors: as if Stalin, during another quarrel, said to his wife: do you know that you are my daughter?! Olga Kuchkina directs new problem to biographers: “Has incest finished off Nadya?”

Joseph knew Nadya's mother, Olga, from Baku times. 23-year-old revolutionary and 23-year-old married woman often spent time together. Her husband accepted their meetings. Nadya was Stalin's second wife. The first one to be married is Katya Svanidze, the sister of fellow underground fighter Alyosha Svanidze. 16-year-old Keto set the condition that she would become a wife if they got married. The Georgian woman did not contradict her husband’s will in any way. She was so shy that when his friends appeared, she hid under the table. Relatives said about her: “a wife-child, looking up at her husband, accepting as the law his power over herself and rightness in everything and always.” Keto died of typhoid fever, but managed to give birth to a son, Yasha. Stalin will have a hard time with her death, which will not prevent him from later destroying his relative Alyosha Svanidze, as well as imprisoning, shooting, and driving to suicide his relatives along the Alliluyeva line.

Stalin would take the teenager Yasha to Moscow from Georgia only in 1921. “The relationship between son and father will forever remain strained. Yasha will find joy in his relationship with his stepmother. Stalin mocks them, either being jealous, or experiencing enduring irritation towards both,” writes Olga Kuchkina. Nadya is only 27, Yasha is 17. It will come down to Yasha attempting suicide. This will only cause the famous mockery from my father: he couldn’t even shoot himself properly.

Stalin also treated his son from Alliluyeva Vasya badly, despised him and got him drunk. “Stalin always had a bottle of Georgian wine on his table; he teased his wife by pouring a glass for a one-year-old boy. They said that Vasino’s drinking began in childhood,” the author writes.

The author of the article also reports less known data - about Stalin’s illegitimate children. About the new editor-in-chief of the literary drama, Konstantin Kuzakov, who appeared on television in the early 70s, they immediately began to say that his father was Stalin. Kuzakov was silent about his origin. He spoke a year before his death. In an interview with Arguments and Facts in 1996, he admitted: “I was still very young when I found out that I was Stalin’s son.”

Kuzakov's mother, Matryona, was the daughter of a deacon. The exiled Joseph Dzhugashvili lodged with her in Solvychegodsk, having arrived there in January 1911. It was freezing. Matryona had been widowed for a year and worked alone. The exile replaced her husband. Nine months later they gave birth to a black-haired boy. He stood out in stark contrast to his blond siblings. Matryona named him Kostya, and wrote down his middle name - Stepanovich, after the name of her husband, who died two years before Kostya was born.

Subsequently, Matryona will receive Moscow housing, registration and a more euphonious name - Maria. Working in the propaganda department of the Central Committee, Kuzakov would be accused by Beria of involvement in “atomic espionage.” In 1947, he was expelled from the party and removed from all posts. He is awaiting arrest. A short remark from Stalin will cancel the repressions. Kuzakov will be reinstated in the party on the day of Beria’s arrest.

Another romantic episode in Stalin’s life will happen in the Turukhansk region, in the village of Kureyka. 37-year-old Koba is again in exile. From 1914 to 1916, he lived with a 14-year-old peasant woman, Lida Pereprygina, and cohabited with her. Two babies were born in Kureika. The first one died. The second, born in April 1917, was recorded as Alexander Dzhugashvili. He gave his word to the gendarme, who was pursuing an exile for molesting a minor, to marry, but when the sentence expired, he left Kureika. Alexander was adopted and given his last name by the peasant Yakov Davydov. After marrying him, Lida gave birth to eight more children. She wrote letters to Stalin, but Stalin did not answer.

These facts were contained in a highly secret letter from KGB Chairman Serov, sent to Khrushchev on July 18, 1956. Alexander Davydov graduated from the College of Communications in Krasnoyarsk. There he was summoned to the NKVD and signed a non-disclosure agreement to “particularly mysterious state information.” He ended his days as a foreman in Krasnoyarsk. Stalin never had personal contacts with either Alexander or Konstantin. The “Father of Nations” did not love his sons - neither illegitimate nor legitimate.

“He had strong potency. Nadezhda Alliluyeva’s medical record contains information about ten abortions. The doctor who consulted her abroad sympathized: “Poor thing, you live with an animal.” Why did he prefer those who were younger? It’s easier to cope with an undeveloped consciousness. It’s easier to inspire what you want, subjugate yourself. He was attracted by the image of a rebel, a fighter for the poor against the rich. The hidden traits of a ruler were originally in his nature, argues Olga Kuchkina.

Maria Svanidze writes enthusiastically about Stalin and angrily about his enemy Avel Enukidze: “Being himself depraved and voluptuous, he stinked everything around him - he took pleasure in pimping, family discord, seduction of girls... Women with suitable daughters owned everything, the girls were unnecessarily thrust upon other men... The institution recruited staff only based on gender characteristics that Abel liked. To justify his debauchery, he was ready to encourage it in everything - he went out of his way to meet his husband, who was abandoning his family... or simply set up his husband with a ballerina, a typist, etc., that he did not need...”

The diary of Maria Svanidze allows one to judge the morals of the Kremlin elite: the leader was no stranger to “ballerinas and typists,” the author concludes. Among the ballerinas to whom Stalin paid attention were Marina Semenova and Olga Lepeshinskaya. Memoirist Gronsky writes, without citing his last name, that in the mid-30s Stalin often returned from the famous ballerina to the Kremlin at 2 - 3 o'clock in the morning. Among the singers they talked about Valeria Barsova and Natalia Shpiller. But above all, rumor connected him with Vera Davydova. She had the nickname "Tsar-Baba". Gendlin’s book “Confession of Stalin’s Mistress” was published in the West, where their romance is described in detail.

This is how Vera Aleksandrovna Davydova describes one night with Stalin at his dacha: “After strong hot coffee and delicious grog, I felt completely good. The fear and confusion disappeared. I followed him. It turned out that I.V. taller than me. We entered a room where there was a large low couch. Stalin asked permission to take off his jacket. He threw an oriental robe over his shoulders, sat down next to him, and asked: “Can I turn off the light? It's easier to talk in the dark." Without waiting for an answer, he turned off the light. I.V. He hugged me and skillfully unbuttoned my blouse. My heart began to flutter. "Comrade Stalin! Joseph Vissarionovich, dear, don’t, I’m afraid! Let me go home!..” He did not pay any attention to my pathetic babble, only in the darkness his animal eyes lit up with a bright flame. I tried to break free again... but it was all in vain.”

Stalin is 54, Davydova is 28. Their relationship lasted 19 years. A three-room apartment, titles and awards were awarded to the ballerina with ease. The singer's relatives declared the book a fake. A scandal broke out, but it quickly faded away.

Here is evidence from Svetlana Alliluyeva’s book “Twenty Letters to a Friend”: “New faces appeared, including the young snub-nosed Valechka, whose mouth did not close all day from a cheerful, ringing laugh. After working in Zubalovo for three years, she was transferred to her father’s dacha in Kuntsevo and remained there until his death, later becoming a housekeeper...”

Valentina Istomina, a medical school graduate, was first intended for General Vlasik, but when the Master liked her, he had no choice but to forget about her. Years later, Vlasik will be sent to the Magadan camp.

In the book “Just One Year,” published in the West in 1970, Svetlana Aliluyeva writes: “He gave his name to a system of bloody one-man dictatorship. He knew what he was doing, he was neither mentally ill nor delusional. With cold prudence he asserted his power and, more than anything else, was afraid of losing it. Therefore, the first task of his entire life was the elimination of opponents and rivals.”

It was short, but apparently happy marriage. Because it was for love...

Catherine was introduced to her future husband, Joseph Dzhugashvili, by her brother Alexander, who, like Joseph, was passionate about religion - both studied at theological seminary - and... politics.

First of all, Joseph in love found it necessary to introduce his chosen one to his mother. Keka liked her son's bride and received a blessing for the marriage.

At that time, such things were still important for the future Soviet dictator.

It’s an amazing thing - dozens of books have been written about Stalin and his personal life. But at the same time, almost nothing is known about his first woman.

I had the opportunity to meet the descendants of those who personally knew both Joseph himself and his Kato. At the beginning of the last century, this was the name given to the future ruler of one-sixth of the land and his greatest love.

From their stories and memories I will try to recreate the story of the life and death of Ekaterina Svanidze.

She was an unusual woman. Already because for her sake, former seminarian Dzhugashvili went down the aisle.

On the night of July 16, 1906, in the monastery of St. David, located in Tiflis on Mount Mtatsminda, the wedding of the 19-year-old daughter of a Tiflis peasant and the 26-year-old son of a shoemaker from Gori took place. Dzhugashvili had just joined the Bolshevik Party and was not at all alien to the joys of family life.

At that time, Joseph was already in an illegal situation.

Therefore, the wedding took place secretly and at night. The only priest who agreed to perform the ritual was Soso’s classmate at the theological seminary.

The young Bolshevik had to get married under someone else's name. According to his passport, he was listed as Galiashvili.

The series of pseudonyms began...

Only four months will pass, and Ekaterina Svanidze will be able to fully experience what it means to be the wife of a revolutionary.

On November 13, the police came to her apartment on Freylinskaya Street, looking for Joseph. He was in Baku at that time. Therefore, the gendarmes - not to leave empty-handed - arrested Kato.

The formal reason for the arrest was that Svanidze showed the police her maiden passport, although her marriage was no longer a secret to anyone.

On the eve of the new year, which became the last in her life, Svanidze was released. Her relatives wrote a petition about this. The woman was five months pregnant, and the Tiflis police may have simply taken pity on the unfortunate wife of Joseph Dzhugashvili. Who, we must give him credit, also signed the petition. True, he appeared in it as cousin arrested.

© photo: Sputnik / RIA Novosti

And after three months, the parents had to flee Tiflis. The reason for the escape was a raid on a postal carriage, which the young father organized on Erivan Square in Tiflis.

As a result of the attack, 250 thousand rubles were stolen - a huge sum at that time.

However, it later turns out that the real organizer of the famous robbery was the tsarist police. All stolen banknotes were marked, and when attempting to exchange them abroad, many wanted revolutionaries were arrested.

Only Soso, who at that moment was again hiding in Baku, escaped detention. Subsequently, such luck would give rise to speculation that he was a secret police officer.

But such conversations will arise later. In the meantime, the couple went on with their normal lives, if we did not take into account the need to hide.

Catherine was offended by her mother-in-law, whom she called “old woman.” The reason was familiar to any young family: Keke refused to look after Yakov while his daughter-in-law and son were in Baku.

Kato had to turn to relatives for help, whose house would later become home to Yakov.

The only way Catherine could help her son was with money, which she passed on to her family. The woman was a popular dressmaker in Tiflis, who dressed the wife of the police chief himself.

Maybe that’s why the relationship between Keke and Kato didn’t work out in the end? Stalin's mother was just a simple laundress. And his son’s wife dressed all the city nobility.

Who knows if it was female rivalry that quarreled Joseph’s two main women?

© photo: Sputnik / Galina Kmit

During her stay in Baku, Ekaterina Svanidze fell ill with transient consumption. Her husband brought her back to Tiflis and returned to Baku again.

He arrived in the capital of Georgia only the day before his wife’s death, on November 21, 1907. The next day Svanidze passed away.

The marriage of Soso and Kato, as the young people were called by their friends, lasted a little more than a year. According to contemporaries, Joseph truly loved Catherine.

Perhaps because from the first day she began to behave correctly - she looked up to her husband, without questioning his words in the slightest and not even daring to think that her Soso, forced every now and then to hide from the police and leave his young wife in loneliness, maybe something is wrong.

Although, of course, there were people who said the opposite. Thus, a certain Pyotr Mozhnov, who knew the owner of the Baku refuge Soso and Keto, recalled that “Joseph, returning home drunk, scolded his wife last words and kicked him...

At the funeral of Ekaterina Svanidze, held at the Kukiya cemetery in Tiflis, Joseph Dzhugashvili told a friend: “This creature softened my stony heart; she died, and with her my last warm feelings for people died.”

When the coffin with Catherine's body was lowered into the ground, Joseph threw himself into the grave. One of Dzhugashvili’s friends, Gerontius Kikodze, who was present at the funeral, had to go down to the grave and almost by force pull his inconsolable comrade out of there.

A year after the death of his wife, Joseph Dzhugashivli took a pseudonym for himself, by which he went down in history, to this day forcing people to talk not only about himself, but also about members of his family.

Soso Dzhugashvili became Joseph Stalin.

There are many speculations about why Dzhugashvili chose this particular pseudonym. Personally, I am close to the version associated with the death of Ekaterina Svanidze.

Joseph's "heart of stone" now beat in a man of steel. Who thought only about power.

Ekaterina Svanidze’s brother Alexander, the same one thanks to whom Joseph’s meeting with his first wife took place, became a fiery revolutionary. He was the Minister of Finance of Soviet Georgia, worked for several years in Geneva, returning from where he headed Vneshtorgbank in Moscow. He and his wife were one of the most trusted people in Stalin's house.

In 1937, Svanidze was arrested and soon executed. His wife, upon receiving the news of her husband's death, died of a broken heart.

All ties with the past were severed. No one even dared to mention the name Svanidze in Stalin’s house.

The name of Catherine began to sound from Stalin’s lips only in last years life, when he loved to remember his youth, Georgia and his first love...

The figure of the leader of the people, as Joseph Stalin is called, has become overgrown with many rumors, speculations and legends in the years since his death. Personal life of the powerful leader of the USSR for a long time was strictly classified, people knew almost nothing about his spouses, what can we say about his mistresses? Meanwhile, both during the years of his revolutionary youth and while at the helm of the country, Stalin paid attention to many girls and women. Let's find out what the leader's chosen ones were like?

Official story

Joseph Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili (1878-1953) first married at the age of 26. His wife was 16-year-old Kato (Ekaterina) Svanidze. Son Yakov was born to this couple in 1907. Soon the young mother, who had never been in good health, fell ill with typhoid and died.

According to the memoirs of contemporaries, Kato literally idolized her husband. She was a shy, modest girl who listened with delight to Joseph's stories of the struggle for social justice and equality for all. After her death, the revolutionary began to deal with class enemies noticeably more harshly.

The second wife of the leader was Nadezhda Alliluyeva. When they got married, she was 17 years old, and Joseph was already 40. Moreover, the romance began a year before the wedding. This fact gives some ill-wishers a reason to reproach Stalin for an unhealthy attraction to very young girls.

Son Vasily was born in 1921, and beloved daughter Svetlana - in 1925. Yakov, brought from Georgia, lived with them and was raised in the family of Kato Svanidze’s parents until he was 14 years old.

On the night of November 8-9, 1932, Nadezhda Alliluyeva committed suicide; the circumstances and reasons for her death are still controversial.

Stalin never married again.

Matryona Kuzakova

In 1909-1911, the young revolutionary served exile in the city of Solvychegodsk, Vologda province. There he settled in the house of the daughter of a local deacon, Matryona Kuzakova, who was a widow and raised her children alone. The woman had a hard time, she was forced to chop wood, clear snow, repair the fence herself...

Joseph saw that the young woman literally did not straighten her back for days on end. The man began to help Matryona with the housework. And soon he replaced her husband. As a result of this relationship, a black-haired boy was born, sharply different from his fair-haired brothers and sisters. True, Stalin never saw the child, the period of exile ended, and he continued revolutionary activity. Matryona named her son Konstantin, and his patronymic Stepanovich, registering it with her late husband, who died 2 years before the baby was born.

When a new literary drama editor with the surname Kuzakov appeared on Shabolovka, and this was in the early 70s, colleagues whispered that he was the son of Stalin himself. Shortly before his death, Konstantin Stepanovich personally confirmed these rumors: in his interview with the Argumenty i Fakty newspaper, published in 1996, Kuzakov said that he learned the name of his real father from his mother as a child. True, he subsequently signed a non-disclosure agreement to state security representatives.

According to rumors, only kinship with the leader of the people saved Konstantin from arrest in 1947. Then he worked in the propaganda department of the CPSU Central Committee and was included in the list of those accused of “atomic espionage”; the case was fabricated by Lavrentiy Beria. But the trouble is over.

They say that having taken a high post in the Kremlin, Stalin gave Matryona Kuzakova a Moscow apartment.

Lydia Pereprygina

In 1913-1916, the future leader of the peoples served another exile, this time in the Turukhansk region. In the village of Kureika, he settled in the house of two orphans - Jonah and Lydia Pereprygin (brother and sister). Joseph began to live together with his 14-year-old mistress.

This shocking information about the seduction of an orphan girl by an adult man was revealed in 1956, when Nikita Khrushchev began collecting dirt on Stalin, wanting to debunk his cult of personality. State security officers found out all the ins and outs. It turned out that Lida Pereprygina gave birth to two children from Joseph. The first child died in infancy, and the second - son Alexander - was born after Stalin left Kureika.

Most Siberians looked at the seduction of a minor with indifference. But when her brother Jonah found out about Lida’s pregnancy, he and local resident Pyotr Ivanov contacted the local gendarmerie. Stalin was saved from criminal prosecution only by his promise to marry the girl when she came of age. But the man did not keep his word.

Subsequently, Lydia married fellow villager Yakov Davydov. And her son Alexander before the Great Patriotic War worked as a postman, was wounded twice at the front, and rose to the rank of major. Then this man was the director of a canteen in Novokuznetsk.

Like Konstantin Kuzakov, in 1935, Alexander Davydov, at the request of the NKVD officers, signed a document not to disclose the secret of his origin.

Yuri Davydov, one of Lydia Pereprygina’s grandchildren, told reporters that his grandmother was a serious woman with a strong character.

Vera Davydova

Being in fact the ruler of a huge superpower, Stalin could afford secret affairs with famous artists. It was rumored that his mistresses were ballerinas Olga Lepeshinskaya and Marina Semenova, and among the singers he especially singled out Natalia Shpiller and Valeria Barsova.

But the longest relationship connected Joseph Vissarionovich with the soloist Bolshoi Theater Vera Davydova. This bright novel described by the famous journalist Leonard Gendlin in his book “Confession of Stalin’s Mistress.” Although the singer’s relatives still deny the information contained in it.

According to L. Gendlin, when the relationship began, Joseph was already 54 years old, and Vera was 28 years old. For a long time they met secretly at the leader’s dacha, because both were officially married. Allegedly, only closeness to Stalin can explain all the numerous titles, awards and prizes that the Bolshoi Theater prima was awarded during her life.

Vera Davydova was People's Artist RSFSR, People's Artist of the Georgian SSR, laureate of three Stalin Prizes I degree, owner of a luxurious three-room apartment in the center of Moscow.
Valentina Istomina

The last mistress of the leader of the peoples was Valentina Istomina ( maiden name– Zhbychkina). From 1935 to 1953, she acted as Stalin’s housekeeper: she took care of the housework, set the table, and resolved other issues related to the life of Joseph Vissarionovich. A widower needed female support.

Svetlana Alliluyeva wrote in her book “Twenty Letters to a Friend”: “New faces appeared, including the young snub-nosed Valechka, whose mouth did not close all day from a cheerful, ringing laugh. After working in Zubalovo for three years, she was transferred to her father’s dacha in Kuntsevo and remained there until his death, later becoming a housekeeper...”

Over the years of her work, Valentina became so close to Stalin that she was constantly with him. He only trusted her to serve him food and medicine. Rumors that Istomina was the leader’s mistress, as they say, were confirmed in private conversations by Vyacheslav Molotov, who headed the USSR Foreign Ministry during the Great Patriotic War.

After Stalin's death, Valentina was sent to a personal pension. A childless woman raised a nephew, whose father died at the front. She died in 1995.
Of course, we have not listed all the girls and women to whom Stalin paid attention, limiting ourselves only to the most famous, long-lasting and striking relationships. The personal life of the leader of the peoples was stormy and varied. He liked very young girls, whom he knew how to charm, and talented, beautiful artists, and homely, sincere housewives.

Born on the day of the revolution, October 25 (November 7), 1917, Valya Istomina attracted attention from the very day of her arrival into the world. And when she turned 18, she, a simple village girl, a snub-nosed laugher and just yesterday a factory worker, suddenly became such a significant metropolitan lady that the first beauties of Moscow could envy.

Quite unexpectedly she was offered a “job” special purpose" - to set the table for Stalin himself!

It started with the fact that they trusted her to set the table, but it ended with the leader only asking her to make his bed. And soon, as the rumor goes, she made this bed not only for him, but... for herself too. Valya Istomina, of course, didn’t tell anyone about any of this and didn’t leave any notes with her memories. And no one would have known about this if it had not been for the guards of Stalin’s dacha who have survived to this day.

“As the night is, so it is to Him”

This is what Alexander Mikhailovich Varentsev, one of the leader’s oldest bodyguards, told me: “All the guards at the dacha knew: like the night, Valya Istomina was coming to Him... I won’t say that she was beautiful, but... not bad - I liked her. In general, we talked about her among ourselves like this: Valya has a good life - and the work she needs, and Stalin loves her!

Until Stalin’s death, I served in his traveling guard, and Valya also worked for him all this time. Therefore, do not believe when they say or write that Stalin in 1952 (a year before his death) ordered Valya to be arrested and deported to Magadan for allegedly cheating on him with the head of the Main Security Directorate, Vlasik. True, they add that Stalin quickly forgave her and brought her back... Yes, if she had been fired, much less arrested, we would have known first.”

Another security veteran, Konstantin Fedorovich Kozlov, recalls: “Valya Istomina and I went to work in Kuntsevo on a special bus more than once.

She was a very nice lady. Attractive. Stalin loved her very much. She, like all of us, served Stalin until the last day. His daughter Svetlana Alliluyeva writes about this in her book “Twenty Letters to a Friend.”

Out loud those around her called her “sister-hostess” and only among themselves - “hostess of the Master”. No one remembers being called “Stalin’s mistress,” although they didn’t consider her his wife either. It seemed to them that the most accurate definition of her role in the life of the leader lies precisely in this word - “mistress”.

“It was Valya Istomina who was entrusted with washing Stalin’s body before being placed in the coffin,” the former head of the Kremlin’s Special Kitchen, Gennady Nikolaevich Kolomentsev, confirmed to me.

Valentina Istomina’s nephew, now a 62-year-old pensioner, Boris Pavlovich Zhbychkin, learned about everything only many years later. His father, Pavel Vasilyevich Zhbychkin, who also worked in Stalin’s entourage, did not tell Boris anything about those times.

With the Zhbychkin family of peasants from the village of Donok in the Oryol region, Stalin developed a real family relationship. Valya, from a simple server in the Master’s dining room, turned into a real hostess, and the brothers (the younger Pasha and the older Fedor) became breadwinners for his table. It was she who brought them to work for Stalin (the middle brother Vasily died at the front).

“Pasha began to fish for the Boss, and Fyodor served with me at the 501st government food base,” G. Kolomentsev told me. He loved to remember how Pasha could easily ask Stalin to pour him cognac not into a glass, but into a 150-gram wine glass... “yes, in the popular way, Comrade Stalin, to the very brim.” And Stalin did not object, did not perceive such requests from his, so to speak, “secret relative” as familiarity.

State Security Sergeant

According to Boris Zhbychkin, after Stalin’s death, Valya Istomina continued to live with her former husband “in perfect harmony.” However, maybe it only seemed so from the outside. After all, “Uncle Vanya” couldn’t always walk around with his ears plugged up so that various rumors wouldn’t reach him?

“Aunt Valya didn’t have her own children, much less any “daughter from Stalin”! - says the nephew. - The deceased brother Vasily left two sons. And Aunt Valya adopted one of them. Uncle Vanya, who returned from the war as a colonel, agreed to this... By the way, he had many awards for the war, but Aunt Valya joked: they say, I didn’t fight, but I have no less awards...

After Stalin died, it no longer worked. She lived in abundance - she had a special pension. True, after perestroika it was canceled. But Uncle Vanya worked all the time, so we didn’t go hungry. By the way, Istomina’s husband, contrary to speculation, never worked as a driver at Stalin’s dacha, although he drove and repaired the car himself. I remember that shortly before my aunt’s death I brought them a bag of potatoes, and Uncle Vanya and Aunt Valya were tinkering in their car. They bought “Zaporozhets” with her aunt’s money - it seems when they assigned her a personal pension and gave her compensation. She had the rank of State Security Sergeant. And she was a member of the party... Although she seemed not to be interested in politics.

To confirm that Stalin knew her well, she sometimes showed a book he signed for her and a watch given by Mao Zedong, whom she fed when he was visiting the Master.

Until the end of her days, she did not suffer from anything special. She died in 1995 from a stroke. When it happened, my aunt was taken to the state security hospital. They tried to save him for two days, but they couldn’t. She was buried at the Khovanskoye cemetery. None of the former colleagues were at the funeral.”

"Fell to my knees"

Why did Istomina remain silent about her past work until the end of her days? Maybe it’s really because she was the wife of two husbands at once? Because she truly loved both of them? One at home. The other - at work... Everything happened as if she lived in “two worlds” at the same time.

One “world” was different from the other, like earth and sky. A simple apartment somewhere on Orlikov Lane is one thing. And a completely different matter is the chambers of the Kremlin celestial. No one even from powerful of the world I didn’t have access there. And she was the mistress there until his last days.

Istomina outlived her Master, her “heavenly husband” by as much as 42 years. And the “earthly husband” outlived her - by 6 years...

Stalin’s daughter, remembering farewell to her father, wrote: “The servants and security came to say goodbye. That's where it was true feeling, sincere sadness... everyone cried. They wiped away their tears like children, with their hands, sleeves, and scarves. Many cried bitterly... Valentina Vasilievna Istomina came to say goodbye - Valechka, as everyone called her, - the housekeeper who worked for her father at this dacha for eighteen years. She fell to her knees near the sofa, fell with her head on the dead man’s chest and began to cry out loud, as in the village. For a long time she could not stop, and no one stopped her. ...Before last days she will be convinced that there was no better person in the world than my father.”

Only a real wife could say goodbye forever like this...