November 29 in Russian history

Once again kudos to Jason, who runs ExecutedToday.com. Today he wrote an article about Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya.

Zoya was one of the most famous partisans in the USSR and, of course, her life and death were mythologized. So, in one of the first articles published in 1942, the author told that the during the tortures the fascists asked her where is comrade Stalin, and she replied that comrade Stalin is vigilant on his duty. In 1990s many newspapers (mostly tabloids) published articles about Zoya based on dubious new documents. Some of them concluded that her death was the result of the careless decision of the commanders who sent children to death, that it was some other girl, that there were no Nazis in the houses that she burned, others claimed that she was schizofrenic. These sensations were not confirmed later.

However, these fake stories launched some serious investigations. So, the facial expertise confirmed that it was really Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya. There were two versions of why she was caught. First, a member of her group, Klubkov, who was caught first but managed to escape later, was accused of betraying her. He was executed in 1942. However, he was, probably, forced to slander himself during the interrogations in the Soviet counter-intelligence. The German documents stated that she was captured after one of the village residents, Sviridov, noticed her and reported to the Germans. It became known that after she was seized, some women, who had earlier lived in the houses occupied by the Nazi soldiers and burnt by the partisans, attempted to attack her to avenge for their houses.

The remaining part of her story, including her last words, is true and complies with the testimonies of the residents of Petrishchevo.

Zoya's brother, Alexander, was killed in Vierbrudenkrug, near Königsberg, on 13 April 1945.