From what and when did Lenin die? Did Lenin die his own death? How Lenin died

The day Lenin died is written in black letters in Russian history. This happened on January 21, 1924, the leader of the world proletariat did not live only three months before his 54th birthday. Doctors, historians, and modern researchers have not yet agreed on why Lenin died. Mourning was declared in the country. After all, the man who managed to be the first in the world to build a socialist state, and in the largest country, has passed away.

Sudden death

Despite the fact that Vladimir Lenin was seriously ill for many months, his death was sudden. This happened on the evening of January 21. The year was 1924, Soviet power had already been established throughout the entire Land of Soviets, and the day when Vladimir Ilyich Lenin died became a national tragedy for the entire state. Mourning was declared throughout the country, flags were lowered at half-mast, and mourning rallies were held at enterprises and institutions.

Expert opinions

When Lenin died, a medical council was immediately assembled, in which the leading doctors of that time participated. Officially, doctors published this version of premature death: acute circulatory disorders in the brain and, as a result, hemorrhage in the brain. Thus, the cause of death could have been a repeated major stroke. There was also a version that Lenin suffered for many years from a venereal disease - syphilis, which a certain French woman infected him with.

This version has not been excluded from the causes of the death of the proletarian leader to this day.

Could syphilis be the cause?

When Lenin died, an autopsy was performed on his body. Pathologists discovered that there was extensive calcification in the vessels of the brain. Doctors could not explain the reason for this. Firstly, he led a fairly healthy lifestyle and never smoked. He was not obese or hypertensive and did not have a brain tumor or other obvious lesions. Also, Vladimir Ilyich had neither infectious diseases nor diabetes, in which the vessels could have suffered such damage.

As for syphilis, this could have been the cause of Lenin’s death. After all, at that time this disease was treated with very dangerous medications that could cause complications for the entire body. However, neither the symptoms of the disease nor the results of the autopsy confirmed that the cause of death could be a venereal disease.

Bad heredity or severe stress?

53 years old - that’s how old Lenin died. For the beginning of the twentieth century, this was a fairly young age. Why did he leave so early? According to some researchers, the cause of such an early death could have been the leader’s poor heredity. After all, as you know, his father died at exactly the same age. According to the symptoms and descriptions of eyewitnesses, he had the same disease that his son later suffered from. And other close relatives of the leader had a history of cardiovascular diseases.

Another reason that could have affected Lenin’s health was his incredible workload and constant stress. It is known that he slept very little, had practically no rest and worked quite a lot. Historians describe a well-known fact: in 1921, at one important event, Lenin completely forgot the words of his own speech. He had a stroke, after which he had to learn to speak again. He could barely write. He had to spend a lot of time on rehabilitation and recovery.

Unusual seizures

But after Ilyich suffered a hypertensive stroke, he came to his senses and recovered quite well. In the early days of 1924, he was so fit that he even went hunting himself.

It is unclear how the leader’s last day went. As the diaries show, he was quite active, talked a lot and did not complain about anything. But a few hours before his death, he suffered several severe convulsive seizures. They did not fit into the picture of a stroke. Therefore, some researchers believe that the cause of the sharp deterioration in health could be ordinary poison.

Stalin's hand?

Today not only historians, but also many educated people know when Lenin was born and died. Previously, every schoolchild remembered these dates by heart. But neither doctors nor researchers can still name the exact reason why this happened. There is another interesting theory - Lenin, they say, was poisoned by Stalin. The latter sought to gain absolute power, and Vladimir Ilyich was a serious obstacle on this path. By the way, later Joseph Vissarionovich resorted to poisoning as a sure way to eliminate his opponents. And this makes you think seriously.

Lenin, who initially supported Stalin, sharply changed his mind and bet on the candidacy of Leon Trotsky. Historians claim that Vladimir Ilyich was preparing to remove Stalin from governing the country. He gave him a very unflattering description, called him cruel and rude, and noted that Stalin was abusing power. Lenin's letter addressed to the congress is known, where Ilyich sharply criticized Stalin and his leadership style.

By the way, the story of the poison also has a right to exist because a year earlier, in 1923, Stalin wrote a report addressed to the Politburo. It said that Lenin wanted to poison himself and asked him to get a dose of potassium cyanide. Stalin said that he could not do this. Who knows, maybe Vladimir Ilyich Lenin himself suggested the scenario of his death to his future successor?

By the way, for some reason doctors did not conduct a toxicological study at the time. Well, then it was too late to do such tests.

And one moment. At the end of January 1924, the 13th Party Congress was to take place. Surely Ilyich, speaking at it, would again raise the question of Stalin’s behavior.

Eyewitness accounts

Some eyewitnesses also speak in favor of poisoning as the sure cause of Lenin’s death. The writer Elena Lermolo, who was exiled to hard labor, communicated with Vladimir Ilyich’s personal chef Gavriil Volkov in the 30s of the twentieth century. He told the following story. In the evening he brought dinner to Lenin. He was already in poor condition and could not talk. He handed the cook a note in which he wrote: “Gavryushenka, I was poisoned, I am poisoned.” Lenin understood that he would soon die. And he asked that Leon Trotsky and Nadezhda Krupskaya, as well as members of the Politburo, be informed about the poisoning.

By the way, for the last three days Lenin complained of constant nausea. But during the autopsy, doctors saw that his stomach was in almost perfect condition. He could not have had an intestinal infection - it was winter, and such diseases are uncharacteristic for this time of year. Well, only the freshest food was prepared for the leader and it was carefully checked.

Leader's funeral

The year when Lenin died is marked with a black mark in the history of the Soviet state. After the death of the leader, an active struggle for power began. Many of his comrades were repressed, shot and destroyed.

Lenin died in Gorki near Moscow on January 24 at 18:50. His body was transported to the capital by steam locomotive, and the coffin was installed in the Hall of Columns of the House of Unions. Within five days, the people could say goodbye to the leader of the new country, which had just begun to build socialism. Then the coffin with the body was installed in the Mausoleum, which was specially built for this purpose on Red Square by the architect Shchusev. Until now, the body of the leader, the founder of the world's first socialist state, remains there.

It seems that Vladimir Lenin’s entire life has already been sorted out bit by bit and described in thousands of books. But after the collapse of the USSR, it turned out that it was not so much the life of the leader of the world proletariat that was being described as the legends about him. One of these legends turned out to be the story of Lenin’s death...

Under socialism, schoolchildren were taught the fairy tale that Lenin's death was the result of an illness caused by poisoned bullets fired at him by the bourgeois henchman Fanny Kaplan.


At the end of the 80s of the twentieth century, this version was questioned; at that time, yesterday’s hero was already in the role of a world villain. But the truth, probably, as usual, lies somewhere in the middle.

Bullets filled with lies

Lenin was indeed wounded by Kaplan in August 1918. As the Great Soviet Encyclopedia stated: “Two poisoned bullets hit Lenin. His life was in danger." But the encyclopedia was disingenuous, as were the officials.

Fanny Efimovna Kaplan
People's Commissar of Health Semashko clearly “embellished” the story of the assassination attempt on the leader when he announced that the bullets were filled with curare poison. It is not entirely clear why they did not remove the bullets from the leader’s body? Although they didn’t seem to bother him.
They remembered about bullets in 1922, when Lenin began to suffer from headaches. The Berlin doctor Klemperer, who examined Ilyich, advised to remove the bullets, since they cause poisoning with their lead. However, the doctor treating Lenin, Rozanov, stated that the bullets were overgrown with connective tissue through which nothing could penetrate the body.
And yet it was decided to remove one bullet. But then it turned out that there was no place for the leader of the world proletariat in the men's ward of the hospital. He spent the night in the women's room. True, the operation was easy, the bullet was right under the skin.
In October 1925, the same “light” stomach surgery was performed on Mikhail Frunze. It cost him his life; this operation was performed by the same doctor Rozanov.
Three weeks after the bullet was removed, Vladimir Ilyich’s condition suddenly worsened. On May 25-27, he suffered a serious attack, which resulted in partial paralysis of his right arm and leg and speech impairment. It is likely that this was due to the "successful" operation.

For many years, the official version of Lenin’s illness reigned unconditionally - that he had hereditary cerebral atherosclerosis. However, in recent years, another version has become popular. Allegedly, Vladimir Ilyich died of syphilis, which he picked up from a Parisian prostitute in 1902. This is exactly the conclusion that historian and writer Helen Rappoport made after a detailed study of the circumstances of Lenin’s death.
And in 2004, an article was published in the European Journal of Neurology that Lenin died of neurosyphilis. This version is supported by Lenin’s treatment method. Professor Osipov wrote in the Red Chronicle in 1927 that the sick leader was treated with iodine, mercury, arsenic and malaria vaccinations.
Nowadays they say that atherosclerosis cannot be treated this way. This is how late neurosyphilis is treated. And yet I don’t want to believe researchers who claim that the revolution in Russia was made by a madman with syphilis of the brain. Even if they are right.
As it turns out, one could really sympathize with Vladimir Ilyich. As soon as his health began to deteriorate, his “faithful comrades” immediately began a behind-the-scenes struggle for power.

Already in the summer of 1922, the West began to build versions regarding Lenin’s successor. Among the most likely candidates were Rykov, who replaced Ilyich as the pre-Soviet People's Commissar (head of the country's government), and Bukharin, the “favorite of the entire party.”
Preference was given to these two based on their nationality - they were Russian. And thanks to this, they allegedly had an advantage over the Georgian Stalin, the Jew Trotsky and the Pole Dzerzhinsky. They also had great political weight over another candidate for power - Plenipotentiary Representative in Germany Krestinsky, who had previously been the executive secretary of the party's Central Committee.

Who's next in line for power?

However, in reality, Stalin was gaining more and more political power. He tried to control everything, even the leader's treatment. When doctors allowed Lenin to dictate to his secretaries for 5-10 minutes a day, they reported everything to Stalin. But Vladimir Ulyanov would not have been Lenin if, even bedridden and semi-paralyzed, he had not tried to participate in the political life of the country.

In December 1922, he entered into an agreement by correspondence with Trotsky so that at the upcoming plenum of the Central Committee he would voice his position on “preserving and strengthening the monopoly of foreign trade.” And although Vladimir Ilyich dictated the letter to Trotsky to his wife Nadezhda Krupskaya, the secretary of the sick leader Fotieva immediately informed Stalin about its contents.
He realized that Lenin, with the hands of Trotsky, would try to defeat him at the next plenum. Stalin called Krupskaya, scolded her, saying that she was not following the doctors’ orders to rest the leader, threatened with punishment along the party line and said that if this happened again, he would declare Lenin’s widow Artyukhin (an old Bolshevik, head of the Women’s Department of the Central Committee).

Krupskaya complained about Stalin's rudeness to her husband. Lenin wrote him a letter, demanding that he apologize to Nadezhda Konstantinovna. Relations between Lenin and Stalin were thoroughly damaged. And the recovery of Vladimir Ilyich threatened Joseph Vissarionovich with disgrace.
Against the backdrop of this situation, a version arose that Stalin “did not allow” Lenin to recover. While already in exile, Trotsky often said that Stalin poisoned Lenin. This version still exists today.
At the instigation of one of Stalin’s secretaries, who fled abroad, it was developed in the form of a story about how on January 20, 1924, Stalin sent two doctors to Lenin in Gorki, accompanied by the deputy chairman of the OGPU, Genrikh Yagoda. Allegedly they gave the leader poison. The next day, Vladimir Ilyich died.


And Elizaveta Lermolo, who served six years in the Kirov murder case, after emigrating to the West, said that in prison she met with the chef of the Kremlin sanatorium in Gorki, Gavrila Volkov, who told her that on January 21, 1924, it was he who brought Lenin at eleven o’clock in the morning lunch.
There was no one in the room. Lenin made an attempt to rise and, stretching out both hands, made several inarticulate sounds. Volkov rushed to him, and Lenin thrust a note into his hand. Immediately, Doctor Elistratov, Lenin’s personal therapist, burst into the room. With Volkov's help, he laid Lenin on pillows and injected him with something sedative. Lenin calmed down. And soon he died.
Only after his death did Volkov unfold the note he had hidden. It was written in barely legible scrawls: “Gavrilushka, I was poisoned... Go now and bring Nadya... Tell Trotsky... Tell everyone you can.”

Curiously, there is another version, according to which Lenin was poisoned by the cook. And he did this through mushroom soup, to which they added dried cortinarius ciosissimus, a deadly poisonous mushroom.
Experts say that the issue of Lenin’s poisoning can be clarified once and for all by examining his hair. Modern technologies allow this. But the authorities are against it - in the end, it doesn’t matter anymore.

Stalin removed Krupskaya?

There is no doubt that Stalin's hostility towards Krupskaya continued after Lenin's death.
There is a version that a year after the death of her husband, Nadezhda Konstantinovna tried to obtain political asylum in England. this issue was even discussed in the English Parliament, which, as you know, had many socialists at that time.


One must assume that this information should have reached Stalin. And the successor was unlikely to forgive the leader’s wife for such intentions. But, of course, he could not imprison or kill Lenin’s wife openly. And therefore there is a version that Nadezhda Konstantinovna left this mortal world not without the help of Joseph Vissarionovich.
They say she was going to speak at the 18th Party Congress and say something important. On the eve of the congress on February 24, 1939, friends visited Krupskaya in Arkhangelskoye to celebrate the hostess’s approaching seventieth birthday. The table was set, the decoration of which was the cake sent by Stalin.
Nadezhda Konstantinovna felt great and ate it with appetite. In the evening she suddenly felt ill. She died 3 days later in terrible agony.

Oleg Loginov bolivar_s wrote in January 19th, 2018

Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov (Lenin) died on January 21, 1924 (53 years old) at 18:50. He was buried on January 27, 1924. Lenin suffered a series of strokes: after the first, the 52-year-old leader of the world proletariat became disabled, and the third killed him.
Official message about Lenin's illness
The newspaper “Rul” published the following note: “The message published by the Soviet government about the illness of V.I. Lenin says: The former chairman of the Council of People's Commissars, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin-Ulyanov, suffers from severe overwork, the consequences of which are complicated by poisoning. In order to restore his strength, Comrade Lenin must for a long time, at least until the fall, retire from state affairs and abandon any activity. His return to political work appears likely after a long rest, since, in the opinion of medical authorities, restoration of his strength is possible."
Deteriorating health, moving to Gorki
1922, March - Vladimir Ilyich began to have more frequent seizures with a short loss of consciousness with numbness on the right side of the body. The following year, a severe form of paralysis on the right side of the body developed, and speech was affected. However, doctors did not lose hope of improving the situation.
1923, May - the leader was transported to Gorki, this had a good effect on his health. In October, Ilyich even asked to be taken to Moscow. By winter, his health had improved to such an extent that he began to try writing with his left hand.
1924, January 7 - on Lenin’s initiative, his wife and sister organized a Christmas tree for children from surrounding villages. The patient himself seemed to feel so well that, sitting in a wheelchair, for some time he even took part in the general fun in the winter garden of the former master's estate.
Last days
As People's Commissar of Health Semashko testifies, two days before his death, Ilyich went hunting. This was confirmed by Krupskaya. On January 21, they planned another hunt for Lenin - for wolves. However, according to doctors, cerebral vascular sclerosis continued to “turn off” one area of ​​the brain after another.

Last 24 hours. Death
The leader’s last 24 hours, as described by one of Lenin’s attending physicians, Professor Osipov: “On January 20, Lenin had general malaise, poor appetite, sluggish mood, and had no desire to study; he was put to bed and a light diet was prescribed. The next day this lethargic state continued, the patient remained in bed for about 4 hours. We visited him morning, afternoon and evening, as needed. The patient developed an appetite and wanted to eat; it was allowed to give him broth. At six o'clock the malaise began to intensify, consciousness was lost, and convulsive movements began to appear in the arms and legs, especially on the right side. The right limbs were tense to such an extent that it was impossible to bend the leg at the knee, and there were also cramps on the left side of the body.
This attack was accompanied by sharply increased breathing and cardiac activity. The number of respirations increased to 36, and the number of heartbeats began to reach 120-130 per minute, and one very threatening symptom appeared, which was a violation of the correct respiratory rhythm; this is a cerebral type of breathing, quite dangerous, which almost always indicates the approach of a fatal end.
Of course, morphine, camphor and everything that was needed were prepared. After some time, breathing leveled out, the number of breaths decreased to 26, and the pulse to 90 and was well filled. At this time we measured the temperature - it was 42.3 ° C - a constant convulsive state led to such a sharp increase in temperature; The mercury rose so much that there was no more room in the thermometer. The convulsive state began to weaken, and we already had some hope that the seizure could end safely, but at exactly 6:50 a.m. suddenly there was a sharp rush of blood to the face, the face became purple, then followed by a deep sigh and instant death. They began to perform artificial respiration, which lasted 25 minutes, but it led to nothing. Lenin’s death occurred from paralysis of the respiratory tract and the heart, the centers of which are located in the medulla oblongata.”
Subsequently, Nadezhda Krupskaya wrote in one of her letters that “the doctors did not expect death at all and did not believe it when the agony had already begun.”

Was Lenin poisoned by Stalin?
There were rumors that Lenin was poisoned by Stalin - for example, Trotsky wrote in one of his articles: “During Ilyich’s second illness, apparently in February 1923, Stalin at a meeting of Politburo members after the removal of the secretary said that Lenin unexpectedly called him to his place and began to demand that poison be delivered to him. He again lost the ability to speak, considered his situation hopeless, foresaw the proximity of a new blow, did not trust the doctors, whom he could easily catch contradicting, retained complete clarity of thought and suffered unbearably. I remember to what extent Stalin’s face seemed unusual, mysterious, and inappropriate to the circumstances. The request he conveyed was of a tragic nature; There was a half-smile frozen on his face, like on a mask. “Of course, there can be no question of fulfilling such a request!” - I exclaimed. “I told him all this,” Stalin objected, not without annoyance, “but he just waved it off. The old man is suffering. He wants, he says, to have poison on him, and he will resort if he is convinced of the hopelessness of his situation.”
At the same time, Trotsky claims that Stalin could have invented the fact that Ilyich turned to him for poison - in order to prepare an alibi for himself. But this episode is also confirmed by the testimony of one of the leader’s secretaries, who in the 1960s told the writer Alexander Beck that Lenin actually asked Stalin for poison. “When I asked doctors in Moscow,” Trotsky further writes, “about the immediate causes of death, which they did not expect, they vaguely shrugged their hands.
Of course, the autopsy of the body was carried out in compliance with all formalities: Stalin, as General Secretary, took care of this first of all. However, the doctors did not look for poison, even if the more discerning ones admitted the possibility of “suicide.” Most likely, Ilyich did not receive poison from Stalin - otherwise Stalin would have eliminated all the secretaries and all the leader’s servants over time so as not to leave traces. And Stalin had no particular need for the death of the completely helpless Ilyich. Moreover, he has not yet crossed the line beyond which the physical elimination of unwanted people began. So, the more likely cause of Lenin’s death is illness.

More versions of poisoning
But the version of poisoning still has many supporters. Among them is the writer Vladimir Solovyov, who devoted many pages to this topic. In his fictional work “Operation Mausoleum,” he supported Trotsky’s thoughts with the following arguments: 1) The autopsy of Lenin’s body began with a long delay - at 16:20; 2) Among the doctors who performed the autopsy, there was not a single pathologist. 3) One of the doctors, the personal physician of Vladimir Ilyich and Trotsky, Guetier, did not sign Lenin’s death certificate, citing the dishonesty of the investigation. 4) Chemical analysis of stomach contents was not performed. 5) The lungs, heart and other vital organs, as it turned out, were in excellent condition, while the walls of the stomach were completely destroyed.
Dr. Gabriel Volkov, arrested shortly after Lenin’s death, told his cellmate Elizabeth Lesotho in the prison cell that on the morning of January 21 at 11 a.m. he brought the leader a second breakfast. Ilyich was in bed; there was no one else in the room. Seeing Volkov, the patient made an attempt to rise, extended both hands to Volkov, but his strength left him, he collapsed on the pillows, and a piece of paper fell out of his hand. Only Volkov managed to hide him when Dr. Elistratov came in and, to calm the patient, gave him an injection. Lenin fell silent, his eyes closed - as it turned out, forever. Only in the evening, when Lenin had already died, Volkov was able to read the note given to him by Ilyich. He could hardly make out the scribbles scrawled by the hand of the dying man: “Gavrilushka, I’m poisoned... call Nadya immediately... tell Trotsky... tell everyone you can...”.
According to Soloviev, Vladimir Ilyich was poisoned with mushroom soup, to which dried cortinarius ciosissimus, a deadly poisonous mushroom, was added.

Leader's funeral
Even while the leader was alive, members of the Politburo in the fall of 23 began to lively discuss his funeral. It is clear that the ceremony will be majestic, but what should be done with the body - cremated in the proletarian anti-church fashion or embalmed, following in step with science? “We... instead of icons, we hung leaders and will try for Pakhom (a simple rural peasant - editor’s note) and the “lower classes” to discover the relics of Ilyich under a communist sauce,” party ideologist Nikolai Bukharin wrote in one of his private letters. However, at first it was only about the farewell procedure. Therefore, Abrikosov, who performed the autopsy of Lenin’s body, also carried out embalming on January 22 - however, it was ordinary, temporary. “...When opening the body, he injected into the aorta a solution consisting of 30 parts of formaldehyde, 20 parts of alcohol, 20 parts of glycerin, 10 parts of zinc chloride and 100 parts of water,” explained I. Zbarsky in the book .
On January 23, the coffin with the body of the leader of the proletariat, in front of a large crowd of people who had gathered, despite the terrible frost, was loaded into a mourning train and taken to the capital, to the Hall of Columns of the House of Unions. Meanwhile, near the Kremlin wall on Red Square, to arrange the tomb and foundation of the first Mausoleum, they are crushing the heavily frozen ground with dynamite. The newspapers of those times reported that in a month and a half, about 100 thousand people visited the Mausoleum, but a huge line was still lining up at the doors. And the Kremlin begins to frantically think about what can be done with the body, which in early March begins to rapidly lose its presentable appearance...

After the death of Lenin on January 21, 1924, at the mourning meeting of the Second Congress of Soviets, it was decided to build
Mausoleum near the Kremlin wall. By January 27, the day of the leader’s funeral, a temporary wooden mausoleum according to Shchusev’s design was erected

The first bell about the illness, which in 1923 turned Ilyich into a weak and feeble-minded person, and soon brought him to the grave, rang in 1921. The country was overcoming the consequences of the civil war, the leadership was rushing from war communism to the new economic policy (NEP). And the head of the Soviet government, Lenin, whose every word the country eagerly hung on, began to complain of headaches and fatigue. Later, numbness of the limbs, up to complete paralysis, and inexplicable attacks of nervous excitement are added to this, during which Ilyich waves his arms and talks some nonsense... It gets to the point that Ilyich “communicates” with those around him using just three words: “ just about", "revolution" and "conference".

In 1923, the Politburo was already doing without Lenin.

“Makes some strange noises”

Doctors are being prescribed to Lenin all the way from Germany. But neither the “guest workers” from medicine nor the domestic luminaries of science can in any way diagnose him. Ilya Zbarsky, the son and assistant of the biochemist Boris Zbarsky, who embalmed Lenin’s body and for a long time headed the laboratory at the Mausoleum, being familiar with the history of the leader’s illness, described the situation in the book “Object No. 1”: “By the end of the year (1922 - Ed.) his condition noticeably worsens, instead of articulate speech he makes some unclear sounds. After some relief, in February 1923, complete paralysis of the right arm and leg sets in... The gaze, previously penetrating, becomes expressionless and dull. The German doctors Förster, Klemperer, Nonna, Minkovsky and Russian professors Osipov, Kozhevnikov, Kramer, invited for a lot of money, are again at a complete loss.”

In the spring of 1923, Lenin was transported to Gorki - essentially to die. “In the photograph taken by Lenin’s sister (six months before his death - Ed.), we see a thinner man with a wild face and crazy eyes,” continues I. Zbarsky. - He cannot speak, he is tormented by nightmares at night and during the day, at times he screams... Against the background of some relief, on January 21, 1924, Lenin felt a general malaise, lethargy... Professors Förster and Osipov, who examined him after lunch, did not reveal any alarming symptoms. However, at about 6 o'clock in the evening the patient's condition sharply worsens, convulsions appear... pulse 120-130. Around half past seven the temperature rises to 42.5°C. At 18:50... doctors pronounce death.”

The broad masses of the people took the death of the leader of the world proletariat to heart. On the morning of January 21, Ilyich himself tore off a page of the desk calendar. Moreover, it is clear that he did it with his left hand: his right was paralyzed. In the photo: Felix Dzerzhinsky and Kliment Voroshilov at Lenin’s tomb.

What happened to one of the most extraordinary figures of his time? As possible diagnoses, doctors discussed epilepsy, Alzheimer's disease, multiple sclerosis, and even lead poisoning from a bullet fired by Fanny Kaplan in 1918. One of the two bullets - it was removed from the body only after Lenin's death - broke off part of the shoulder blade, hit the lung, and went into close proximity to vital arteries. This allegedly could also cause premature sclerosis of the carotid artery, the extent of which became clear only during the autopsy. Academician of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences Yuri Lopukhin cited excerpts from the protocols in his book: sclerotic changes in Lenin’s left internal carotid artery in its intracranial part were such that blood simply could not flow through it - the artery turned into a solid dense whitish cord.

Traces of a stormy youth?

However, the symptoms of the disease were little similar to ordinary vascular sclerosis. Moreover, during Lenin’s lifetime, the disease most closely resembled progressive paralysis due to brain damage due to late complications of syphilis. Ilya Zbarsky draws attention to the fact that this diagnosis was definitely meant at that time: some of the doctors invited to Lenin specialized in syphilis, and the drugs that were prescribed to the leader constituted a course of treatment specifically for this disease according to the methods of that time. However, some facts do not fit into this version. Two weeks before his death, on January 7, 1924, on Lenin’s initiative, his wife and sister organized a Christmas tree for children from the surrounding villages. Ilyich himself seemed to feel so well that, sitting in a wheelchair, for some time he even took part in the general fun in the winter garden of the former master's estate. On the last day of his life, he tore off a piece of a desk calendar with his left hand. Based on the results of the autopsy, the professors who worked with Lenin even made a special statement about the absence of any signs of syphilis. Yuri Lopukhin, however, on this occasion refers to a note he saw from the then People's Commissar of Health Nikolai Semashko to pathologist, future academician Alexei Abrikosov - with a request to “pay special attention to the need for strong morphological evidence of the absence of luetic (syphilitic) lesions in order to preserve the bright image of the leader.” Is this to reasonably dispel rumors or, conversely, to hide something? “The bright image of the leader” remains a sensitive topic today. But, by the way, it’s never too late to put an end to the debate about the diagnosis - out of scientific interest: Lenin’s brain tissue is stored in the former Brain Institute.

Hastily, in 3 days, the knocked together Mausoleum-1 was only about three meters in height.

"Relics with communist sauce"

Meanwhile, while Ilyich was still alive, his comrades began a behind-the-scenes struggle for power. By the way, there is a version why on October 18-19, 1923, the sick and partially immobilized Lenin made his way from Gorki to Moscow for the only time. Formally - to an agricultural exhibition. But why did you stop by the Kremlin apartment for the whole day? Publicist N. Valentinov-Volsky, who emigrated to the USA, wrote: Lenin looked for documents that compromised Stalin in his personal papers. But apparently someone has already “thinned out” the papers.

While the leader was still alive, members of the Politburo in the fall of 23 began to lively discuss his funeral. It is clear that the ceremony should be majestic, but what should be done with the body - cremated according to the proletarian anti-church fashion or embalmed according to the latest word of science? “We... instead of icons, we hung leaders and will try for Pakhom (a simple village peasant - Ed.) and the “lower classes” to discover the relics of Ilyich under a communist sauce,” wrote party ideologist Nikolai Bukharin in one of his private letters. However, at first it was only about the farewell procedure. Therefore, Abrikosov, who performed the autopsy of Lenin’s body, also carried out embalming on January 22 - but an ordinary, temporary one. “...When opening the body, he injected into the aorta a solution consisting of 30 parts of formaldehyde, 20 parts of alcohol, 20 parts of glycerin, 10 parts of zinc chloride and 100 parts of water,” explains I. Zbarsky in the book.

On January 23, the coffin with Lenin’s body, in front of a large crowd of people who had gathered, despite the severe frost, was loaded into a funeral train (the locomotive and carriage are now in the museum at the Paveletsky Station) and taken to Moscow, to the Column Hall of the House of Unions. At this time, near the Kremlin wall on Red Square, in order to arrange the tomb and foundation of the first Mausoleum, deep frozen ground is being crushed with dynamite. Newspapers of that time reported that about 100 thousand people visited the Mausoleum in a month and a half, but a huge line was still lining up at the door. And in the Kremlin they are starting to frantically think about what to do with the body, which in early March begins to rapidly lose its presentable appearance...

“Arguments and Facts” continues the story about the last year of life, illness and “adventures” of the body of the leader of the world proletariat (beginning in).

The first bell about the illness, which in 1923 turned Ilyich into a weak and feeble-minded person, and soon brought him to the grave, rang in 1921. The country was overcoming the consequences of the civil war, the leadership was rushing from war communism to the new economic policy (NEP). And the head of the Soviet government, Lenin, whose every word the country eagerly hung on, began to complain of headaches and fatigue. Later, numbness of the limbs, up to complete paralysis, and inexplicable attacks of nervous excitement are added to this, during which Ilyich waves his arms and talks some nonsense... It gets to the point that Ilyich “communicates” with those around him using just three words: “ just about", "revolution" and "conference".

In 1923, the Politburo was already doing without Lenin. Photo: Public Domain

“Makes some strange noises”

Doctors are being prescribed to Lenin all the way from Germany. But neither the “gast-arbeiters” from medicine nor the domestic luminaries of science can in any way diagnose him. Ilya Zbarsky, son and assistant of a biochemist Boris Zbarsky, who embalmed Lenin’s body and for a long time headed the laboratory at the Mausoleum, being familiar with the history of the leader’s illness, described the situation in the book “Object No. 1”: “By the end of the year (1922 - Ed.), his condition was noticeably deteriorating, he Instead of articulate speech, he makes some unclear sounds. After some relief, in February 1923, complete paralysis of the right arm and leg sets in... The gaze, previously penetrating, becomes expressionless and dull. German doctors invited for big money Förster, Klemperer, Nonna, Minkowski and Russian professors Osipov, Kozhevnikov, Kramer completely at a loss again.”

In the spring of 1923, Lenin was transported to Gorki - essentially to die. “In the photograph taken by Lenin’s sister (six months before his death - Ed.), we see a thinner man with a wild face and crazy eyes,” continues I. Zbarsky. - He cannot speak, he is tormented by nightmares at night and during the day, at times he screams... Against the background of some relief, on January 21, 1924, Lenin felt a general malaise, lethargy... Professors Förster and Osipov, who examined him after lunch, did not reveal any alarming symptoms. However, at about 6 o'clock in the evening the patient's condition sharply worsens, convulsions appear... pulse 120-130. Around half past seven the temperature rises to 42.5°C. At 18:50... doctors pronounce death.”

The broad masses of the people took the death of the leader of the world proletariat to heart. On the morning of January 21, Ilyich himself tore off a page of the desk calendar. Moreover, it is clear that he did it with his left hand: his right was paralyzed. In the photo: Felix Dzerzhinsky and Kliment Voroshilov at Lenin’s tomb. Source: RIA Novosti

What happened to one of the most extraordinary figures of his time? Doctors discussed epilepsy, Alzheimer's disease, multiple sclerosis, and even lead poisoning from a bullet fired as possible diagnoses. Fanny Kaplan in 1918. One of the two bullets - it was removed from the body only after Lenin's death - broke off part of the shoulder blade, touched the lung, and passed in close proximity to vital arteries. This allegedly could also cause premature sclerosis of the carotid artery, the extent of which became clear only during the autopsy. He cited excerpts from the protocols in his book Academician of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences Yuri Lopukhin: sclerotic changes in Lenin’s left internal carotid artery in its intracranial part were such that blood simply could not flow through it - the artery turned into a solid dense whitish cord.

Traces of a stormy youth?

However, the symptoms of the disease were little similar to ordinary vascular sclerosis. Moreover, during Lenin’s lifetime, the disease most closely resembled progressive paralysis due to brain damage due to late complications of syphilis. Ilya Zbarsky draws attention to the fact that this diagnosis was definitely meant at that time: some of the doctors invited to Lenin specialized in syphilis, and the drugs that were prescribed to the leader constituted a course of treatment specifically for this disease according to the methods of that time. However, some facts do not fit into this version. Two weeks before his death, on January 7, 1924, on Lenin’s initiative, his wife and sister organized a Christmas tree for children from the surrounding villages. Ilyich himself seemed to feel so well that, sitting in a wheelchair, for some time he even took part in the general fun in the winter garden of the former master's estate. On the last day of his life, he tore off a piece of a desk calendar with his left hand. Based on the results of the autopsy, the professors who worked with Lenin even made a special statement about the absence of any signs of syphilis. Yuri Lopukhin, however, in this regard refers to a note he saw from the then People's Commissar of Health Nikolai Semashko pathologist, future academician Alexey Abrikosov- with a request “to pay special attention to the need for strong morphological evidence of the absence of luetic (syphilitic) lesions in Lenin in order to preserve the bright image of the leader.” Is this to reasonably dispel rumors or, conversely, to hide something? “The bright image of the leader” remains a sensitive topic today. But, by the way, it’s never too late to put an end to the debate about the diagnosis - out of scientific interest: Lenin’s brain tissue is stored in the former Brain Institute.

Hastily, in 3 days, the knocked together Mausoleum-1 was only about three meters in height. Photo: RIA Novosti

"Relics with communist sauce"

Meanwhile, while Ilyich was still alive, his comrades began a behind-the-scenes struggle for power. By the way, there is a version why on October 18-19, 1923, the sick and partially immobilized Lenin made his way from Gorki to Moscow for the only time. Formally - to an agricultural exhibition. But why did you stop by the Kremlin apartment for the whole day? Publicist N. Valentinov-Volsky, who emigrated to the USA, wrote: Lenin in his personal papers looked for those who had compromised Stalin documentation. But apparently someone has already “thinned out” the papers.

While the leader was still alive, members of the Politburo in the fall of 23 began to lively discuss his funeral. It is clear that the ceremony should be majestic, but what should be done with the body - cremated according to the proletarian anti-church fashion or embalmed according to the latest word of science? “We... instead of icons, we hung leaders and will try for Pakhom (a simple village peasant - Ed.) and the “lower classes” to discover the relics of Ilyich under a communist sauce,” the party ideologist wrote in one of his private letters Nikolai Bukharin. However, at first it was only about the farewell procedure. Therefore, Abrikosov, who performed the autopsy of Lenin’s body, also carried out embalming on January 22 - but an ordinary, temporary one. “...When opening the body, he injected into the aorta a solution consisting of 30 parts of formaldehyde, 20 parts of alcohol, 20 parts of glycerin, 10 parts of zinc chloride and 100 parts of water,” explains I. Zbarsky in the book.

On January 23, the coffin with Lenin’s body, in front of a large crowd of people who had gathered, despite the severe frost, was loaded into a funeral train (the locomotive and carriage are now in the museum at the Paveletsky Station) and taken to Moscow, to the Column Hall of the House of Unions. At this time, near the Kremlin wall on Red Square, in order to arrange the tomb and foundation of the first Mausoleum, deep frozen ground is being crushed with dynamite. Newspapers of that time reported that about 100 thousand people visited the Mausoleum in a month and a half, but a huge line was still lining up at the door. And in the Kremlin they are starting to frantically think about what to do with the body, which in early March begins to rapidly lose its presentable appearance...

The editors thank the Federal Security Service of Russia and Doctor of Historical Sciences Sergei Devyatov for the materials provided.

Read about how the leader was embalmed, Mausoleum-2 was built and destroyed, and his body was evacuated from Moscow during the war in the next issue of AiF.