The village of Krasina mine.Memorial to the Victims of Fascism.School No. 27 As it was in the USSR

22 monuments to the Heroes of the Great Patriotic War have been erected in the city of Shakhty. During the Great Patriotic War, the residents of Shakhty made a worthy contribution to ensuring Victory over Nazi Germany. Many gave their lives in a deadly battle with the enemy. In June 1942, the city was temporarily occupied by the Nazis. The fascists tried to establish a "new" order, restore mines and establish coal mining for their needs, but came across friendly resistance from the townspeople. The miners, who did not have time to leave the city, disrupted the activities of the Nazis. Not a single large or medium-sized mine was restored and put into operation by the Nazis. An underground organization began its activities behind enemy lines. Its members disabled enterprises, blew up trains with fuel and ammunition. The occupiers brutally dealt with the patriots of our Motherland. Many Shakhty residents died at their hands. The shaft of the Krasin mine became their mass grave. The fascists, with the help of traitors, seized the secretary of the underground district committee of the party, T.S. Kholodov. Soon the underground workers were arrested: worker sh. Krasina N.I. Gudkov, I.T. Klimenko, O.A. Meshkova, V.M. Evlakhov, I.P. Tkachenko, Komsomol members, the Fomin brothers, and others. No amount of torture and torture broke the will of the patriots. It was here that Ivan Timofeevich Klimenko performed his last feat. One autumn day, the Gestapo brought an old communist to the pit of the mine to execute him. Ivan Timofeevich grabbed the fascist and rushed with him into the shaft of the mine. Olga Andreevna Meshkova, a communist underground worker, performed the same feat. The Palace of Culture in the village of the October Revolution bears her name. And for how many more Shakhty residents, whose names are no longer recognizable, this place has become the last refuge… According to the most conservative estimates, the Nazis dumped them into the shaft of the mine. Krasina 3500 people.
On March 10, 1943, a resolution was adopted to perpetuate the memory of the Shakhty patriots who were tortured by the fascist occupiers. The first MONUMENT to the VICTIMS OF FASCISM, which was a wooden pyramid with a star, was erected at the site of the tragic events at the Krasin mine shaft.
In 1959, a monument to fallen heroes was erected on the site of the mine shaft, in which Soviet citizens rest, and an Eternal Flame was lit. There is now a memorial on the site of the landfill. The author of the monument is architect F. S. Komarov. Photo of the 1960s.
The next step was the design of the Krasinsky Memorial from the moment when the sculptor I. Reznichenko sculpted a monumental figure of a miner with an eternal flame in his hands. The memorial at the L. Krasin mine (architect R. Muradian, sculptor I. Reznichenko) was built in 1975. He became the personification of the struggle against fascism, stoic firmness and patriotism.
The space of the Shakhty memorial goes beyond the immediate visual perception of the ensemble and includes a panorama of the entire city of Shakhty. The steppe environment is interpreted as a kind of symbol of the "Russian field". The composition of the memorial complex is saturated with images of tragedy, aesthetically meaningful and extremely concise.
The date of the opening of the modern memorial is May 9, 1975. The right to light the Eternal Flame was granted to veterans of war and labor, the daughter of O.A. Meshkova - A.S. Sidelnikova, the son of the underground worker N.I. Gudkov - Nikolai Gudkov, it was he who led the column of those who went to the opening of the memorial. The MEMORIAL COMPLEX TO THE VICTIMS OF FASCISM at the Krasin mine is one of the largest mass graves in the territory of Eastern Donbass, a symbol of the courage and indomitable will of the Shakhty people.
The main monument of the memorial complex is located on the site of a former landfill. The monument is designed in the form of two powerful pylons, silhouetted resembling a terricon, a truncated pyramid. There is a thought about the burial mound, about the symbols of eternity, informationally fixed in the minds of people. The figure of a grieving miner holding a bowl of fire cuts through the space between the pylons and reminds of the terrible tragedy that took place here. The shaft of the mine, into which people were dumped, is decorated in the form of a decorative lattice. The concrete pylons are lined with granite chips, and the sculpture is lined with copper sheets. The pedestal is made of labradorite. The traffic pattern of visitors to the memorial complex has been thoughtfully solved. The sculpture of a miner is located on the axis of the street. People walk around the monument, walk along the memorial wall to the shaft of the mine, and with each step the emotional tension of perception of the complex increases. The mute witnesses (the shaft of the mine, #mines #Rostov region #victims of fascism #village of Krasina #USSR