Cats siege of Leningrad Bashny.Net

Text + 7 images
In continuation of this theme.
66 years ago, January 27, 1943 has been completely removed the siege of Leningrad. Great event ... do not fall out of the city a terrible ordeal ... and the inhabitants survived. Eternal glory to them ... On the eve of this date in Russian newspapers and Russian Internet publications appeared blockade cats.





Elisha cat and the cat Vasilisa.
Russian blogger says Sim:
If from the Nevsky Prospekt enter Malaya Sadovaya Street, then right at the second floor of the store can be seen Eliseevsky bronze cat. His name is Elisha and the bronze beast like residents and tourists. On the other hand when, on the ledge of the house number 3 lives girlfriend Elisha - the cat Vasilisa.



The idea is to Sergei Lebedev, the sculptor - Vladimir Petrovich, sponsor - Ilya processing (a division of labor is something). Monument cat established January 25, 2000 (ten years pussycat sitting on the "post"), and "the bride put it on April 1 of the same in 2000. The names of the cats came up with residents of the city ... at least so says the Internet, here I do not remember. Although in 2000 I was 14 years and 10 years is longer

It is believed that if to throw a coin on a pedestal Elisha, then you will be happy, joy and luck. According to legend, in the wee hours when the street is empty and illuminated signs and lights are not so bright, you can hear the bronze Kitties peremyaukivayutsya. But about this I can not say, in the wee hours on Malaya Sadovaya I had ever provided.



It would seem - as cute set of Petersburg monument to the beloved home little animals ... and it turned out that not just put cats deserve a monument.

September 8 1941 Leningrad was taken in the ring, it began a blockade that lasted 900 days. Very soon the city was nothing to eat, the people began to die ... in the terrible winter of 1941-1942, ate everything, even the pets (and it saved many lives). But if people die, the rat fruitful and multiply!

It turned out that the food in a hungry city rat missing! Blokadnitsa Kira Loginova recalled that "... the darkness of a long line of rats led by their leaders of moved on Shlisselburgsky path (now Avenue Obukhov defense) directly to the mill, where the milled flour for the whole city. In rat shot, they tried to put pressure tanks, but nothing worked: they climbed onto tanks and successfully drove them further. It was organized by the enemy, clever and cruel ... "(" Trud "02.05.1997, p.7). By the way my mother's grandmother, who lived for some time in the besieged city told me that one night, looked out the window and saw that the whole street is teeming with rats, after that long could not sleep. When they were crossing the road, even the trams had to stop.

 - In the spring of 42, my sister went to the garden, a broken right at the stadium on Levashovsky street. And suddenly we saw that directly to us moving some gray mass. Rats! When we ran to the garden - everything has been eaten - says Zoe blokadnitsa Kornileva.

All kinds of weapons, bombing and fire fighting were powerless to destroy the "fifth column", overeat die of starvation blockade. The gray creature eats even what little food that remained in the city. In addition, because of the hordes of rats in the city there was a threat of epidemics. But no "human" methods to combat rodents did not help.

And then, immediately after breaking the blockade January 27, 1943, in April issued a decree signed by the Chairman of the Leningrad City Council about the need to "write out of the Yaroslavl region and deliver the car to Leningrad four smoky cat" (smoked were considered the best rat-catchers). Witnesses said that the cat snapped up instantly, followed by queues. L. Panteleev wrote in his diary siege in January 1944: "Kitten in Leningrad is 500 rubles" (kilogram of bread with it then sold for 50 rubles. The salary of the watchman was 120 rubles)



 - For the cat gave the most precious thing we had - bread. I left very little of their rations, to then give the bread for a kitten woman whose lambing cat - says Zoe Kornileva.

Yaroslavl cats managed to drive away quickly enough rodents from food stores, however, completely solve the problem could not. Therefore, at the end of the war it was declared another "cat mobilization". At this time the cats were recruited in Siberia. "Cat's appeal" was successful. In Tyumen, for example, collected 238 males and females between the ages of six months to 5 years. Many do bring their pets to the assembly point. The first volunteer was the black and white cat Amur, which the hostess personally handed over to the wishes "to contribute to the fight against the hated enemy." Total was sent to Leningrad 5000 Omsk, Tyumen, Irkutsk cats who honorably coped with its task - to purge the city from rodents. So among the St. Petersburg Murok almost no indigenous, local. Many have a Siberian roots or Yaroslavl.

Many people say that the story of the "blockade cats" - a legend. But then the question of where in the city after the war, there are so many baleen and striped and where did the real army of rats?



The legendary cat Maxim.
St. Petersburg Museum of cats looking for a hero. His employees want to perpetuate the memory of the legendary cat Maximus. Oh, maybe, the only survivor of the blockade in the cat for a long time legends. At the end of the last century, the story of Maxim told the special correspondent of "Komsomolskaya Pravda", the author of animal stories Vasily Peskov.
During the siege of almost all the cats died of starvation or were eaten. That is why the story of his mistress interested writer.



"Our family has gone so far that uncle demanded a cat to be eaten almost every day - leads words of the owner of the animal Sands Vera Nikolayevna Volodya. - My mother, when they went out of the house, locked with a key Maxima in a small room. He lived with us even parrot Jacques. In good times Zhakonya our singing, talking. And then from hunger and, moreover, all oblez. A little bit of sunflower seeds, which we bartered on Dad's gun, will soon come to an end, and our Jack was doomed. Cat Maxim barely wandered too - get out hair tufts, the claws are not retractable, no longer even meow, begging for food. Once Max had managed to get into the cell to Zhakone. At other times, the drama would happen. And that's what we saw when he returned home! Bird and cat sleeping in a cold room, huddled together. Uncle is so affected that he stopped at the cat attempt ... »
Soon the parrot had died, but survived Mike Farley. And he was almost the only cat that survived the siege. The house Volodya became even led tours - everyone wanted to look at it. Teachers brought entire classes. Maxim died only in 1957. From old age.

Sources: 1. 2



Source: