8.9. 1941 Beginning of the siege of Leningrad

The siege of Leningrad began in early September 1941. It lasted a full 900 days. The suffering of the local population was immeasurable. People died of hunger, cold, disease, bombing and sniping.

By the end of the second week of August 1941, Plan Barbarossa had been in full swing for seven weeks. German army groups swept through the Ukraine: Smolensk had fallen, nearly four Russian armies were surrounded near Kiev, Army Group North was heading for Leningrad, and to the south German forces were advancing toward Crimea. According to German claims, nearly two-thirds of the Red Army's force at the start of the war, 2,750,000 men, had been eliminated. At least two-thirds of them were prisoners of war who died of starvation.

The actual siege of Leningrad began in early September 1941. The beginning of this operation coincided with the movement of most of the armored units of Army Group North to the center of the front, where they were to take part in the final drive on Moscow. The German troops arrived at Leningrad precisely on 8 September. Hitler's original intention was to seize Leningrad by first assault. The German firing positions were right on the edge of the city.

"The brave defenders repulsed the attack. The siege lasted a full 900 days, until the blockade was broken. The suffering of the local population was immeasurable. People died of hunger, cold, disease, bombing and sniping. Due to the frozen ground, it was almost impossible to bury the bodies of the dead and they were deposited, for example, in the hospital yard. At one time, the number of corpses reached up to the first floor," writes Ladislav Chrobák in his book Stories from My Life and Travels.

Today, all the victims of the blockade are buried in the Piskarevsky cemetery, where they are placed in common graves of 10,000. The graves are marked only by the year. It counts one million inhabitants. In the cemetery there is a larger-than-life bronze statue of the Mother of the Fatherland mourning her children. On the wall behind the statue is an inscription - No one will be forgotten. Nothing will be forgotten.

When the siege ring closed in early September 1941, the city's population was about 2.5 million, including about 100,000 newly arrived refugees. By the end of 1943, on the eve of the liberation, the population had fallen by at least 1.9 million to no more than 600,000 souls. "By that time, about one million Leningraders had been evacuated across Lake Ladoga, and another 100,000 had been sentto the front, which means that the people who died of hunger must have been less than 800,000," Anna Reid writes in Leningrad.

Demographer Nadezhda Cherepenina recently recalculated these figures based on residence permits issued in the city at the time. Her estimate of the dead, about 700,000, is lower because she excludes from the calculation, for example, unregistered refugees from the countryside...

Sources: Christian Jennings, The Third Reich Listens, Anna Reid, Leningrad, Ladislav Chrobak, Stories from My Life and Travels, https://historycollection.com/