“Svetlana Alliluyeva. Broken fate." Documentary. According to the last will of Svetlana Alliluyeva, on her tombstone it will be written: “lana peters” - she also asked that no one be informed about the place of her burial. What happened to Svetlana Alliluyeva

Fate did not spoil Svetlana Alliluyeva at all, despite the fact that she was the beloved daughter of Joseph Stalin. Even as a child, her father gave her expensive gifts, but life with the leader of the people was unbearable. Her mother committed suicide, unable to bear living with the dictator. Stalin, who was grieving the death of his wife, tried to be a good father to his children, but Svetlana tried to do what she wanted, which is why Stalin took a harsh approach to her upbringing.

She dreamed of becoming a writer, improving her personal life and simply becoming a happy wife and mother, but her father’s menacing shadow haunted her all her life. Alliluyeva got married, gave birth to heirs for her husbands, changed lovers, but met her old age as a lonely person, whom even her own children rejected. Death overtook an 85-year-old woman while she was living in a nursing home in the American city of Richland County.

Difficult female fate

Even in her youth, the girl fell in love with Lavrentiy Beria’s son, Sergo, who captivated her not only with his height and beauty, but also with his upbringing and good education. The girl told her friend Marfa, the granddaughter of Maxim Gorky, about who captured her heart. Sveta dreamed of marrying him and even shared her secrets with her father. Despite the fact that his father was not against this candidacy, the young man’s father, Lavrenty Beria, wanted to protect him from such a party. But soon Sergo fell in love with Marfa, whom he later married. After their wedding, Stalin’s daughter stopped communicating with her friend and then for a long time could not forget the handsome man. She hoped to eventually win him back from her rival, but he only irritably waved her away.

Alexey Kapler

To forget her unhappy love, the 17-year-old girl accepted the courtship of 40-year-old screenwriter Alexei Kapler. She was interested in this adult man, but there was a purely platonic relationship between them. Svetlana enjoyed going to the theater and cinema with him, and walking the streets. When the father found out who his daughter was dating, he demanded that the screenwriter immediately leave the capital. The man refused, then, on Stalin’s orders, he was convicted and exiled to Vorkuta.

Grigory Morozov is the first husband of Svetlana Alliluyeva

Alliluyeva dreamed of leaving her father's house as quickly as possible, so she got married at the age of 19. Her chosen one was Grigory Morozov, a classmate of her brother Vasily. According to Svetlana herself, she did not have feelings for her husband, but she did not want to wait for love. The leader of the nations, although he was dissatisfied with the union with a Jew, still gave the newlyweds an apartment. Her husband loved her and dreamed of adding to the family. In 1945, a son, Joseph, was born, however, Alliluyeva did not want to give birth to an unloved man, whom she soon divorced.

with second husband Yuri Zhdanov

Soon Stalin himself found her a groom, Yuri Zhdanov, the son of Politburo member Andrei Zhdanov. Svetlana was afraid to contradict her father, agreeing to marry a second time in 1949. A year later, she gave birth to a daughter, Ekaterina, but did not live with her husband, leaving the baby in his care. Svetlana tried to find her female happiness even after the death of her father: in 1957, Ivan Svanidze, the son of Alexander Svanidze, who was repressed by her father in 1941, became her husband. This marriage also quickly became obsolete: the woman was unfaithful to her husband, who soon learned about her adventures.

In her memoirs, she admitted that her beloved man was Indian Brajesh Singh, 15 years older than her. The lovers met while they were being treated in the same hospital. The Indian communist taught Alliluyeva a lot, and only with him did she know what passion and love are. The lovers wanted to start a family, but Soviet officials did not allow her to legalize her marriage with a foreigner. In 1966, the Indian died of cancer, and Svetlana managed to travel to her beloved’s homeland, where she scattered her beloved’s ashes over the river. The woman wanted to live in India for a while, but she was denied this.

In the photo, Svetlana Alliluyeva with her husband of five, William Peters, and their common daughter Olga

Then she decided to emigrate to the USA. In 1970, Stalin's daughter married architect William Peters, after which she became legally known as Lana Peters. This short-term marriage did not bring her anything except the birth of another daughter, Olga, whom she gave birth to at the age of 44. Having filed a divorce from her husband of four, Svetlana traveled around the world and did her favorite thing - writing memoirs and books.

How did life turn out for her children?

Alliluyeva's eldest son was adopted by her ex-husband, Yuri Zhdanov. Joseph Grigorievich pursued a medical career, becoming a highly qualified cardiologist. He worked for many years at the capital's academy and wrote many scientific works. In his personal life there were two families, in one of which his son Ilya was born. Joseph Grigorievich died in 2008, but his mother never came to Russia to see off her eldest son on his last journey.

In the photo, Svetlana Alliluyeva’s eldest son, Joseph

Daughter Ekaterina settled in one of the villages of Kamchatka, where she is an employee of the Institute of Volcanology. After Alliluyeva abandoned the girl, her mother-in-law took care of her upbringing. Catherine received her education and left Moscow forever. She got married and gave birth to a daughter. The husband drank a lot and died of cirrhosis of the liver. After his death, the woman became unsociable and now communicates only with her family. Having learned about Alliluyeva’s death, she told reporters that she did not know this woman.

Stalin's daughter sent her youngest daughter Olga to a boarding school when she was 11 years old. Now she sells souvenirs and has her own small shop. She was unable to start a family because she divorced her husband. Olga maintained contact with her mother during her lifetime and often talked to her on the phone.

In the personal life of Joseph Stalin's daughter there were many romances, she got married several times, the first time this happened during her student years - then Grigory Morozov, who studied in the same class with Svetlana's brother Vasily, became her husband. The children of Svetlana Alliluyeva were born from different men, and the first of them, son Joseph, was born in her first marriage.

Svetlana Iosifovna lived with Grigory for about five years - the father did everything so that his daughter would break up with the person he disliked.

Soon after the divorce, Alliluyeva went down the aisle again - with Yuri Zhdanov, whom she saw almost only on the wedding day - Joseph Vissarionovich this time chose his daughter's husband himself, but this marriage did not bring her happiness.

As soon as Svetlana Alliluyeva gave birth to her second child, daughter Katya, she immediately filed for divorce. Svetlana Iosifovna’s relationship with her daughter did not work out since childhood - when Katya was seven years old, Alliluyeva left the country, leaving her daughter to the parents of her ex-husband, for which Katya was never able to forgive her mother.

Alliluyeva's third child was born in her fifth marriage, after emigrating to the States. The father of Olga’s daughter was William Peters, an American architect, whom Svetlana Iosifovna married in 1970.

Svetlana Alliluyeva’s children did not have a good relationship with their mother, they did not experience maternal love, so they tried to remember her as little as possible. After her flight from the country, Joseph and Katya crossed her out of their lives, and Catherine, in fact, abandoned her completely.

Svetlana Alliluyeva’s son Joseph, after his parents’ divorce, was adopted by his mother’s second husband, Yuri Zhdanov, who gave the child his last name. Later, Joseph returned his patronymic and took the surname Alliluyev. Joseph Grigorievich received a medical education and became a cardiologist. He worked all his life at the Moscow Medical Academy, published over one hundred and fifty scientific papers, defended his doctoral dissertation, and received the title of Honored Scientist.

His personal life did not work out right away; he was married twice, in his first marriage he had a son, Ilya. Joseph Grigorievich died in 2008, Svetlana Iosifovna, having learned about the death of her son, did not want to come to Moscow to see him off on his last journey.

Joseph Grigorievich tried to avoid publicity, almost never gave interviews, and in one of them he spoke about his mother like this:

“My mother is an absolutely unbearable person in terms of character... Once, angry, she threw a hammer at me, a boy. If I hadn’t dodged, I wouldn’t be talking to you now...” recalled Joseph Alliluyev.

Svetlana Alliluyeva’s eldest daughter, Ekaterina, had even more negative memories of her mother, and this is probably why, when she was informed about the death of Svetlana Iosifovna, she said that she had nothing to do with this woman - Katya was not able to forgive her mother for the fact that when she, having left the country, abandoned her daughter to the mercy of fate.

Ekaterina Yuryevna became a geophysicist, and after graduating from university she moved as far as possible from the capital - to Kamchatka, to the village of Klyuchi, located at the foot of the Klyuchevskaya Sopka volcano. She lived in this village for almost forty years, never leaving, married one of the employees of the volcanological station where she worked, and gave birth to a daughter, Anna.

Her personal life was difficult - her husband left his first wife and children for her sake, and expected that marriage with Stalin’s granddaughter would change his biography for the better, but this did not happen. Ekaterina Yuryevna cut off all ties with relatives and did not receive any help from them.

Catherine’s husband drank, fell ill with cirrhosis of the liver, began to have mental problems, and in the end he shot himself with a hunting rifle.

Alliluyeva’s youngest daughter Olga also did not have warm feelings for her mother, who sent her to a boarding school at an early age.

Olga later changed her name to Chris and became Evans, taking her husband's last name. Now she is divorced, Olga has her own business in Portland - she owns a small souvenir shop.

Grandchildren and great-grandchildren of Svetlana Alliluyeva

The daughter of the leader of all nations did not have a good relationship with her children, so Svetlana Alliluyeva’s grandchildren could not experience love and care from their grandmother. Svetlana Iosifovna's granddaughter Anna Vsevolodovna Kozeva also has a strained relationship with her mother, Svetlana's daughter Ekaterina Zhdanova.

Anya was born in 1982 in Kamchatka, where her mother left Moscow in 1977. Now Anna Vsevolodovna lives in a military unit located near the village of Klyuchi, where her mother lives.

Anna got married, her husband is an ensign, and she herself works as an accountant. In Anna Vsevolodovna’s family, a daughter, Victoria, is growing up, the great-granddaughter of Svetlana Alliluyeva.

Another descendant of Svetlana Iosifovna is the grandson Ilya, the son of Joseph Grigorievich Alliluyev, who was born in Svetlana’s first marriage. Ilya is now fifty-three years old, he bears a different surname - Voznesensky. When Svetlana Alliluyeva came to the Soviet Union, Ilya was fourteen years old, but he never met his grandmother.

His mother, the first wife of Joseph Alliluyev, says that they never maintained family ties with Svetlana Iosifovna. Despite the fact that Ilya’s parents divorced, he communicated with his father, a wonderful cardiologist Joseph Alliluyev, until his death. Ilya Iosifovich himself is a famous Moscow architect.

Svetlana's parents Nadezhda Alliluyeva and Joseph Stalin.

Alliluyeva arrived in India in December 1966, accompanying the ashes of her common-law husband Brajesh Singh. She received consent to leave the country from the then chairman of the Council of Ministers, Kosygin. With the permission of the Politburo of the Communist Party, Alliluyeva could stay in the country for two months to say goodbye to her loved one and be with his relatives.

According to the recollections of friends, getting ready for the trip was nervous and quick. For some reason, it turned out that Svetlana forgot to put a photo of her children and mother in her suitcase. She yelled at her son’s wife, who tried to bring a bag containing an urn with ashes, and did not say goodbye to her friends who came to see her off. Saying goodbye to the children was also hasty and cold.

This is freedom!/

Svetlana liked India for its unusualness and tranquility, and she wanted to stay in this country. However, she was refused. Indira Gandhi feared Alliluyeva's unpredictability, which could cause complications in international relations. Then on March 6, Svetlana asked for permission to stay in India for another month. This was also denied to her - she already exceeded the permitted period by half a month.

In her memoirs, Alliluyeva wrote that she had no intention of leaving the USSR. It is unknown what happened, but on March 8, she left the hotel, left gifts for the children in the room, got into a taxi and went to the US Embassy. Svetlana Alliluyeva made her choice - she decided to flee the USSR, leaving her children there.

Joseph and Ekaterina Alliluyev.

Svetlana got married for the first time in 1944. Her husband was Grigory Morozov, an old friend of brother Vasily. A year later, they had a boy, who was given the name Joseph, surname Alliluyev. Stalin did not like his son-in-law; during three years of marriage he never saw him, but he liked his grandson. Subsequently, Joseph became a famous cardiologist who achieved considerable success in medicine.

When his mother went abroad, Joseph was 22 years old. The first two years were especially difficult. Joseph worked at the clinic in two shifts, came home, where correspondents from various printed publications were waiting for him. Osya was forced to communicate with them so that rumors would not spread throughout the country that Stalin’s grandson had been taken away somewhere. Gradually, Joseph’s life settled into its own rut, unlike his sister, for whom her mother’s act was a strong blow.

Grandson of Joseph Stalin Joseph Alliluyev

In a letter to his mother, Joseph wrote that by her action she had separated herself from her children. Now they will live according to their own understanding, receiving advice and real help from other people. In fact, he abandoned his mother on his own behalf and on his sister’s behalf. Many Soviet people did not care at all about the flight of Stalin’s daughter abroad; they could not forgive her for abandoned children and countless scandalous novels abroad. But in 1983 they started talking about family reunification.

Svetlana and her daughter from her last marriage, Olga, began to call back with Osya, and more or less friendly communication was established. In 1984, mother and daughter came to the Soviet Union, intending to stay in the country forever. Joseph saw a man who lived under different circumstances, in another country, and became a complete stranger to him. Svetlana did not like his wife, his constant employment (Osya was working on his dissertation), and his reluctance to communicate with her. When his mother left for Georgia, and then abroad forever, Joseph, according to him, experienced great relief.

Ekaterina Zhdanova did not forgive her mother.

Svetlana married for the second time in 1949 to Yuri Zhdanov. A year later they had a girl, who was named Katya. According to Joseph, the mother loved her daughter more, but the process of raising her son consisted of “constant fighting.” Her mother's escape became an unexpected and bitter betrayal for Katya. After graduating from Moscow State University with a degree in geophysics, a few years later she went to Kamchatka to the village of Klyuchi. Katya was sociable, lively, sang and played the guitar. Soon she got married, leaving her last name in the marriage, and gave birth to a daughter, Anya. After the suicide of her husband, who abused alcohol, Catherine changed, became unsociable, and began to withdraw into herself, recognizing only the company of dogs.

House of the indomitable Ekaterina Zhdanova.

Of her relatives, she only communicated with her father. Having given up the rights to an apartment in the capital, she lived all her life in a small wooden house without a TV, furnished with old furniture. She worked at the station of the Institute of Volcanology. When Alliluyeva tried to settle down in her homeland for the second time, Katya refused to meet with her mother. She limited herself to a short note in which she wrote that she would never forgive. Alliluyeva gave her daughter letters from American scientists assigned to the station, but she did not answer. In response to the message about Svetlana’s death, Stalin’s granddaughter said that it was a mistake, that she was Zhdanova, and Alliluyeva was not her mother.

Stalin's family.

Svetlana Alliluyeva never revealed to anyone the reasons for her departure, which served as the basis for breaking off relations with her children. She justified her action by saying that her son and daughter were already at an age when they could take care of themselves. She forgot that at that time such an escape was considered a betrayal of the Motherland, and the attitude towards the relatives of the defector was difficult. Only they knew what they had to endure in connection with their mother’s flight. And they had their own reasons for never forgiving their mother.

Stalin had two sons, Yakov (from his first wife) and Vasily, and a daughter, Svetlana. Everyone's fate is tragic.

Yakov was captured by the Germans and died there. The father looked at the younger ones, Vasily and Svetlana, with regret. Neither son nor daughter could awaken fatherly love in him. Perhaps Stalin did not have access to these feelings at all. After his death, Vasily went to prison and died an old man. Svetlana fled the country.

Svetlana Stalina was once envied by millions. People in their dreams imagined her fantastically happy life. How far they were from reality!

Svetlana was only six years old when her mother, Nadezhda Alliluyeva, shot herself. But Svetlana will learn about what actually happened to her mother many years later. She wrote about her father: “The death of his mother hit him terribly, devastated him, took away his faith in people and in friends... And he became embittered.” After the fatal shot in the Kremlin, Svetlana herself found herself completely alone. The leader's daughter was deprived of friends and girlfriends, the joys of communicating with people.

Svetlana's relationship with her father was very difficult. She was his favorite as a child. Then something happened: either he was disappointed in the girl, or those around him completely disgusted him, but his daughter began to irritate him.

She suffered and subconsciously searched for a man who would not only give her freedom, but would also be to some extent like her father. Is this why all of Svetlana’s marriages were unsuccessful and quickly fell apart? None of her men brought her true happiness. But her men also had a hard time. The man she fell in love with first spent ten years in places not so remote. A harsh price to pay for one love date.

Her brother Vasily introduced her to the famous screenwriter Alexei Yakovlevich Kapler, whom people of the older generation still remember as the wonderful host of the popular television program Kinopanorama. Alexey Yakovlevich was a famous screenwriter; his scripts were used to produce the popular films “Lenin in October,” “Lenin in 1818,” and “Kotovsky.”

It was the November holidays. Kapler and Svetlana danced the then fashionable foxtrot. She so wanted to talk to someone frankly. And in front of her was an adult and intelligent man, ready to listen to her. There was a twenty-two year difference between them. Svetlana was still at school. Kapler came to her school and stood in the entrance of a neighboring house. I was afraid to approach. Employees of the first department of the NKVD, who were in charge of protecting the leaders of the party and government, relentlessly followed the leader’s daughter.

Then Kapler flew to Stalingrad. Once in Pravda, Svetlana Stalina read an article by war correspondent Kapler, written in the form of a letter from the front to the woman she loved. She immediately realized that it was a letter addressed specifically to her. The article ended with the words: “It’s probably snowing in Moscow now. From your window you can see the battlements of the Kremlin...”

Svetlana did not know that all her telephone conversations were monitored and recorded. The head of Stalin's guard, General Vlasik, ordered Kapler to be warned that it would be better for him to move away from Moscow. But he fell head over heels in love and did not heed the warning.

On March 3, 1943, Alexei Kapler, winner of the Stalin Prize of the first degree, holder of the Order of Lenin, was arrested. He was accused of “maintaining close contacts with foreigners suspected of espionage.” We were talking about foreign cultural figures who came to the Soviet Union. Meetings with them took place by decision of the Central Committee and under the supervision of security officers.

On November 25, 1943, a special meeting decided: “A.Ya. Kapler should be imprisoned in a forced labor camp for a period of five years for anti-Soviet agitation.” He was sent to the North, to Vorkuta. He served five years and in 1948 came to Moscow. It was a mistake. Probably the security officers were afraid that he would meet the leader’s daughter again. He was arrested and given another five years in the camps

Stalin's difficult, despotic character did not allow him to come to terms with the fact that his daughter was already an adult and had the right to her own life, to love. But Svetlana’s desire to break free from the Kremlin only intensified. As soon as she turned eighteen, she married her brother’s classmate, Grigory Morozov. She so wanted to find someone close to her, at least someone who would love her and think about her.

The father was dissatisfied with his Jewish son-in-law, but muttered:

To hell with you, do what you want...

He demanded that she never come to him with her husband. Only when she got divorced did Stalin invite her to relax together in the summer. When Svetlana Stalina and Grigory Iosifovich Morozov separated, he was forbidden to see his son. When Svetlana unexpectedly returned to the Soviet Union in the eighties, Morozov helped her. Evgeny Maksimovich Primakov, who was friends with Morozov, believes that Svetlana was counting on renewing her relationship with her ex-husband. But it was already too late...

After Morozov, she married the son of Politburo member Andrei Aleksandrovich Zhdanov, a promising party worker, Yuri Zhdanov.

“Our marriage with Svetlana,” Zhdanov said much later, “took place in April 1949. At that time, our family and Svetlana lived in conditions of Kremlin seclusion. Svetlana was at my father’s funeral. Then we began to meet in our apartment.

I am at work from morning to evening, my mother is alone in captivity in the Kremlin. Svetlana shared her loneliness. Our meetings became more frequent, and the matter ended in marriage. I got Svetlana writing out bibliographic cards from Marx, Lenin, Pavlov for her work. She did everything very carefully, I keep some of the cards to this day. But, apparently, he made a psychological mistake: Svetlana strove for her own literary work, strove for self-expression. I overlooked this, which was the reason for the loss of contact, and then the divorce.”

Having found herself in the family of the main party ideologist Zhdanov, Svetlana was shocked by the abundance of chests filled with “goods”, and in general by the combination of ostentatious, sanctimonious “party spirit” with terry philistinism. For some reason, it is common to admire the asceticism of senior Soviet officials. This is an illusion, their lives simply took place behind high fences, the security officers reliably protected the “modest life” of their superiors from prying eyes.

In the fall of 1952, the dynastic marriage quickly fell apart.

Svetlana Alliluyeva wrote to her father:

“As for Yuri Andreich Zhdanov, we decided to separate from him. This was a completely natural conclusion, after almost six months we were neither husband nor wife, and who knows who, after he quite clearly proved to me that he was not in words, but in reality - that he doesn’t care about me at all and doesn’t need me, even after he repeated to me a second time that I should leave him his daughter.

No, I’ve had enough of this dried-out professor, this heartless “erudite,” let him bury his head in his books, and he doesn’t need a family and a wife at all, his numerous relatives completely replace them.

In a word, I don’t regret at all that we broke up, but I’m only sorry that a lot of good feelings were wasted on him, on this icy wall!”

And Svetlana could not tell her father personally about such important events in her life, because the leader isolated himself from everything and did not want to see her...

After the 20th Congress, Svetlana met with her distant relative Ivan Svanidze, who had returned from exile. At birth, he was named Jonrid in honor of the American journalist who wrote the famous book about the October Revolution, Ten Days That Shook the World. Svanidze lost his parents at the age of eleven - his father was shot, and his mother was sent into exile, where she died. Svanidze and Alliluyeva got along. But two unfortunate and tormented souls could not give peace and consolation to each other.

After the death of her father, Svetlana Alliluyeva’s personal life remained a subject of constant concern to the highest authorities. Especially from the moment she met a foreigner. Indian communist Raji Brij Singh lived in Moscow and worked as a translator at the Foreign Literature Publishing House. Their romance proceeded under the vigilant attention of operatives of the 7th Directorate of the KGB.

Knowing her character, they did not dare to interfere with Svetlana. But they watched relentlessly. Just like her brother, Vasily Stalin, was followed until his death in March 1962. Most of all they were afraid of contacts between Stalin's children and foreigners. And then there’s an affair with an Indian citizen!

The security officers were in vain to fear that someone was trying to recruit Svetlana Alliluyeva. Everything she did in her life, she did, obeying her own feelings and desires. In general, she was a very independent person and, in spite of everything, she married an Indian. But she was unlucky again. Her fourth husband - he was much older than her - turned out to be a sick man. And he died in her arms. He bequeathed to bury him in his homeland. Svetlana asked permission to fulfill his last wish.

The Politburo really didn’t want to let her go abroad, as if they had a presentiment of something! But her late husband was a communist, India is a more than friendly country, and there was no reason to refuse. Svetlana was reluctantly released, although accompanied by two security officers. But they didn’t follow.

On March 7, 1967, when Moscow was preparing to adequately celebrate International Women's Solidarity Day, Stalin's daughter Svetlana Iosifovna Alliluyeva came to the American embassy in Delhi and asked for political asylum. She was taken to Italy, then to Switzerland, and from there she was taken to the United States.

Having fled to the West, Svetlana Alliluyeva sat down to write a book of memoirs, “Twenty Letters to a Friend.” She painted a portrait of her father, who saw enemies everywhere: “This was already a pathology, it was a mania of persecution from devastation, from loneliness... He was extremely fierce against the whole world.”

Svetlana wrote not so much about her criminal father as about her worthless, stupid, double, useless and unpromising life, full of cruel losses and bitter disappointments and losses. Proximity to power can give a person comfort, honors, ostentatious respect, but it does not make a person happy. In the eighties, she returned to the USSR, but was unable to settle here and left her homeland again - this time forever.

March 6, 1967 daughter Joseph Stalin Svetlana Alliluyeva decided not to return to the Soviet Union.

“Kalina-raspberry, Stalin’s daughter, Svetlana Alliluyeva, ran away, what a fig family!” - this is how folk art responded to the event, which put the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee and other governing bodies of the Soviet Union on the ears.

The beloved daughter of Joseph Stalin, whom foreign media referred to only as the “Red Princess,” became a “defector.”

Svetlana Iosifovna caused a lot of trouble even for dad. The daughter's stormy temperament resulted in a series of novels that Svetlana began when she was still a teenager. From the choice of his daughter, Stalin often flew into a rage, which fell on the heads of the unlucky suitors. For the director Alexey Kapler The relationship with the girl resulted in many years of stay in the Gulag.

In 1944, Svetlana married Grigory Morozov, her brother's classmate, Vasily Stalin. The marriage produced a son, who was named Joseph, but the relationship did not last long. In 1949, Stalin's daughter married a second time - this time to the son of the leader's comrade-in-arms Yuri Zhdanov. The marriage lasted three years and Svetlana had a second child - a daughter. Catherine.

Farewell ceremony for Joseph Stalin. Svetlana Alliluyeva is in the center. Photo: RIA Novosti

Under the wing of the state

After the death of her father, Svetlana found herself under the close attention of the new leaders of the state. True, unlike brother Vasily, she was not put away either in prison or in a psychiatric hospital. She worked at the Institute of World Literature, in the sector for the study of Soviet literature.

Svetlana, now bearing the surname Alliluyeva, continued to try to arrange her personal life. The lady's next chosen one was an Indian aristocrat and communist Raja Bradesh Singh.

The USSR authorities were quite wary of marriages with foreigners. But, firstly, Alliluyeva did not officially marry Singh, secondly, India was considered a friendly state, and thirdly, the leadership of the countries believed that it would be better for Stalin’s daughter to be involved with men than to publicly say something unnecessary.

According to the memoirs of the then head of the KGB of the USSR Vladimir Semichastny, Alliluyeva lived very well by those standards - a good salary, payments to herself and her children. Stalin's daughter lived in a “house on the embankment”; a dacha and a car were assigned to her. In general, Svetlana Iosifovna could support not only herself and her children, but also her common-law husband, who transferred all his earnings to relatives in India.

Comrade Kosygin's guarantee

In the fall of 1966, Raja Bradesh Singh died after a serious illness, and Svetlana Alliluyeva wrote a letter Leonid Brezhnev with a request to allow her to travel to “her husband’s homeland to scatter his ashes over the sacred waters of the Ganges.”

The Politburo thought about what to do. Soviet leaders knew that Alliluyeva had completed work on the book “Twenty Letters to a Friend.” The contents of this manuscript were well known to them. In general, they did not see anything too seditious in her - Svetlana criticized her father for repression, which did not diverge from the official line of the party. But, at the same time, they were not going to allow the publication of memoirs in the USSR, and they were not eager for the book to be published in the West.

They decided that Alliluyeva could be released, instructing the KGB to prevent Stalin’s daughter from taking away the manuscript.

Mikhail Semichastny claimed that Svetlana did not take her out, but still managed to somehow transfer her abroad.

The decisive factor in allowing Alliluyeva to leave was the personal guarantee of the head of the Soviet government Alexey Kosygin, who had a friendly relationship with Stalin’s daughter.

Confidence was added by the fact that Svetlana’s son Joseph was going to get married and the date of the celebration had been set. Members of the Politburo logically reasoned that the mother was unlikely to miss her son’s wedding.

KGB warns

To the USSR Ambassador to India Ivan Benediktov was instructed to provide Svetlana with all possible assistance.

In December 1966, Svetlana Alliluyeva arrived in India, where Ambassador Benediktov placed her in a separate apartment on the territory of the village of Soviet diplomatic mission employees.

The ashes were scattered over the waters of the Ganges, but Svetlana Iosifovna was not in too much of a hurry to return to her homeland. With permission to stay for seven days, Alliluyeva spent a month in India. His son called his mother from Moscow, asking when Svetlana would return. She begged Joseph to postpone the wedding.

Alliluyeva herself persuaded Ambassador Benediktov to resolve the issue of extending her stay in India for another month. The diplomat agreed, and Svetlana was indeed given the go-ahead. At the same time, Stalin’s daughter left for her late husband’s native village and completely disappeared from the sight of her compatriots for a month.

Finally, in early March, it was decided that Alliluyev should be returned. Moreover, Joseph was losing patience, and his calls to his mother, who had returned to Delhi, were extremely nervous.

And Svetlana Iosifovna asked the ambassador to once again extend her stay in India. But this time Ivan Benediktov handed Alliluyeva a passport and a plane ticket to Moscow on March 8.

Stalin's daughter began to pack her things and buy gifts, but the head of the Soviet intelligence station in Delhi became wary - there were certain oddities in her behavior. In a restaurant, a scout, disguised as a foreigner, managed to talk to Svetlana, who was drinking heavily. She, blaspheming the Soviet leadership, including Kosygin, who vouched for her, let slip that she wanted to stay abroad, and already had “some agreements” for this.

The conversation was reported to Ambassador Benediktov, but he did not believe it. Just in case, Svetlana was assigned to be monitored by a security officer working at the embassy. It was necessary to watch Alliluyeva especially carefully during her traditional evening walks. The fact is that Svetlana Iosifovna was walking past the territory of the US Embassy.

Gateway to the “free world”

Despite these precautions, Svetlana Alliluyeva escaped. Right in front of her escort on the evening of March 6, 1967, she “drew” into the US Embassy grounds through a gate that was usually closed.

That same night, the Americans took the woman to the airport and she flew to Switzerland, where she asked for political asylum. However, she was refused first in Switzerland and then in Italy, and in transit through Germany arrived in the United States, where she was granted asylum.

“Huge everyone! I'm very happy to be here! This is just wonderful!” Stalin’s daughter greeted journalists at Kennedy Airport.

And in the USSR at that time there was a “debriefing”. Kosygin was a “high-flying bird,” so they preferred to forget about his guarantee. The main scapegoat was Ambassador Benediktov, who was recalled from India and transferred to work in Yugoslavia, relations with which were very difficult at that time.

Alliluyeva’s escape became one of the arguments for the removal of KGB head Vladimir Semichastny in May 1967. In addition, dozens of Soviet officials of lower rank were punished.

Already from abroad, Svetlana called her son, trying to explain the motives for her action. Joseph refused to understand his mother, considering her act a betrayal. He also did not allow Svetlana to talk to her sister.

New York - Moscow - New York

Alliluyeva managed to amass a decent capital from her memoirs, and in 1970 she married an American architect William Peters. She took the name Lana Peters, gave birth to a daughter, who was named Olga, and the birth of Stalin’s granddaughter in the USA became a new sensation for the American press.

But gradually interest in her in the United States began to fade. The expected hunt for the fugitive by the KGB did not follow - the new head of the Committee Yuri Andropov decided that Alliluyeva was of no interest.

Lana's new marriage lasted only a couple of years, as the architect Peters began to complain that "Lana had awakened dictatorial character traits, the same as her father."

After living for a decade with her daughter in the USA, in 1982 Svetlana moved to the UK, and in November 1984 she appeared... in the Soviet Union.

This was not a special services operation—Stalin’s daughter was homesick. At the press conference, she scolded the West and accused the American intelligence services: “All these years I have been a real toy in the hands of the CIA!”

They settled her in Tbilisi, created all the conditions for her, but two years later, already under Mikhail Gorbachev, she again asked for permission to travel to the United States. She received it quickly enough - everyone was already tired of Svetlana Iosifovna’s “turns”. The children she abandoned in the USSR were never able to forgive her.

Olga Peters changed her name to Chris Evans, and now lives in Portland. Whether she, unlike her brother and sister, was close to her mother is known only to herself. For the last two decades of her life, Svetlana Alliluyeva lived almost as a recluse, either in the USA or in the UK, rarely giving interviews. She died in November 2011 in a nursing home in the American city of Richland, Wisconsin.