I sensed a catastrophe

January 21 found us at the station in TiFlis, on our way to Sukhum youfind. I was sitting with my wife in the working half of my car, with the high temperature that was the usual thing at that time. There was a knock on the door, and my faithful assistant, Syermuks, who was accompanying me to Sukhum, entered. From his manner as he walked in, from his livid-gray face as he handed me a sheet of paper, looking past me with glassy eyes,  It was the decoded telegram from Stalin telling me that Lenin had died. I passed it to my wife; she had already guessed it.







The Tiflis authorities soon received a similar telegram. The news of Lenin’s death was spreading in ever-widening rings. I got the Kremlin on the direct wire. In answer to my inquiry, I was told: “The funeral will be on Saturday, you can’t get back in time, and so we advise you to continue your treatment.” Accordingly, I had no choice. As a matter of fact, the funeral did not take place until Sunday, and I could easily have reached Moscow by then. Incredible as it may appear, I was even deceived about the date of the funeral. The conspirators surmised correctly that I would never think of verifying it, and later on they could always find an explanation . I must recall the fact that the news of Lenin’s first illness was not communicated to me until the third day. This was a system. The object was to “gain time.”







The Tiflis comrades came to demand that I write on Lenin’s death at once. But I knew only one urgent desire-and that was to be alone. I could not stretch my hand to lift my pen. The brief text of the Moscow telegram was still resounding in my head. Those who gathered at the train waited for a response. They were right. The train was held up for half an hour, and I wrote the farewell lines: “Lenin has gone. Lenin is no more.” The few handwritten pages were transmitted to the direct wire.







“We arrived quite broken down,” writes my wife. “It was the first time we had seen Sukhum. The mimosa were in full bloom — they are plentiful there. Magnificent palms. Camellias. It was January; in Moscow the cold was bitter. The Abhazians greeted us on our arrival in a friendly manner . In the dining-room of the rest-house, there were two portraits on the wall, one — draped in black — of Vladimir Ilyich, the other of L.D. We felt like taking the latter one down, but thought it would look too demonstrative.”