The Death of Stalin: Part I
On March 6, 1953, at 3:05am, the famous radio announcer, Yuri Levitan, broke the news to the people of the Soviet Union. "The Central Committee of the Communist party, the Council of Ministers and the Praesidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR announce with deep grief to the party and all workers that on March 5, at 9.50 pm, Josef Vissarionovich Stalin, Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist party and Chairman of the Council of Ministers, died after a serious illness. The heart of the collaborator and follower of the genius of Lenin's work, the wise leader and teacher of the Communist party and of the Soviet people, stopped beating."
Stalin was 73 years old when he died of a cerebral haemorrhage. The Soviet people had first been made aware of his illness on March 4. From March 6-8, his embalmed body lay in state in Moscow's Hall of Columns. Millions of Muscovites- as well as many others who had made the pilgrimage to Moscow- came to pay tribute to the God Stalin. Due to the vastness and emotion of the crowd, hundreds of people were trampled to death.
March 9 was the date of his funeral. Nine pallbearers- insiders like Khrushchev, Beria and Molotov- carried his coffin (with his corpse eventually being laid to rest next to that of Lenin), while Malenkov , Beria and Molotov made speeches. At noon, the noise of bells and guns was heard throughout the USSR. The Great Father of the Soviet Union was finally gone.
Officially, Stalin had died of natural causes. From the very moment he passed on, however, some people were brave enough to whisper that there had been a conspiracy; Stalin had been murdered. We will probably never be completely sure of what happened, but if one closely examines all the details there is evidence to suggest that Stalin was, indeed, murdered.
From March 10-22, the official Communist Party newspaper Pravda persevered with its familiar content and tone: Stalin's name was continually mentioned and his thoughts invariably described in reverential terms; the need for eternal vigilance to weed out hidden enemies was hammered home; while the anti-Semitism that had become a feature of Soviet policy in the years preceding Stalin's death was also apparent.
From March 23, however, there was an obvious change: Stalin's name began appearing infrequently and the associated hyperbole noticeably diminished; the paranoia about internal enemies considerably decreased; equally significant was that the anti-Jewish articles ended.
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