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What the defenders and residents of Leningrad experienced is almost impossible to put into words. The Nazis stormed the city, methodically destroyed it with heavy artillery shelling, air raids and subjected it to a severe blockade.
However, the Leningraders survived! According to various estimates, from 800 thousand to one and a half million people died. Losses were especially great among civilians. Thousands of people died from shells and bombs, but even more from hunger, exhaustion and cold.
Everyone knows about the exploits of the inhabitants of besieged Leningrad, who at the cost of their own lives held and did not surrender the city to the enemy, everyone knows, and this will never be forgotten.
Less well known are the activities of people who profited from the deaths of their fellow citizens, making fortunes in a starving city. These scoundrels, who have covered themselves with indelible shame, should not be forgotten either.
Just three days after the start of the war, some Antipov sisters came to the attention of the OBKhSS, one of whom worked as a chef in the dining room, and the second was in charge of a haberdashery store. When detained at home, the sisters found about 100 kilograms of flour, the same amount of sugar, canned food, butter, 100 kg of soap and a full range of haberdashery.
During the most difficult period of the blockade, the inhabitants of Leningrad were given only 125 grams of bread per day. And it was far from the bread we are used to - cake, cellulose, bran and soda were added to the blockade bread, and these components were sometimes more than real flour. Despite this, bread was valued more than gold, because it was life, and there was catastrophically little food in the city surrounded by the enemy.
From the first days of the blockade, in Leningrad, queues lined up at the military registration and enlistment offices from those wishing to go to the front. No less crowds of unfortunate citizens stormed grocery stores, trying to stock up on food and other essentials.
Absolutely everything was swept off the shelves, but someone made stocks in order to survive, and someone in order to make easy money on the deficit.
Very soon the shops were empty and their windows were boarded up. After that, public transport and street lighting stopped working in the besieged city, and then electricity completely disappeared. At the same time, like mushrooms after rain, points began to appear where people were offered to exchange valuables for food.
Dealers, in whose hands were concentrated impressive stocks of food, exchanged a glass of rice, a loaf of bread or a small bag of flour for gold jewelry, fur coats and paintings by famous artists. Sometimes they sold for money, at astronomical prices, but such deals were not very popular, since there was practically nowhere to spend cash in the besieged city.
It goes without saying that speculators did not hesitate to set exorbitant prices. They knew perfectly well that in a state of permanent hunger, a person is ready to give everything for a piece of bread. Thus, the price of a kilogram of bread on the black market in different periods varied from 400 to 1200 rubles (with the official cost of 1 ruble 90 kopecks). For comparison, the average salary in the city was about 400 rubles a month. At the same time, bread was the most popular commodity. One of the inhabitants of the besieged city recalls how she exchanged a gold watch for a piece of butter the size of a walnut.
After all the dogs and cats were eaten in the city, canned meat was considered an unprecedented luxury, and not every speculator would agree to exchange it even for a gold ring. At the same time, no one guaranteed the quality of the purchased food, even for such a price. Even technical oils were mercilessly diluted with water, and instead of canned food they could sell sand rolled up in a jar.
In the hands of enterprising merchants, large material values ​​were concentrated. Their new owners did not have much hope that the city would be liberated and become Soviet again. They were more satisfied with the option of surrendering Leningrad to the German invaders. With the capture of the city by the Nazis, all these gold bracelets and chains, landscapes and sculptures, coats and gramophones, will acquire real meaning and allow them to live in clover, they thought.
Law enforcement agencies, despite the serious workload, did not forget about these businessmen and fought them as best they could. As a result of the raids, dozens of points were discovered where things were exchanged for food and apartments were found stuffed to the ceiling with valuable property.
#onceonearth
#Leningrad blockade
#The Great Patriotic War
#The Second World War
#to remember