The fate of the son of Beria. Repression against the son and wife of Beria

The mere name of Stalin's chief of security, Lavrenty Beria, terrified ordinary citizens. But his wife was considered the first Kremlin beauty. Nina Beria was a bright brunette with burning eyes, and many men sighed for her. But Nino did not start any novels - all her life she remained faithful and devoted to her husband. Even when he was gone.

How did Lavrenty and Nino meet?

N. Zenkovich in the book "Marshals and General Secretaries" sets out the following version of the acquaintance of future spouses. Like, 16-year-old Nino came from the Mingrelian village, located not far from the village of Merkheuli, where Beria himself was from, to ask for her arrested brother. In Sukhumi, at the railway station, there was a train on which Beria was going to go to Tbilisi. It was in the early 20s. The girl began to ask for her brother, and Lavrenty invited her to his compartment. There he locked the door and raped Nino. After that, he kept her locked up in his compartment for several more days, and then offered to become his wife.

True, Nina Teimurazovna herself denied these details. She claimed that Beria simply invited her to marry him after several months of dating.

I.A. Mudrova in the book “Great love stories. 100 stories about great feeling"Writes:" Lavrenty Beria was married to Nina Teimurazovna Gegechkori. She was the niece of the Bolshevik Sasha Gegechkori and the cousin of the Menshevik and Freemason Gegechkori, who headed the government of Georgia in 1920, the niece of Noah Zhordania, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Menshevik government of Georgia, who fled abroad after the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks.

In the early 1920s, Nino, an orphan, lived with the family of her relative Sasha Gegechkori. When he went to prison for Bolshevik activities, the girl began to carry parcels for him and so met with his cellmate Lavrenty Beria. When Soviet power was established in Georgia, Beria specially came from Baku to ask Gegechkori for Nino's hand in marriage. But he refused, because she was a minor. Then Nino decided to marry Lawrence without permission. At least this is how she described the events in an interview with the Tbilisi newspaper 7 DGE, after perestroika.

According to Nina, the Soviet government was going to send Lavrentiy to Belgium to study oil refining issues. With one condition: he must be married. “I thought about it and agreed - rather than live in someone else's family, it's better to create your own,” explains Nino.

Kremlin wife

22 year old marriage young man on a 16-year-old girl at that time was the norm. Nina Teimurazovna assured more than once: she entered into marriage according to own will. But I didn't have to go to Belgium. The family lived in Georgia, then moved to Moscow, where Nina Teimurazovna worked as a researcher at the Timiryazev Academy. Beria entered Stalin's inner circle, including dealing with issues of the defense industry, including the development nuclear weapons and rocketry.

Unlike the wives of many other senior officials - Molotov, Kalinin, Budyonny, Poskrebyshev - Beria's wife never fell under repression. She was envied by other "Kremlin wives": among them she was known as the first beauty, wore elegant outfits, always looked perfect, was smart, graceful, with amazing taste and sense of style.

Beria's widow

A black streak began for their family after the death of Stalin. June 26, 1953 N.S. Khrushchev convened a meeting of the Council of Ministers of the USSR and raised the question of Beria's suitability for his position. As a result, Lavrenty Pavlovich was removed from all posts and arrested on charges of espionage and conspiracy to seize power. In addition, he was also accused of sexual promiscuity, that he had many mistresses, and not everyone entered into a relationship with him voluntarily.

Nina Teimurazovna Beria denied this information both during interrogations and later in an interview. She claimed that all the women with whom her husband allegedly had intercourse were in fact ... state security agents. According to her, Beria disappeared at work for days on end and he simply did not have time to start novels ...

After the arrest of Beria, Nina Teimurazovna and her son Sergo were first kept under house arrest at one of the state dachas near Moscow, then sent to prison. Until the end of 1954, both of them were kept in solitary confinement: she - in the Lubyanka, he - in the Lefortovo prison. In order to influence Nina, they even staged the execution of her son in front of her ...

When Beria was shot, the family was sent to Sverdlovsk. There, Sergo got a job as a senior engineer, but he and his mother were under constant surveillance. At the end of their exile, they returned to Georgia, from where they were forcibly taken back to Russia. Subsequently, at the request of a group of prominent scientists and in connection with the illness of Nina Teimurazovna, the family was allowed to move to Kyiv. Nina Beria died in Kyiv in the mid-90s, Sergo Beria - in 2000.

Shortly before her death, Nina Teimurazovna gave an interview in which she fully justified her husband. She claimed that Lavrenty Pavlovich was not involved in mass repressions, since the Beria family moved to Moscow only in 1938, and the main number of repressions fell on the 37th. Nowadays, it has become known that Beria, on the contrary, released from prison many who were arrested by his predecessors.

According to the widow, Everyday life Beria was quiet, calm, restrained, never raised his voice to the household, loved his wife, son and grandchildren, tried to spend every free minute with loved ones. She believed that her husband was killed "without trial or investigation" and that in fact Beria and other associates of Stalin served "high goals" and were devoted to their country and their people.

After graduating from the seven-year plan in 1938, he moved to Moscow with his parents Lavrenty Beria and Nino Taimurazovna. As a child, the boy was fond of music and actively studied foreign languages ​​- in addition to German and English, he learned Dutch, Japanese and French, and subsequently spoke many of them fluently.

The family's move to the capital was forced. Lavrentiy Beria was given the position of First Deputy People's Commissar of Internal Affairs - on Stalin's promise, for only a couple of years, and then he would allegedly be allowed to return to his native Georgia.

Beria arrived alone, which angered the leader, and soon the rest of the family was brought to the capital by force. The head of security received an order to “bring to Moscow everything that is alive in the Beria family,” which he did with perfect accuracy, delivering not only his wife and son, but also grandmothers, a deaf-mute aunt and 2 cats to the new address.

Sergo Lavrentievich settled with his family in a mansion on Mikheevskaya Street and went to Moscow school No. 175. After finishing 10 classes, the young man went to work at the Central Radio Engineering Laboratory of the NKVD.

When the war began, the leadership of the district committee of the Komsomol issued recommendations to Sergo for admission to the intelligence school. There, in 3 months he mastered the specialty of radio engineering and went to the active troops with the rank of lieutenant. Soon, the young officer was responsible for several responsible tasks, for example, participation in operations in Kurdistan and Iran.

A year later, Sergo Beria returned to Moscow and became a student of the military communications academy, which did not prevent the military authorities from time to time to call him for other secret assignments. For responsible service, the young man was awarded the Order of the Red Star and the medal "For the Defense of the Caucasus." In his senior year, Sergo developed a graduation project for a rocket control system, which the commission rated as excellent and recommended for implementation.

The science

In 1947, after graduating from the institute, Beria received the position of deputy chief designer of the SB No. 1 MV bureau. His educational achievements went into action: on the basis of the drawings, a group of specialists created anti-aircraft missile system S-25 "Berkut".

The bureau was an institution operating in the strictest secrecy: employees were brought and taken away on special buses, conversations in them, as well as movements along the corridors in working time, were banned, and specialists had special passes and were considered a "special contingent". The name itself, according to rumors, received an ironic decoding - “SB is“ the son of Beria ”, but there were few who wanted to repeat this joke publicly.

Over the years of work in the organization, Sergo Lavrentievich created a project for a new weapon - the Kometa system, for which he received the Stalin Prize and the Order of Lenin. In 1948, he defended his Ph.D. thesis, and in 1952, his doctoral thesis.

After Stalin's death, the scientist, along with other associates of the leader, fell into disgrace. Sergo and his mother were locked up in a dacha near Moscow, and then arrested. In 1954, Beria's son met in a solitary cell in the Butyrka prison - he was charged with organizing a counter-revolutionary conspiracy aimed at overthrowing Soviet power and the reconstruction of capitalism.

Soon the Central Committee of the CPSU issued a decree depriving Sergo Lavrentievich of the title of laureate of the Stalin Prize, scientific and military ranks (by the time of his arrest, he had risen to the rank of colonel). At the meeting of the VAK, it was announced that both dissertations did not contain the personal achievements of the scientist, but were the fruit of the joint work of a group of other engineers and calculators.

In November 1954, Sergo Beria was sent into administrative exile, retaining, however, the possibility of working in the military-defense specialty. Together with Nino Taimurazovna, he was given documents for the surname Gegechkori ( maiden name mother) to hide their relationship with Stalin's accomplice. Sergo settled in Sverdlovsk and worked for the next 10 years as a senior engineer at a research institute under the close supervision of the investigating authorities.

In 1964, Sergo's mother fell seriously ill, and he, by that time, having again become a prominent scientist, was allowed to move to Kyiv. There, Beria went to work in an organization now known as the State Enterprise Research Institute Kvant, where he stayed until 1988. Later, the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR invited him to the position of chief designer in the Department of New Physical Problems.

Beria's son was repeatedly offered to leave the country, but he never took advantage of a single opportunity, considering this a betrayal of his father's memory. In addition, Sergo preferred to serve his native country, and he never associated himself with the ruling elite.

In 1990-1999, Sergo Lavrentievich was the scientific director and chief designer of the Kyiv Research Institute "Kometa". During perestroika, as part of conversion projects, he created new materials for oil and gas pipelines and fuel tanks. It was from this organization that he was retired.

Personal life

In the biography of Beria, there is only one marriage - with Marfa Maksimovna Peshkova, granddaughter. Judging by the surviving photos, in their youth they were a beautiful couple: both are tall, with delicate features, and their children were also very good-looking.

The marriage union was preceded by a serious hobby. Sergo Beria became the first love of Stalin's daughter -. They studied at the same school, and a tall, slender brunette won the heart of a young girl. Parents reacted differently to what was happening: according to rumors, Stalin was not against their union, and Beria was very afraid of being so closely associated with a high-ranking family and advised his son to stay away from Alliluyeva.

To the relief of his father, Sergo's youthful love quickly cooled down, and he chose another wife - the beautiful Marfa, but Svetlana worried for a long time because of the failed relationship. Being married, she even tried to divorce him from his wife, but by that time Sergo had no feelings other than irritation.

This story is shown in the series "", which was released in 2018. The film is dedicated to the life of the leader's daughter and her love interests. Young Beria was played by Karen Galstyan.

Marfa Peshkova gave birth to three children to the scientist - a son, Sergei, and daughters, Nina and Nadezhda. When Sergo Lavrentievich was in exile in Sverdlovsk, his wife filed for divorce. According to her, the reason was the betrayal of her husband.

Later, the grown-up son moved to his father in Kyiv. Sergey is now married and works as a radio electronics engineer. Eldest daughter Nina is an artist, she graduated from the Stroganov School and moved to Finland with her husband, Nadezhda became an art critic and lives in Moscow.

All his life, Sergo spoke respectfully about his father. He reluctantly renounced the name of Beria and returned it at the first opportunity. According to the memoirs of his son, Lavrenty Beria was a multi-talented person: he was fond of architecture and painted beautifully, passing on his hobbies to Sergo. He treated children with love and gentleness, trying to instill in them diligence and independence.

The image of Beria the rapist, a dissolute and cruel man to women, created by propaganda, caused particular indignation in his son. He did not deny extramarital hobbies Lavrenty Pavlovich - he sometimes shared with his adult son the details of his personal life, but did not seek to condemn them.

“Father was not sinless,” Sergo said in an interview. “But which of the men at least once in his life did not allow himself such a weakness?” Just as mildly, he assessed other aspects of the parent's activities: "Those who accused him of all earthly sins, the same Khrushchev, for example, have much more sins."

Until the end of his life, he fought to restore the good name of his father. Sergo wrote the book “My father is Lavrenty Beria” in the genre of memoirs, where he not only recalls the warm moments associated with the family, but also opens some previously unknown pages national history. Later, 2 sequels were released: "The son is responsible for the father" and "In the corridors of Stalin's power."

Death

Sergei Beria died at the age of 75 in Kyiv on November 11, 2000. Despite his contributions to the field military industry, majority Russian media bypassed this event.

The cause of death was believed to be heart disease. The grave of the famous designer is located at the Baikove cemetery.

Bibliography

• 1994 - "My father is Lavrenty Beria"
• 1998 - " cruel age: Kremlin secrets»
• 2002 - “My father Beria. In the corridors of Stalinist power"
• 2013 - “My father Lavrenty Beria. The son is responsible for the father

Name: Nina Beria (Gegechkori Nina Teimurazovna)
Date of Birth: 1905
Age: 86 years old
Date of death: 1991
Place of Birth: Georgia
Activity: wife of the head of the NKVD Lavrenty Beria
Family status: widow

With the establishment of Soviet power in Georgia in the 1920s, the lives of many families, despite losses and upheavals, began to return to their usual track. High school student Nino Gegechkori was sheltered by relatives: she was left without parents, without a home, without a livelihood. Once, on the way to school, a thin guy in an oversized coat, cap and funny round glasses caught up with her. Nina knew him - it was Lavrenty Beria, an acquaintance of her uncle Sasha.

Beria bothered the girl with conversations that were not interesting to her. Without knowing why, she accepted his invitation for a walk in the park. There, on the bench, Lavrenty announced that he had been watching her for a long time and wanted her to become his wife. Not that the young man fell in love - his only hobby was politics - but a government trip to Belgium awaited him, and only family ones were allowed to go abroad.

Not what I imagined family life Nina. Brought up in the best Georgian traditions, she was an uncomplaining, submissive wife, kept the house in perfect cleanliness, and brought up her son in strictness. Beria disappeared day and night at work - he returned tired, taciturn. He went bald and stout so that Nina had to order new shirts and suits from the atelier almost every month. But once he was athletic and fit, he easily swam across the river, rowed, played volleyball. And yet she still loved her husband, although with her sensitive heart she understood: he had a mistress for a long time - and maybe more than one ...

Over time, the sexual promiscuity of the Commissar became more and more perverted, he chose not only beautiful women but also girls. With the rapture of a maniac, Beria kept a list - according to some sources, it contains 40 names, according to others - more than 70. It mentions famous actresses Zoya Fedorova, Tatyana Okunevskaya, Olga Chekhova, students of the Institute of International Relations and even the names of some "Kremlin wives".

Of course, Beria's opponents regularly reported on his behavior to Stalin, but he needed the services of his people's commissar and only smiled in response: "It's just that Comrade Beria is tired and he needs rest." However, when intelligence reported to Stalin that his daughter Svetlana had been seen in Beria's mansion, the leader was pretty scared. He immediately called her and ordered her to urgently return home.

Nina Teimurazovna was not only an unusually beautiful, but also a very intelligent woman. What made her deny irrefutable evidence and believe in the innocence of her monster husband? Perhaps the answer is known to those mistresses of Beria, who, even after his arrest, called the People's Commissar a true gentleman and refused to testify against him ...

Without the intercession of her husband, she waited for Nina hard fate: she was arrested and interrogated, but even when the execution of her son Sergo was staged in front of her, she refused to give evidence that denigrated the name of her husband. Then Sergo and Nina were sent to prison, and after the execution of Beria they were sent to Sverdlovsk. It was as if someone's hand had torn out of a history book a page with the name of Nina Beria. It is only known that after difficult years of wandering, due to illness, she was allowed to leave for Kyiv, where she died in 1991.

But a little about something else. In 1994, a book was published by Beria's son Sergo, entitled "My father is Lavrenty Beria." And in 2002 - the second edition with the participation of colleagues from France. good, kind, interesting book. An example of how a son should treat his father, even despite all the zigzags of his father's life. An example of how a son should fight for the honor of his father, even recognized by history scoundrel. It is difficult to question the life episodes cited by Sergo. By the way, Sergo does not report any special news on the main milestones of his life. Except, perhaps, for the assumption that his father L. Beria was killed by unknown soldiers on June 26, 1953, on the first day of the alleged arrest, and a made-up double was used in court instead of him.

But first things first.

First, about Sergo himself. He was born on November 28, 1924 in Tbilisi from the marriage of Lavrenty and Nino. This was their second child. The first died in infancy. This is reported by his mother during interrogation. At school, Sergo began to study in Tbilisi. He studied well, was an excellent student. He was into music and sports. By 1938 he had finished seven classes. In that year, Father Sergo Lavrenty Pavlovich already held a big post in Georgia. More precisely, the main one - he was the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Georgia. At the end of 1938, L. Beria was transferred to work in Moscow. To the post of First Deputy People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR. The people's commissar then was N. Yezhov. I think the appointment of the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of one of the leading republics to the post of first deputy. people's commissar can be safely called a demotion career ladder. Usually it was considered normal and approximately equal personnel situation when the first secretary of the regional party committee was appointed people's commissar or later minister. And here it’s not the regional committee, but the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the republic, and not the people’s commissar, but the first deputy. It is clear that Stalin planned to make a small "castling" and replace Yezhov in such a responsible post with a person close to himself. And it turned out to be Beria - a young 39-year-old Georgian fellow countryman, a responsible party worker, in the past a security officer and a reliable person, worthy of replacing Yezhov, who had bothered everyone and, moreover, had been fined in everyday trifles. I don’t know if Stalin revealed to Beria the cards that in a short time he would become the first person in the NKVD. Perhaps they had such a conversation after all. In any case, this should follow from the situation itself: Stalin must somehow explain to Beria why the idea of ​​​​moving the latter to Moscow suddenly arose, and even with a visible decrease. Sergo recalled that his father at first resisted the transfer, about which there are even documents, but then, apparently, having understood the prospect, he agreed. The decision of the Politburo took place, and Beria left to work in Moscow. One. Without family. Sergo and his mother stayed in Tbilisi. His mother - Beria's wife - at that time worked in Tbilisi, was engaged in agricultural science, and Sergo went to school. Sergo recalls that in the same year, 1938, Stalin's head of security, Vlasik, unexpectedly arrived in Tbilisi for them. The whole family - he, Sergo, his mother, grandmother and aunt were put in a comfortable saloon car and taken to Moscow to his father. Vlasik said that this was done by order of Stalin, who was unhappy that his "protégé" lives in deep solitude. The family was housed in the Government House on the street. Serafimovich. It is also called "House on the Embankment". Famous, historical object, repeatedly described in the literature. Address: Serafimovicha street, house 2. After a while they moved to a well-known mansion on the corner of Nikitskaya and Garden Ring(St. Kachalova, house 28). Sergo began to study at a Moscow school. “As usual,” it was school number 175, in Staro-Pimenovsky Lane, on Mayakovka. The famous Moscow school, where the children of high-ranking officials, including Stalin, studied. With good, experienced teachers, a well-thought-out program, a reliable boss - the publishing house of the Izvestia newspaper, which is still located 300 meters from this school. Among the teachers, by the way, was Galina Bulganina - the wife of Nikolai Alexandrovich. She taught English language. Sergo studied well here too. He was fond of radio business, which would later become his life's work and main profession. He was engaged in boxing in Dynamo. Trained him famous athlete- Honored Master of Sports and the absolute champion of the country Viktor Mikhailov. By the beginning of the war, Sergo was almost 17 years old. They didn’t take him to the front, despite the fact that he asked to go there. In the military registration and enlistment office, as usual in such cases, they offered to “grow up”.

And yet, in the fall of 1941, Sergo began military career. Not without the help of his father, as soon as he was 17 years old, he became a cadet of the NKVD intelligence school. Where this intelligence school was located and what it did, where it trained its graduates, we, of course, do not know. Sergo is silent about this. But that doesn't matter. It is clear that the scouts were trained for reconnaissance. And reconnaissance had to be conducted then behind enemy lines. The son of the People's Commissar of the NKVD is in intelligence. The phenomenon is normal. By the way, Stalin's children - Yakov and Vasily, Mikoyan's children - Stepan, Vladimir and Alexei, Frunze's son - Timur, Shcherbakov's son - Alexander and other guys - Sergo's friends at that time also went to fight. True, they were more fortunate: they were two or three years older than Sergo, by that time they had graduated from military schools and went to the front. All of them, as you know, were pilots, with the exception of Yakov - he was an artilleryman. Sergo was a scout. He liked this thing for a long time. His father supported him in this. Sergo recalled: “Father generally had a tremendous influence on my formation. For example, when I was only twelve years old, he gave me military technical bulletins and asked me to make collections of materials on a given topic. In Moscow, he complicated the task for me - he offered to make the same selections already from foreign magazines. He drove me into a certain direction so that I could learn to think and analyze. It was only later that I realized how much he had given me.”

And yet S. Beria tells something about the beginning of his intelligence career:

“We were then being prepared for being sent to Germany. Twice in 1941 they tried to throw it into the Peenemünde area, where the institute that developed rocket engines was located. Then the parachute drop was abandoned, preferring a long journey from Iran to Turkey, Bulgaria and further to Germany. In the end, they didn't take me. No one spoke about the reasons for what was happening, but I had to stay in Iran for a total of about four months. Then our group was recalled to Moscow, and then sent to the Caucasus. Literally for one hour I managed to drive home to see my mother. She told me that my father was also leaving for the Caucasus.”

During 1942, Sergo took part in the fighting in the Caucasus. Let me remind you that he was then 18 years old. He was part of the border groups of the NKVD, which opposed the German intelligence teams, ensuring the advancement of their troops to the mountain passes. At the same time, his father also took part in the defense of the Caucasus, but, of course, Lavrenty Pavlovich himself did not climb mountains and did not sit in ambushes. He performed there, so to speak, strategic functions. Sergo was awarded a medal for participation in the defense of the Caucasus, and his father was awarded the Order of the Red Banner.

At the end of 1942, by order of the headquarters of the Supreme High Command, the military academies were replenished with new students: the army needed competent military personnel. Sergo was offered the intelligence department of the Military Academy. Frunze. He trained then and trains now officers - commanders of military intelligence.

Sergo refused and asked to join the Leningrad Military Electrotechnical Academy (later the Academy of Communications) at the Faculty of Radar. During his studies, Sergo is also involved in special assignments. In particular, as he writes, during the Tehran Conference in 1943, as part of a special group, he provided information about the "informal situation" of the allies. Simply put, he listened to their conversations and reported "upstairs." On this occasion, Stalin himself received his reports. Stalin was pleased with the work of the scouts then. In fact, Stalin treated Sergo well. Once, seeing Sergo with his son Vasily, he reproachfully said to his son, who was not in a very sober state:

Take an example from Sergo. He graduated from the academy, postgraduate course!

Vasily muttered displeasedly:

Have you finished with us?

Sergo himself recalled this.

While studying at the academy, Sergo meets with famous scientists Berg, Shchukin, Kuksenko. They offered him a job in the field of radar. In 1947, he graduated from the academy with a gold medal and remained in postgraduate studies. Engaged in the development of guidance systems for the radar beam.

The topic is interesting and relevant. According to her, Sergo defended thesis at the end of the academy.

After graduating from postgraduate studies, S. Beria was the chief designer of the Almaz design bureau, which was located in Moscow not far from the Sokol metro station. He worked hard and conscientiously. He was respected in the team. Defended candidate and doctoral dissertations. He received the rank of colonel and the Order of Lenin. And he was then only 28 years old. Undoubtedly, his father supported him. But I think that this is just the case when such support benefits more than harm.

He was arrested in a very original way: on June 26, 1953, on the day of his father’s arrest, he, his pregnant wife Marfa, two children and his mother were transferred to a special dacha of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, where they were kept for about a month, and then he and his mother were arrested for real, with transfer to Lefortovo. Sergo describes all the horrors that he and his mother had to endure in Lefortovo, and then in Butyrka. They were often interrogated, including at night, they didn’t let me sleep, they made some idiotic accusations - such as “restoration of capitalism and the revival of private property”, staged an imitation of execution in order to force the mother, who was watching this “performance” from above from the window, to sign that -then. Marfa Maksimovna Peshkova - Sergo's wife recalls that he was brought to her on a date thin, emaciated, in prison clothes, girded with a rope. Marfa Maksimovna brought parcels to him in Butyrka. After being held in custody for a year and a half, after the execution of his father, Sergo was released and, together with his mother, was sent into exile in the Urals. With a surname not Beria, but Gegechkori, and with a patronymic, not Lavrentievich, but for some reason Alekseevich. Demoted from colonel to private, deprived of awards. Marfa Peshkova and three small children remained in Moscow. Atomic scientists Khariton, Kapitsa, Kurchatov participated in his release. They wrote to Malenkov and Khrushchev. Before his release, Sergo met with the new KGB chairman I. Serov and Prosecutor General R. Rudenko. They had a “peeping” conversation with him and released him. In addition, they suggested that Sergo change his surname and patronymic. He agreed and for the rest of his life became known as Sergei Alekseevich Gegechkori. Frankly, I think that then, in 1954, and later, it was in his interests. In prison, Malenkov spoke to Sergo twice. He was interested in his father's archives. In Sverdlovsk, Sergo worked in the old secret specialty: he was engaged in missile and torpedo weapons for submarines. Marfa Maksimovna recalls that they were given a good apartment in Sverdlovsk - a three-room apartment, however, far from the center. Sergo went to work at his research institute by bus. It's cold in winter, you could get sick. The mother-in-law got a job at the Khimmash plant. And she, Marfa, stayed with the children and "plied" between Moscow and Sverdlovsk. The eldest daughter, Nina, went to school in September 1954, and they decided that she should study only in Moscow. Two other small children (daughter Nadia and son Sergei - he was born in 1953, when Sergo was in Lefortovo) were also in her arms in Moscow. Marfa Maksimovna recalls that in Sverdlovsk Sergo had a woman whom she became aware of. The marriage broke up.

In 1964, with the permission of the country's leadership, Sergo and his mother moved to Kyiv, where he worked as a designer, and later as director of the Kyiv Research Institute "Kometa", doing the same as before. His son Sergei moved to Kyiv.

Sergo's mother, Nina Teimurazovna, died in 1992.

When I was writing a book about Vasily Stalin, I went to Kyiv to Sergei Alekseevich, interviewed him. He met me normally, talked for a long time about Vasily, then turned to the case of Lavrenty Pavlovich. Sergei Alekseevich did not raise any question about the rehabilitation of his father, which is attributed to him, and even explained to me the reason - our society is not yet ripe for this ...

Marfa Maksimovna Peshkova lives near Moscow, in Barvikha. I recently met with her, gave her my book about Stalin's son Vasily. She knew him well too. He says that Vasily was a good guy, but he only drank a lot. The children of Sergei Alekseevich and Marfa Maksimovna (a son and two daughters) are already adults. They have their own children.

This is the fate of Sergo.

Now closer to the materials of his criminal case.

According to the distribution of duties between the members of the investigation team, carried out by Rudenko when initiating a criminal case, Sergo "got" the assistant to the USSR Prosecutor General Alexander Kamochkin. More precisely, not so, Kamochkin got Sergo. This meant that Kamochkin would investigate all episodes related to Sergo. First of all, interrogate, confront, bring charges, conduct searches, and then send the case to court. Of course, provided that there are grounds for this. And if not, then issue a decision to dismiss the case. In thieves' language, all this is called in short - "twist".

So, from the moment of his arrest, Kamochkin began to "twist" Sergo Beria.

I must say that Alexander Nikolayevich Kamochkin himself was already an elderly, experienced investigative worker. He had the rank of State Counselor of Justice of the 3rd class, in military terms Major General. All his prosecutorial life he was associated with the preliminary investigation, by 1953 he reached the assistant prosecutor general, and later, after the end of the Beria case, he would become the deputy prosecutor general of the USSR, supervising the preliminary investigation in the prosecutor's office. A very serious position.

The procedure for investigating the case against Sergo was established in such a way that a separate case was opened against him, as well as against other persons arrested in parallel with L. Beria and his six "accomplices", and it was subject to independent investigation. The protocols of the preliminary investigation, interesting for the “main” case, were duplicated, that is, they were made in two copies - one for the Sergo case, the second for the father’s case, and, as N.S. Khrushchev, "his gangs". There are no major violations here. Now this is called "separating the case into a separate proceeding." It is only necessary to carefully monitor the capacity in which people are interrogated in this case (witness, suspect, accused). When I was a prosecutor, I demanded that my investigators “not get lost” in this. In my time, it was possible to run into a penalty here, including from the Prosecutor General. In the case of Beria, no one paid attention to these "trifles", including Rudenko himself. They even came up with a special form - the protocol of the interrogation of the arrested person. So guess who was this "arrested"?

I will not rewrite the entire criminal case against Sergo Beria into a book. I’ll say it again, it was hard for him in Lefortovo, and then in Butyrka, you wouldn’t wish this on your enemy.

At first, he was charged with a short “duty” charge under article 58 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR, in almost all its interpretations (a conspiracy against the Soviet regime, an attempt to restore capitalism, the revival of private property and other rubbish).

Kamochkin interrogated him several times on this issue. Sergo denied his guilt. A little later, according to the records in the protocols, Kamochkin began to find out all sorts of nonsense from him. Similar to this.

Answer: When we lived until 1938 in Tbilisi, my mother Nina Teimurazovna was manicured by a hairdresser named Manya, an Armenian by nationality, I don’t remember her last name. Mani had a daughter, Lucy, whom I knew as a child. About four years ago, the hairdresser Manya ended up in Moscow, she began to come to our country house, did manicures to Nina Teimurazovna and dyed her hair. I learned from Manya that her daughter Lyusya was married to Plygunov, a mechanic who worked at one of the factories where chief designer was Glushko. Perhaps I told Mana that her son-in-law could come to the recruitment department of KB-1, but I did not give recommendations to Plygunov. Plygunov was accepted into one of the shops, and then worked in the 16th shop. In 1953, Plygunov received the title of laureate of the Stalin Prize. I personally did not put him on the list for the award, but I saw him on the list.

Question: Tell us, who wrote the dissertations for you, for the defense of which you were awarded a Ph.D., and then a doctoral degree?

Answer: The fact that dissertations are being compiled for me by the theoretical department of SB-1 was known to the deputy. Minister of Armaments Ryabikov Vasily Mikhailovich, later head of the 3rd Main Directorate, and Shchukin Alexander Nikolaevich - deputy. chairman of the radar committee, later deputy. Head of the 3rd Main Directorate. Academician Mintz, an opponent for his doctoral dissertation, knew that the dissertation was being prepared in the theoretical department of SB-1. Shchukin A.N. was also an opponent. - academician.

Question: Consequently, you defended your candidate's and then your doctoral dissertations, using the work of a team of employees of the theoretical department of SB-1, appropriated the work of the latter. Have you previously used the materials compiled by G. V. Korenev, who was then a prisoner at the 4th special department of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, when compiling your graduation project, which you defended in 1947?

Answer: I can't remember if Kravchenko gave me the materials that Korenev was working on. However, these materials were not fully used in my graduation project. I admit the possibility that a drawing from Korenev's materials was attached to the graduation project. I can’t remember whether Korenev told me in 1948 about the sketch used in the graduation project, in which the car was missing a tail, or there was no such conversation. On the issue of preparing a dissertation, I did the wrong thing.

Question: Do you know that b. secretary Beria - Vardo, with whom Beria L. cohabited and had a child from her, were they sent to France and Turkey?

Answer: I don't know Vardo, I don't know her. In March 1953, in Barvikha, Sarkisov told me that Beria cohabited with his secretary Vardo.

After that, more specific questions and answers about the father begin. It must be said right away that what you will read below was obtained from a young man, on the one hand, driven to extremes, on the other hand, not experienced in all the “charms” of prison life, who testified in fact under torture, under the threat of execution of himself and his loved ones. Here are excerpts from Sergo's case.

Protocol dated 31.07.1953

(The interrogation began at 21:00 and ended at 00:50 on August 1, 1953)

Question: What can you show on the merits of the case and the charges brought against you?

Answer: Having familiarized myself with the decision to bring charges of July 31 this year. I declare that I do not plead guilty to the charges against me. I was not a member of the anti-Soviet treacherous group of conspirators, I don’t know who this group consists of, and I never set as my goal the seizure of power, the elimination of the Soviet system and the restoration of capitalism. I didn’t even have the thought that my father, Beria L P., could take the path of betrayal of the Motherland. But if he had such criminal goals, he did not share these goals with me. Beria L.P. is my father, but he moved away from me and my mother, in relation to whom he turned out to be a scoundrel.

Here are more serious questions and answers. It can be seen that the stay in Lefortovo has borne fruit. We read excerpts from the protocols. August 7, 1953 (21:00 - 0:50)

... I went to my father's apartment only on his call or through the housekeeper, asking him for permission to go to him. By nature, imperious, intolerant of remarks, he very rarely talked to me, and interrupted me in conversations. For questions government controlled he did not talk to me, rarely did I turn to him on these issues. I remember separate conversations with my father. After an editorial appeared in the Pravda newspaper about serious shortcomings in the bodies of the Ministry of State Security in connection with the doctors’ case, I turned to my father with the question: “Why are Ignatiev’s work being criticized, because he is the secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU?” I asked this question to my father because it was clear to me that without the knowledge of my father, the front line would not have appeared, since he worked as the Minister of the Interior. Beria P.P. he answered my question irritably, contemptuously at Comrade Ignatiev: “What kind of secretary of the Central Committee is he, he ... ( obscene word) canine. And don't mind your own business...

8/8/1953 (4 pm - 5 pm 35 min.)

... Question: Tell us everything you know about L.P. Beria's enemy activities.

Answer: I affirm that about the hostile activities of the father - Beria L.P. I don't know anything, he never spoke to me about his intentions. I knew that Beria L.P. led a depraved life, had a second family, which I learned from Sarkisov ...

Here's another interrogation protocol.

08/10/1953 (21:45 - 0:55)

... Question: Tell us everything about the criminal activities of the enemy of the people L.P. Beria.

Answer: I reiterate that I was not aware of the facts of the criminal activity of L.P. Beria. I did not know that my father was the leader of an anti-Soviet, treacherous group of conspirators whose goal was to seize power, eliminate the Soviet system and restore capitalism. Personally, I was not a member of any conspiratorial group. If Beria L.P. led a conspiratorial group, he hid his criminal activities from me.

Never in my presence Beria L.P. did not speak negatively about the leaders of the party and government. In only one case, when I asked why, after the case against doctors was closed, a politically sharp editorial was published in the Pravda newspaper, while Ignatiev was the secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU - Beria L.P. in an insulting manner expressed in the address of comrade. Ignatiev.

Interrogation protocol for the next day.

08/11/1953 (21 h -0 h 30 min.)

Question: Give evidence about the criminal activities of the enemy of the people L. Beria.

Answer: I affirm that I was not aware of the criminal activities of L.P. Beria. I knew that he was an immoral, depraved person, he meanly acted towards my mother and me. I did not know all the details about the depraved lifestyle of Beria L.P., but what I learned from Sarkisov gave me reason to consider Beria L.P. a morally corrupt person.

At that time, I could not imagine that Beria L.P. was an enemy of the people. Hostile statements from Beria L.P. I did not hear, in the family, he did not share about his work, about his intentions, plans.

And another interrogation. Again the next day.

08/12/1953 (21 hours - 0 hours 15 minutes)

Question: Your father, L.P. Beria, has been exposed as an enemy of the people, an agent of international imperialism. Having lost the appearance of a communist, becoming a bourgeois degenerate, the adventurer L.P. Beria hatched plans to seize the leadership of the party and the country in order to restore capitalism in our country. Tell us about the criminal activities of Beria L.P.

Answer: It is now clear and understandable for me that my father, Beria L.P. exposed as an enemy of the people and apart from hatred I have nothing for him. At the same time, I reiterate that he did not tell me about his criminal activities, about criminal intentions and goals, as well as about the criminal ways in which the enemy of the people Beria went to his criminal goal. Living with him in the same house, but in different apartments, I knew that he was leading a depraved life, that he was an immoral person. Now it is clear to me that a depraved way of life is just one disgusting feature of the enemy of the people, L.P. Beria. However, at that time I did not have the thought that he could betray the interests of the Motherland. Obviously, living with us, the enemy of the people Beria L.P. disguised himself as statesman, and we in the family believed this ...

And another interrogation. Again the next day. Fifth in six days.

08/13/1953 (23:00 - 0:30)

Question: Tell us about the criminal actions of L.P. Beria, the enemy of the people?

Answer: I remembered the statement of L.P. Beria, which characterizes him as an adventurer. At the end of 1952, upon returning from a business trip, I, along with other workers, was in the office of L.P. Beria. in the Kremlin. During the discussion of one of the issues, one candidate began to be discussed, and during the discussion, someone said that this person (whose candidacy was discussed) was working not for fear, but for conscience. Beria L.P. seriously noted that "there are no people working for conscience, everyone works only for fear." I was so struck by this statement of L.P. Beria that at the same meeting I told him: “how can it be, after all, Soviet people work because of their convictions, because of their conscience.” To this Beria P.P. he told me that I do not know life ... "

All this appears in the materials of the criminal case of Sergo Beria, everything is recorded and personally signed by him. Of course, I would like Sergo to be as hard as a stone, so that after reading the originals of his testimony in the case, there would be the same feeling as after reading his book. But ... And yet I want to remind you once again that these testimonies of Beria's son, who was not guilty of anything, were led to mockery of him, and this must be taken into account. And the literary editing and processing of the protocols of his interrogations do not surprise me personally: although he was a doctor technical sciences, but he understood these issues very poorly and did not know that in the bodies, it turns out, then there were investigators - "cutters" and investigators - "writers". The latter were such masters in literature and presentation of testimonies in Russian that even experienced editors of any publishing house would envy them.

So one should not be offended by Sergo Beria for the weakness shown by him. Put yourself in his place.

And why in his book he came up with a version (more precisely, even an assumption) that his father was killed on the first day of his arrest on June 26, 1953 - I can’t answer this question, you need to ask Sergo himself or his publishers.

Moreover, this fact does not bear any burden.

Beria's wife Nina Teymurazovna (Georgian Nino) was arrested on July 19, 1953. She was accused of complicity in the anti-Soviet conspiracy, the "revival of capitalism", ties with foreign citizens and other crimes of an "on-duty" nature. The investigation began with the clarification of personal data. The case of Nino was conducted by the investigator for the most important cases of the USSR Prosecutor's Office, Tsaregradsky. The first interrogation on July 19, 1953, together with Tsaregradsky, was conducted by Rudenko. It must be said that the structure of the criminal legislation in those years made it possible in such situations to brutally crack down not only on the head of the family, accused of committing a counter-revolutionary crime, but also on his numerous relatives, and of any remoteness: wife, parents, brothers, sisters, etc. This opportunity was actively used before the war and especially during it. The well-known abbreviations CHSIR (family member of a traitor) or SOE (socially dangerous element) were then, as they say, well known. According to the law, this was called "connection with the criminal environment." Since the Criminal Code of 1926 was in force in 1953, in which all this was provided for, Rudenko, who led the investigation into the Beria case, on, in general, legal and understandable grounds, actively used this right in relation to Beria’s relatives, especially his son and wife. Now all this, of course, is illegal, but then ... Here is what the Criminal Code of the RSFSR said about this in those years.

"St. 7. With regard to persons who have committed socially dangerous acts or pose a danger due to their connection with the criminal environment or their past activities, measures of social protection of a forensic, medical, or medical-pedagogical nature are applied.

For this category of persons, the Criminal Code of the RSFSR provided for punishment under Article 35, which was actively applied.

"St. 35. Removal from the boundaries of the RSFSR or from the boundaries of a separate locality with obligatory settlement in other localities is appointed for a period of three to ten years; this measure as an additional measure can be applied only for a period of up to five years. Removal from the RSFSR or from a separate locality with compulsory settlement in other localities in conjunction with corrective labor may be used only as the main measure of social protection. Removal from the boundaries of the RSFSR or from the boundaries of a particular locality with a prohibition to live in certain localities or without this restriction is appointed for a period of one to five years.

It should be noted that “as an exception” all this was often applied without a trial, without a sentence, but only by order of the authorities in the course of administrative proceedings. This means: the criminal case has been terminated or not initiated at all, but you will still be sent into exile. By the way, this is what the Soviet government did at the end of 1954 with his wife and son L. Beria, as well as with the relatives of the rest of the convicts.

But let us turn to the criminal case of Nino Beria. Undoubtedly, her personality attracted the investigation by her closeness to her husband - the main person involved in this whole story. But what role could Nino play in his "criminal" activities? Yes, none! But, of course, she could know something: she knew her husband’s circle, friends, enemies, she was in companies, met with the wives of other accused, she could tell a lot. So Nino Beria represented a certain operational interest for the investigation. How is this set up? Method one - interrogations. And preferably in isolation. It must be said that Rudenko did not abuse this right. None of the children and wives of the other accused (and subsequently convicted) were arrested during the investigation. They were simply sent after the trial to a "remote area of ​​the USSR", forbidden to live in Moscow, Leningrad, Kyiv, Tbilisi, the Caucasus and Transcaucasia. The Central Committee made a special decision on this after the trial.

Under the "old" government, the examples were different. More rigid. In 1951, after the arrest of the head of the MGB V. Abakumov, not only his wife, but also baby, for which the investigators themselves bought milk, since the mother had lost it. And kept them there for more than two years. Abakumov's son began to walk right there, in a prison cell. But back to Beria's wife.

The main issue with which the proceedings began was the clarification of her "non-proletarian origin." Until now, there are legends around this, born of her princely surname Gegechkori. N. Rubin in the book “Lavrenty Beria. Myth and Reality" writes: "Unlike her future husband, she was distinguished by a noble origin: her father, Teimuraz Gegechkori, was a nobleman, the ancestors of her mother, Dariko Chikovani, came from a princely family."

Agree that Georgian surnames ending in “shvili” or “dze” sound somehow simpler and there are no questions here. And then suddenly "Gegechkori". Probably, it will look the same as if some Tsaregradsky suddenly appears among the company of the Ivanovs, Petrovs and Sidorovs. Nino's aristocratic appearance gives rise to further "revelations".

N. Rubin notes: “A straight, thin nose, large penetrating eyes, an impeccable figure, preserved, by the way, to a ripe old age ... And a proud landing of the head and a slightly arrogant and majestic look speak precisely of a princely - at least - origin."

True, the writer L. Vasilyeva in her book “Kremlin Wives”, with reference to the wife of Marshal M. Katukov, unexpectedly clarifies: “She (N. Beria. - Auth.) Skillfully hid the curvature of her legs.” Well, God bless her, "with the curvature of her legs." This, as they say, is a matter of taste. Nino Beria was really spectacular.

Nina Teimurazovna Beria was born in Georgia in 1905, six years later than Lavrenty, in the village. Martvili. Already under Soviet rule, the village was renamed Gegechkori, and the district was called Gegechkor. By the way, here, too, the ignorant have questions - is it really her family estate there? I’ll say right away that no, she didn’t have a family estate there. It turned out the way, for example, in the Russian village of Ivanovka, when many Ivanovs live there.

Nino's mother Daria Vissarionovna Chikovani at the time of her marriage to her father Teimuraz Sikuevich Gegechkori already had four children from another marriage - three daughters (Xenia, Vera and Natalya) and a son Nikolai Shavdia. Her first husband Nestor Shavdia, like her father's first wife, died of illness. Thus, the family of Teimuraz and Daria (in Georgian Dariko) Gegechkori had five children. The youngest and only from their common marriage is Nino.

The materials of the criminal case contain a statement by Nino Beria, sent by her from the Butyrka prison on January 7, 1954, addressed to N. Khrushchev. This letter was forwarded to the Central Committee of the CPSU from the main military prosecutor's office, copied and distributed at the direction of N.S. Khrushchev to the members of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU "in a circle" for discussion in working order. This is a big statement, in it N. Beria asks for release. But first, it touches on the question that interests us.

She writes.

“My social origin is from small estate nobles, but as far as I know my father’s ancestors received the nobility during the Turkish invasion of Georgia in the struggle against them, the majority bearing this surname are peasants by origin. My father had in his own possession two hectares of land, a wooden house of three rooms, under the roof of which there were constantly wooden vats in case of rain, there were no draft animals, there was no cow and even poultry, because there was not enough corn harvested from this piece of land, even for the people in the family; I saw meat or a mug of milk only on big holidays, and I tried sugar for the first time in my life at the age of eleven. Under these conditions, of course, there could be no talk of any kind of hired force, even the hands of my mother’s children from my first husband, who could be assistants in the household, had nothing to do and nothing to live in the house. They were forced to work as laborers for others, but because at that time they were ashamed of this, they left our village for other areas (sister Xenia in the city of Poti was a nanny in a merchant family, brother Nikolai Shavdia was a farmhand in Kutaisi in the family of a priest) . My father, in my memory, being already quite an old man, was barefoot and undressed all day pouring sweat on this small piece of land. In 1917, he was shot by a royal guard and died six months later. Such is my "noble origin".

All this, if there is a need, can be accurately installed on the spot - in Georgia (Gegechkor region, the village of Gegechkori, formerly Martvili), where I was born in 1905.

During interrogation by Rudenko and Tsaregradsky, Nino confirms all this. Here is an excerpt from the case.

“Question: Tell us about your biographical data.

Answer: My father is a petty nobleman who had 2 hectares of land. My maiden name is Gegechkori. In 1917, my father was killed by a Menshevik guard... After his death, I lived in the house of my stepbrother (on my mother's side) Shavdiy in Tbilisi. He worked as a bookkeeper, accountant and supported me. I studied.

In 1921, when I was 15 years old, my cousin Aleksey Gegechkori took me to be brought up. He was a Bolshevik and worked as the Minister of the Interior and Chairman of the Revolutionary Committee ... "

Nino Beria testified about the beginning of the married life of Nino and Lavrenty during interrogation by Rudenko and Tsaregradsky.

“In 1922, when I was in the 7th grade, I met L.P. Beria, who came from Baku on official business. I did not know Beria before and met him through my relative David Birkai, who studied at a technical school. Birkaya was the son of a railroad worker, with whom, as Beria told me, he hid during his work in the underground.

In 1922, I left with Beria for Baku, and then, when he was transferred to Tbilisi, I returned with him and his mother.

I started working as a bank teller. In 1924 my second child was born (the first died) and I was at home for some time. From 1928 to 1932 I studied at the institute in Tbilisi.”

However, there are a lot of rumors, fantasies and inventions here. And some are scarier than others.

“While in the late 1920s in Abkhazia,” says Tadeus Wittlin, “Beria lived in a luxurious special train in which he arrived in Sukhumi. The train stood on sidings, at some distance from the station building, and consisted of three Pullman cars: a bedroom, a lounge car with a bar, and a dining car.

That evening, when Beria was about to leave for Tbilisi, a girl of about sixteen, of medium height, with black eyes, approached him near the station. Convenient complexion.

The girl came from her native Mingrelian village, adjacent to the village of Merkheuli, where Beria himself was from. She asked him to intercede for her arrested brother.

Beria noticed the beauty of the girl. Allegedly wanting to get additional details about his brother, he invited her to the train, but not to the salon car and not to the restaurant.

In the sleeping compartment, Lavrenty ordered the girl to undress. When she, frightened, wanted to run away, Beria locked the door. Then he hit her in the face, twisted her arms behind her back, pushed her onto the bed, leaned on her with his whole body.

The girl was raped.

Beria kept the girl all night. The next morning he ordered his orderly to bring breakfast for two. Before leaving on business, Lavrenty again locked up his victim. Beria was captivated by the freshness and charm of this girl, he also realized that she was exactly the type that fully corresponded to his sensuality. She was modest, graceful, full-bodied. She had small breasts big eyes, radiating a kind light, and a plump sensual mouth.

It would be foolish of him to refuse such a creation of nature. Beria spent a few more days in Sukhumi, checking the implementation of the five-year plan of 1928-1933 in the construction of local roads and highways, new housing, hospitals and schools. All this time he kept his little captive locked in the train.

So little Nina became his wife.

I must say that fantasies in the field of "sexual outrages" committed by the first persons of our state are very diverse. How not to recall here the common story about the rape of 17-year-old Nadia Alliluyeva by 39-year-old Joseph Stalin in a saloon car near Tsaritsyn in 1919. There are even references to "eyewitnesses" - sister Anna and father of Nadezhda Sergei Yakovlevich.

“Revealed” in sexual promiscuity S.M. Kirov, N.A. Bulganin, N.S. Vlasik. Even grandfather M.I. Kalinin - All-Union headman. He, it turns out, preferred operetta prima donnas. He moved, however, with difficulty, for many years using the old man's stick.

But nevertheless, in the biographical labyrinths of Nino Beria, not everything is so simple.

During the investigation, for example, it was established that she had two uncles on her father's side (i.e., brothers of Teimuraz Gegechkori). One, Alexander, is a Bolshevik - that's good. But her other uncle, Eugene, is a "scoundrel" - he was already the Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Menshevik government of Georgia and emigrated to France when Soviet power was established in Transcaucasia. This is already a "puncture" in the biography of the wife of the People's Commissar of the NKVD, and later the minister. And off we go.

“Question: The testimony of Shavdiy Teimuraz dated June 29, 1953 is read out to you.

“... In Paris, Gegechkori, Eugene and his wife asked to say hello to close relatives, including Nina Teimurazovna, Nikolai Nesterovich, Daria Vissarionovna and others. At the same time, Gegechkori's wife handed over gifts - two pairs of suede gloves, Lorigan perfume, and a large silk handkerchief. I asked to give these gifts to close relatives…”.

Do you confirm this?

Answer: I did not receive any greetings or gifts. Shavdia did not tell me anything about his visit to Gegechkori. So I don't know anything about the issue."

Now about the mentioned Teimuraz (in the Russian way - Timur) Shavdia. Here, too, "puncture". This is Nino's nephew, the son of her half-brother Nikolai Shavdia. By age, he is the same age as Nino's son, Sergo, and was friends with him. Just not as an example to his cousin - he did not differ in good studies and exemplary behavior. I got mixed up in Tbilisi with some company, I stole. But that's all, as they say, half the trouble. During the war, 20-year-old Timur was captured at the front, then served with the Germans in France in the legion, received a non-commissioned officer rank and some kind of award. In 1945 he was delivered as repatriation to Georgia from Paris, where he remained after the war. He explained that he was simply a prisoner. But on February 18, 1952, the MGB was arrested and on July 9, 1952 he was convicted of treason by the military tribunal of the ZakVO to 25 years in prison. In April 1953, Beria ordered to check the legality of T. Shavdia's conviction. On the personal initiative of B. Kobulov, Shavdia was transferred to Moscow, and his case was requested by the Ministry of Internal Affairs for study. This was regarded as an attempt to rehabilitate the traitor, besides a relative of Beria's wife, and went to the prosecution's asset.

On this issue, N. Beria was dealt with separately, but they really did not achieve anything. She really was not involved in the fate of her nephew.

Here are excerpts from the case.

“Question: Tell us more about Shavdia Teimuraz.

Answer: I cannot add anything new to what I showed about Shavdia Teimuraz during previous interrogations.

Question: Tell me, did the Shavdia family live in Tbilisi in a house next to you?

Answer: Yes, they lived on the same street, in a neighboring house. We lived together, that is, in the neighborhood, for several years before our departure for Moscow in 1938.

Question: Didn't Shavdia Teimuraz at that time, that is, before your departure for Moscow, constantly visit your house, being friends with your son Sergo?

Answer: As a rule, I did not let him into my house.

Question: Was Shavdia Teimuraz at your dacha, where and when?

Answer: In my opinion, he was at our dacha in Gagra in 1951. His wife worked somewhere as a doctor and I met her on the beach. She said that Teimuraz came to her and was leaving today, but she, due to being busy, could not see him off. I invited them to my dacha, fed them lunch and they left.

Question: How do you explain that a man who betrayed his homeland, went over to the Germans and fought against Soviet troops, who had an award - a green ribbon - for good service from the German command and the rank of non-commissioned officer of the German army, who later served in the SS troops and took part in the suppression of the movements of French patriots and their execution, remained unpunished until April 1952, although all this was known to the state security authorities back in 1945?

Answer: I didn't know this. That. whoever knew this must answer for it, for he himself is essentially a traitor and an enemy, without punishing the traitor. You have to ask Rapava, who was then the Minister of Internal Affairs of Georgia. I asked him to check Shavdia Teimuraz.

Question: Why, when Shavdia Teimuraz was arrested in Georgia on 18.11. 1952, and then by the verdict of the military tribunal on July 9, 1952, he was sentenced to 25 years of labor camp for treason, then his case, when Beria became the Minister of Internal Affairs, was urgently requested to Moscow, where Shavdia Teimuraz was also taken?

Answer: I do not know and could not know.

Investigator Tsaregradsky spent a lot of time to clarify issues related to Beria's entourage. He was especially interested in the families of Kobulov, Merkulov, Goglidze. We didn't get anything here either. So, general conversations, petty everyday questions: who bought what, what he brought, what he got, what he gave, what he said. The situation in the country, on vacation, in apartments, etc. is described in detail.

“I first saw Beria’s wife, Nina Teimurazovna, in 1935, when I was working in Gagra, and she came there to the dacha.

I know that when I was the Minister of State Security of Georgia from 1948 to 1952. Beria's wife came to the dacha in Georgia every year.

I would like to note that her visit to Georgia was annually accompanied by obligatory meetings with senior officials of Georgia.

She always came in a separate saloon car. In the same way, she left Tbilisi for one of their dachas in a saloon car. As a rule, in connection with her arrival, she was allocated to the dacha - a cook, a masseuse, a tennis instructor, security, and attendants. Be sure to put the phone "HF" in the country. Special horses were allocated for walking.

I did not always participate in the meetings and seeing off of Beria's wife, but I became aware that she asked if I was present at the meeting. From this I had to conclude that it was necessary to meet her, otherwise there could be trouble.

Do you confirm these statements?

Answer: I cannot confirm these testimonies: I did not demand any meetings or seeing off for myself, and I was even embarrassed when someone came to meet me. The cook, when the children went with me to the dacha, came with me from Moscow. And there was no tennis instructor, but I asked the beginning. guards to let one of the guards play tennis to play with me ... "

As you can see, there are significant contradictions here too: Rukhadze says one thing, Nino Beria another. According to the law, it is possible to conduct a face-to-face confrontation between Rukhadze and N. Beria. But she is not. Yes, this is understandable. For such a trifle, one should not waste energy on face-to-face betting. I admit that everything that Rukhadze is talking about really took place, and it still does now, when the first persons are being served.

As you understand, everything established by the investigation had no judicial prospects for Nino herself. We can safely say that the cases against her and her son Sergo were initiated illegally. There were also no grounds for their arrest and detention for a year and a half. And they were sent into exile without any legal grounds.

Nino Beria in Butyrka was driven to despair. I will quote a part of the letter we already know of 01/07/1954, which she sent to Khrushchev. By the way, in my opinion, this letter testifies to her high culture, education and intellect. Although this is understandable: after all, she was already a candidate of science then. True, agricultural.

“... Considering myself absolutely innocent before the Soviet public, before the party, I take on the impermissible courage to turn to you, to the party with a request to intercede with the Prosecutor General of the Soviet Union - Rudenko, so that they would not let me die alone, without the comfort of my son and his children in a prison cell or somewhere in exile. I am already an old and very sick woman, I will live no more than two or three years, and then in more or less normal conditions. Let them return me to the family of my son, where my three little grandchildren need the hands of a grandmother.

If my communication with people, as with a disgraced and despised by everyone at the present time, is inappropriate, I undertake to observe the prison regime that I now have at home. If I can earn my own bread on my own, I will do the work entrusted to me with all conscientiousness, as I have always done in my life.

Regarding L.P. Beria, I will continue to proceed from the decision that Soviet people and the justice he has created.

If the prosecutor still finds that I was to some extent involved in the hostile action against the Soviet Union, I can only ask him for one thing: to expedite the pronouncement of the sentence I deserved and its execution. I no longer have the strength to endure those moral and physical (due to my illness) suffering with which I now live.

Only a quick death can save me from them, and this is precisely what will be the manifestation of the highest humanitarianism and mercy towards me.

In November 1954, after a year and a half of imprisonment and almost a year after the execution of her husband, Nino and his son were released from prison and sent into indefinite exile. By decision of the Presidium of the Central Committee, at first they wanted to Krasnoyarsk region, but then they "outplayed" the Urals. Closer to Moscow. Here it is appropriate to recall the old Russian saying "radish horseradish is not sweeter."

I must say that in the course of the investigation of the cases of Nino Beria and her son, the investigators persistently tried to understand the "moral decay" of Lavrenty Beria and his "women's affairs." We figured it out long and hard. We managed to find out something. But more on that later. Separate chapter.

They were very different, Sergo Beria and Marfa Peshkova, but at the same time they were related by origin, upbringing and the system that left an indelible imprint on their lives. The main component of their marriage was the most real feelings that could overcome any trials. But it didn't work out. Three children and joint experiences could not save their family. What could prevent them from living together all their lives?

Binding thread

Marfa Peshkova, the granddaughter of the famous Soviet writer Maxim Gorky, sat at the same desk with Svetlana Stalin, the daughter of Joseph Vissarionovich. The girls talked a lot, visited each other at home, were best friends. They were different, but it was this difference that united them.

Martha loved leisure playing sports, cycling. Svetlana, on the contrary, preferred quiet classes, she read a lot. They found common ground, all the time they opened something new to each other. But later, feelings for one young man became an insurmountable barrier between the girls.

Svetlana Stalin met Lavrenty Beria's son Sergo while on vacation in Gagra. And even then I felt sympathy for him. She was not accustomed to share her experiences even with the closest people, so no one knew about her feelings.

They were in the seventh grade when Marfa first saw Sergo at Stalin's dacha. He was handsome and charming, distinguished by good manners and was gallant towards girls, which made him the hero of the dreams of more than one young woman.

But even then Martha's heart did not tremble. She noted a handsome boy, but no feelings arose for him. It all happened much later, after high school.

New family

Marfa could not even imagine that Sergo paid attention to her. On the day they met, he communicated only with Svetlana. When they happened to meet by chance in Moscow, they both only exchanged greetings.

In one of summer evenings When the girl had already graduated from school, he appeared at the dacha, where she lived in the summer with the Marfa family. He came not alone, but together with mutual friends. After that, he began to come to the girl already alone, invariably showing signs of attention to her.

Sergo was already studying at the Leningrad Academy of Communications, and Marfa went to see him in Leningrad. They went to the Hermitage together, went to Peterhof, walked a lot, realizing more and more how close they were to each other.

Young people wrote letters to each other, which at first ended up on the table of Lavrenty Pavlovich. He and his wife invariably opened them first and only then, having sealed them, passed them on to their son. True, they could not read a single word on their own. Sergo and Marfa, practicing in English, agreed to write to each other only in a foreign language. The fact that the letters did not immediately get to her lover, Martha learned a few years later, when Nino Teimurazovna mentioned the disappointment that invariably overtook her when she could not read a single line from the letter of her son's beloved girlfriend.

However, she treated Sergo's choice very favorably, even invited Marfa to spend the night at their dacha when her husband was not there. Nino Gegechkori looked closely at her future daughter-in-law, and the girl met Lavrenty Beria on the very day when she officially became Sergo's wife.

Sergo's parents cordially accepted his son's wife into the family. We spent family evenings together with pleasure, later rejoiced at the appearance of grandchildren. Lavrenty Beria in the family was invariably gentle and caring, went for walks with his granddaughter, told many funny stories. Sergo and Martha were happy.

And the friendship between Marfa Peshkova and Svetlana Stalina was completely upset. Svetlana was already married, but she accused her friend of allowing herself to become the wife of a man whom Svetlana had met before and was in love with him. She still hoped to get Sergo's attention, but his marriage to Marfa ruined her plans.

Shattered happiness

Marfa was already waiting for the birth of her third child, when Lavrenty Beria was shot, and she was quickly taken away with her husband and children from the government dacha, settling in another country house. And then Sergo was arrested and kept in custody for almost a year, after which he was sent into exile.
Nino Teimurazovna and her son settled in Sverdlovsk. All members of the family of Lavrenty Beria by this time had new documents for the name Gegechkori. Marfa at first also went to Sverdlovsk, later, at the insistence of her mother-in-law, she went back to Moscow to take care of the children. But at the slightest opportunity, Martha went to her husband.

On the next visit of his wife, Sergo and Martha went for a walk. And they met a girl who suddenly attacked Sergo almost with her fists, demanding to know what kind of woman was next to him. The girl turned out new girlfriend husband. That same evening, Marfa flew to Moscow and soon filed for divorce.

Sergo Beria and Marfa Peshkova were able to maintain normal relations, the ex-wife allowed her son Sergei to live in Kyiv with his father, realizing that the boy needed a male upbringing. She repeatedly visited Seryozha, met with ex-husband. But the former feelings in her died, even at the moment when she found out about his betrayal.

There were legends about the love affairs of Lavrenty Beria, although for more than 30 years Nino Gegechkori, a woman who had to endure many trials, remained his only wife. What of this is part of the legend, and what really happened in their family?