(Note: This is the full version of the story. An abbreviated version is reprinted in the print edition of Challenge and in the PDF edition.)
The great communist leader Joseph Stalin died 51 years ago. Among working-class people and many others too, he was the most loved and respected man in the world, because he represented the great achievements of the Soviet Union and the world communist movement. And, in part, that love and respect can be measured by the witness of ordinary people.
We in PLP don’t believe in building "cults" of great men. But the working class has great ancestry!." How great Stalin – and the communist movement of his day, which he led and represented – were, can be measured, in part, by the hatred and lies told against him by the capitalist exploiters and their agents all over the world.
V.A Atsiukovsky went on to become a physicist and engineer. In 1994, past retirement age, he wrote Communism – the Future of the Human Race (1994). He continues to be active as a scientist and as a supporter of the communist movement in Russia. This account is from his autobiography, Prikliucheniya inzhenera, zapiski aktivista (The adventures of an engineer, the notes of an activist), 1998.
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Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin died on March 5 1953. For the overwhelming majority of my generation, which had not fought in the war, and of the older generation which did, J.V. Stalin’s death was an immense tragedy. Of course among us there were people who were silently glad at his death, but at that time they did not dare breath a word of such feelings. Later they tried hard to bring into disgrace not only Stalin’s name but everything that had been done in his time. But during those days we were seized with grief, and with a single thought – to go to Moscow, to pay our respects to our deceased Leader and Teacher.
All over the country work stopped, and classes were cancelled at all educational institutions. They were also cancelled for us at the Leningrad Polytechnic Institute. Everyone was in confusion, but as soon as it became certain that Stalin’s wake was scheduled for March 10 many people, including myself, rushed to the Moscow train station hoping to somehow get to Moscow. We didn’t know then what was happening in Moscow.
During those days the Moscow train station was like a beehive in a state of alarm. We saw that we would not be able to get to the capital, or even leave Leningrad, and I proposed to two of my comrades a simple plan how we could get to Moscow. The plan was this: to use local commuter trains to get through all the cordons, which would no doubt be stationed around in order to prevent any great agglomeration of crowds in Moscow, and then on the most distant train, which would no doubt still be running, to get to our goal. My two friends decided against it, and I went off by myself.
My plan could not have worked better. Lying on the floor under a shelf in an almost empty car of a commuter train, I heard patrols walking the platform at Liuban’ and stopping someone, but no one even entered the car I was in, and soon the train moved farther along. I don’t remember where and how I managed to find a seat in the farthest train, which was completely packed, but I arrived in Moscow on the morning of the second day of the funeral, and set off to say goodbye to Stalin.
Everybody knows what had happened in Moscow on the first day of the funeral. The authorities lost control of the situation. Moscow was overflowing with people who had rushed to the October Hall, where J.V. Stalin’s body was laid out for viewing. There was a terrible press, in which many people were killed. No one had expected such a huge crowd of people. And only after a day, exactly when I had managed to get to Moscow, was order restored, all Moscow covered with barricades, and only organized delegations were being allowed to reach Stalin. I managed to get through to Sverdlov Square only because I was wearing a military overcoat that I had been issued at the special military school after it was concluded. I waited until evening, made use of the dim light and mingled with some military delegation, and with it passed by all the barricades. But at Sverdlov Square the delegation was turned away because of lack of discipline: the wives of the military men, also walking in the same column, behaved themselves inappropriately, laughing and making merry, and in the end the whole column was turned back. But I was already on Sverdlov Square and was not prepared to leave it. And towards the evening of the second to third day there were gathered together on Sverdlov Square about a hundred persons, "interlopers", as I was.
They didn’t drive us away, and near morning, about seven o’clock on the third day of the wake, we were formed into a general column, and with us began that gigantic line of those who wished to bid farewell to Stalin, a line that stretched throughout the whole of Moscow. There was no longer any press; order was completely maintained. I went with the first group of one hundred persons, said farewell to the person for whom I had the most respect of anyone in the world, and went home to the dormitory of my Institute.
But after two more days I was called into the Young Communist bureau of my faculty where I was to give my explanation of how I had dared to abandon my Institute during such a time. Everyone who had tried to get to Moscow during those days but had failed to get any further than Moscow train station had to give their explanations too. And I had made it to Moscow, so special attention was paid to me.
-- Did you understand that it was forbidden to go to Moscow? – they asked me.
-- Of course I understood, -- I answered.
-- And did you know that you’d get into trouble for that?
-- Of course I knew.
-- And you went anyway? And will you do it again the next time?
-- You’re crazy! – I said to the Young Communist leadership, - How can there be a ‘next time’! We only had one Stalin, and I went to say farewell to him, and not to you. There cannot be any ‘next time.’
-- And you don’t regret that you did this?
-- I don’t regret it. -- I answered.
And then they decided to expel me from the Young Communist League.
My Young Communist group learned about this and supported me ‘to the death.’ They voted lack of confidence in the faculty bureau and demanded that my case be transferred, not to the Young Communist Committee, where I would undoubtedly be expelled with all the consequences that would follow from that, but to the faculty assembly, which had long ago been scheduled for the next few days. And the faculty assembly, having first in principle condemned me for lack of discipline, voted an organizational censure against me – and that was all. I remained in the Young Communist League, and in the Institute.