The dacha problems of Comrade Stalin and Comrade Gorbachev ...
"He left behind not ten palaces ..."
("Stalin and Corruption" A. Samsonov)
("Stalin and Corruption" A. Samsonov)
Everyday life of the greats of this world. Not so long ago, another material by A. Samsonov appeared on VO, and it contained this really wonderful phrase, put into the epigraph. It involuntarily evokes a desire to find out - and what buildings, so to speak, were left for personal use by Comrade Stalin. Well, if not ten palaces, then ... at least left something? And here, as it turned out, everything is not as simple as it seems to some. That is, again we will talk about the “sin” of incomplete knowledge, from which we all constantly suffer. Some to a greater extent, some to a lesser extent. Although, of course, it is simply impossible to know everything and everyone in the world. You can't read all the books, look through all the Internet resources, you can't visit all the museums even in our country ... you can't, you can't, you can't!
But ... you can go, for example, have a rest and learn a lot of interesting things during this trip. Well, at least this summer. And in the summer it happened that my daughter and her son-in-law recovered to rest somewhere on the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus and rested there very well. In addition to good food and living conditions, excursions were also offered. One of them interested: "Stalin and Gorbachev's dacha." That is, two dachas could be visited at the same time, which, of course, was a gift of fate for her.
She brought me a lot of interesting information and photos from the excursion. I worked on all this wealth without haste, and here on you - an article from my colleague, and even with a "figure of speech", which is so straight into the epigraph and asks. After that, it remains only to finish the work begun and ... to put this material on VO, which reduces the problem of "incomplete knowledge", at least in part and very slightly, but reduces it!
And it so happened that Comrade Stalin really did not leave behind ten palaces that belonged to him personally. But he left behind ... 15 summer cottages that belonged to him personally! This figure is called by the guides at Stalin's dacha in Musser, but the exact number of dachas that Stalin used is not named on the Internet. It is indicated that from 1919 to 1953
“There are up to 20 such residences, some of which have not survived for various reasons. Most of the sites are closed to the public at the moment or are the residences of prominent political figures. "
The list of what is known and exists today is as follows:
"Blizhnyaya Dacha" (Moscow)
Dacha "Zubalovo-4" (Kalchuga, Moscow region)
"Dalnyaya Dacha" (Semenovskoye, Moscow region)
"Dacha in Lipki" (Mytishchi, Moscow region)
"Long Beards" (Valdai, Novgorod region)
Dacha "New Matsesta" (Khostinsky district, Sochi)
Dacha in Malaya Sosnovka (Yalta)
Dacha "Cold River" (Gagra)
Summer cottage on Lake Ritsa (Gudauta district)
Dacha "Mussera" (Mysra)
Summer cottage in New Athos (New Athos)
Dacha "Sukhumi" (Sukhumi district)
Stalin received his first dacha, along with an apartment in Moscow, back in 1919. It was a house that belonged to the former Baku oil industrialist L.K. Zubalov. But over time, the number of summer cottages began to increase. Some of the dachas were near Moscow, others were in the south, and there Stalin not only rested, but also underwent medical treatment. Stalin's chief of security, General N.S. Vlasik recalled that Stalin traveled with his family to the Black Sea in August-September and usually for two months. He was personally involved in organizing the improvement of his dacha economy, and, although a lot of people worked there, it happened from time to time "took ... in his hands garden shears and cut dry branches". Dachas were usually used to receive guests.
Both the construction and the maintenance of all these dachas required considerable funds. In 1951 alone, 23,3 million rubles were spent from the budget of the security department for the maintenance of Stalin's state dachas and apartments (the average annual salary of 3 thousand workers). But here we need to add the cost of the road to the dacha near Lake Ritsa - another 16,5 million rubles. There were special underground bunkers at the dachas, which were built by SMU-12 Metrostroy and paid from its own budget. Naturally, hundreds of people were involved in both the maintenance and protection of such important government facilities. So, for example, only in the staff of the Kremlin apartment and Blizhnyaya dacha there were 73 service personnel and 335 more guards. Stalin's daughter Svetlana Alliluyeva recalled that dachas were often rebuilt at the request of her father:
“Wherever he went to rest in the south, the whole house was rebuilt by the next season. Either he lacked the sun, now he needed a shady terrace; if there was one floor, a second was added, and if there were two, then one was demolished ... "
It is interesting that during Stalin's absence his dachas were not preserved! They continued to work so that at any moment he could come to any of them and meet there ready-to-serve staff, full security staff and ... his favorite menu. Moreover, it so happened that Stalin announced that he was going to one dacha, and then, on the way, he changed his mind and turned out to be completely different - a purely Asian cunning, calculated to deceive enemies. In any case, wherever he came, the readiness of the dacha for his arrival was absolute everywhere. And it was worth it, of course, not cheap at all!
It would be interesting, of course, to find materials for all the dachas, to make calculations by year, but ... who really needs it today? Nevertheless, it is interesting to look into the holy of holies of such a great man like Stalin, and see at least one of his dachas up close. And consider that today we are very lucky: we are "going" to Stalin's dacha in Musser. And in total in Abkhazia he had five of them!
At the Mussera dacha, Stalin was only eight times, the last one in 1952. Together with the park, its territory is 40 hectares. True, and this must be emphasized right away, it was rebuilt in a completely different way from Stalin's residence on the Kholodnaya River. For some reason, during the restoration of the building, they did not strive at all to reproduce the authentic historical appearance. Air conditioners, for example, were installed directly into the walls. The seats on the benches were not preserved, the stairs leading from the building were peeled off, and many of the buildings in the summer cottage were never restored. And nevertheless, a lot has been done ...
As for the dacha itself, this is a two-story asymmetrical house with a long terrace. The photographs show that from many of the original design elements and furniture of that time, practically nothing remained - only the walls, trimmed with marble panels and parquet made of ... boxwood roots. There are also secret passages in the country house, but now they are concreted. There were three passages in total: one to the sea, one to the guest house and one to the medical building. From the original furniture, Stalin's table with a volume from Lenin's collected works, lamps, and a billiard table have been preserved.
But the meeting room has been perfectly preserved, with a ceiling and walls trimmed with panels of noble woods. In one of the bedrooms, elements of the decor have also been preserved: silk wallpaper on the walls, curtains (Stalin loved the twilight and blackout curtains on the windows!), A wardrobe and several chairs, as well as a mattress with horsehair padding. Preserved and unique mirrors, made to increase the growth of Stalin. They say that the leader was very complex because of his small stature and therefore could not stand all the tall ones. Also next to the building was a building, inside which there was a cinema, a room for playing billiards, as well as a swimming pool. Stalin did not like swimming in the sea, and seawater was pumped to him into a large indoor pool.

Hall for negotiations. Notice the wall lined with squares of precious wood and the impressive coffered ceiling!

View of the medical building from the balcony of the second floor of Stalin's dacha. There was also a pool, healing showers and a massage room.
The dacha in Musser was the first southern dacha of the leader. The entire party elite had previously rested in the CEC rest house. And then, in 1926, Stalin was invited to a hunt organized on the territory of the Pitsundo-Mussera reserve by the head of Soviet Abkhazia, Nestor Lakoba. And during this hunt, he looked after the mansion of the Armenian oil tycoon Lianozov, who fled the revolution to Finland. It is clear that, although his estate was nationalized by the Soviet government, all its interior decoration was immediately plundered by local residents, and then for a long time in the homes of local Abkhazians one could find a luxurious Bohemian glass chandelier and rosewood furniture sets.

This is a very interesting place. It is not clear what it is? Above is ... a movie screen on which you could watch movies on a warm southern night. What's that down there? And below there was an artificial waterfall! Such miracles of "relaxation" were arranged at this leader's dacha!
In order to build a dacha in the Mussera reserve, a special economic department of the CEC was created. The architectural project was developed by the Leningrad architect Vladimir Gelfreikh. Moreover, the work went on with difficulty, since Stalin continually introduced new and new amendments to the project. Preserved drawings with red marks made by his hand - also a kind of monument of his era. Moreover, it was Stalin who invented those very secret passages, which could only be entered from his bedroom. It is interesting that all the residences of the leader in Abkhazia were painted green. And this was not a fad, not a striving for aestheticism, but a heightened precaution, since Stalin believed that a green house surrounded by a forest would be invisible from the air. And then suddenly they will swoop in, but how can we bomb ... Our leader did not trust either strangers or his own ...
The construction site was surrounded by a three-meter-high fence, barbed wire winding and observation towers. The construction was completed in 1936, and in 1942 the dacha was mined in case it was captured by the Germans.
The last time Stalin visited here was in 1952, and immediately after his death it was transferred to the jurisdiction of the KGB, and until 1988 it was guarded and no one was allowed inside it. Then, on the contrary, the construction of a dacha for Gorbachev began, so that Stalin's dacha was simply abandoned.
But more recently, it was put in order and now it is open to visitors, and in the summer, excursions to the cottage start every hour. In the meantime, the group is going to wait for the guide, you can walk around its territory, inspect the once luxurious park and Stalin's pavilion.

And this is the most amusing photo. All tourists ask the same question: “You have Finnish plumbing here with ... a bidet, but what, did Stalin have a bidet? And the guides answer that yes, the plumbing is, of course, new, but there is no doubt that the bidet was. So with intimate hygiene, in contrast to the overwhelming majority of the then citizens of the country, Comrade Stalin was in perfect order!
Almost all rooms are open to tourists, including the bathroom and sleeping rooms. Moreover, the excursion is usually complex, that is, excursions to both Stalin's dacha and Gorbachev's dacha, which is located nearby. You can get to the Mussera dacha from Pitsunda, which is 8 km from Mussera, but transport does not go there, so you have to go there on foot, in your car, take a taxi or sail by sea by boat, which is the most convenient option. By the way, you can't see the dacha from the sea either ...
PS Photos by Svetlana Zolotareva.
To be continued ...
Information