"I killed Yesenin." Confession of Nikolai Leontiev.
Razomlev after a bath and a shot of vodka, the old man unfolded his palms and said wearily: “You won't believe it, but with these same hands I killed Yesenin …” My partner really didn’t believe it. And then the old man slowly told the amazing story of his life.
This bath feast happened in 1976 in the Khabarovsk village of Urgal, where at that time a young officer, Viktor Titarenko, was doing military service, who turned out to be an unwitting witness to the old man's confession. At home, he wrote down what he heard, but over the long years of service he never found how to dispose of these recordings.
And only after retiring, already 52-year-old Major Titarenko showed them to the staff of the Moscow magazine "Miracles and Adventures", where they were published this year.
The old man was Nikolai Leonidovich Leontiev, who is living out his life from a prosperous St. Petersburg family. In his younger years, he managed to graduate from the cadet corps, and with the outbreak of the civil war he found himself an application in the Cheka, served in the protection of the Trotsky train, under the command of Yakov Blumkin, later a famous terrorist.
Yakov Blumkin
Apparently, it was Blumkin who, years later, attracted Leontyev to carry out Trotsky's delicate task to neutralize Sergei Yesenin. As Leontyev recalled, the murder of Yesenin, detained at the station, was not part of their plans. It was supposed to explain to Yesenin the perniciousness of his conflict with the Soviet regime and the opportunity to get rid of troubles in exchange for his information activities in the interests of the GPU. Such a proposal infuriated Yesenin, and he rushed to the provocateurs. In the dump Leontyev fired, the bullet went under the poet's right eye, and Blumkin hit Yesenin on the head with the handle of a pistol.
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Such an unexpected outcome led the employees of the GPU to the need to stage a suicide. According to Leontyev, at first they tried to hang Yesenin's corpse on a pipe using the poet's trouser belt. But the belt was short. Then the same belt was tightened around Yesenin's neck and his head was leaned against the radiator.
A few years later, with the expulsion of Trotsky from the country, the threat loomed over the fate of all his associates. There were mass arrests of Trotskyists and trials over them with heavy sentences. Leontyev did not wait for his turn, but on the advice of his friends left for Siberia with the intention to get into the confidence of the ataman Semyonov for covert subversive work, who continued to fight the Soviet regime. However, Semyonov exposed him, recruited him and made him his closest assistant for many years.
The end of this adventure came in 1945 with the arrest of Semyonov and his entourage. Nikolai Leontyev received a term of 25 years in the camps, which he served in full. Freed already at an advanced age, he stayed in a settlement in the taiga village of Urgal, where, shortly before his death, he decided to tell about the darkest episode of his life.
- Of course, Leontyev's revelations are of great value for researchers, - Viktor Kuznetsov comments on this publication. - However, we still have to work hard to clarify a number of facts from Leontyev's story, to combine them with the already known circumstances of Yesenin's death. Unfortunately, the reliability of these memories could have been affected by time, with which human memory does not always cope: after all, Leont'ev talked about the events of half a century ago. Yes, and Viktor Titarenko could confuse something with hearsay - he did not specify the details from the old man's story.
The very same personality of the narrator, as established by Viktor Kuznetsov, is genuine: the father of the regular Chekist was a very respected man, hereditary honorary citizen of St. Petersburg Leonid Vasilyevich Leontiev, who owned a large print-printing factory before the revolution.
And now the surname "Leontiev" is common in the highest circles. Maybe that's why Yesenin's true death is hidden? There was a poet - and he is not, the denouement is akin to the type of "lyrics", and "keeping the brand" of the genus is very prestigious …
Inna Svechenovskaya
Petersburg writer Viktor Kuznetsov published the book "The Mystery of the Death of Sergei Yesenin", in which he recreates the real events of 75 years ago.
75 years ago in Leningrad, at the Angleterre hotel, the poet Sergei Yesenin committed suicide. And only now some circumstances of his death have become known, which cast doubt on the official version of suicide. Viktor Kuznetsov, a writer, journalist, member of the Writers' Union of Russia, literary critic, told the Faktov correspondent about his investigation, which lasted almost ten years.
With this hand I personally shot Sergei Yesenin
- Tell me why you doubted Yesenin's suicide and started your own investigation?
- I noticed inconsistencies in the official coverage of the "mystery of Angleterre", egregious factual and logical contradictions. The fact is that I very well represent and understand the era of the twenties and thirties of the last century. Because I know her not from textbooks, but from the inside. For I am an “archival rat” studying documents, and therefore, quite early on, I felt the lies of our history. I saw that Yesenin's actions, which were discussed, contradict his personality. Well, and, of course, there was a feeling that much does not fit in this story. I even felt ashamed of some researchers. Another point is that while investigating, I can say that I personally experienced the tragedy of the poet, as if “let it pass” through myself. Without this, it would hardly have been possible to penetrate the deepest recesses of the crime. I'm still lucky that it all started in the late eighties,when the "thaw" came and many secret archives, for example, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the FSB, became more accessible. Now everything is closed again. And now it would be impossible to do the same work.
And you know what's amazing? When the book was already written and published, I read a publication in the Moscow magazine "Miracles and Adventures" in which Reserve Major Viktor Titarenko wrote that more than twenty years ago in the Urgau village of the Khabarovsk Territory he heard the confession of a Gulag "graduate" Nikolai Leontyev. The latter, already an old and sick person, suddenly opened up and said: “Vitek, but with this very hand I shot Sergei Yesenin.” Then these words seemed to the officer the delirium of a madman, they simply did not fit into my head. This was so at odds with the generally accepted view of the sad events that cut short the poet's life. But still, when he came home, he recorded the confession of the former prisoner.
And after reading my book, Viktor Titarenko decided to publish the confession he had heard. Moreover, the analysis of the biography of Nikolai Leontiev completely coincides with the facts that are discussed in my research. By the way, the archive of the manuscript department of the National Public Library in St. Petersburg contains the original photograph of Yesenin, which shows a bullet hole above his right eye and a mark from a blow, apparently by the handle of a revolver, in the forehead.
- And yet I cannot help asking why it was necessary to kill the populist poet Sergei Yesenin. After all, as far as I know, he accepted the revolution and even sang it?
- The fact is that the twenties almost mirror our time. Both from an economic perspective and in other aspects. Back then, being a patriot, glorifying Russia was an act, a heroism, they were shot for this. By the way, Yesenin's friend, the poet Ganin, was shot precisely for this. And then, sad as it may seem, we don't know the true Yesenin. What is written in textbooks is high time to throw it away, all this is rubbish, with rare exceptions. Since we still imagine him as a kind of refined, golden-haired, curly-haired boy with huge eyes, who wrote about birch trees, girls, and so on. We do not know either his true biography or the depth of his work. But the very existence of Yesenin's poetry as such - melodious, melodic - was a reproach to the reinforced concrete structures of certain poets of that time. And Gorky, who loved Yesenin as a poet,in the rank of "petrel", who hated him, wrote to Bukharin that a blow was needed on the Yesen region, a blow on this very wing of the New Peasant poetry.
There were other reasons that Yesenin's killer recalled. The fact is that after 1923 Yesenin became a counter-revolutionary. And in a letter to A. Usikov in February 1923 he writes: “If I were alone, if there were no sisters, I would spit on everything and leave for Africa or somewhere else. It’s sick to me, a Russian son, to be a stepson in my state … I cease to understand which revolution I belonged to. I see only one thing: that neither the February, nor the October ". Further, Yesenin "winged" Soviet power at all corners. And Demyan Bedny told Furmanov about this. In addition, Andrei Sobol told in Italy at the beginning of 1925 that “to cover up the Bolsheviks like Yesenin publicly did not even occur to anyone in Soviet Russia. Anyone who said a tenth of what Yesenin said would have been shot long ago."
"Thirteen criminal cases were opened against Yesenin, and most of them were under the article" anti-Semitism"
- I know that Sergei Yesenin had a reputation as a brawler, criminal cases were even opened against him, accusing him of hooliganism and other offenses. Did it have anything to do with his death?
- But how. You have touched on a topic that many literary scholars diligently avoid. Thirteen criminal cases were brought against him, and most of them were under the article "anti-Semitism". By the hand of Lenin, it was written into the manuscript of Sverdlov's About It that such people should be outlawed and shot. And many of the articles under which Yesenin was accused, just fit this law. Moreover, the last case, which threatened Yesenin with a court, also fell under this article.
- What kind of court? What was Sergei Yesenin accused of?
- Yesenin was returning from Baku by train with his wife Sofya Tolstaya. On the stretch of the city of Serpukhov, he decided to dine in a dining car. But the Chekist did not let him in. They quarreled. This quarrel was heard by the diplomatic courier Alfred Roga, a foreigner from Tallinn. Kamenev's friend, a doctor by profession, Levit was traveling on the same train. And Roga asked Leviticus to examine Yesenin for his mental health. Can you imagine this picture ?! Yesenin is in a compartment with his wife, the door opens, Levit comes in and says: "Sergei Alexandrovich, do you want to be examined for your mental health?" What is Yesenin doing? This Levite flew to the last carriage. We have not written about this anywhere. But many publications on this topic, in particular, Horn's note, explanations of Levit and Yesenin, were in American magazines.
Well, then the events developed like this. When the train just approached Moscow, Yesenin was immediately arrested. Both Horns and Leviticus filed a lawsuit against him, including under the article "anti-Semitism." Sergei Yesenin signed a recognizance not to leave and on the advice of friends, they say, "loonies are not judged" went to a psychiatric hospital.
Now look … There was no sense in going to Leningrad. Firstly, he was on trial, and secondly, also because there was no more or less established way of life. In Moscow, he had his first wife, a son from this marriage and, finally, friends who supported him - they simply gave him a corner. After all, Yesenin did not have his own housing. It sounds incredible, but it's a fact.
- So what caused his visit to Leningrad?
- I think that he wanted to escape. And most likely to the UK. We are currently working on this topic. Yesenin, under pressure from his relatives, went to a psychiatric hospital and on November 26, 1925, wrote to his friend Pyotr Chagin: “I’ll get rid of some scandals and move abroad. There, marble lions are more beautiful than our living medical dogs. You know that the lion is an integral attribute of the state symbols of England. Moreover, Yesenin was printed there.
- And yet who benefited from the death of the poet?
- All roads lead to Trotsky. They had a very difficult relationship. Once in a drunken company Yesenin said: “I will not go to Moscow while Leiba Bronstein rules Russia. He doesn't have to rule. " And these words were heard by the GPU sex worker Gleb Alekseev and handed them over to their destination. Then, in the poem "The Country of Rascals" there is a character named Chekistov, he says: "What kind of Jew are you? You are a lord from Weimar. " And Trotsky at one time lived and studied in Weimar. Well, reading this … who likes it? There were many other clashes between them, which gave rise to Trotsky's hatred of Yesenin. It was Trotsky who rejected Lunacharsky's petition that there was no trial of Yesenin, since he believed that the hype around Yesenin's name was needed to show the true face of the Russian anti-Semite.
"Yesenin did not appear on the lists of residents of Angleterre."
“So what happened at Angleterre?
- The fact is that Yesenin has never been to this hotel. He became a victim of the political game between Stalin and Trotsky. When Stalin won in December 1925, Trotsky saw the intrigues of anti-Semites in this and asked Bukharin to scout out the situation in Moscow through his own channels … And then yesterday's leader of the revolution was close to disgrace … Well, he also needed to throw out all this negative energy on someone … Of course, on Yesenin.
- Why?
- Because Yesenin embodied the spirit of the Russian nation. The killer told Major Titarenko that when Yesenin arrived in Leningrad, he and Blumkin, who knew the poet well, since he was well into literary bohemia and wrote poems himself, lured Yesenin to the hotel on the very first day to wash the meeting. And that's where it happened. But this is not the whole truth … Yesenin did not cross the threshold of the hotel. Yesenin is not included in the lists of residents of the Angleterre Hotel. And no one among those who stopped there or the service personnel saw or heard Sergei Yesenin. Given the poet's incredible sociability, this practically could not be. Although, on the other hand, this is not surprising, if we take into account that everything happened completely differently … Upon his arrival in Leningrad, he was arrested by Trotsky's unofficial order. And they were allegedly held in house no. 8/23 on Mayorov Avenue, where they interrogated for four days. The point of the interrogations was that they wanted to recruit Yesenin as a secret employee of the GPU. I do not think that Trotsky gave the order to kill the poet, but it just so happened … Yesenin apparently resisted and pushed Blumkin with force, he fell. Then Leontyev fired … The photo shows a trace of a bullet wound, and after that Blumkin hit Yesenin in the forehead with the handle of a revolver.and after that Blumkin hit Yesenin in the forehead with the handle of the revolver.and after that Blumkin hit Yesenin in the forehead with the handle of the revolver.
After the murder from Leningrad, Blumkin contacted Trotsky and asked what to do with Yesenin's corpse. He replied that tomorrow his article would appear in the newspaper that the unbalanced, decadent poet had killed himself, and everyone would be silent. And so it happened.
- And what about the investigation?
- You know, the police did not participate in this case at all. And some strange organization was investigating, which was called the "Active Secret Criminal Investigation Department." It was led by Peter Gromov. In the early nineties I met with one of its members - militiaman Georgy Evseev, born in 1901. He told me an absolutely incredible thing, which was later confirmed by Leontyev's recollections. Like, Yesenin was tied to a pipe … from a battery. And the old militiaman swore that this was exactly what happened. From Leontyev's notes: “They tried to hang Yesenin on their own belt. But Yesenin's waist was narrow, and they could not tie him to the steam heating pipe, since the belt was short. They stuck it to the battery, so that later they could represent the trace of the impact of the revolver handle as a burn. " And then all the paperswho will appear in the course of the investigation were falsified. I thoroughly checked them and proved that, for example, the forensic examination act is fake. How did this happen? I brought up the real files of the doctor, whose signature was on the act, and saw that he described suicides in a completely different way, and in particular those who hanged themselves.
- Tell me, how does your version explain the numerous memories of Yesenin's friends who expected such a step from the poet?
- He had real friends in Moscow, and in Leningrad they described meetings with him and shared memories of Trotsky's sexot. All of them signed a "fake" act on the discovery of the body of Sergei Yesenin. By the way, when I appeared on the Vremya program, named these GPU agents and exposed them, one of my relatives fainted, since he did not assume that his uncle was involved in this.
- Did the Yesenin commission to clarify the real circumstances of the poet's death under the Russian Writers' Union, chaired by Yuri Prokushev, support your point of view about the murder of the poet?
- Not. And now my long article is being prepared for publication in a Moscow magazine, in which a convincing rebuke is given to those who have been profitably exploiting the name and glory of the poet for many years. My research has generated interest in the UK, Germany, Italy and Yugoslavia. The London newspaper The Guardian gave a positive response to the book. And "Book Review" in 1998 called the book an intellectual bestseller.
Victor Kuznetsov
