Lenin's fatal illness is still a mystery. In the absence of official information, which still remains sealed, all sorts of sensational rumors flourish. They are fueled even more by the equally vague and unverified information about Lenin's brain research, which is allegedly still being carried out.
Atherosclerosis, syphilis, poisoning, genetic disease or what?
In 1921, the leader of the world proletariat showed symptoms of a strange and serious illness of the central nervous system. From time to time, his mental, speech and motor functions began to be disrupted, limbs refused, he was tormented by nightmares and delusional visions. These attacks became more frequent, and by the end of 1922 Lenin had become incapacitated, except for brief periods of enlightenment. In 1923, he was almost without a break in Gorki under the supervision of doctors and the departure of his wife and practically did not lead the party and the country.
Lenin was treated by the luminaries of medical science from Russia and Germany, but they did not come to a single and final conclusion about the nature of his illness. The official version of death remains a stroke. There was a cerebral hemorrhage, but it happened against the background of an already long-standing chronic disease, about which they continue to argue. Allegations appeared in the White émigré press that Lenin's brain had been eaten away by chronic syphilis, and in the early 1990s these stories were picked up in the disintegrating USSR. It is curious that in the treatment course prescribed to Lenin there were also drugs for syphilis, and the People's Commissar of Health N. A. Semashko forbade mentioning in the official report of Lenin's death even the denial that he had syphilis, so as not to give any reason for enemy propaganda.
Until now, versions have been expressed about the chronic and deliberate poisoning of Lenin. All Soviet school textbooks said that Fanny Kaplan in 1918 wounded Lenin with two poisoned bullets. Some books and articles claim that Lenin was poisoned with lead from bullets. And during perestroika, they began to write that Stalin had poisoned him. Such inconsistency makes one think that the version of the poisoning is fake.
Lenin's father died at about the same age also from a cerebral hemorrhage. This gives reason to assume that Lenin was struck by some hereditary ailment. However, there is no evidence that Ilya Ulyanov was ill in the last years of his life in the same way as his son Vladimir.
Promotional video:
Small brain of the "genius of humanity"
When, after the death of the leader, his brain was removed for research, he was very badly affected. The internal carotid artery was so hard that it could be tapped with tweezers. It seemed that the diagnosis of atherosclerosis of the vessels of the brain, which led to a stroke, was confirmed. At the same time, a significant part of the brain was destroyed, which could be interpreted as bacterial or viral damage. Some articles still claim that the healthy part of Lenin's extracted brain was no larger than a walnut, but this is a clear exaggeration. However, the doctors who conducted the study were surprised that Lenin could live with such a sick brain for some time and even regain consciousness from time to time and look adequate.
The Bolshevik leaders were interested in creating a legend about the super-genius Lenin and intended to use the entire arsenal of modern science to substantiate it. In addition, they hoped that the study of Lenin's brain would help in the future to grow superhumans like him, who would lead the world proletariat to communism. After all, the Bolsheviks then (like the Nazis later) were very fond of eugenics - the dubious science of the possibility of breeding "improved" breeds of people.
The task was complicated by the fact that the volume of Lenin's cranium was less than average, and even in a healthy state, his brain would weigh no more than 1340 grams. Although it was known for a long time that outstanding people also have small brains (for example, the writer Anatole France's brain weighed a little over 1000 grams - like the average Pithecanthropus), this did not fit into the myth of the leader being created. A German scientist, Social Democrat Oskar Vogt was called in to help.
Brain Institute
“Under Vogt” in Moscow in 1925 the Brain Institute was organized. A German neurologist, with the help of a specially designed tool, cut the brain into more than 30 thousand pieces and carefully studied (fortunately, the high salary was paid regularly) for three years. In 1927, he published the results of a study in which it was stated that Lenin's brain possessed some unique features of the cellular structure that determined its genius. As almost all scientists now admit, this statement had no scientific value and was only a propaganda trick.
Then the fun begins. In theory, Lenin's brain should be kept by the successor to the Institute of the Brain - the Brain Research Department of the Scientific Center of Neurology of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences. They say that the brains of many dozen of our outstanding compatriots, from Vladimir Mayakovsky to Andrei Sakharov, are also preserved and studied there. But the work of the Institute, after a brief period of relative openness in the early 1990s, is now classified again, just as it was in Soviet times.
Sometimes there are publications of doubtful reliability that most of the exhibits in the Pantheon (as the Institute's brain storage was unofficially called) was lost after 2004, when the research had to be stopped due to lack of funding. The brains of prominent people (possibly Lenin as well) allegedly ended up in one of the abandoned buildings of the Institute. A spontaneous homeless man appeared there, almost all the exhibits were damaged, and only in 2014, when a rumor spread about poisoning by chemical reagents remaining in the abandoned building, it was boarded up by order of the Ministry of Emergencies. So far this gossip has not been denied, and the Institute has not shown the brains of the Soviet leaders to anyone.
Oskar Vogt returned from Soviet Russia to Germany in 1930. According to some reports, he took with him part of Lenin's brains for additional research. They were housed at the Kaiser Wilhelm I Institute for Brain Research in Berlin. But soon there was a nuisance - the Nazis came to power in Germany, and fragments of Lenin's brain were in their hands. Vogt himself, due to his social democratic past, was dismissed from this institution in 1936. According to the Belgian journalists L. Van Bogert and A. Dewulf, the Berlin operation in April 1945 was undertaken by the Soviet troops in order to take possession of Lenin's brain before the Americans could get to it. After that, Lenin's brain was allegedly put on public display at the Lenin Mausoleum for a while (which is not confirmed by other sources),and then he was again placed in the Moscow Brain Institute.
Yaroslav Butakov