"A porcelain doll"

Extended application for documentary for the cycle "Secrets of the Age".

Materials: chronicle, Feature Film“The feat of a scout”, staged shooting is possible, documents from the FSB archive.

Synchronizations: military historian, historian Alexander Namozov, military historian Sergei Drobyazko; experts: Yury Kazanov, Sergey Kozyrev.

Background. In the early 1930s, Lisovskaya was a ballerina and performed in Warsaw. And then a certain impresario invited her and several other actresses to go to America, to Hollywood, to try their hand at cinema. The girls got paid. And on the way they learned that they were allegedly lured to a brothel in the Middle East. Lisovskaya, frightened, fled the train in Berlin. Part of the advance was spent on fashionable clothes and jewelry (in general, she did everything to live in a big way). Lydia was afraid that the gang who tried to lure her to a brothel would start looking for a fugitive. Therefore, she took refuge in the province - in the town of Kostopol, which is a few tens of kilometers from Rivne. Her youngest lived there with her parents. cousin Maya Mikota. Lydia aroused both admiration and envy because she was fabulously beautiful (by the way, one of her undercover pseudonyms - Porcelain Doll - seemed to confirm this). Lydia had refined manners, dressed chic and tastefully, was a true "gentry lady". And here, in Kostopol, fate brought her together with ... the future father of the famous Russian politician Vladimir Zhirinovsky - Wolf Eidelstein. The world is small.

History first. Waitress at the casino. The maiden name of Lydia Lisovskaya is Demchinskaya. Before the war, she was married to a Polish officer who, with the rank of captain, took part in the battles against the German army, in 1939, was captured and ended up in a Nazi concentration camp. The German attack on the USSR found Lydia in her hometown of Rovno, after being captured by the Germans, she worked as a cook's assistant in a canteen serving officers and staff of a prisoner of war camp. At the risk of her life, she helped several Soviet soldiers escape. Among them: Vladimir Gryaznykh, who joined the "Winners" partisan detachment. It should be noted that during the war, Rivne was the capital of Ukraine occupied by the Germans. All the main military and administrative authorities of the occupiers were located there, and the fascist Gauleiter of Ukraine Erich Koch also lived here. That is why at the beginning of 1942, the operational group of the 4th Directorate of the NKGB "Pobediteli" was abandoned near Rovno, led by an experienced intelligence officer Dmitry Nikolayevich Medvedev. A little later, Nikolai Ivanovich Kuznetsov joined the detachment under the pseudonym "Grachev", who had a special leadership task. Among the main tasks of the partisans was the creation of a network of safe houses and safe houses in Rovno, attracting reliable, patriotic residents of the city who worked in the occupation institutions to the detachment. That is why Gryaznykh's report about Lisovskaya interested the Chekists, and intelligence officer Nikolai Gnidyuk, who legalized himself in the city under the guise of a petty trader Yan Baginsky, was connected to her check. By this time, Lydia managed to get a job as a waitress in the casino of the economic headquarters of the occupation forces in Ukraine, headed by General Kerner. Having met Lydia, Gnidyuk was convinced that she was sincere in her hatred of the Nazis. It was decided to reveal to the woman that Nikolai was a partisan. To this, Lisovskaya said that she had the opportunity to poison Kerner if the partisans gave her poison. But scouts saw her in a completely different role. It was known in the restaurant that she was the widow of a captain in the Polish army, almost a count, that she had graduated from Warsaw ballet school and the conservatory, that before the war she was even invited to act in Hollywood, that when she was an officer's wife she took prizes in shooting and horse riding competitions. All this flattered the visitors.

The second story. save your sister. Lydia quickly found herself a high-ranking boyfriend - the 54-year-old head of the concentration camp. This helped her save her sister Maya, when she was almost driven away to work in Germany. It so happened that one Kostopol policeman sought love from Maya. And she did not reciprocate him. So he included her in the list to be sent to the Reich. The echelon in which she was transported made a stop in Rovno to take on new slaves. Lydia, referring to her acquaintances, went through the cordons and took her sister. At first, she arranged her as a barmaid in a dining car on the Kharkov-Berlin train. But Maya was raped there. After that, the girl went to work at the Deutsche House restaurant in Rovno and became an agent of the NKVD. By the way, it was in this restaurant that Maya met Ortel, a scout.

History the third. salon owner. She did not repel her numerous admirers, but she knew how, as they say, to keep them at a respectful distance. No one could boast of any serious success with her, but some of her regular visitors earned her the right to come to visit, sometimes even - with her permission - to bring fellow officers who found themselves in Rovno passing from the front or to the front. So gradually, in her apartment at number 15 on Legion Street, a company was formed, where Leon also visited. Given that the locals were sitting on meager occupation rations, the guests themselves brought wine and snacks. The parties were fun, but no one allowed themselves any liberties. Lisovskaya was very pretty: twenty-five years of age, seemingly flexible, slim figure sportswomen, big gray eyes, lush hair the color of ripe rye. She did not get close to other waitresses. They frankly envied her, called her proud behind her eyes, but they were afraid - they knew that she would never let anyone offend herself. Lydia's real friendship was only with her cousin Maria Mikota, or, as she was usually called, Maya. Maria was also a beauty, but in a completely different way: lively, thin, with dark eyes. long hair and an unusual slit with green eyes. They lived together. Lydia treated her sister like an equal, although Maya was much younger - she was not yet eighteen. Maya also worked in some cafe "nur fur deutsche" - "only for the Germans", but almost every day she ran to Lydia's "Deutschoff" and, of course, took part in all the parties. Information of military and political significance flowed into the house along Legion Street as if by itself, without any apparent effort on the part of its young mistresses. Hitler's officers and officials, who so willingly spent their free time not only drinking and dancing. They were still talking. Some are less, others are more. About all sorts of things, about anything. They recalled episodes from front-line life, told jokes, complained about official troubles, boasted of successes and promotions, scolded not very high authorities, gossiped about colleagues. Among these conversations, individual phrases slipped through that made it possible to judge the movements of troops, moods, movements, and other things of interest to Soviet intelligence. In the detachment, information was verified, analyzed, compared with information received from other sources, encrypted, turned into dispassionate columns of numbers and transmitted beyond the front line - to the Center.

History four. search. Lisovskaya's apartment turned out to be convenient for reconnaissance in all respects. A small amount of weapons, ammunition, and money were also stored here. Once it nearly cost Lydia her life. The Germans regularly arranged in Rovno, as, indeed, throughout the occupied territory, general searches and raids. Once they came to Lisovskaya. Failure seemed inevitable, the decision had to be made immediately, and Lydia found it: with a dazzling smile, she invited the young officer in charge of the search to sit on the sofa. While the gendarmes rummaged through all the nooks and crannies of the apartment, Lydia flirted with their commander. Here one of the soldiers reached for a round hat box on the closet. Lisovskaya jumped up from her seat, snatched a hat from a cardboard box, and with a laugh pulled it over the bewildered soldier's head. Unable to restrain himself, the officer laughed and waved his hand, signaling that the search was over. Laughing, the Nazis left, and Lydia, completely exhausted, sank into a chair. In a cardboard box, under the hat, there was a bag with pistol cartridges. In the sofa on which she sat with the officer during the search, there were pistols, hand grenades, money ...

History fifth. "a find for a spy." During the fun feasts of Ortel, Maya also learned about the plans of the German command to fight a decisive battle on the Kursk Bulge in the summer of 1943, using the latest Tiger and Panther tanks. Ortel blabbed about the most secret task that his wards from the school of saboteurs were supposed to carry out in Moscow. Moreover, Ortel selected these militants from among the NKVD officers recruited by the Abwehr. They had to cross the front line, get to Moscow in order to carry out a terrorist attack - to eliminate the generals von Seidlitz and von Daniels who had fallen into Soviet captivity. These and a number of other captured senior officers of the Wehrmacht organized (apparently, at the prompting of the NKVD) the Union of German Officers. Its members, on radio broadcasts and through loudspeakers on the front line, agitated their compatriots for the overthrow of Hitler. Thanks to Maya, the militants were captured in Moscow.

Story six. Kill Siebert. In May 1943, German officers - regulars of the casino offered Lisovskaya to take on board Lieutenant Paul Siebert, who had recently arrived in the city. (For additional income, she sometimes rented out a room in her apartment to the Germans.) Siebert arranged meetings in the apartment with other Germans whom Lydia introduced him to. She, for her part, spoke to the chief lieutenant about the imminent defeat of Germany and the need to ensure its existence in the future. This gave rise to serious doubts among the partisans - is Lisovskaya Paul Siebert probed by the Gestapo? Doubts were dispelled when Lydia again asked Gnidyuk for poison, this time in order to kill her guest, who confessed to her that he personally participated in the executions of prisoners of war. The check is over. Siebert, who is also a special agent of the 4th Directorate of the NKGB Nikolai Kuznetsov, revealed himself to Lisovskaya as a Soviet intelligence officer. From that time on, Lydia became his closest assistant. Lydia helped Kuznetsov make acquaintances with German officers and collect information about high-ranking fascist officials in Rovno. In addition, she involved her cousin Maria Mikota in intelligence work, who, on the instructions of the partisans, became a Gestapo agent under the pseudonym "17". Now the detachment was able to learn in advance about the punitive raids of the Germans, and Kuznetsov met the SS officer von Ortel, who was part of the team of the famous German saboteur Otto Skorzeny.

Story seven. tehran 43. Maya, Lisovskaya's cousin, was friends with Ortel. In 43, Ortel announced to Maya that they would have to part for a while, as he was being summoned to Berlin. Before leaving, being slightly tipsy, he asked his beloved what to bring her from a business trip: "Maybe a Persian carpet? We never made love on the carpet." Further, the information went through an established chain: Maya retells the conversation about the Persian carpet to another agent - her sister Lidia Lisovskaya, she - to Kuznetsov. And Nikolai transmitted this information to the NKVD partisan detachment "Winners" and from there by radio to the Center. Well, in Moscow they immediately realized that a person from the group of saboteur Otto Skorzeny might be interested in Persia - the Germans are preparing an attempt on the heads of the powers of the Big Three. Similar information was then received from other sources, which only confirmed the information from the Kuznetsov group.

History eighth. general kidnapping. In the fall of 1943, Lidia Lisovskaya, on the instructions of Nikolai Kuznetsov, got a job as a housekeeper to Major General Ilgen, commander of the eastern special forces. He was key figure in the leadership of the armed groups of a nationalist persuasion, which consisted of former citizens of the USSR who went over to the side of the occupiers. By November, Lydia was able to provide the partisans with detailed information about the daily routine, external protection, the time of departures and arrivals of General Ilgen, and other necessary information. An operation was planned for November 15, 1943, in which Nikolai Kuznetsov, his closest associate Nikolai Strutinsky, as well as two new partisans - Stefansky and Kaminsky, took part, for whom the task was a kind of test. On November 15, at 4:15 pm, four partisans drove up in a car to Ilgen's house. Kuznetsov was dressed in the uniform of a German army captain, Strutinsky was a private, Stefansky was a lieutenant, and Kaminsky was in the uniform of an employee of the Reichskommissariat. Vasily Lukovsky, a sentry from the Cossacks who had gone over to the side of the Germans, was on duty near the house. Strutinsky remained near him for observation. Kuznetsov went inside with two assistants, where Lisovskaya and Mikota were waiting for them. In the house was Ilgen's batman Cossack Mikhail Myasnikov, who was immediately disarmed and put in 1 isolated room, offering to think about whether he wanted to join the partisans. Exactly at five, a car drove up to the house. The general got out of the car and went to the house. His driver waited for Ilgen to go inside, and only after that he left. In the house, Ilgen was met by Lydia, who tried to distract him with a conversation. Kuznetsov, Stefansky and Kaminsky stood at the door in the corridor, ready to attack. When Ilgen began to undress, Strutinsky entered the house in the uniform of a private in the German army. The general asked loudly: "What do you want?". Kuznetsov immediately rushed at him, grabbed him by the throat and gagged his mouth. Kaminsky tied Ilgen's hands, but, as it turned out, he did it badly. Then everyone went to the car. Kuznetsov led the general, the rest - the Cossacks. Five meters from the car, Ilgen broke free, his hands were untied. Physically strong, in the past - an excellent boxer, he hit Kuznetsov in the face and began to loudly call for help. The partisans ran up to Kuznetsov, calmed down Ilgen and put him in the car. Four Germans ran out from a nearby street shouting "What's going on?" and the changing of the guard appeared. Kuznetsov calmly approached the Germans and said that they had caught a bandit, and he was forced to arrest all four and deliver them to the Gestapo. The Germans began to make excuses that they were employees of the Reichskommissariat and were not involved in the case, they asked to be released. Kuznetsov persistently suggested that they follow him, then he arrested one of them - the most active, who turned out to be the personal driver of Gauleiter Erich Koch. The driver Koch was put into a car with the partisans, Ilgen and the Cossacks. Kuznetsov remained with the three armed Germans, slowly wrote down their names, after which he "let him go." While the new guard at Ilgen's house was trying to figure out where the old sentry had gone, Kuznetsov calmly walked to the car, and the partisans left for a safe house. In order to create an alibi for Lydia, she was sent in advance to meet with a Gestapo officer in a crowded place where there were many military men who knew her. In addition, on the instructions of the partisans, Ilgen's orderly Mikhail Myasnikov left a note on the table in the general's office: "Thank you for the porridge, I'm going to the partisans and taking the general with me. Death to the German invaders! Cossack Myasnikov." The next day, Lisovskaya was nevertheless arrested and interrogated by the Gestapo for eight days. Since it was not possible to convict her, and besides, the German officers who saw Lydia on the day of Ilgen's abduction stood up for her, she was released. Later, on the instructions of the partisans, Lisovskaya, together with the retreating German troops, moved to Lvov.

Story nine. save siebert. But the imaginary Lieutenant Siebert (Kuznetsov) was exposed. This was done by one of the suitors of Maya Mikota, counterintelligence officer Martin Gettel. However, he paid for this with his life: he decided that the imaginary Siebert was an agent of British intelligence and offered his services to Britain. We arranged a meeting at one of the safe houses. There Kuznetsov killed Gettel.

Tenth story. Undisclosed secret. After the liberation of the Rivne region by the Soviet troops, the partisan detachment "Winners" was disbanded. For the courage shown in the fight against the invaders, Lidia Ivanovna Lisovskaya was presented to the Order Patriotic War 1 degree. On October 27, 1944, in the village of Kamenka, near the Ostrog-Shumsk highway, the bodies of two women with bullet wounds were found. Documents were found with them in the name of Lisovskaya Lidia Ivanovna, born in 1910, and Mikota Maria Makarievna, born in 1924. According to surveys of local residents, the investigation found that at about 7 pm on October 26, 1944, a 6-ton military vehicle stopped on the highway, in the back of which there were two women and three or four men in the form of officers Soviet army. Minota was the first to get off the car, and when Lisovskaya wanted to give her a suitcase from the back, three shots rang out. Maria Minota was killed immediately. The car took off, and Lydia Lisovskaya, wounded by the first shot, was finished off and thrown out of the car further down the highway. Among the documents of the dead was a certificate issued by the NKGB department for the Lvov region with the following text: “The real comrade Lisovskaya Lidia Ivanovna has been issued that she is being sent to the disposal of the UNKGB for the Rivne region in the city of Rovno. A request to all military and civil authorities to provide all possible assistance in promotion of Comrade Lisovskaya to her destination". People's Commissar of State Security Merkulov ordered a thorough investigation into the kidnapping and murder of Lisovskaya and Mikota. The investigation itself was carried out under the direct control of the head of the 4th department of the NKGB of the USSR Sudoplatov. Who was the 34-year-old Lydia Lisovskaya, if her death so worried the top leadership of the state security agencies? The answer to this question is provided by the recently declassified materials of the Central Archive of the FSB of Russia.
A thorough investigation into the circumstances of her death, conducted in 1944-1945, unfortunately, did not produce results. One of the versions spoke of the involvement in the murder of Rivne Gestapo agent Richard Arend, who before the war studied with Lidia in the same gymnasium, and after the German retreat, according to Lisovskaya’s reports, she caught her eye in Lvov in the form of a Soviet officer more than once. Other versions were based on Lisovskaya's reports of threats to her from Poles and Ukrainian nationalists living in Lvov. Why Lisovskaya and Mikota did not go to Rovno by train, although railway tickets were bought for them, could not be established. They could not find the car that brought them up. One thing is clear: they became a victim of fascist agents who acted on the territory of Ukraine even after liberation from the occupiers

Arrived in the detachment of Medvedev [ According to the story of N. I. Kuznetsov’s colleague, intelligence agent Nikolai Gnidyuk. Now N. Ya. Gnidyuk works as a deputy chairman of the Lviv Regional Executive Committee] prisoner of war Vladimir Gryaznykh (he escaped from a concentration camp in Rovno) reported that he and his comrades managed to escape from enemy captivity with the help of a senior waitress in an officer's casino. Her surname is Lisovskaya. My name is Lydia Ivanovna. She asked if the fugitives managed to find the partisans, to connect her with them.

Nikolai Gnidyuk was assigned to see this woman. At the address that Gryaznykh gave him, Gnidyuk tracked down Lisovskaya. The scout was met by a slender young blonde above average height, with a beautiful swarthy face and large blue eyes. When they met, Lisovskaya spoke with captivating simplicity about herself, about her hatred for the German fascists, who took away her husband, the captain of the Polish army, and destroyed him in a concentration camp.

“I can give you some general,” the interlocutor said to Gnidyuk. - I'm ready for anything. Give me any task - I will do it. If you like, I'll take your people to the casino when there are a lot of German officers there. I can pour poison into a dish or steal a folder with secret documents ...

She proposed her plans with such assertiveness that her behavior seemed too suspicious to partisan scouts. Gnidiuk already knew that German officers often visited Lisovskaya's apartment. Lidia Ivanovna returns with escorts.

One day she brought a briefcase with documents. The briefcase was “requisitioned” by her from an old colonel who had gone over to the casino, but it contained only some invoices. Lidia Ivanovna managed to learn the night passwords. It seemed that something was not clean here. Surely the Gestapo started a game with partisan scouts. So far, it is going for worthless "giveaways", but with the help of its agent, Hitler's intelligence, of course, thinks of spreading nets in order to get a rich catch. And Lisovskaya, meanwhile, persistently pursued a "big deal."

When Gnidyuk reported to Kuznetsov about the first meetings with Lisovskaya, he said:

Yes, this lady's behavior is suspicious. Well, keep in touch with her. Let's study this person. We have to test it in practice.

Lisovskaya regarded this alertness of the scouts in her own way and, when meeting with Gnidyuk, joked:

“The Germans trust me more than you!”

Nikolai Ivanovich at that time was already working in a “pair” with Valya Dovger, who, after an audience with Koch, by the “highest” order of the Gauleiter, was assigned to work as a typist-clerk in the economic department of the Reichskommissariat. German officers vying with each other tried to show their attention to the beautiful fraulein, stuffing themselves into suitors.

Once one of the officers suggested to Kuznetsov:

- Listen, Siebert, do you want me to introduce you to the first beauty of the city? Polish countess. See and forget the way to Valentina...

A few days later, at a meeting of a group of scouts, which took place in Ivan Prikhodko's apartment, Nikolai Ivanovich, summing up the conversation, concluded:

Let's leave, comrades. For business! - He was silent for a while and, remembering something important, half in jest, remarked intriguingly:

- And I have, by the way, today a meeting with one beauty!

The scouts answered him with jokes:

- Nikolai Ivanovich, at least leave us the address where this beauty lives. And then you will go, get married and ... what good, you will be lost!

- By the way. Remember the address,” Kuznetsov responded briskly. “Legions, fifteen. Lelya.

– How, Legions, fifteen?! Gnidyuk exclaimed. “Yes, Legions, fifteen.

- Excuse me, it's the same Lydia Lisovskaya!

- Can't be!..

- Yes, yes, Legionov, fifteen, Lidia Ivanovna Lisovskaya. There is no other Lely, - Gnidyuk confirmed.

“But I have an appointment with her today at eight o’clock.

I also have a date at eight-thirty.

- Well, then, let's go!

Kuznetsov came to Lisovskaya earlier. He was accompanied by an interpreter, but, citing urgent business, he quickly left.

Lidia Ivanovna received officer Paul Siebert with her characteristic courtesy and courtesy.

Soon Gnidyuk also appeared in Lisovskaya's apartment. He was met by the owner's sister Maya. Learning that Gnidyuk had come, Lidia Ivanovna ran out to him animatedly and quickly apologized:

“I beg your pardon, I have a very interesting officer. Will you share company with him? Sit for a while and I'll kick him out.

But Kuznetsov knew who had come, and he spoke from another room:

- Verdort? (Who is there?) – he asked importantly.

“Ah, Paul Siebert,” exclaimed Lisovskaya anxiously. It was my cousin who came to visit.

“Ah, cousin?” Beat, beat! said Paul Siebert. “Cousin?...” he asked, going out into the living room, and, staring at Gnidiuk with a piercing gaze, remarked suspiciously:

- Cousin? Khabenzi document? Siebert demanded.

- Yawol, Herr officer! – readily answered Gnidyuk. He suddenly felt funny. But, nevertheless, he continued the game. Taking out his ausweiss, Gnidyuk readily showed it to the officer. Paul Siebert scanned the certificate with his eyes and exclaimed:

– Kostopol?! Partizan? Du bist partisan?! - an alien officer began interrogating the guest of the hostess.

Lisovskaya was seriously alarmed. Throwing up her hands, she began to dissuade:

- No, Mr. Siebert! This is my cousin. I know him well!

– Vek! - the angry officer shouted at the hostess and put Gnidyuk's documents in his pocket, warned:

“Come to the Gestapo tomorrow!” I'll check what kind of cousin you are!

- I know him, I ask you, Herr Officer, give him the documents ... - Lisovskaya switched from a pleading tone to a pleading one. The latter had an effect on the German.

The hostess quickly brought it to the table. And the formidable officer became kinder. He even invited the "cousin" whom he had just yelled at to the table and offered a drink "to the victory of our weapons."

Thus began the acquaintance of Paul Siebert-Kuznetsov with the mysterious waitress of the officer's casino.

Kuznetsov continued to visit Lele - Lisovskaya - as a German officer, and Gnidyuk - as a partisan. Checking Lydia Lisovskaya was coming to an end. The scouts were convinced that they were dealing with a man who really wanted with all his heart to help in the fight against the Nazi invaders, that Lelya was collaborating with the Gestapo on the instructions of the Soviet command.

- Lidia Ivanovna, - says the former reconnaissance partisan N. Ya. Gnidyuk, - began to work under the leadership of Nikolai Ivanovich. Lisovakaya worked in intelligence very fruitfully and did no less than other intelligence officers.

The news came from where they did not expect

One day researcher Lev Monosov tracked me down by e-mail. He read my materials and found an inaccuracy in regard to Kuznetsov's short stay in the Jewish self-defense detachment. And the name of the fighter in this book of mine is already given the correct one. New facts of Kuznetsov-Siebert's activities in the German rear were also revealed.

So, in the period from 1941 to 1943, the Nazis set up 50 ghettos in Ukraine. One was near Rovno. During the period of occupation, the Germans destroyed 1 million 800 thousand Jews - three-quarters of the total pre-war number. In Western Ukraine, where the Nazis and local Ukrainian nationalists acted especially brutally, several hundred people managed to survive, who were mostly rescued by partisans. And in the Rovno ghetto, Jews were brought for extermination both from the countries captured by the Nazis and from the occupied western regions of the USSR. By the end of 1943, almost all those driven into the ghetto were killed in Rovno - according to some estimates, from 80 thousand to 100 thousand people. The ghetto itself was liquidated when Rovno was liberated by Soviet troops. The city was taken on February 2, 1944.

The total liquidation of Jews in Rovno was carried out by SS Sonder teams and Lithuanian punitive police battalions. But even against their terrible background, Ukrainian nationalists stood out with sadism. They had their own special service UTA - the Ukrainian secret police, also known as the Ukrainian Gestapo.

And in the documents sent to me by Lev Monosov there is information about how Kuznetsov saved those doomed to death.

His reconnaissance group operating in Rovno included Lidia Ivanovna Lisovskaya. She was born in this city in 1910. After graduating from high school, she studied piano at the Warsaw Conservatory. Fluent in French and German. Beauty Lydia was even invited to act in Hollywood. And she married a Polish officer who went missing while defending Warsaw. So she returned in 1940 with her mother Anna Voitsekhovna Demichanskaya to Rovno and established contact with Soviet intelligence.

Lisovskaya involved her cousin Maria Mikota in intelligence work, who, on the instructions of the partisans, became a Gestapo agent under the pseudonym "17". Lydia Ivanovna took an active part in the operation of Kuznetsov's reconnaissance group to kidnap Major General von Ilgen, commander of the Eastern Special Forces, from Rovno. General Ilgen was a key figure in the leadership of the nationalist armed formations, which consisted of former citizens of the USSR, who went over to the side of the invaders and were directly involved in the mass executions of the population.

The staunch anti-fascist Lisovskaya not only carried out Kuznetsov's reconnaissance missions, she provided assistance to hiding prisoners of war and Jews. As Lev Monosov writes, according to documented testimonies, in October 1943, when the Germans were driving Jews through Rovno to be executed, Lidia Ivanovna Lisovskaya, together with Nikolai Ivanovich Kuznetsov, rescued and hid a Jewish girl. Paul Siebert learned from his acquaintances from the Gestapo about the planned execution by the Germans and thought about this risky step in advance. Of course, Kuznetsov's role in saving the girl was decisive. It was impossible for Lisovskaya alone in broad daylight to do this. She would have been destroyed immediately on the spot for helping the Jews. Only Kuznetsov, in the form of a German officer, could freely approach the girl’s parents killed by the Sonderkommando, take the bloodied child and, together with his lady, Lisovskaya, transfer the baby to the church, and in the evening take her to Lisovskaya’s apartment, from which he allegedly rented a room. Even if Kuznetsov were approached by a patrol with a check of documents, then the presence of a German officer's uniform, documents and a Gestapo badge stolen by partisans, which gives unlimited powers to its owner, would remove all questions. Ukrainian policemen, auxiliary units and Lithuanian nationalists who participated in the escort of the convoy and the execution, did not have the right to check the documents of a German officer at all.

The name of the girl - Anita - was given by Nikolai Kuznetsov. During the arrest of Lisovskaya by the Gestapo and after her death, Anita was raised by Lydia Ivanovna's mother, Anna Voitsekhovna Demichanskaya. The name of the saved person, as Monosov writes to me, has been established - Anna Adamovna Zinkevich. She was found after the war, and Zinkevich officially confirmed the fact of her rescue. The underground worker V. G. Gribanova and the underground partisans A. I. Lobacheva and O. P. Volkova testified about this.

The fate of Lydia Lisovskaya was tragic. The underground worker was threatened with death more than once. In November 1942, Lisovskaya was arrested by the Gestapo, but everything worked out and she was released. In January 1944, a second arrest followed, brutal torture, imitation of execution. Before her execution, she wrote a farewell letter in her cell on the wall in blood. By a lucky chance (on the day of the execution she was unconscious in the cell), Lisovskaya managed to escape.

But in October 1944, after the liberation of this part of Ukraine from the invaders, Lydia Ivanovna Lisovskaya and her cousin Maria Makarovna Mikota were brutally murdered by Ukrainian nationalists. Lisovskaya was posthumously awarded the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st class.

Approximately in October - November 1943, Kuznetsov saved from death a four-year-old Jewish boy whose parents were killed by the Nazis. The scout rescued the child from the ghetto and took him to the partisan detachment. This was subsequently confirmed by the commander of the Pobediteli detachment, Dmitry Medvedev, commissar Alexander Lukin, and doctor Albert Tsessarsky. A four-year-old boy who did not know his own name or surname was named Pinya. He was extremely weak, but the nurses came out of him. They sewed clothes for him, tried to feed him better. At the request of Kuznetsov, the boy was sent by plane to Moscow. According to some reports, at least, so Monosov claims, Kuznetsov asked the leadership of Soviet intelligence to allow him to adopt a boy after the war, came up with a name for him. They searched for this baby saved by Nikolai Ivanovich, but they could not find it. And that is not all. During reconnaissance operations in Rovno and its environs, Kuznetsov hid Jews and helped send them to a partisan detachment.

FAVORITE RADIO OPERATOR OF NIKOLAY KUZNETSOV
Africa de las eras

The radio operator Masha, and later Colonel of the illegal intelligence service Africa de Las Heras, considered the two most difficult war years spent in the Pobediteli partisan detachment to be the happiest in her life.

Africa de Las Heras, pseudonym Patria, is one of the most prominent and at the same time not too disclosed figures of Soviet illegal intelligence. Fragile, little Spaniard, fully devoted to the service new homeland, she was at one time almost the only foreign intelligence officer awarded the Order of Lenin for her exploits. In her native Spain, she fought against Franco, and then, apparently, she became one of those who were preparing an assassination attempt on Trotsky. During the war years, she was a partisan and radio operator of the legendary Nikolai Kuznetsov. Long-term creator, head of illegal residencies in Western Europe and in Latin America, after returning from illegal intelligence, she raised excellent students. The dossier of the Colonel of the Foreign Intelligence Service de Las Heras and her files are classified as "top secret". Even on several order books that I leaf through, there are no photographs.

Who will introduce the heroine

The student of Africa de Las Heras, also a colonel, the successor of her glorious work, perhaps relatively recently returned from the same distant lands where her mentor worked. Without drawings - the name of the narrator is unknown. Name? Any simple name of ours will suit this youthful, beautiful, elegant Russian woman, full of friendliness to her interlocutor and love for Africa, who was called Marya in Russia

Pavlovna and whom the interlocutor considers almost a second mother. I will call the colonel of illegal intelligence in different ways.

Natalya Ivanovna, I think we saw each other somewhere? - I start.

Of course, of course, - Tatyana Sergeevna nods. - At one celebration, - and casually recalls the date (it turns out that so many years have flown by) and even the place where I was sitting.

Yes, Tamara Ivanovna is not mistaken in her story about Africa.

And we will begin this chapter, not worrying about the exact chronological sequence, with the Great Patriotic War. Word to Tatyana Ivanovna.

The legendary Soviet intelligence officer Nikolai Kuznetsov died under mysterious circumstances in the spring of 1944, his assistants - Lidia Lisovskaya and Maria Mikota - died under mysterious circumstances in the autumn of 1944.

Maria Mikota

Lydia Lisovskaya
Photo: Google

There are a lot of materials about this trinity on the Internet. I will quote just one:

"From the materials of the search case.

L. G. Lishenko (before and after the war - the chairman of the executive committee of the village council in the village of Doloche, neighboring Kunev): “On that day, N. V. Granchuk, the driver of the milk truck, arrived from Kunev and said that two women had been killed near Kamenka. I sat on the cart and told Nikifor to go to Mozyarka. The dead lay by the side of the road, facing the sky. She had a light blond, half-untwisted braid. Not far from the murdered woman, the secretary of our village council found a fur muff in which documents and photographs lay. We handed over all the documents to the commander of the 226th separate rifle battalion of the troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Major Maksimov (we failed to find such a unit and such a major through the archive of the troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. - Auth.). Some time after the murder, Major Maksimov told me that the car in which the killers were traveling had crashed into a house in Kremenets while being pursued. Two died, the third, who was sitting in the back, remained alive.

Was the survivor detained? Has his identity and the identity of the dead been established? Where did the fourth go? There are no answers to these questions yet.

Yu.K. Khvoinaya (a former resident of Kamenka, later went to Poland): “We were digging potatoes in the garden and saw what was happening 200 meters from us ... One woman jumped off the truck, and the second handed her a suitcase. At this time, an officer with golden shoulder straps jumped out of the cab and began to talk about something with the one who got off the car. There was a cry “Don’t shoot!” But three shots rang out. The officer quickly jumped into the cab, throwing a suitcase into the back of it, and the car went at high speed towards Shumsk. When we ran up to the woman lying on the road, she was already dead.

GV Babchuk (a resident of Kamenka): ..... And the one who brought the suitcase remained in the car. Then they shot her in a car and the blood dripped all the way to Mozyarka."

M. V. Stratyuk (former chairman of the local collective farm "Russia"): "In October - I don't remember the day now - forty-four years after dinner, a green Studebaker, half covered with a tarpaulin, rushed from Shumsk to Ostrog. On it sat four men in the form of Soviet military personnel and two women. After a while the car at a crazy speed again swept past us back to Shumsk. But now there was only one woman in the back next to the four military men. We immediately learned that a murdered woman was lying near the village of Kamenka. I drove to the indicated place. People gathered around the deceased. She lay in a roadside ditch. Soon a second one was also brought here, who died near the village of Mozyarki. Thanks to the documents found with them, it became clear to us that they were scouts from the “Winners” detachment. We escorted the patriots with honors on their last journey. We erected a monument with a corresponding inscription on their grave ... "

Quite recently, a man who had long been considered dead turned to Kim Zakalyuk. This is Jerzy Lisowski, Lidia's husband.

Jerzy Lisowski was a Polish officer, was taken prisoner at the beginning of the war, then spent a long time in concentration camps. At first, the Lisovskys corresponded, then the connection was cut off.

Before the war, they had a friend Jozef, also an officer in the Polish army, about whom Lisovsky knew that with the outbreak of hostilities he began to work for Polish intelligence, that is, for the Polish government, which had moved to London.

In response to one of her husband's letters, where he asked what she does, Lida writes: what Jozef does. What she meant by that is difficult to judge. Did she mean working for the Polish government in London? Or just intelligence? Jerzy Lisowski, as he himself told Zakalyuk, does not rule out that his wife could work for British intelligence. Apparently, he has a reason for this. But he will be able to confirm this more precisely after a trip to London, where he hopes to find Required documents. (By the way, Jerzy Lisowski is a Canadian citizen and currently lives in Poland.)

Is the death of Lisovskaya, Mikota, Kuznetsov connected with this new information? Perhaps the scouts knew something they shouldn't have known?

The chain of disappearances and deaths of those who saw Kuznetsov shortly before his death is also striking. Vasily Drozdov, a scout, for example, disappeared near the village of Boratin at the end of the war, and Fedor Pristupa, also a scout, crashed on a motorcycle under mysterious circumstances immediately after the war. The medical examiner who gave the opinion on the death of Lisovskaya and Mikota was killed the next day.

Former partisans told Kim Zakalyuk that relations between Kuznetsov and the commander of the Pobediteli detachment, D. M. Medvedev, were very strained. After an unsuccessful assassination attempt on Erich Koch, Hitler's viceroy in Ukraine, Medvedev arrested Nikolai Ivanovich and, accusing him of cowardice and excessive caution, asked the Center to apply capital punishment to him. Fortunately, the Center did not give consent then ...

We are also embarrassed by the fact that such professional and cautious intelligence officers, having worked for a long time in the fascist rear, side by side with the Gestapo and the SD, where they also served far from amateurs, are dying one by one at the hands of Ukrainian nationalists.

In a word, there are many mysteries and so far more questions than answers. That is why I would like the State Security Committee of the USSR to publish materials related to the activities and deaths of the famous intelligence officers and enter into a frank dialogue with those who are studying the undisclosed pages of our country's past.

We hope so. The classification "secret" from mysterious murders will be removed.

Timur SVISTUNOV Rivne - Milcha - Kyiv.

So, the 226th separate rifle battalion of the VV MVD. An obvious mistake of the author in the designation of the departmental affiliation of the part. In 1944, there were no ministries yet, but there were people's commissariats. So, it would be more correct to call this part like this: the 226th separate rifle battalion of the NKVD VV. However, the author argues that such a division did not exist in nature. OK. Now let's look at another document:

Photo: https://obd-memorial.ru/html/info.htm?id=83988535

So, almost all buried in the village. Kunev, Izyaslavsky district, Khmelnytsky region mass grave in the center of the village (except for the girls and private Viktor Solokh) are servicemen ... of the 226th separate rifle battalion of the internal troops of the NKVD of the USSR. The battles in these places were not with the Germans, but with the Ukrainian Insurgent Army. The situation at night is appropriate. Lydia Lisovskaya and Maria Mikota were experienced and very cautious scouts. It is unlikely that they would have sat down in the evening in the first passing car, feel a threat to their safety. And they sat down. I have no doubts that it was our own people who made such a "gift". Just what caused it? Did the girls know too much? Probably. In my opinion, this is how the connection between Soviet intelligence and Erich Koch was hidden. I suppose that it was Nikolai Kuznetsov and his assistants who worked in connection with him ...