The first fire in the USSR

The tradition of lighting the Eternal Flame originated in Paris after the end of the First World War, which killed millions of people. It appeared later in the USSR. There is a widespread misconception that for the first time in the USSR, the Eternal Flame lit up on November 6, 1957 in Leningrad near the monument to the Fighters of the Revolution. And a few months later, on February 23 of the following year, he burned in Sevastopol on Malakhovsky Kurgan.

Events unfolded differently. Surprisingly, for the first time in the Soviet Union, the memorial flame was lit not in Leningrad, or even in the capital, but in a small working-class village near Tula. Let's talk about everything in more detail.

The beginning of the Eternal Flame story

The story of the Eternal Flame began in Paris at the Arc de Triomphe at the Grave of the Unknown Soldier. The flame was lit by Minister of War Andre Maginot on November 11, 1923. It symbolized the memory and sorrow of the French who died in the battles of the First World War.

The fire lighting ceremony quickly spread around the world. By 1937, the Eternal Flame had flared up in the Czech Republic, Belgium, Poland and other countries. A little later, it was lit in Canada, America and most European countries.

Sergei Alexandrovich Jobadze took the initiative to light the Eternal Flame in the USSR. At that time, he was the head of the Shchekino Gas Plant in the Tula region. Let's take a closer look at the biography of this man and the events of that time.

Biography of the initiator of the creation of Eternal Flame in the USSR

S.A. Jobadze was born in 1909 in Tbilisi in the family of an employee of the Transcaucasian Railway. In 1934 he graduated from the Moscow Institute of Chemical Technology. Since 1941, he took an active part in the Great Patriotic War. He was mobilized as an instructor of the 4th Department of the Headquarters of the Extermination battalions of the NKVD of Moscow and the Moscow region. His duties included the training of sabotage groups, the formation of partisan detachments, and their combat training for work in the enemy's rear.

S.A. Jobadze made a huge contribution to the Great Victory. In collaboration with the leadership of the special school, he developed a plan for "rail wars." He envisioned the mass withdrawal of railway lines with the help of an explosion of TNT bombs.

Thanks to his studies at the Institute of Chemical Technology, Jobadze suggested spending 70 grams of TNT on detonation instead of the 400 used. Many did not believe in the effectiveness of the new method, but it turned out to be effective. If the bombers had used 400 grams of explosives, as before, its reserves would have been depleted at the height of the Second World War.

As a result of the introduction of the tactics of "rail wars" and other sabotage, total railway transportation in the territories occupied by the Nazis decreased by 40%.

On June 9, 1945, Lieutenant Colonel Jobadze was sent to Germany on a mission to become commandant of Berlin. It was fulfilled by him. From 1955 to 1962, he S.A. Jobadze was appointed head of the Shchekino Gas Plant. During these years, he put forward the initiative to create a mass grave of Soviet soldiers at the turn from the Shchekino-Tula highway to the Pervomaisky settlement.

The history of Eternal Flame in the USSR began exactly then. There was a mass grave in the village of Kochaki near St. Nicholas Church. During the construction of the settlement, it was decided to reburial the remains of the fighters. A modern monument site was chosen for the construction of the mass grave. In 1956, the remains of fallen soldiers collected from various places in the area were buried here.

On May 9, 1955, Sergei Jobadze and the pioneer Olga Korotkov lit the first Eternal Flame in the Soviet Union. A couple of years later, the Grieving Warrior memorial was inaugurated here. The Stalin Prize received by Jobadze was spent on its construction.

Craftsmen from different parts of the world worked on the creation of the memorial. The sculptures were made in workshops in Kiev, and the design of the pedestal and its layout were handled by the plant's management with the support of architect Ekaterina Nezhurbida. The slabs for the monument were brought from Moscow, and the gas to support the burning of the torch was supplied from the factory. Gorenje

In the late 90s, in order to save money, the Eternal Flame Gorenje was stopped burning on a permanent basis: it was lit only on May 9th. But in 2013, since the installation of the monument to S. Jobadze, a stone slab with his biography, on the memorial, the situation has changed. From that time on, the flame is kept burning constantly. Gorenje

Unfortunately, there was no designation on the Grieving Warrior memorial that it was here that the Eternal Flame was lit for the first time in the USSR in memory of the people who fell in fierce battles for the freedom of our Motherland. Perhaps one day a memorial obelisk with this information will be erected.