A story in an envelope: letters home from a soldier who did not return from the war. Front letters A

Soldiers' letters... Triangles, yellowed from time to time, with field mail stamps... What a salvation they were during the war, reaching the news to this day, like greetings from a distant time of war. Written to the sound of bullets, they are extremely sincere and are all the more precious to us.

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Letters from the war years

Class hour

Goals:
1. Expand children’s knowledge about war; interest in unknown historical facts; cultivate respect for the defenders of the Motherland; develop patriotic feelings and experience of moral behavior of the individual, stimulating interest in the history of one’s country, small homeland, village.
2. To contribute to the formation of students’ ideas about the history of correspondence, about letters of the war years, as an integral part of the history of our country and our people.

Equipment:
computer, multimedia projector, screen, presentation “Letters from the War Years”,

Video Letter from the Front(1)

Teacher: 67 years ago, on May 9, fireworks thundered in honor of the victory in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945, but the echoes of that war still live in every heart. There is no family that is not affected by the war. As letters from the front were expected, small yellow triangles were a guarantee that the person who sent them: husband, son, brother, loved one was alive and well, which means there was hope of seeing him alive. It was so scary when letters stopped coming from the front, which meant the person was missing or killed.

Letters from the war years keep the memory of those days. They had everything: short, spare stories about the war and poems, photographs, if there was an opportunity to be photographed by a front-line photographer, clippings from front-line newspapers, words of love for loved ones, at that moment they contained life!

Soldiers' letters... Triangles, yellowed from time to time, with field mail stamps... What a salvation they were during the war, reaching the news to this day, like greetings from a distant time of war. Written to the sound of bullets, they are extremely sincere and are all the more precious to us. How much joy the long-awaited, triple-folded notebook piece of paper, in which sometimes there were only two words: “I am alive,” brought to families. Unfortunately, it often happened differently.

Many Russian families carefully keep pieces of paper that have turned yellow with time, become thinner at the folds, and are usually written in pencil with faded field mail stamps and military censorship marks. Letters from the fronts of the Great Patriotic War - how they were awaited! It is not for nothing that the front triangle remained in our minds as one of the symbols of that formidable era.

Performance of the song “Frontline Letters”(gr. Fidgets)

How many soldiers' letters

Since that last war

Still to the recipients

Never delivered

Maybe there is no addressee

And there is no one who wrote it...

So who is he looking for?

Triangular envelope

chorus

Triangular fable

Impossible reality

To the three dooms of the sky

Bullet crazy square dance

Triangular story

A story in a few lines

"Like, I fight with conscience...

Listen to your mother, son.."

Covered with yellow ash

Triangles autumn

The lines are washed away by the showers

Like a widow's tear

And the words have already become

Very illegible

But it's painfully clear

The meaning of those letters is simple

chorus

Triangular fable

Impossible reality

To the three dooms of the sky

Bullet crazy square dance

Triangular joy

Triangular sadness

Survivors three words

"I'm Marusya, I'll be back.."

We want you to know

People of our country

These letters were written

We have soldiers from the war

This is how it was bequeathed

Love everything completely

What were they defending?

And they were able to protect

chorus

Triangular fable

Impossible reality

To the three dooms of the sky

Bullet crazy square dance

Paper triangle

Have dreams and hold on

Flashed once

"WIN..it seems..!"

Teacher: On January 19, you and I will celebrate the 70th anniversary of the liberation of our village from the Nazi invaders. More than 400 Nasonovites went through the gunpowder smoke, blood and sweat of the hard times of war, and over 300 of our fellow countrymen never met the victorious spring of 1945. The names of many of them are inscribed in the glorious history of their native village: they are included in the memorial of the monument. But the soldier’s connection with his home was not interrupted. Letters from the front... They are kept in many families, in archives, in museums. You take them in your hands so carefully, like an expensive and fragile object. Sheets of paper, yellowed with age, sometimes filled in with pencil and uneven handwriting. The lines have almost faded, but the front-line envelope marked “Military” still calls for:

For the honor of my wife,
For the lives of children,
For the happiness of my Motherland,
For our fields and meadows -
Killenemy invader.

Student: Letters from the front, as historical documents, have a number of features.
1. The fighter sending the message home did not even think that, decades later, his message would be read and studied by strangers. Therefore, he wrote simply, frankly, and sometimes unpretentiously, conveying numerous greetings to his family and friends. The soldier was interested in the smallest everyday details of the rear life, which he missed so much.
2. Many letters are very short and discreet. They were written in the intervals between battles, on the eve of the battle. Several lines of such a letter end with the phrase: “I’m leaving for battle.”
3. Being in the terrible hell of war, the soldier sought in his letter to reassure and encourage his relatives. Therefore, the letters are full of optimism, hope of return, faith in Victory.
4. Front-line soldiers constantly looked death in the eye: friends and fellow soldiers were dying around them, each of them was “on the brink” of death. Therefore, courage and heroism have become everyday, everyday life. They wrote about their exploits modestly, as a matter of course.
5. It is no secret that the letters were reviewed by military censorship. Lines containing important information, military data, were crossed out and painted over with black ink. The front triangle was stamped “Viewed by military censorship.”

Student:1

They wrote them on the verge of death
Under the grinding of tanks, the roar of guns,
They wrote them in the trenches, dugouts,
On the bomb-scarred border,
On the streets of burned cities...
Oh, letters from the front lines of those terrible years -
There are no more priceless documents in the world!

Student 2

“...I wrote everything I needed,
And when I see you, I’ll tell you.
And now the soldier's letter
I'll fold it into a triangle.

The first angle is the most important,
I'll bend this corner
So that with Victory and glory
We ended the war.

I'll fold the edges of the second one -
Here comes the corner
To return me healthy
On the father's threshold.

Well, the third, well, the third
I’ll fold it in your honor as soon as possible,
To meet you as before
And call it yours.

So fly with warm greetings
To the treasured porch,
Triangular, without brand,
Front letter! »

(shows how to fold a front triangle)

(reading letters by children - boys read letters from soldiers)

“Hello, dear Zinochka and Galochka! I send you my warmest greetings. Zinulya, now there is only one task - the speedy defeat of Hitler so that we can meet again. I hope that after the defeat of the enemy our meeting will take place. I hope that you will pass this life test with honor. Always remember that I think about you in battles, that I, without sparing my life, fight for your quiet life, for your freedom and independence. And if you have to die, then don’t forget me, know that my life is the price of your life. I think you understand all this perfectly well.

Warm greetings to everyone who knows me and to all of ours. Kiss Galochka. I kiss you deeply many times. Yours, Anatoly."

"Mother! You must be really tired! How many things have you had to do, dear!.. Mommy, I ask you, at least don’t worry about me. I'm fine. It’s a simple thing, a soldier’s thing—we’re fighting. We are trying to finish off the Nazis as quickly as possible... You keep writing to me to tell me to be more careful. I'm sorry, mom, but this is impossible. I'm the commander. And who will the soldiers follow as an example if their commander begins to think in battle not about how to win the battle, but how to save his own skin? You, mom, understand that I can’t do this, although, of course, I would really like to go through the whole war and stay alive, to return to my hometown again, to meet all of you.”

: “Hello, dear brother Anatoly! I am writing you a letter from the front. Here I defend my Motherland. And I ask you - study well and listen to mommy! Tolya, you only need to study excellently. With this you will help me, defeat the enemy."

“Dear Manya! I send greetings to the children - Zoya, Kolya and Valya. I'm alive and well. Manechka, take care of the children. Pay attention to Zoe's health. She's weak for us. She needs to drink milk."

“Dear mother, I was wounded in Latvia. I'm in the hospital. The wound on my left leg is slowly healing. Soon we will win a little, then we will live cheerfully and happily.”

Private Vitaly Yaroshevsky, addressing his mother, wrote: “If I die, then I will die for our homeland and for you.” Pyotr Sorokin, who went missing in 1941, managed to write only a few letters to his family. Here are the lines from one of the latter.
“Hello, mommy! Don't worry about me... I've already been through my baptism of fire. We’ll be in Kronstadt, I’ll be sure to send you silk for your dress.” But I didn’t have time.

“Goodbye, dear mommy!

This is my suicide letter, and if you receive it, know that you no longer have a son. I died as your son and as the son of the Motherland. I did not spare my life for the good and happiness of people, for your calm old age, for the happy life of children.

No need to cry! Be proud and remember me. Tell those who are still growing up that you had a son and that he, without sparing himself, gave his life for their happiness, for their joys.

I am very worried when I write this letter to you, but I firmly believe that what I did not have time to do will be completed by my comrades. The Nazis will be wiped off the face of the earth, and they will have no peace in the next world.

I kiss you deeply, firmly for the last time!
Your son Oleg.”

Teacher: There wasn’t a person at the front who didn’t miss his home. It is no coincidence that almost all letters begin with an address to family and friends: “dear mother”, “my relatives”, “my dear children”, “beloved Masha”, etc. As a rule, in the letters of soldiers there are short narratives about the war. They sent poems, photographs, newspaper clippings and leaflets to their relatives. Since letters were written directly from the battlefield, “from the front line,” as the war progressed, front-line soldiers increasingly indicated the places where the battle was taking place. Usually just one line: “I’m writing from Prussia,” “we defended the Oder,” “greetings from Belarus.”

We, little sister, are now near Kaluga,
The nights are gentle and good here.
Even though the storm is approaching from the south,
The nightingales here sing from the heart...

A flash of lightning illuminated everything -
Helps me write a letter...

With unprecedented, fervent strength**
We will enter the battle to spite everyone's death...

I always can't sleep before a fight,
And today I couldn’t sleep...

I don’t say goodbye to you, sister,
When I have time, I’ll finish the letter...

Give my regards to our mother
And say: I am grateful to her,
Loyalty to the Motherland, earthly feeling,
Everything that is invested in us, sons,
With milk we imbibed and holy
Let us now fulfill our duty...

The commander and ordinary soldiers,
Dying, in delirium they call out to their mother...

I'll come back! How could it be otherwise?
Will fate turn towards Vasilko?..."

Mom is crying over this letter,
And then he puts it in foil,
So that this shrine does not fade,
That letter that came to her from the war...

And my grandmother was waiting for her son
Thirty years! "Whether lame or blind,
My son Vasyatka would return, -
She whispered at the icon, -
Without him, I have a hard time in the world..."

These are the ones the war destroyed!
Damn this war!

Teacher: Letters to the front! The soldiers were eagerly awaiting them. Letters from a distant home warmed their hearts. In the lull between battles, front-line soldiers read and re-read lines written by a dear and close person, remembering their wives, loved ones...

Each triangle has its own story: happy or sad. It also happened that sometimes news from the front that a loved one was alive and well came after a terrible government envelope. But the mothers and wives believed: the funeral came by mistake. And they waited - for years, decades.

(student reads with a black scarf on her shoulders, at the end she covers her head with the scarf)

There was a war going on. Ukraine moaned.
But the smell of spring was in the air.
A mother at the front wrote a letter to her son:
"Hello, my dear Alyoshenka!

Are you healthy, my beloved son?
You shed blood for the Fatherland...
How I want these couple of lines
Lay great love!

I, my love, miss you.
I'm crying...But I'm sorry. That's not the point.
Are you alive. I know that for sure.
After all, the heart cannot deceive.

I wish I could become a beautiful white bird,
So as not to suffer from separation,
Circling over the sinful Earth,
And to see you, my dear!

Why don't I receive news?
You promised to write when you left.
I meet the postman at the gate,
But there are no letters from you...

You beat the fascists. I understand, honey...
I know that you are sad about home...
But believe me, I will still find strength,
To wait for you, my baby.

Do you remember Valya? Did you live next door?
So, she said, she will be waiting for you.
I keep your hare from my childhood...
Do you remember how you loved to play with him?..."

The mother wrote to her child.
All in tears. Two nights straight.
And I didn’t know that there was a funeral
The postman will deliver today...

(the girls read the letters - letters to the front)

Hello, my dear, dear Vanechka, I’m sorry that I write rarely, because we are in the joy of autumn. Lots of worries. The other day we went with the women of our village to collect firewood; we couldn’t prepare firewood; there was nothing to heat the hut with in winter.

Autumn is the time for berries and mushrooms. Recently I went to the swamp to pick blueberries. I spent the whole day walking on damp hummocks, my shoes, you know, a little tight. But it’s okay, I managed, as long as it wasn’t difficult for the soldiers at your front. I live with you, I live with children. Yesterday there was a letter from our son Vasily, he is fighting on the Kaliningrad front, I really miss him. I pray for you every day. Irishka and Semochka often ask: When will dad and brother return from the war? And little Lizochka sits and sits and says: And if the war ends tomorrow, we will bite into sweet dumplings, and lots and lots of sugar and bread? Poor Lizochka, so far she has only one desire - to eat sweets! But don't worry about us. As people live, we will live too. You must be able to live in difficulties. I see you, my dear, thinner, exhausted from difficult hikes, but not broken!

We are looking forward to seeing you, see you soon, your Marusya. 08/28/41

The student reads E. Blaginina’s poem “Letter to a Soldier.”

Hello dad,

I'm dreaming about you again

Only this time not in war.

I was even a little surprised

How old you were in the dream.

Dad!

You will return unharmed

After all, the war will end someday.

My dear, my dear darling,

Soon the May holiday will come to us.

Of course, I congratulate you

And I wish you not to get sick at all,

I wish you with all my heart

Defeat the fascists as quickly as possible.

So that they don’t destroy our land,

So that you can live like before,

So that they don't bother me anymore

Hug you, love you,

So that over this huge world

Day and night there was a cheerful light...

Pupil. April 9, 1942 Hello, our dear and beloved brother Vanya! We send you all our heartfelt greetings. I’m telling you that we live as before, there is bread, there is firewood, but the situation with feed for the cattle is bad...

This is where I finish writing this letter, we remain alive and healthy, we wish the same for you, greetings to the whole family!

Pupil. March 15, 1942 Hello, dear dad! We miss you very much, we keep dreaming about you in your overcoat, if only you could come home. You should see, dad, how much snow we have. Dad, goodbye bye, send me an answer. Hello from my daughters.

Leading : The guys in our class carried out search work. And this is what we learned about our relatives

(Tanya Bezgodkova - presentation about her grandfather, Igor Potekhin - story about his grandfather, display of letters from the front)

Bottom line

Our class hour has come to an end.

I want to end it with these words:

Presenter ( against the background of the melody of the song “Echo of Love”):

A darkened leaf is folded into a triangle,
It contains bitter summer and alarm signals,
It contains the sadness of retreat in that desperate year.
The autumn wind is rushing and the command: forward!
Even death retreated, at least for a few days,
Where the soldiers' letters went their way.
And with a bow, the last letters, full of strength,
The postman brought gifts from those killed in battle.
Letters from the front contained both fate and love,
And the sleepless truth of front-line voices.
In letters the faith of a soldier in our peaceful days
Even though they were once far away.
I ask you: keep the soldiers' letters
They are simple and sometimes sad,
They hold so much hope and eternal meaning.
I ask you: keep the soldiers' letters,
An alarming memory of human kindness!

They have long remained in history. There are fewer and fewer people today who remember these terrible years. But the echo of war does not subside. Unexploded shells are still found on the battlefields, and military triangle letters and postcards are kept in family archives as a memory of the heroism of our fathers and grandfathers.

Front mail

Even in the USSR, the government paid special attention to the connection between front-line soldiers and their relatives. But the only way to do this in the early 40s was by mail. It was believed that a letter from home greatly increases a soldier’s fighting strength. Therefore, a postal message was organized. Machines for transporting correspondence were prohibited from being used for other purposes. had the same priority as wagons with ammunition. Therefore, they were allowed to be attached to any train so that military triangle letters from the front would reach their recipients.

All correspondence to the front and rear was free. The only exceptions were parcels. But the letters did not always arrive on time. There were cases that triangles came ten and twenty years after the end of the war.

Type of correspondence

Due to the great need for letters, the national economy began to widely produce envelopes, postcards and letter blanks. They had a colorful artistic design of a patriotic nature. On postcards, for example, caricatures of Germans were printed and they were signed with beautiful slogans: “I shoot so hard that not a bullet hits a German,” “Death to the German occupiers.”

But these preparations practically did not reach the front. And there wasn’t always enough plain paper for letters. Therefore, military triangle letters became widespread. Even a child knew how to fold them, since there were practically no envelopes then.

Newspapers and leaflets came to the soldiers, which raised morale and told about news that happened in the rear and on other fronts. But it was always meager and irregular, since wartime required caution. And with the message, everything was not always perfect, since postal vehicles were often ambushed and looted.

Triangular letters

Today it may not be clear why military triangle letters were sent. This form seems pointless and impractical. As the practice of the war years showed, this is absolutely not the case. The simple form allowed one to refuse envelopes and send free letters to any city in the Motherland.

Every soldier sent home military equipment, even a novice in military affairs knew it. To do this, a rectangular sheet of paper was folded diagonally from right to left, and then in half - from left to right. Since the sheets were rectangular, there was always a narrow strip at the bottom. It served as a kind of valve, which was tucked inside a triangle with pre-bent corners.

The letters were not sealed and did not require stamps. Addresses were written on the front side, and the back was left blank. The rest of the page was covered in small handwriting in order to communicate as much information about oneself as possible to loved ones, since letters were sent infrequently.

"Censored"

Since it was wartime, the letters could fall into the hands of the enemy. In order not to reveal secrets with them, censorship checked military triangle letters. This is where it becomes clear why they were not sealed, but simply wrapped in a special way. This made it easier for the censor to read them, so as not to damage the paper, and along with it, information valuable to relatives.

There were cases when fighters were accidentally able to describe the location of their position, the number of troops, or plans for further maneuvers. Such information was carefully sketched out in black paint so that no one could read it.

To bypass censorship and hint to loved ones about their condition or whereabouts, soldiers included small clues in their letters. There are cases when relatives received triangles with wormwood branches, which hinted at a bitter life in the field. Cuttings from newspaper leaflets were also used as hints.

Letters approved for sending were stamped “Censored”, which allowed further sending to the addressee.

The special meaning of the triangle letter

During the war years there were almost always problems with the delivery address. Firstly, people in the rear often moved to escape the fighting. Secondly, they also did not stand still. Thirdly, recipients often died or went missing. In such cases, military triangle letters became a kind of signal of joyful or sad news. History knows many cases when they arrived with a delay, much later than the official “funeral”. This gave hope to the family that the soldier was alive and well and would soon return home.

If the addressee died in war, the delivery address was crossed out and the letter was returned. This was tantamount to a funeral that might never come. It is for this reason that letters were never returned if the addressee moved to an unknown address or ended up in the hospital, but the post office did not know which one.

Today, various unreceived war triangle letters are kept in museums. Photos of them serve as a source for studying the history of the Great Patriotic War, since the sheets of paper themselves are already dilapidated and can collapse from frequent touching.

Subjects of letters

Since there was strict censorship at the front, military triangle letters had a special style. The fighters rarely told sad details about themselves. They were brave and expressed great optimism that the war would soon end.

In response, they asked to tell us about their relatives and news that happened at home. Soldiers often expressed concern about the health of relatives. The tone of almost all letters is solemn. And the messages themselves are filled with sincerity, which can be read in every word.

Today we know that if the fighters had not known how to make a military triangle letter, we would not have known what the war was really like. After all, it’s no secret that official data did not always coincide with real events.

When the current generation sees letters from the front folded into triangles, young people are often surprised by their unusual shape. But 70 years ago, this form of letter did not surprise anyone - then they were the most valuable thing that a postman could bring, because “triangles” were news from a loved one.

Triangle letters were the standard form of correspondence between soldiers during World War II. With their help, communication was maintained between soldiers fighting at the front and their relatives. The triangles reported that the soldier was alive, but terrible news could also come - such letters often replaced a “funeral message.” Where did the unusual form of letters come from? During the war, letters from soldiers from the front were delivered to their families free of charge. However, in the very first weeks of the war, postal workers were faced with the fact that there were simply not enough envelopes.

This is how triangle letters came to be, soldiers simply folded their letter several times, while on the blank outer side they wrote the address of the recipient and the name of the sender. For such letters, not only ordinary sheets of paper were used, which also had problems, but also pages torn from booklets, paper from cigarette packs, newspapers (the text was written in the margins) and any available material. The content of such letters was mostly standard - soldiers wrote about their love for their families, sometimes drew pictures for their young children and promised to return home after the war.

Such letters had another advantage. After all, it was easy for them to be checked by the NKVD censors, who looked through all the correspondence. That is why the letters were not sealed. Censors checked the letters for any statements against the system or any references to classified information, such as the location and movement of military units.

Despite all the terrible stories about the NKVD, censors, as a rule, treated letters very humanely (unless, of course, they contained outright criticism of the authorities).

Usually, everything “unnecessary” was mercilessly covered over with black ink, and the letter itself was sent. News from the front was turned back very rarely. Today, thousands of similar letters survive, which were once sent in the tens of millions during the war. Basically, they can be found in private collections and among eyewitnesses of the war, who carefully preserve pieces of paper that have turned yellow with time.

On May 9, 2010, to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the victory in Russia, sets of triangular letters specially printed for the occasion were sent to war veterans. Just like 70 years ago, they can be sent without a stamp or stamp to any place within Russia. And finally, these letters were immortalized in songs, of which the most famous, perhaps, is Mark Bernes' song "Field Mail."

Remembering the events of the war, it is worth remembering about fate, photographs of which at one time did not leave the front pages of Soviet newspapers.

The collection was prepared and published by Nizhny Novgorod archivists. It includes letters from front-line soldiers, their relatives and friends, as well as reproductions of photographs of correspondents identified in archival funds. The collection not only puts into circulation unpublished documents and family archives of Nizhny Novgorod residents, but also shows the events that took place through the eyes of direct participants in the war.

“I’m still alive...” (Front-line letters 1941-1945) / Comp. M. Yu. Gusev. N. Novgorod, 2010. - 304 p.: 8 p. ill. - 1000 copies

“Anyutka, you’ll be in Rabotki, write me a song from the record “Golden Taiga” performed by Vinogradov and if you find a song from the movie “Musical Story” performed by Lemeshev, beginning with the words: “Oh, you, darling, you are a beautiful maiden, we will go with you, let’s go for a walk” (Doc. N 103)….

The collection was prepared and published by Nizhny Novgorod archivists for the 65th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945. It includes letters from front-line soldiers (soldiers, officers), their relatives and acquaintances, as well as reproductions of photographs of correspondents identified in archival funds.

In the 1980s - early 1990s. in the State Archive of the Gorky Region (now the Central Archive of the Nizhny Novgorod Region, TsANO) several collections of front-line letters were formed, received from various sources: from the districts of the region, from a Nizhny Novgorod radio journalist, etc. The idea of ​​their publication arose among archivists back in the mid-1990s ., however, the preparation of the book began only in 2008, when public interest in these sources was no longer in doubt.

The collection has two goals: one is scientific, related to the identification and introduction into circulation of unpublished documents from TsANO, the State Socio-Political Archive of the Nizhny Novgorod Region and family archives of Nizhny Novgorod residents; the other is universal, designed to publicize and preserve for posterity the names of the direct participants in the war, as well as to show the events that took place through their eyes.

The publication included 216 letters, the authors of which belonged to various social groups, had different educational levels and life experiences. With their help, archivists tried to present a certain cross-section of society, to show the real attitude of the participants in military operations to the events that took place, their worldview and spiritual priorities. The main criterion for selecting documents was the significance of the content of the letters, as well as their factual and emotional components. Most of the documents were letters in envelopes, postcards, soldiers’ “triangles” and so-called “soldier’s letters” on letterhead, which made it possible to do without envelopes and stamps. There were extremely few letters sent to the front, because it was difficult to preserve them in combat conditions.

Inside the collection, the documents are arranged in alphabetical and chronological order, which is quite justified, since the main task of the compilers is to show the personality and psychology of a person who finds himself in extreme conditions of war. Each block of letters is preceded by a brief biographical note about the authors. True, no information has been found about some of them; a number of letters are dated from indirect sources.

The collection was prepared in accordance with the Rules for the publication of historical documents in the USSR (M., 1990). In exceptional cases, when transmitting text, the spelling and syntactic features of the original are exactly preserved. There is a solid scientific and reference apparatus: a historical and archaeographical preface, biographical information about the authors of the letters, notes to the text, name and geographical indexes, as well as a list of sources used. It is fortunate that in order to avoid confusion, the biographical information indicates the current administrative and territorial affiliation of the mentioned settlements.

The published letters were sent to relatives and friends, acquaintances, former colleagues, school teachers, professors, party and Soviet bodies, organizations where their authors worked before the war, strangers, and relatives of the victims. It was the concern for the families they left behind that forced the front-line soldiers to turn to the district committees with a request to help their wives, parents, and children. In a collective letter from soldiers and commanders to the wife of a deceased fellow soldier, in addition to assurances that in response to the death of her husband they will “mercilessly destroy the reptiles” until they liberate their “beautiful Motherland,” there is also a request to accept “a modest gift of 319 rubles as a memory about a comrade” (Doc. No. 67).

In the first year of the war, front-line soldiers mainly talked about the difficult everyday life of war: long marches, digging trenches, shelling, shortages of food and tobacco.

“We haven’t seen a single piece of bread for two days; they only give us a pot of soup without bread for 4 people twice. We’re just dragging our feet, we don’t know what will happen next,” writes N. T. Zheglov to his relatives, but immediately adds: “But for now he’s alive and well” (Doc. No. 44).

The success of the Soviet troops near Moscow gave the fighters hope for a quick end to the war (apparently, by analogy with the Patriotic War of 1812):

“You know that the German is being persecuted on all fronts, he is retreating, there is unrest within his country, the soldiers of his army have already begun to desert... from which we can conclude that the war will soon end and we must return home with victory” (Doc. No. 45 ).

However, from the end of 1942, the place of unfulfilled hopes in letters was taken by descriptions of the atrocities of the Nazis:

“These are the kind of cannibals who force residents in a temporarily occupied territory to sit on ice, in basements, hungry and cold, while they themselves drag and rob them down to the last chicken” (Doc. No. 3).

For example, I. S. Gorokhov told his relatives how he

“I walked along the charred streets of villages and cities, saw the burned corpses of old men and women, and small children” (Doc. No. 31).

The only and natural desire of the Soviet soldiers after everything they saw was to give “heat to a cultural nation” (Doc. No. 59), to beat “mercilessly, harshly, without mercy” (Doc. No. 60).

In 1944-1945 The content of letters from the front has changed: they contain more and more nostalgia and fewer stories about military operations. Tired of endless battles and scenes of devastation, the soldiers were mainly interested in the health of their relatives, their successes in school and work, declared their love, and yearned for a peaceful life.

The soldiers' letters to the parents and wives of their fallen fellow soldiers stand somewhat apart. Many of them did not just report the death of a loved one, but sought to support relatives, entered into correspondence with them, and tried to help financially. In one of these letters, a soldier, telling about the heroic death of his fellow soldier, asked his mother:

“Dear... Praskovya Ivanovna, I ask you to consider me your son” (Doc. No. 21).

And in further correspondence, he addressed her as “dear mother Praskovya Ivanovna,” promising to petition the command to provide her with the necessary documents to receive benefits as the family of a deceased hero (Doc. No. 22). Such touching filial care cannot fail to touch the readers' heartstrings.

Of course, letters from the front are not the most reliable source for studying the history of the Great Patriotic War. Often they were written after the battle, in moments of calm, some things were remembered. There is an opinion that people were afraid to express their thoughts openly, keeping in mind the censorship. It seems that the reluctance to talk in detail about the war was dictated not so much by fear of military censorship, but by the desire to break away from the terrible reality at least for a short time, an attempt to return to the familiar home world. That is why the soldiers waited so much for letters from home and tried to answer them.

“Anyutka, you’ll be in Rabotki, write me a song from the record “Golden Taiga” performed by Vinogradov and if you find a song from the movie “Musical Story” performed by Lemeshev, beginning with the words: “Oh, you, darling, you are a beautiful maiden, we will go with you, let's go for a walk" (Doc. No. 103).

And this is another letter:

“And the more difficult the situation, the more I think about you, my beloved, I want to be among you again as soon as possible, to hold Galochka and Yurik in my arms and enjoy them, and they with you, and when I write this letter, it’s as if I’m talking to you, I would like to tell you, when you sit down to dinner, leave a place for me too” (Doc. N 130).

The subject matter of the published letters is clear evidence of what a person lived at the front: it is impossible to think only about battles all the time; soldiers were always drawn to a peaceful life. Perhaps this is one of the most interesting results of this collection, which received a great public response and became a worthy gift from Nizhny Novgorod archivists for the anniversary of the Victory.

• Full text of the book(rar archive, text in pdf format) “I’m still alive” (Front-line letters 1941-1945) on the website of the state archival service of the Nizhny Novgorod region is available at the link

Extracurricular event for Victory Day for grades 3-6

Extracurricular event on the topic "Letters in the Great Patriotic War"

Yolgina Elena Stepanovna, primary school teacher, NOU "Russian full-day gymnasium", Chita
Description: The event is designed for students in grades 3-6 and is aimed at the patriotic education of the younger generation. The material will be useful to primary school teachers, class teachers of grades 5-6, the extracurricular activity was tested in grades 3-4 and 5, designed for 45 minutes - 60 minutes.
Target: help students understand the importance of field mail during the Great Patriotic War, contribute to the formation of a sense of patriotism through familiarity with letters from the Great Patriotic War.
Tasks:
1. Help to remember the period 1941-1945 in Russian history by association;
2. Organize a conversation about the Great Patriotic War, using letters as sources of information;
3. Teach how to make an envelope, conduct a master class;
4. Record a video letter - gratitude to veterans.
Planned results
- personal: nurturing patriotism and love for the Motherland and people, developing a sense of pride in one’s Motherland, the history of Russia, developing emotional and moral responsiveness;
-meta-subject: setting an educational goal, communication in a group, using oral speech for one’s conclusions and conclusions, mastering the skills of semantic reading of a text (epistolary genre), willingness to listen to the interlocutor and conduct a dialogue, defining a common goal, the ability to negotiate the distribution of roles in joint activities
- subject: improving reading techniques, understanding and awareness of text, the ability to consciously perceive and evaluate the content and specifics of various texts, and participate in their discussion.
Equipment: projector, monitor, envelope with dates 1941-1945, paper for folding triangles, letters from the front for reading in groups, a poem by Valentin Savin for each child, a camera for recording videos with words of gratitude to veterans, St. George's ribbon on the teacher's chest, photos of triangular envelopes from the times of the Great Patriotic War
Progress of the event.
1. Goal setting.
Teacher: I brought an envelope with me. Look at him carefully. There is a hint on it. What will we talk about today? What years are these?
1941-1945. (Write it down on the board). How many years did this war last? When did it start? When did it end? (sign by date). How many years have passed since it ended?
Letter, Great Patriotic War. So we'll talk...
You guessed right, we will talk about letters written during the Great Patriotic War and their meaning for people.
2. Updating knowledge.
Teacher: War...What do you imagine when you hear this word? (Write down the children’s answers on the board)
During the Great Patriotic War, people experienced full fear and pain, there was a lot of death and suffering.
Who knows what our country was called at that time? (Soviet Union)
Our country was not ready for war, so Nazi troops quickly advanced across our territory, capturing city after city, village after village, killing our people, including children. Before fascist troops attacked the Soviet Union, not a single country offered them adequate resistance. And their army was considered invincible. Hitler had a plan to take over our country. Who is Hitler? (Head of Nazi Germany). He planned to take over our country in a few months. But within the first days it became clear that this plan would not work.
3. Teacher: From the very first days of the war, a military field post was organized. Such mail is organized during wars. Each military unit has its own, usually five-digit number, since the military unit is constantly moving and the unit does not have a permanent address. Mail was given great importance. Why?

People wrote letters to each other. The WWII field mail delivered 70 million letters to the army per month.
Who delivers the letters?

The work of a postman at the front was dangerous and difficult. Postmen, under bullets and risking their lives, delivered letters to soldiers in the active army.

Ask someone who wants to read it
What is the mood of the letter?
Nevertheless, the troops fought bravely, but what did they do in the rear? What is the rear?

In the rear there were plants and factories, people worked selflessly for the front, for victory, without sparing themselves, they supported their relatives with letters.
Which city do you think Hitler wanted to conquer the most?
Indeed, Nazi troops were moving towards Moscow. All the people were very worried; they regularly announced the state of affairs at the front on the radio. By November 1941, the enemy was already near Moscow. On November 7, 1941, a parade of troops took place in Moscow.

Our soldiers immediately went from the parade to the front line, that is, where the fighting is taking place. And they defended Moscow.

Let's stand up, imagine how the soldiers felt, and just as beautifully as the defenders of Moscow, let's march to the song "Farewell of the Slav", composed by Vasily Ivanovich Agapkin.

For the first time, the Nazi troops were defeated and everyone realized that they could be defeated. This awareness was very, very important for all Soviet people. People realized that they could win this war. From the surviving letters one can trace how the mood of the fighters changed, they became confident in their victory. Here is one letter from a fighter to his mother. This letter was translated into poetry by the poet Valentin Savin.
(You have the text of this letter on your desk; you can read it with me).
You ask what's wrong with me
Am I healthy, alive and why am I silent?
Well, what can I tell you, dear.
I'm alive, healthy, I want to go home.

You know, a German near Moscow.
He is eager to celebrate the victory.
We are fighting a fierce battle with him.
We'll win, and I'll come.

Sometimes it's worse here than hell.
Believe me, my little mother,
I will not perish, I will not be lost.
Your love protects me.

Damn this war!

What else should I write to you about?
The same thing, day and night.
I can tell you one thing
We are driving the invaders away.

Do you see these triangles on the stand? Who knows what this is?
Why aren't these letters in envelopes? Everything can be explained simply: there were not enough envelopes and stamps. Letters from home were of great importance in maintaining the morale of the soldiers. They were the only connecting thread with people close to the fighters. The soldiers wrote that letters were like bread to them.
When do you think soldiers could write letters?

If a wounded soldier ended up in the hospital and could not write, then what did he do? Who could write from his dictation?

Of course, not all letters reached the addressee. Why?
Each letter has its own destiny. Most often, letters whose authors died in the war have been preserved. But if a person came alive, then, as a rule, there were no letters left. The soldiers did not keep many letters from home. Why?
They simply did not have the conditions for storage, the letters took a long time, and then from constant reading and lying somewhere in the breast pocket they gradually wore out.
4. Folding paper in the form of a “soldier’s triangle”
Teacher: Would you like to learn how to fold such a soldier's triangle?
Let's learn how to fold paper in such a way as to make a soldier's envelope. Maybe someone can do it. Place the sheet vertically. We pull the upper right corner to the opposite side, closer to the bottom of the sheet. Now we tighten the upper corner. We insert the lower part like a valve inside the triangle.
Did everyone succeed? If you want, then for Victory Day you can make such a triangular envelope, decorate it beautifully, write wishes and give it to the participants of the Great Patriotic War, home front workers.
5. Working with letters from war participants.
Teacher: Now we will read several letters. To do this, we will divide into groups of 5 people. Each group will receive an envelope. There is a letter in it. You need to familiarize yourself with it, note who writes and to whom, the date of writing, then choose one from the group who would read the letter to all of us. (1-2 minutes).
Ready? Who will be reading aloud in your group? The others listen carefully. What's the most important thing about lines? What interested you? or excited?
5. Minute of silence.
Teacher: We have already said that letters from the victims have been preserved. Let's honor their memory with a minute of silence.

6. Video letter of gratitude to veterans.
Teacher: A lot can be said about the Great Patriotic War. We must not forget how much we owe to those people who defeated fascism, who did not allow us to become slaves, and thanks to them we were born in the first place. Fortunately, not everyone died. There are fewer and fewer of those who participated in the Second World War. 70 years have already passed since then. Let's thank our veterans. Any of you can say words of gratitude. And I will record your video letter. I will submit our video letter to the Veterans Council of Chita; it will be shown to veterans at an event dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the Great Patriotic War. Think about what you will say to veterans, how you will thank them, in what words.
7. Reflection.
Teacher: Our lesson is coming to an end. Think back to what we were talking about. What do you remember that was interesting to you? Were letters needed during the war?
Did letters help you win?
Thanks everyone for the activity. I wish you never find out in real life what war is.