Evacuation of Civilians from Stalingrad: Based on Oral History
The theme of evacuation of the population from Stalingrad is still one of the most difficult and painful for people who survived the battle of Stalingrad. The article attempts to consider how the evacuation of the population of Stalingrad was reflected in the oral history, how it relates to the data of science, what guided the people who made the decision to leave or stay in the warring city. For analysis the author took 90 memoires-interviews published in the book “Children and war”, 4 audio interviews, recorded for the Museum “Children of Tsaritsyn-Stalingrad-Volgograd”, the memories of the employee of factory “Red October”, stored in its Museum. The data obtained were compared with the fundamental work on the fate of Stalingrad during the battle of the Volga - T.A. Pavlova’s monograph “the Secret tragedy of the civilian population in the battle of Stalingrad”. Numerous memories create a completely accurate picture of evacuation from Stalingrad: its spontaneous character, the desire of authorities primarily to save defense resources and the wounded, often sacrificing or saving after all the others, as the least valuable categories of population - women, children and the elderly. Mass evacuation began after August 23, 1942, when a multi-day massive bomb attack on the city began. The withdrawal of people from Stalingrad became extremely dangerous. Memories are full of descriptions of the death of many people during the crossing of the Volga, on the approaches to it and after. They reflect the motives of those who were forced to stay in the fighting city: the preference to die on the ground than during the crossing, the large number of children, the lack of relatives outside the city to whom you could go, the reluctance to leave one’s home. The spontaneity of evacuation under the conditions of constant bombardment of the city forced to sacrifice the disabled, sick or lost family members to save the rest. The population trapped in the war zone, if possible (subject to availability on ships) and as a gesture of goodwill of the military of different ranks, was taken out in order to remove a confounding factor in the conduct of hostilities and for the purpose of salvation.