On May 8, 1945, the Soviet military interpreter Elena Kagan was entrusted with a burgundy-colored box. Her superior in the SMERSH counterintelligence group had told her that it contained Adolf Hitler’s dentures and teeth and that she was answerable with her life for its safekeeping. On V-Day, Elena, a Jew who would have turned 100 this week, was holding a box with what remained of Hitler. “The situation in which I found myself was odd, unreal,” she later wrote in her book, Memoirs of a Wartime Interpreter. “God Almighty, is this happening to me? Is this me standing here at the moment Germany surrenders, with a box in my hands containing the indisputable remnants of Adolf Hitler?!” It would take her a lifetime to fully grasp this moment, and its consequences.
The charred remains of Hitler and Eva Braun were unearthed in Berlin on May 4: A soldier found them in a bomb crater in the Reich Chancellery garden. The remains were unrecognizable and were reburied. On May 5, after a series of interrogations, which yielded testimony about Hitler’s suicide, the bodies were uncovered and an official document was drawn up. Elena was there to witness: “On a grey blanket, contorted by fire, lay black, hideous human remains, caked with lumps of mud.” The moment left her emotionally unaffected, unlike the recent sight of Goebbels’ dead children, which haunted her: The youngest girl, Heidrun, seemed to be the same age as her own daughter.
Kagan’s counterintelligence unit attached to the 3rd Shock Army was assigned to hunt for Hitler, a search conducted in deep secrecy. In late April, as the battle for Berlin was nearing the end, Elena interpreted prisoner interrogations in the basement of a house near the Potsdamer Platz. “We were interested in just one thing: where was Hitler?” Unknown to them at the time, on April 30, in the Führerbunker underneath the Chancellery, Hitler and Eva Braun had committed suicide. Elena would recall the center of Berlin ablaze, “the collapsing walls of burnt-out buildings,” and unbreathable air, “acrid and opaque from the fumes and stone dust.” It was her fourth year at the front where she volunteered at 21, leaving behind her baby daughter.
In 1941, after Hitler attacked the Soviet Union, the Red Army desperately needed interpreters. Elena had enrolled in a military translation course where her excellent command of German was noticed (Karl Liebknecht’s widow, Sophie, was among her teachers). Offered a posting in Moscow with the general staff, Elena refused, choosing the front lines. In January 1942 she was deployed to the environs of Rzhev, the ancient city 132 miles northwest of Moscow, and the site of ferocious battles. The Germans called Rzhev, standing at a junction of major railways and highways, “the springboard” for a leap to Moscow. In turn, Stalin demanded that the city be liberated “at any cost.”
Lasting 17 months, the battles for Rzhev and surrounding regions were some of the bloodiest in the war: The Red Army suffered incalculable losses. Yet, these battles did not even enter Soviet history books. After the war Elena campaigned for official recognition of Rzhev’s heroic and tragic role in defending Moscow and took the pen name Rzhevskaya.
In Poland Elena’s superior in the counterintelligence unit, Major Boris Bystrov, had proclaimed: “When we enter Germany I am going to capture Goebbels.” On May 2, 1945, she was astounded to see Major Bystrov and two other officers in Berlin discovering Goebbels’ remains. Goebbels’ charred body was put on display in front of the Reich Chancellery. Recognizable for its metal prosthesis and orthopedic boot, Goebbels’ body “symbolized the collapse of the Third Reich,” Elena writes. His yellow tie, which somehow survived the fire, seemed emblematic of the yellow star Goebbels invented to identify Jews.
Stalin was displeased that the discovery of Goebbels’ remains was publicized. The search for Hitler, he decreed, would proceed in strict secrecy. Elena’s counterintelligence unit was downsized to three: Colonel Vasily Gorbushin (in charge of the search), Major Bystrov, and the translator. They were prohibited all contact with the press and photographers.
On May 2 the Russian assault detachments of the 5th Shock Army broke into the Reich Chancellery. Elena’s group was ordered to inspect the Chancellery and the Führerbunker. During heavy bombardment artillery shells had been hitting the Chancellery, some landing on the bunker’s roof and cutting its electricity; the place was dark and stuffy. Elena recalls: “There were overturned tables, broken typewriters, glass and paper underfoot.” Working by the light of oil lamps, she sorted through documents, hoping to find clues about Hitler. There was Bormann’s correspondence, Hitler’s personal papers, and Goebbels’ diary—the notebooks dated from 1932 to July 8, 1941. She read the papers in the halls of the Chancellery. Focused on her immediate task, Elena could only skim through Goebbels’ diary before dispatching it to the front headquarters with her notes. In 1964, while researching her memoir, she would read this diary at the Council of Ministers Archive.
After the liberation of the Reich Chancellery Soviet war correspondents streamed into the Führerbunker, emerging with souvenirs. By May 5 Colonel General Nikolay Berzarin, the commander of the 5th Shock Army that liberated the Chancellery, put the place under guard. Elena’s counterintelligence group of the rival 3rd Shock Army had to smuggle out the presumed remains of Hitler and Eva Braun. On May 6, at the crack of dawn, the bodies were carried over the fence of the Chancellery garden and loaded onto a waiting truck. In Buch, on Berlin’s outskirts, a commission of medical experts and pathologists, headed by the principal forensic medical specialist of the 1st Belorussian Front, Lieutenant Colonel Faust Shkaravsky, conducted a series of autopsies. In 1936, in Buch, the first racial evaluations had been performed on Hitler’s orders. On May 8, 1945, Soviet forensic experts examined Hitler’s remains.
A Jewish female doctor, Anna Marants, a medical service major, performed the dissection. (A native of Kyiv, Marants was acting principal pathologist of the 1st Belorussian Front; after the war she worked in Kyiv’s hospitals.) The Soviet forensic pathologists were forbidden to take photographs, but on May 9, during the autopsy on Goebbels’ body, Doctor Shkaravsky photographed the medical experts in the examining room.
Because Hitler’s remains were badly burned, the teeth, with abundant bridgework, crowns, and fillings, presented the most important anatomic means of identification. Hitler’s gold bridge and lower jaw were placed in a box and handed over to Colonel Gorbushin who gave it to Elena, deemed the most reliable in their group of three. (Earlier, in Poznań, “a bulky, reinforced coffer” with gold items was brought from a bank to Elena’s bedroom. The gold was to be dispatched in sealed bags to Moscow; in the meantime it was emptied into a compartment underneath her sofa. “I was trusted. So in Poznań I slept on a hoard of gold,” she remarks.)
On May 8, driving through a devastated Berlin, they located Hitler’s laryngologist, Dr. Carl von Eicken, the head of the Charité university clinic. The professor had last treated Hitler in 1944; he said Lev Trotsky also had been his patient. A dentistry student in this clinic helped in the search for Hitler’s dentist, Dr. Hugo Blaschke, who by then had fled Berlin; working in his clinic was Dr. Bruck, a Jewish dentist recently emerged from hiding. His former student, Käthe Heusermann, had been Dr. Blaschke’s dental assistant. She had attended Hitler—and helped hide her Jewish teacher from the Nazis. Heusermann received her rations at the Reich Chancellery, sharing them with Dr. Bruck.
Heusermann was a tall, blond, attractive woman of 35. As part of Hitler’s entourage she had much to fear; however, she had refused Dr. Blaschke’s offer to evacuate. As she explained to Elena, her fiancé was in Norway and she was afraid to lose touch with him if she left Berlin. She had been working for Dr. Blaschke since 1937 and had assisted in extracting Hitler’s teeth.
Heusermann was interrogated several times and at great length. She was the only person on hand who knew the distinctive features of Hitler’s teeth. Elena writes, “I asked her not to give the teeth their specialist names—incisor, canine, and so on, for fear I might not correlate the German and Russian terms correctly. Instead she simply gave them numbers.” Heusermann’s account coincided with the autopsy report. She also helped locate Hitler’s dental records and X-rays, having guessed correctly that they were kept at the Führerbunker. Hitler’s dental records were found in the box room, surprisingly intact, given the general chaos of the bunker where Russian soldiers were partying.
On May 11 Dr. Shkaravsky, who had been in charge of the autopsies, interviewed Heusermann in Buch. This time she drew a diagram of Hitler’s teeth, commenting on every detail. She said Dr. Blaschke’s dental technician, Fritz Echtmann, could confirm her report. Echtmann examined Hitler’s and Eva Braun’s dentures. He recognized his work and said that Braun’s bridge was his invention: “I did not make such a bridge for anyone else …”
The investigation was nearing the end when a member of Hitler’s bodyguard, Harry Mengershausen, was captured. He had observed Hitler’s and Braun’s cremation and burial. Mengershausen and his interrogators sat on logs in the Chancellery garden while Elena translated. When Mengershausen pointed out the burial site, irrefutable evidence of Hitler’s death was obtained.
“I was confident,” Elena writes in her memoir, “that within another day or two the whole world would know we had found Hitler’s body.” But Pravda, the major Soviet publication, printed accounts of Hitler’s escape, and the Red Army was urged to hunt for Hitler. “It was a deceitful charade, a weird attempt to disguise the fact that his body had been found,” Elena remarks.
Stalin, informed of the investigation results, sent his representative to Berlin to personally verify the reports. Around May 23 Lieutenant General Alexander Vadis, head of counterintelligence SMERSH of the 1st Belorussian Front, launched a new round of interrogations. Käthe Heusermann and Fritz Echtmann, free until then, were detained. Elena, as a translator, was warned of her potential liability: Everything concerning the investigation of Hitler’s death was a Soviet state secret and the punishment for disclosing it was up to 15 years in the gulag. Lieutenant General Vadis compiled a dossier for Stalin, which was sent to Moscow along with material evidence: Hitler’s dentures and teeth. From Berlin, Vadis’ reports went to Lavrenty Beria, head of the NKVD.
Elena’s superior, Colonel Gorbushin, was summoned to Moscow where Victor Abakumov, the head of SMERSH of the USSR Commissariat of Defense, told him: “Comrade Stalin has familiarized himself with the entire course of events and the documents relating to the discovery of Hitler. … He considers the matter closed. At the same time, Comrade Stalin said, ‘But we shall not make this public.’”
On Nov. 1, 1965, Kagan, now Elena Rzhevskaya, received a phone call from Marshal Georgy Zhukov. During World War II the distance between Zhukov, the commander in chief of the Soviet army and Stalin’s deputy, and Elena, then a rank-and-file translator, was immense. Now aged 69, demoted after the war by Stalin and later by Nikita Khrushchev, Marshal Zhukov lived in obscurity, receiving no one.
His meeting with Elena was an exception. Despite his proximity to Stalin Zhukov had not been informed about Hitler’s death, obtaining the first definite confirmation from Elena’s book. Unfathomable to her, even the glorious marshal who had accepted Germany’s surrender in Berlin was kept unaware that Hitler’s body had been found and identified. After the war Stalin had pressed Marshal Zhukov, “Where is Hitler?”
By then, Stalin had received ample factual evidence of Hitler’s death, yet he denied this knowledge to the world. So, it fell to Elena to disclose the secret of the century. First published in Moscow in 1965, her memoir became widely translated (although not into English) and sold 1.5 million copies. The English translation of an expanded version of her book appeared in 2018.
Elena struggled for answers as to why Stalin suppressed information about Hitler’s death. Stalin’s “inscrutable personality” and his “ambiguous attitude towards Hitler” were some of her best clues. In 1965, Marshal Zhukov would tell her the obvious: “Stalin had no sense of responsibility to the historical record …”
Before returning to her army unit stationed in the German town of Stendal, Elena had visited Käthe Heusermann and Fritz Echtmann at the front headquarters and was allowed to take Heusermann for a walk. They chatted about things they would do together upon her release. “I liked everything about her. … Käthe was just somebody people liked.” She would not see Heusermann again. Two decades later, from an archival document, Elena would learn her fate and that of Echtmann.
When in October 1945 Elena was leaving Germany, Major Bystrov told her: “There were three of us at every stage of this Hitler saga. Of those three, you are the only one who can write about it.” Elena was a future writer, having studied literature before the war; two others were intelligence officers. She left Germany on board Zhukov’s Douglas cargo plane, which was returning to Moscow.
During the postwar decade, when Stalin launched his campaign against the Jews, Elena witnessed arrests in the Jewish community. In January 1948, Solomon Mikhoels was killed on Stalin’s orders. Elena was in the stream of mourners going past the great actor’s coffin in the Jewish State Theater. Mikhoels’ theater, which she had frequented, was shut down the following year. Like other Soviet Jews at the time Elena was denied employment. She also faced an additional fear—she was one of the three witnesses of Adolf Hitler’s postmortem. Nonetheless, she recorded information about the search for Hitler.
In 1954, one year after Stalin’s death, she took her memoir to Znamya literary magazine, which published war journalism and prose. The editor, afraid to be the first to publish an account about the discovery and identification of Hitler’s remains, printed her memoir, but without this vital part. In 1961 Elena outwitted her editors and included the story establishing Hitler’s death in her book Spring in a Greatcoat, a collection of her previously published novellas. Her editors failed to spot the new material.
In September 1964, after years of trying, she received access to the documents she had been translating in Berlin two decades earlier. Some bore her signature as a military translator; others were new to her. Thus, she came upon a folder containing the 1945 “delivery notes for items the staff at front headquarters were sending to the SMERSH directory in Moscow.” Two of Hitler’s tunics and a cap were being forwarded to Moscow along with two other “items”—K. Heusermann and F. Echtmann. This brief inhumane reference spelled out their fate. “I just sat there dejected, switched off,” Elena writes. “I just had to live with it, another secret.”
Much later, Elena read Heusermann’s unpublished memoir about her imprisonment in Russia, which she received from Lev Bezymensky, a fellow wartime interpreter and writer who had interviewed Heusermann in Düsseldorf. Before being charged she spent six months in the Lubyanka Prison, then six years in solitary confinement in Lefortovo. In November 1951 Heusermann and Echtmann (among others) were condemned by resolution of the Special Council of the Ministry of Internal Affairs “as witnesses of Hitler’s death.”
In December Heusermann was dispatched in a cattle car to a labor camp in Taishet, southeastern Siberia, where, unable to fulfil her labor quota and put on a penal ration, she became emaciated. She was saved by a woman, a Carpathian Jew, who shared her food parcels with her.
The end of Heusermann’s term, in 1955, coincided with Chancellor Konrad Adenauer’s visit to the USSR; he agreed with Khrushchev about the return of German prisoners. Flown to Moscow, placed in a well-furnished cottage in the countryside, Heusermann was taken on a sightseeing tour of Moscow—before being dispatched to Berlin in a first-class sleeping compartment. She was 45 when she returned. Her fiancé was long married and raising a family. Heusermann settled in Düsseldorf and worked for a while in dental practice. In the mid-1960s she and Echtmann testified in Germany that they had identified Hitler’s body from his teeth. Elena learned this from articles in Shtern and Die Welt.
After publication of her book Berlin, May 1945 Elena repeatedly traveled to Germany. When offered to meet Heusermann, she refused. “What could I say to her?” she writes. “I had been spared, but had evidently myself come within a whisker of her fate.” Heusermann had paid a terrible price for helping the Soviet investigation. In Memoirs of a Wartime Interpreter where she first included Heusermann’s story, Elena writes: “That burden of guilt will never leave me.”
A brief afterword: In 1986 my father, the writer Grigory Baklanov (Friedman), published Elena Rzhevskaya’s account of her meeting with Marshal Zhukov in the literary magazine Znamya, which he edited. He was able to prevail over censors who wanted to suppress Zhukov’s negative remarks about Stalin.
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Alexandra Popoff is the author of several literary biographies, most recentlyVasily Grossman and the Soviet Century.
Mnamo Mei 8, 1945, mtafsiri wa kijeshi wa Sovieti, Elena Kagan, alipewa sanduku lenye rangi ya rangi ya burgundy. Msimamizi wake katika kikundi cha kupambana na ujasusi cha SMERSH alikuwa amemwambia kwamba kilikuwa na meno ya Adolf Hitler na kwamba alikuwa na jukumu la uhai wake kwa ajili ya kuhifadhiwa kwake. Siku ya V, Elena, Myahudi ambaye angekuwa na umri wa miaka 100 wiki hii, alikuwa akishikilia sanduku na kile kilichobaki cha Hitler. "Hali niliyokuwa nimekabili ilikuwa ya ajabu, isiyo ya kweli", baadaye aliandika katika kitabu chake, Memoirs of a Wartime Interpreter. <unk>Mungu Mwenyezi, je, hii inatokea kwangu? "Hii ni mimi nikiwa hapa wakati Ujerumani inapojiuzulu, nikiwa na sanduku mikononi mwangu lenye mabaki ya Adolf Hitler?""" ! Ingemchukua maisha yake yote kuelewa kikamilifu wakati huu, na matokeo yake. Maiti ya Hitler na Eva Braun ilichimbuliwa mnamo Mei 4 katika shamba la Reich Chancellery. Mabaki hayo hayakutambuliwa na yakazikwa tena. Baada ya mfululizo wa mahojiano, ambayo yalitoa ushuhuda kuhusu kujiua kwa Hitler, miili ilifunuliwa na hati rasmi ilitolewa. "Elena alikuwa hapo kushuhudia: ""Katika blanketi ya kijivu, twisted na moto, kuweka nyeusi, mabaki ya binadamu hideous, caked na makundi ya matope."" wakati kushoto yake hisia untouched, tofauti na mtazamo wa hivi karibuni wa Goebbels ""watoto waliokufa, ambayo haunted yake: msichana mdogo, Heidrun, alionekana kuwa na umri sawa na binti yake mwenyewe." Kikosi cha kupambana na ujasusi cha Kagan kilichohusishwa na Jeshi la Tatu la Kushambulia kilipewa mgawo wa kumtafuta Hitler, utafutaji uliofanywa kwa siri sana. Mnamo Aprili, wakati vita vya Berlin vilipokaribia kumalizika, Elena alitafsiri mahojiano ya wafungwa katika chumba cha chini cha nyumba karibu na Potsdamer Platz. "Hata hivyo, ""Hitler alikuwa wapi?"" - ""Hitler alikuwa wapi?"" - ""Hitler alikuwa wapi?"" - ""Hitler alikuwa wapi?"" - ""Hitler alikuwa wapi?"" - ""Hitler alikuwa wapi?"" - ""Hitler alikuwa wapi?"" - ""Hitler alikuwa wapi?"" - ""Hitler alikuwa wapi?"" - ""Hitler alikuwa wapi?""" "Elena alikuwa akikumbuka katikati ya Berlin, ""ngome zilizokuwa zikiporomoka za majengo yaliyokuwa yamechomwa,"" na hewa isiyoweza kupumua, ""mchungu na isiyo na uwazi kutokana na moshi na vumbi la mawe.""Ilikuwa mwaka wake wa nne mbele ambapo alijitolea akiwa na umri wa miaka 21, akimwacha binti yake mchanga." Mwaka 1941 Hitler aliposhambulia Urusi, jeshi la Urusi lilihitaji sana watafsiri. Elena alikuwa amejiandikisha katika kozi ya tafsiri ya kijeshi ambapo udhibiti wake bora wa Kijerumani uligunduliwa (mjane wa Karl Liebknecht, Sophie, alikuwa miongoni mwa walimu wake). Alipokabiliwa na nafasi ya kutumikia huko Moscow pamoja na maafisa wakuu, Elena alikataa, akichagua kwenda vitani. Mnamo Januari 1942, meli hiyo ilitumwa katika eneo la Rzhev, mji wa kale ulio umbali wa maili 132 kaskazini magharibi mwa Moscow, na mahali pa mapigano makali. Wajerumani waliliita Rzhev, lililokuwa kwenye makutano ya reli na barabara kuu, "kiwanja cha kuruka" cha kuruka hadi Moscow. Stalin alidai kwamba mji huo uachiliwe kwa gharama yoyote ile, na kwa miezi 17 mapigano ya Rzhev na maeneo ya karibu yalikuwa ya damu zaidi katika vita hivyo. Hata hivyo, vita hivyo havikuandikwa hata katika vitabu vya historia vya Sovieti. Baada ya vita Elena alifanya kampeni ya kutambuliwa rasmi kwa jukumu la Rzhev la ushujaa na msiba katika kutetea Moscow na alichukua jina la kalamu Rzhevskaya. "Mwanzoni mwa mwaka 1945 mkuu wa kikosi cha upelelezi cha Poland, Boris Bystrov, alitangaza kuwa ""Nitakapowasili Ujerumani nitamkamata Goebbels"" na alishangaa kuona Bystrov na maafisa wengine wawili huko Berlin wakigundua mabaki ya Goebbels." Mwili wa Goebbels uliokuwa umechomwa moto ulionyeshwa mbele ya Ofisi ya Kansela ya Reich. Inajulikana kwa ajili ya prosthesis yake ya chuma na boot orthopedic, Goebbels'mwili <unk> alionyesha kuanguka kwa Reich ya Tatu, <unk> Elena anaandika. Tai yake ya manjano, ambayo kwa njia fulani iliokoka moto, ilionekana kuwa ishara ya nyota ya manjano ambayo Goebbels alibuni ili kuwatambulisha Wayahudi. Stalin hakufurahia kwamba uvumbuzi wa mabaki ya Goebbels ulitangazwa. Aliamuru kwamba utafutaji wa Hitler uendelee kwa siri sana. Kikosi cha upelelezi cha Elena kilipunguzwa kuwa watu watatu: Kanali Vasily Gorbushin (aliyeongoza utafutaji huo), Meja Bystrov, na mtafsiri. Walikatazwa kuwasiliana na waandishi wa habari na wapiga-picha. Mnamo Mei 2, vikosi vya Urusi vya jeshi la 5 vilivamia jengo la Reich Chancellery. Kikundi cha Elena kilipewa amri ya kuchunguza Ofisi ya Kansela na Führerbunker. Wakati wa mashambulizi makubwa makombora ya makombora yalikuwa yakishambulia Chancellery, baadhi yakitua kwenye paa la bunker na kukata umeme wake; mahali hapo kulikuwa na giza na joto. "Elena anakumbuka hivi: ""Kulikuwa na meza zilizopinduliwa, mashine za kuandika zilizovunjika, glasi na karatasi chini ya miguu.""" Bormann alikuwa na barua, Hitler alikuwa na karatasi za kibinafsi, na Goebbels alikuwa na kitabu cha kumbukumbu cha tarehe kutoka 1932 hadi Julai 8, 1941. Alisoma magazeti katika majumba ya Ofisi ya Kansela. Akiwa amezingatia kazi yake ya haraka, Elena angeweza tu kuchunguza kwa ufupi kitabu cha kumbukumbu cha Goebbels kabla ya kukituma kwenye makao makuu ya mbele pamoja na maelezo yake. Mwaka 1964 alipokuwa akifanya utafiti wa kumbukumbu zake, alisoma kitabu hicho katika Hifadhi ya Baraza la Mawaziri. Baada ya kuachiliwa kwa Reich Chancellery waandishi wa habari wa vita wa Sovieti walimiminika ndani ya Führerbunker, wakitoka na zawadi. Mnamo Mei 5, Kanali Nikolai Berzarin, kamanda wa Jeshi la 5 la Shambulio, aliweka nafasi hiyo chini ya ulinzi. Kikundi cha upelelezi cha Elena cha Jeshi la Tatu la Kushambulia kililazimika kuingiza kwa siri mabaki ya Hitler na Eva Braun. Mnamo Mei 6, asubuhi na mapema, miili ya waliokufa ilibebwa kwenye ua wa bustani ya ofisi ya rais na kupakiwa kwenye lori lililokuwa likisubiri. Katika mji wa Buch, karibu na Berlin, tume ya wataalamu wa matibabu na wataalamu wa magonjwa, ikiongozwa na mtaalamu mkuu wa kitiba wa Kwanza wa Belarusian Front, Luteni Kanali Faust Shkaravsky, ilifanya mfululizo wa uchunguzi wa maiti. Mwaka 1936 Hitler aliagiza uchunguzi wa kwanza wa rangi ya watu. Mnamo Mei 8, 1945, wataalamu wa Sovieti walichunguza mabaki ya Hitler. Daktari mmoja Myahudi, Anna Marants, aliyekuwa mkuu wa huduma ya kitiba, alifanya upasuaji huo. Baada ya vita, Marantz alikuwa akifanya kazi kama mtaalamu mkuu wa magonjwa ya jinai wa Kwanza wa Belarusian Front. Wataalamu wa magonjwa ya kibinadamu wa Sovieti walikatazwa kupiga picha, lakini Mei 9, wakati wa upasuaji wa mwili wa Goebbels, Daktari Shkaravsky aliwapiga picha wataalamu wa matibabu katika chumba cha uchunguzi. Kwa sababu mabaki ya Hitler yalichomwa vibaya, meno, pamoja na madaraja mengi, taji, na vifuniko, yalikuwa njia muhimu zaidi ya kitambulisho. "Hitler alipata ""mwisho wa dhahabu"" na ""mwisho wa chini"" katika sanduku na kupewa Koloneli Gorbachev, ambaye alitoa kwa Elena, aliyehesabiwa kuwa wa kuaminika zaidi katika kikundi chao cha watu watatu." (Zamani zaidi, huko Poznań, "sanduku kubwa lenye vifaa vya dhahabu" lililetwa kutoka benki hadi chumbani mwa Elena. Dhahabu hiyo ilipaswa kupelekwa Moscow katika mifuko iliyofungwa; wakati huohuo ilifunikwa katika chumba kilichokuwa chini ya sofa yake. Nilikuwa mtu wa kuaminika. Kwa hiyo huko Poznań nililala juu ya hazina ya dhahabu, <unk> yeye anasema.) Mnamo Mei 8, walipokuwa wakisafiri kupitia Berlin iliyokuwa imeharibiwa, walimpata daktari wa koo wa Hitler, Dk. Carl von Eickens, mkuu wa kliniki ya chuo kikuu cha Charité. "Hata hivyo, baada ya kuuawa kwa Hitler mwaka 1944 na kuuawa kwa Trotsky, ""Lew Trotsky"" aliendelea kuwa mgonjwa wake." Mtaalamu mmoja wa daktari wa meno katika kliniki hiyo alisaidia kutafuta daktari wa meno wa Hitler, Dakt. Hugo Blaschke, ambaye wakati huo alikuwa amekimbia Berlin; Dakt. Bruck, daktari wa meno Myahudi ambaye alikuwa amechukuliwa kutoka kwenye kujificha, alikuwa akifanya kazi katika kliniki yake. Mwanafunzi wake wa zamani, Käthe Heusermann, alikuwa msaidizi wa daktari wa meno wa Dakt. Blaschke. Alikuwa amemhudhuria Hitler na alisaidia kumficha mwalimu wake Myahudi kutoka kwa Wanazi. Heusermann alipokea vyakula vyake katika Reich Chancellery, akivishiriki na Daktari Bruck. Heusermann alikuwa mwanamke mrefu, mwenye nywele nyeupe, mwenye kuvutia mwenye umri wa miaka 35. Akiwa sehemu ya kikundi cha Hitler alikuwa na mengi ya kuhofu; hata hivyo, alikuwa amekataa toleo la Dakt. Blaschke la kuhamishwa. Alieleza kuwa mpenzi wake alikuwa Norway na aliogopa kupoteza mawasiliano naye iwapo angeondoka Berlin. Alitumikia kama msaidizi wa Blaschke tangu 1937 na alisaidia kumchoma Hitler meno. Heusermann alihojiwa mara kadhaa na kwa muda mrefu. Yeye ndiye mtu pekee aliyekuwapo ambaye alijua sifa za pekee za meno ya Hitler. Elena anaandika, "Nilimwomba asipe meno majina yao ya kitaalamu - incisor, canine, na kadhalika, kwa hofu ya kwamba siwezi kuhusisha maneno ya Kijerumani na Kirusi kwa usahihi. Badala yake, aliwapa tu nambari. <unk> Simulizi la Heusermann lilipatana na ripoti ya upasuaji wa maiti. Pia alisaidia kupata rekodi za meno za Hitler na picha za X-ray, baada ya kukisia kwa usahihi kwamba zilihifadhiwa katika Führerbunker. Rekodi za meno za Hitler zilipatikana katika chumba cha sanduku, kwa kushangaza bila kuharibiwa, kwa kuzingatia machafuko ya jumla ya bunker ambapo askari wa Urusi walikuwa wakisherehekea. Mnamo Mei 11, Shkarovsky, aliyekuwa mkurugenzi wa uchunguzi wa maiti, alimhoji Heusermann huko Buch. Wakati huu alichora mchoro wa meno ya Hitler, akitoa maoni juu ya kila undani. Alisema kwamba mtaalamu wa meno wa Dakt. Blaschke, Fritz Echtmann, angeweza kuthibitisha ripoti yake. Echtmann alichunguza meno ya Hitler na Eva Braun. "Braun alisema, ""Sikufanya daraja kama hilo kwa ajili ya mtu mwingine yeyote."" - Alipokuwa akikaribia kumaliza uchunguzi, mwanajeshi mmoja wa Hitler, Harry Mengershausen, alikamatwa." Alikuwa ameona maiti ya Hitler na Braun ikichomwa moto na kuzikwa. Mengershausen na wachunguzi wake waliketi juu ya magogo katika bustani ya Kansela huku Elena akitafsiri. Mengershausen alipokazia mahali pa kuzikia, uthibitisho usioweza kupingwa wa kifo cha Hitler ulipatikana. "Nilikuwa na uhakika, ""Elena anaandika katika kumbukumbu zake, ""kwamba ndani ya siku nyingine au mbili ulimwengu wote utajua kwamba tulikuwa tumepata mwili wa Hitler. ""Lakini Pravda, uchapishaji mkubwa wa Sovieti, ulichapisha akaunti za kutoroka kwa Hitler, na Jeshi Nyekundu lilihimiza kumtafuta Hitler. """ "Ilikuwa ni ujanja wa udanganyifu, jaribio la ajabu la kuficha ukweli kwamba mwili wake ulikuwa umepatikana", Elena anasema. Stalin, akiwa amearifiwa juu ya matokeo ya uchunguzi, alimtuma mwakilishi wake Berlin ili ahakikishe kibinafsi ripoti hizo. Luteni Jenerali Alexander Vadis, mkuu wa upelelezi wa kupambana na Uturuki, alianzisha mzunguko mpya wa mahojiano. Käthe Heusermann na Fritz Echtmann, waliokuwa huru hadi wakati huo, walikamatwa. "Elena, kama mtafsiri, alionwa juu ya dhima yake ya uwezekano: ""Kila kitu kinachohusiana na uchunguzi wa kifo cha Hitler kilikuwa siri ya serikali ya Sovieti na adhabu ya kuifunua ilikuwa hadi miaka 15 katika gulag.""" Luteni Jenerali Vadis alikusanya faili kwa ajili ya Stalin, ambayo ilipelekwa Moscow pamoja na uthibitisho wa vitu: meno ya Hitler na meno. Kutoka Berlin, ripoti za Vadis zilipelekwa kwa Lavrenty Beria, mkuu wa NKVD. "Kulingana na taarifa za polisi, Koloneli Gorbachev alimwita Viktor Abakumov, mkuu wa jeshi la ulinzi la Urusi, ""Mshirika Stalin amejifunza yote yaliyotokea na hati zinazohusiana na kugundua Hitler.""" ... Yeye huona jambo hilo kuwa limefungwa. "Mwanzoni mwa mwaka wa 1965, Stalin alimwambia Kagan, ""Hii haitajulikana hadharani."" 1 Novemba 1965, Kagan, ambaye sasa ni Elena Rzhevskaya, alipokea simu kutoka kwa Marshal Georgy Zhukov." Wakati wa Vita Kuu ya Pili ya Dunia, Zhukov, aliyekuwa kamanda mkuu wa jeshi la Sovieti na msaidizi wa Stalin, na Elena, aliyekuwa mtafsiri wa kawaida wakati huo, walikuwa mbali sana. Baada ya kuachiliwa kazi baada ya vita na Stalin na baadaye na Nikita Khrushchev, Marshal Zhukov aliishi katika giza, bila kupokea mtu yeyote. Mkutano wake na Elena ulikuwa wa kipekee. Licha ya ukaribu wake na Stalin Zhukov hakuwa amejulishwa juu ya kifo cha Hitler, kupata uthibitisho wa kwanza wa dhahiri kutoka kwa kitabu cha Elena. Hata marshal aliyekubali kujisalimisha kwa Ujerumani huko Berlin hakujua kwamba mwili wa Hitler ulikuwa umepatikana na kutambuliwa. "Mashabiki wa Stalin walipoanza kumshawishi Zhukov, ""Hitler yuko wapi?"" aliuliza, ""Je, Hitler yuko wapi?"" na Stalin alikataa kuwa na ushahidi wa kutosha wa kifo chake, lakini aliamua kuifanya kuwa ni kweli." Kwa hiyo, ilikuwa ni jukumu la Elena kufunua siri ya karne hiyo. Kitabu chake cha kumbukumbu, kilichochapishwa kwa mara ya kwanza huko Moscow mwaka 1965, kilitafsiriwa sana (ingawa si kwa Kiingereza) na kuuzwa nakala milioni 1.5. Tafsiri ya Kiingereza ya toleo lililoongezwa la kitabu chake ilionekana mnamo 2018. Elena alijitahidi kupata majibu kuhusu kwa nini Stalin alificha habari kuhusu kifo cha Hitler. "Utu usioeleweka" wa Stalin na "mtazamo wake usioeleweka kuelekea Hitler" zilikuwa baadhi ya vidokezo vyake bora. "Mashali Zhukov alimwambia: ""Stalin hakuwa na hisia ya wajibu kwa rekodi ya kihistoria... Kabla ya kurudi kwa kitengo chake cha jeshi kilichokuwa katika mji wa Ujerumani wa Stendal, Elena alikuwa amewatembelea Käthe Heusermann na Fritz Echtmann katika makao makuu ya mbele na aliruhusiwa kumchukua Heusermann kwa kutembea.""" Walizungumza juu ya mambo ambayo wangefanya pamoja baada ya yeye kuachiliwa. Nilipenda kila kitu kumhusu. ... Käthe alikuwa tu mtu watu walipenda. <unk> Yeye bila kuona Heusermann tena. Miongo miwili baadaye, kutokana na hati ya kumbukumbu, Elena angejua hatima yake na ya Echtmann. "Mwanzoni mwa Oktoba 1945, wakati Elena alipokuwa akiondoka Ujerumani, Meja Bystrov alimwambia: ""Tulikuwa watatu katika kila hatua ya hadithi hii ya Hitler." Kati ya hao watatu, wewe ndiye pekee anayeweza kuandika juu yake. <unk> Elena alikuwa mwandishi wa baadaye, baada ya kusoma fasihi kabla ya vita; wengine wawili walikuwa maafisa wa ujasusi. Aliondoka Ujerumani akiwa kwenye ndege ya mizigo ya Zhukov ya Douglas, iliyokuwa ikirudi Moscow. Katika miaka kumi ya baada ya vita, wakati Stalin alipoanza kampeni yake dhidi ya Wayahudi, Elena aliona watu wakikamatwa katika jumuiya ya Wayahudi. Mnamo Januari 1948, Solomoni Mikhoels aliuawa kwa amri ya Stalin. Elena alikuwa katika mtiririko wa waombolezaji wakipita mbele ya jeneza la mwigizaji mkuu katika Jumba la Maonyesho la Jimbo la Kiyahudi. Jumba la maonyesho la Mikhoels, ambalo alikuwa akizuru mara kwa mara, lilifungwa mwaka uliofuata. Kama Wayahudi wengine wa Sovieti wakati huo, Elena alikataliwa kazi. Pia alikabiliwa na hofu ya ziada - alikuwa mmoja wa mashahidi watatu wa Adolf Hitler baada ya kifo chake. Hata hivyo, alirekodi habari kuhusu utafutaji wa Hitler. Mwaka 1954 baada ya kifo cha Stalin, alitoa kumbukumbu zake kwa jarida la fasihi la Znamya, ambalo lilichapisha uandishi wa habari za vita na mashairi. Mhariri, akiogopa kuwa wa kwanza kuchapisha ripoti kuhusu ugunduzi na utambulisho wa mabaki ya Hitler, alichapisha kumbukumbu zake, lakini bila sehemu hii muhimu. "Mwaka 1961 Elena aliwapiga wakurugenzi wake na kuingiza hadithi ya ""Kifo cha Hitler"" katika kitabu chake ""Mvua katika Greatcoat,"" mkusanyiko wa riwaya zake zilizochapishwa hapo awali." Wahariri wake walishindwa kuona habari hiyo mpya. Mnamo Septemba 1964, baada ya kujaribu kwa miaka mingi, alipata hati ambazo alikuwa akitafsiri huko Berlin miongo miwili mapema. Baadhi yao walikuwa na saini yake akiwa mtafsiri wa kijeshi; wengine walikuwa wapya kwake. "Kwa hivyo, alipata folda iliyo na ""maelezo ya utoaji wa 1945 kwa vitu ambavyo wafanyakazi katika makao makuu ya mbele walikuwa wakituma kwa orodha ya SMERSH huko Moscow.""Vazi viwili vya Hitler na kofia zilikuwa zikiendeshwa Moscow pamoja na vitu vingine viwili." Heusermann na F. Echtmann. Maneno hayo mafupi yasiyo ya kibinadamu yalifafanua hatima yao. "Nilikaa tu huko nikiwa nimevunjika moyo, nikizimia", anaandika Elena. "Mara moja, Elena alisoma kumbukumbu za Heusermann kuhusu kifungo chake nchini Urusi, ambayo alipokea kutoka kwa Lev Bezymensky, mtafsiri mwenzake wa wakati wa vita na mwandishi ambaye alikuwa amemhoji Heusermann huko Düsseldorf.""" Kabla ya kushtakiwa alitumia miezi sita katika Gereza la Lubyanka, kisha miaka sita katika kifungo cha upweke huko Lefortovo. Mnamo Novemba 1951, Heusermann na Echtmann (miongoni mwa wengine) walishtakiwa kwa azimio la Baraza Maalum la Wizara ya Mambo ya Ndani kama mashahidi wa kifo cha Hitler. Aliokolewa na mwanamke, Myahudi wa Carpathian, ambaye alishiriki vifurushi vyake vya chakula pamoja naye. Mwaka 1955 Rais Konrad Adenauer alisafiri na Khrushchev kwenda Urusi, na baada ya hapo akaamua kuwapa askari wa Ujerumani. Alisafirishwa kwa ndege kwenda Moscow, akawekwa katika nyumba ya mashambani yenye fanicha nzuri, na Heusermann akapelekwa kwenye ziara ya kutazama Moscow - kabla ya kupelekwa Berlin katika chumba cha kulala cha darasa la kwanza. Alikuwa na umri wa miaka 45 aliporudi. Mchumba wake alikuwa ameolewa kwa muda mrefu na alikuwa na familia. Heusermann aliishi Düsseldorf na kufanya kazi kwa muda fulani katika mazoezi ya meno. Katika miaka ya 1960, yeye na Echtmann walitoa ushahidi nchini Ujerumani kwamba walikuwa wametambua mwili wa Hitler kutokana na meno yake. Elena alijifunza jambo hilo kutokana na makala katika magazeti Shtern na Die Welt. Baada ya kuchapishwa kwa kitabu chake Berlin, Mei 1945, Elena alisafiri mara kwa mara kwenda Ujerumani. Alipoombwa kukutana na Heusermann, alikataa. "Ningeweza kumwambia nini?" anaandika. "Nilikuwa nimeokolewa, lakini ni wazi kwamba mimi mwenyewe nilikuwa karibu sana na hatima yake". Heusermann alikuwa amelipa bei kubwa sana kwa kusaidia uchunguzi wa Sovieti. "Katika kitabu chake cha ""Memoirs of a Wartime Interpreter"" (Memoirs of a Wartime Interpreter), Elena anaandika: ""Mzigo huo wa hatia hautaniacha kamwe."" - Baba yangu, mwandishi Grigory Baklanov, alichapisha simulizi la Elena Rzhevskaya kuhusu kukutana kwake na Marshal Zhukov katika jarida la fasihi la Znamya, ambalo alileta." Aliweza kushinda wakaguzi ambao walitaka kukandamiza maoni mabaya ya Zhukov kuhusu Stalin. Unaweza kusaidia kuunga mkono chapa ya kipekee ya Tablet ya uandishi wa habari wa Kiyahudi. Bonyeza hapa ili kutoa mchango leo. Alexandra Popoff ni mwandishi wa wasifu kadhaa wa fasihi, hivi karibuni Vasily Grossman na Karne ya Sovieti.