Big Tyuters Island. Bolshoy Tyuters Island in the Gulf of Finland: expedition, photo. Key to the Gulf of Finland
Bolshoi Tyuters Island in post-war times, especially in the seventies, was called nothing more than “the island of death.” He received such a terrible nickname thanks to the active work of the Germans - they completely mined his territory. A lot of time has passed since the end of the war, but peaceful sappers and researchers are dying due to the diligent work of the Nazis. The island has such conditions and nature that it’s time to build sanatoriums and recreation centers, but the war still throws up its terrible “gifts.”
Role
Islands around the world are numerous. Everyone has their own purpose. Some of them are paradises for relaxation, others are trading harbors or pirate havens. Likewise, the island of Bolshoi Tyuters has its own destiny. His destiny was defense against enemies from the sea. The war sprinkled the island with blood - fierce battles were fought here. Over the course of several centuries, it passed from one hand to another every now and then. Most often they were Russians. Everything passes by it - ships, people, it seems that time stopped here 60 years ago. Very few people visited it during this period - mostly these were expeditions.
Characteristics of the island
Bolshoi Tyuters Island in the Gulf of Finland is a granite rock with an area of just over 8 square meters. km. There are two capes on it - Tuomarinem and Teiloniemi, an indicator highest point- 56 meters. The soil on it is diverse, this is due to many geological and morphological conditions. In addition to bare granite rocks, here you can find places with Unique glacial wells were also discovered on the island - they are also called boilers.
The east coast is characterized by dunes and sparse groups of plants. Also here you can find a place where there are about 300 species of flora on just one square meter. The central part is occupied by forests; 10% are swamps. Among them, small hanging swamps are considered a very interesting phenomenon; they are most often located in rock cracks. On the island you can see forests, rocks, swamps, coastal shallows, meadows, beaches, and dune fauna. In places of villages that were once inhabited, individual vegetation is also present.
Island inhabitants. Lighthouse
The island of Bolshoi Tyuters in the Gulf of Finland has, in addition to interesting landscapes and vegetation, an equally fascinating fauna. A rare species of mollusk - the predatory black slug - has found its habitat here. Particularly many of them can be found at the foot of the cliffs. Among the inhabitants of the island there are raccoon dogs, at least their traces have been discovered many times. In addition, a wild ram runs around the island; it escaped from the previous lighthouse several years ago.
By the way, about the lighthouse. He's on the island - the only place a habitat. Its height is 21 meters, the focal plane is located at 75 meters. Two people live on the island - the caretaker and his wife.
Bolshoi Tyuters in the Gulf of Finland has never had a significant population. For some time there was a village of Finnish fishermen on it. However, the war swept her away from the face of the island.
Island today
Bolshoi Tyuters Island in the Gulf of Finland is one of those places where time has stood still. The buildings and structures are overgrown, even the lighthouse keeper does not risk straying far from his workplace, since the island can present an unpleasant surprise, which the Germans generously bestowed upon him. Since the latter left it in a hurry, they left behind not only but also a lot of equipment, ammunition, and heavy weapons. But at the same time, the nature here is simply indescribably beautiful, which, unfortunately, only a few can see. For neutralization dangerous island Sapper landings are regularly sent to it. In addition, they are often joint; for example, the work of Russian and Swedish sappers in 2005 made it possible to detect and neutralize more than 30 thousand objects that could explode at any moment. There were seven similar landings in the post-war years. However, even half of the island cannot be called safe.
Forgotten technology
The island of Bolshoi Tyuters in the Gulf of Finland, a photo of which can be seen in the review, is real. Considering that its specimens are present in abundance on the island, among them there are unique ones. Such as, say, the 40-caliber Boforos automatic anti-aircraft gun. The amount of equipment that the Germans left behind could fill a large museum. Expeditions that explore its territory discover many specimens, some of which can be restored. To date, the units of equipment that have been moved to mainland, about two hundred. There are also 6 in-depth fortifications on the island.
Expeditions
The expedition is sent to Bolshoi Tyuters Island to study the “white spots” on the map of Europe. Due to dense mining, even decades after the end of the war, military personnel died there. It is to neutralize the territory that such studies are carried out. One of the latest was the Gogland expedition, which, in addition to Bolshoi Tyuters, covered some of the outer islands of the Gulf of Finland. Before the landing of the main landing force, piers and platforms for helicopters were arranged. Among its achievements, one can note the discovery of about 200 units of military equipment and weapons. Most of of them is unique. After examining it for the presence of equipment, representatives of the Ministry of Defense and the Russian Geographical Society followed the searchers. On this moment a search is underway for the remains of soldiers who died during the Great Patriotic War.
Travel to the island
Going to the island on your own is very dangerous. Of course it is historical place, where unique examples of equipment and weapons are located, but there are significantly more mines on it. Its nature is amazing; it is very quiet and peaceful here. The only thing that gives the island is that it works to avoid shipwrecks. Ships have been passing by for over 60 years. This is the peculiarity that Bolshoi Tyuters Island has. How to get to it is immediately visible on the map. The main routes are by water or by helicopter. If you still have a great desire to touch this part of history, you can go to the neighboring one, and from there you can also explore Bolshoi Tyuters from afar by water.
Ghosts of the Island
This is what they call the equipment that “rests” on the territory. Big Tyuters in Gulf of Finland, if it had not been mined, it could be called a museum of military equipment under open air. It seems that anti-aircraft guns have become part of nature; sometimes it is difficult to distinguish them from tree trunks or a fallen branch. It can bury itself in the dunes and reveal only a third of itself from under the sands. On the coastal slopes in the trees you can see defensive weapons of 37 caliber. There are pieces of equipment scattered everywhere, including engines. In the forests you can even find a gas generator station and a cable laying machine. Fuel barrels are scattered here and there. You can also find personal flasks of the Germans. All the equipment simply merged with nature, trees sprouted in the car bodies, some tools were covered with moss and grass. If it were not for the danger that lurks around every corner, fascinating excursions could be held here.
conclusions
The island has long been considered a restricted area. There have been successful attempts to clear it, but it is not yet possible to completely ensure safety. Far-reaching plans include making an open-air museum on the territory of Bolshoi Tyuters. But it all comes down to the financial part of the issue. It takes a lot of money to create minimal infrastructure. In addition, the path to the island is very difficult and expensive. That is why it remains completely unexplored and almost deserted.
The complex expedition "Gogland" to explore the Outer Islands of the Gulf of Finland truly happened historical event. The three-year search for the plane shot down during the Great Patriotic War was crowned with success: at the end of May, the wreckage of the Soviet Pe-2 dive bomber and the remains of the pilots were found, and their names were soon established. This is the crew commander, 19-year-old junior lieutenant Mikhail Kazakov, 23-year-old gunner-radio operator Arseny Tyshchuk and navigator Mikhail Tkachenko. The Gogland team even managed to contact the relatives of the fallen heroes.
The Pe-2 dive bomber was shot down on Bolshoi Tyuters Island on the night of September 8-9, 1943.
Death Island, as Bolshoi Tyuters was called during the war, was a well-fortified, ammunition-stuffed and military equipment granite citadel. In September 1944, the three-thousand-strong German garrison hastily left the island, having previously mined it. Since then, Bolshoy Tyuters has been cleared of mines several times, but even now, after several operations and after the titanic work of sappers, ammunition is still being found left on the island. Perhaps that is why the Gogland team managed to get to the crash site only now, after three years of searching and painstaking work in Russian and German archives.
Find the first wreckage of the plane by the Russian search party Geographical Society succeeded on May 25, on the very first day of the search, during the repeated combing of the supposed square, located almost in the very center of Bolshoi Tyuters. Under the shallow soil layer and intertwined tree roots, license plate engine parts, pieces of burnt aluminum skin, a center section wing, an unopened burnt parachute and a large number of fragments. Almost everything around them was strewn with them, since the impact of the downed 7-ton bomber was so strong that it split a granite boulder, pressing the fragments into a shallow layer of rocky ground.
There are plenty of versions about the exact cause of death: but it is absolutely clear that the heroic Pe-2 completed its task and fell into an impenetrable forest thicket with empty ammunition. "Most likely the plane was shot down anti-aircraft artillery Germans, but it is likely that the enemy did not immediately manage to detect this, since there are no messages about this in the combat log for September 8 and 9, 1943,” says Sergei Karpinsky, a member of the search team of the Russian Geographical Society.
“This is the first combat aircraft found by the search team of the Russian Geographical Society,” emphasizes Artem Khutorskoy, head of the expedition, deputy executive director of the expedition center of the Russian Geographical Society. “In the second shift of the expedition’s work on Bolshoy Tyuters, the searchers need to once again, layer by layer, examine the crash site for objects discovery of the tail section and the remains of the crew in order to bury them in the military cemetery in Leningrad region".
The environmental watch continues...
The second shift of the environmental watch on the Outer Islands of the Gulf of Finland - Gogland and Bolshoi Tyuters - began on June 2, 2016. The long road along a busy sea route was filled with conversations and anticipation of meeting with mysterious islands, because getting to them is a dream come true for three dozen volunteers who came from the most remote corners our country.
Evgeny Selivanov from Chelyabinsk is a professional traveler. Having received a diploma in tourism 4 years ago, the graduate decided to experience first-hand what it means to be a traveler in the 21st century. Since then, he has traveled all over Russia and visited many countries. Before participating in the change of the Russian Geographical Society, he built ecological trails in Kenozerskoye national park Arkhangelsk region, after Gogland, is going to the Arctic shift of the Youth Forum "Morning" in Khanty-Mansiysk.
Artem Zaguraev graduated from the Faculty of Geography of St. Petersburg state university, has 10 years of field life behind him, participation in the Russian Geographical Society project "Kyzyl - Kuragino" in 2012. Since then, he has been following the projects of the Russian Geographical Society, and here is his luck - in February, when he went to the Society’s website, he saw an advertisement for volunteers and applied, planning his vacation in advance. Artem’s energy showed up on the very first day. Early in the morning, after a long trek, Artyom was already busy washing the dishes and putting things in order in the forest kitchen of the volunteer camp.
Sargey Vaganov is a professional diver, diving and organizing expeditions to the Barents Sea. I learned about the expedition by chance from social networks, but, like many St. Petersburg residents, I heard a lot about the islands and always dreamed of going to them. For the sake of this chance, I put aside all my personal and professional affairs for a while and went on an expedition.
Pavel Chukmeev represents the easternmost region of the country - Khabarovsk region. An ecologist by profession, Pavel took part in expeditions to Sakhalin and the island of Kunashir, where he studied the biodiversity of the soil inhabitants of these islands. In 2015, he spent a shift in the Ermak camp of the Kyzyl-Kuragino archaeological and geographical project. Having learned about the expedition from social networks, he sent an application, and when it was approved, he took a vacation and came to St. Petersburg.
22-year-old lawyer Dmitry Anatsky from Moscow decided to go on the expedition after his girlfriend worked on a three-month expedition in Antarctica. He considers himself lucky that he will work on Bolshoi Tyuters - literally only a few have managed to visit this island, Dmitry notes with enthusiasm.
Igor Zelkin studies at the Faculty of Geography of Krymsky federal university, a member of the Crimean branch of the Russian Geographical Society, last year spent a month in Kyzyl-Kuragino, after which, like many of his expedition comrades, he began to regularly follow the Society’s projects.
The first thing the volunteers of the second shift of the complex expedition “Gogland” saw on Bolshoi Tyuters were two huge piles of rusted metal standing on the pier, like a giant gate, conveying a symbolic greeting from the pioneers of the ecological landing.
Perhaps, if not for these trophies, it would be difficult to imagine that this peaceful island, fragrant with lilacs and blossoming apple trees, once bore such a terrible name - the Island of Death. Clear this unique corner Volunteers will have to explore nature and history from the legacy of war and the more recent traces of human activity disfiguring the island in the next two weeks.
Text and photo: Tatyana Nikolaeva, Andrey Strelnikov
In ancient times, Tyuters was a haven for Vikings, then a haven for smugglers. Here, Polish and Swedish privateers robbed merchants going to Narva, and here, it happened, they hid the loot. Northern granites, plowed by an ancient glacier, conceal many secluded places.All Russian tsars, starting with Peter, attached great importance to protecting the capital of the empire from attack from the sea. The most important and most fortified defense centers were the islands of the Gulf of Finland. And the first to stand in the way of the enemy were two rocks: Gogland and Bolshoi Tyuters. During the war, fierce battles were fought for the islands. Our landing forces went on the assault. And the Germans and Finns held the defense.
The only possible channel for heavy ships and submarines is exactly within firing range of their artillery guns from the island. This means whoever owned Tyuters owned the entire Gulf of Finland.
Over the past three centuries the island has been Swedish, Russian, Finnish, Russian again, German and Russian again. But there has never been a large population here. From the 18th century until 1940, it was only a village of Finnish fishermen. After the Winter War, little remained of it. There was also a Lutheran church, but it burned down relatively recently.
Thousands and thousands of ships pass by Tyuters every year. But for recent years 60 almost no human foot has ever stepped on it.
Tyuters is amazingly beautiful. It’s so quiet that your ears are ringing. Mushrooms, fish, berries, rocks, forest, clear water. Here we could build sanatoriums, breathe the healing pine air and watch the sun set in the cool waters of the Baltic. But the war made its own adjustments to this picture.
The only intact structure on Tyuters is the lighthouse. There is no way without it, the fairway in these places is very difficult. So Big Tyuters shines at night: 1 second on, 1 second off, then 3 seconds on, 9 seconds off. Although the lighthouse is the most high building on the island - 21 m, it’s impossible to see anything below from it. There were no people here for 70 years, the roads and buildings were overgrown, nature took its toll. Even traces railway- and here she was - covered by the crowns of silent Karelian pines.
In October-November 1939, more than 2,000 aerial bombs were dropped on Tyuters and 4,500 shells were fired. But it was, so to speak, just a shooting.
In October 1941, under German pressure, the island was abandoned by the Red Army, but the Soviet command quickly realized their mistake. The narrowness of the bay turned it into a trap - passage along the fairway became deadly dangerous for our ships. The fleet was locked in Kronstadt, as if in a mousetrap. IN New Year's Eve 1942, the Red Army landed on Tyuters and Marine Corps, but didn't last long. There was no supply of food and ammunition, the reinforcements sent simply did not arrive: the ice on the Gulf of Finland was not yet strong, there were ice holes under it, and half a meter of icy water above it. The soldiers froze to death on the way, and few managed to return to the mainland.
Subsequently, it became increasingly difficult to take Bolshoi Tyuters. The Germans transferred so many forces and resources here that it became the largest stronghold among the islands of the Gulf of Finland; they installed batteries of large-caliber guns, anti-aircraft guns and naval guns on the island.
The Nazis, preparing for a serious battle in the Baltic, brought a fantastic amount of ammunition to the island. And the remaining part cannot be counted, but how many were fired at our ships? By our landings? After all, there was still a second landing. And the third. And the fourth. No one can say how many of our soldiers lie here.
It is believed that the Germans mined the area before fleeing the island in 1944. This is wrong. Studying German maps and documents, examining former minefields, you see that the most powerful fortifications of Tyuters did not appear suddenly. All three years that the Germans were on the island, they meticulously built up its defense. Others were added to one row of thorns, new mines were placed both between old ones and in new places, until the quantity and density of all this iron amounted to some fantastic value.
When the Germans left the island, it had no longer played the same strategic importance for them for several months - in September 1944, the Red Army was already very far to the west. It seems that this is another example of Hitler’s stubbornness, clinging to such pieces of land even when there was no longer not only a strategic, but even a tactical need for them. And then they themselves and their garrisons turned into a burden that could no longer be taken care of and was not worth evacuating. Tyuters obviously turned into such a burden - the thrifty Germans were unable, as usual, to take the equipment with them and limited themselves to damaging it.
And no matter how saturated Tyuters was with ammunition, there were even more of them in the strait between Tyuters and the island of Gogland. During the war in these waters, the Germans placed a total of several tens of thousands of mines at the Zeigl (Sea Urchin) minefield, almost half of them in the 9 and a half nautical miles between Gogland and Tyuters.
Under enemy fire, our minesweepers made passages in the minefields, and the Germans methodically dumped new mines into the strait - thousand after thousand.
During the war, only a few submarines of the Baltic Fleet crossed this deadly channel. The power of the fleet was not fully used, and the war left here only in 1944. And she didn't go far. How much explosive metal is at the bottom: lost submarines and boats with torpedoes, downed bombers with full ammunition, dozens of sunken transports with ammunition, several artillery ships with full magazines. These waters will remain unsafe for a long time. Such a concentration of combat losses in one place indicates the enormous importance the warring parties attached to the island.
Today the island is the farthest part of Russia in the northwest. On the northern coast is Finland, on the southern coast is Estonia. Special border zone, special access regime. But thanks to the assistance of border guards and specially organized expedition Russian Geographical Society, we have the opportunity to find out what Bolshoi Tyuters is, the most mysterious island Gulf of Finland, and answer the question of what exceptional significance it had for German forces in the Baltic. It’s not easy to talk about this, but perhaps it was this small battle for Tyuters, lost by Soviet troops at the very beginning of the war, that made it possible for the Germans not only to maintain a long blockade of Leningrad, but also delayed our victory.
The first shelters and burial places were dug here back in the time of the Varangians. In tsarist times, artillery positions and gun magazines were built. The Finnish army, having received Tyuters from Russia, began a large construction of fortifications. Before the great war, Soviet troops also built their own fortifications - aboveground and underground. There is an interesting inscription on a German map from the Abwehr archives. It states that there should be 15 underground structures on the island. The last joint Soviet-Swedish mission to clear mines on the island discovered six bunkers on it. The remaining nine were never found. Maybe they didn’t search carefully, or maybe they hid these bunkers with skill? For how long?
There are many versions about the purpose of the mysterious bunkers. The most interesting thing is, of course, that the valuables looted by the Nazis were kept here. After all, Army Group “North”, to which the Tyuters garrison belonged, marauded in these parts with all the breadth of its Teutonic soul. Pskov and Novgorod, Oranienbaum and Peterhof, Tsarskoe Selo, Gatchina and Strelna - many treasures and art objects were never found after the war either in Germany or anywhere else. Why don't the Germans store them here, under the protection of granite dungeons and the most powerful fortifications of Tyuters?
During the war, the perimeter of the island was braided with several rows of barbed wire. And mines - tens of thousands. And then - guns and machine guns point blank. Our troops landed here. It seems to me that I should step on here open place, under dagger fire, through a minefield - impossible, hopeless. If the cruisers and battleships of the Baltic Fleet had approached and mixed up the German defenses with their twelve-inch guns, the landing would have succeeded. But the tragedy was that the ships of the fleet could navigate these waters only if the island was occupied by ours.
Another version: in these dungeons the Germans had a factory for the production and supply of ammunition. This, of course, is not the Amber Room, although there would be little left of amber in the dampness here.
In general, some kind of shelters or caches are often found here. And almost everywhere there are traces of human presence. But they are clearly not up to anything serious. For weapons production, larger sizes are needed, and for storing valuables - paintings, sculptures - special conditions are needed.
A complex expedition of the Russian Geographical Society, with the support of the Russian Ministry of Defense, continues to survey the outer islands of the Gulf of Finland. The group went to Big Tyuters And Gogland to study their geography, geology, biology and historical and cultural heritage.
“Island of Death” is parting with the legacy of the war - hundreds of tons of rusty military iron are being prepared by volunteers from all over the country for removal from Bolshoi Tyuters. Shell casings and ammunition fragments will soon be disposed of. But this land is still fraught with danger.
Despite the fact that seven mine clearance operations have already been carried out here, volunteers find another cache of ammunition. Sappers who recently worked in Palmyra, Syria, discovered hundreds of German anti-personnel mines on the island - so-called “frogs” without detonators.
“When the Germans left here, they didn’t have time to take everything with them - they buried and hid something. Look, they are in excellent condition, even the paint has not peeled off,” Ilya Shcherbakov, commander of the mine clearance group of the 30th engineer regiment, shows the mine.
Bolshoi Tyuters, Gogland and neighboring islands literally blocking the exit to the Baltic from the Gulf of Finland. From 1941 to 1944, it was from here that the Germans fired at Soviet ships and aircraft.
The area of Bolshoi Tyuters is only eight square kilometers. But during the war, the Germans made it absolutely impregnable: rows of barbed wire surrounded the entire island, and machine gun nests were located every 50-100 meters. Everything was done to ensure that the Soviet landing force could not take it.
Tyuters was defended by a garrison of three thousand, while combat losses during almost three years of war amounted to only 30 people.
There is a German military cemetery on the island. Now servicemen of a separate search battalion of the Western Military District, at the request of the People's Union of Germany, are carrying out work to exhume the remains of German soldiers.
“Since this place is forested and wild, even last year there were attempts by looters to enter the island, despite the remoteness. Therefore, if you imagine the idea of leaving it and not touching anything, unfortunately, it won’t work,” explains Dmitry Volkov, an employee of the People’s Union of Germany.
Participants in a joint expedition of the Russian Ministry of Defense and the Russian Geographical Society hope to find the remains of Soviet soldiers who took part in several landings. Hundreds of soldiers and sailors went missing in these places.
“It seemed that after the last expedition, well, everyone had already moved this island far and wide, everything interesting was evacuated from here. And we seem to know everything, but it turned out that a lot of interesting things remained,” notes the head of the International Complex Expedition “Gogland” Valery Kudinsky.
On Bolshoi Tyuters, several more bunkers were discovered, built by the Germans in granite rocks. Their goals are still unknown. Geophysicists are now trying to solve this mystery of the island.
Here, presumably, there may be grottoes, the entrances to which were blocked by the Germans during the retreat. They could hide anything - from stocks of weapons and food to valuables and art objects looted by the Nazis near Leningrad.
For 70 years, Tyuters, mined far and wide, remained a reserve of war on its last legs, and only now it has finally begun to reveal its secrets.
In the Baltic, on the island of Bolshoi Tyuters, the interim results of the expedition to search for and remove equipment from the Great Patriotic War are being summed up
The event, organized by the Russian Geographical Society together with the Ministry of Defense, started in early May and will end on August 14. In less than four months, search engines must comb the island, collect German military equipment, which it is full of, and take it to the mainland. This is the first such expedition: before that only sappers worked here. According to experts, the island can be called unique: wild, almost uninhabited (only two people on the lighthouse), crammed like an open-air museum with artifacts abandoned 70 years ago.
Eight square kilometers of taiga and stone
We depart from Levashovsky military airfield. The weather is flyable, despite the low purple sky. Several officers of different branches of the military are loaded on board. And two soldiers with a can for berries.
“We asked, they took us,” they share, informing along the way that they still have a whopping 4 months left until the end of their service. - Interesting! There will be something to tell at home...
Bolshoi Tyuters, which, if you look at the map, lies near Estonia and Finland, is about an hour’s flight, 180 kilometers. The island came under the jurisdiction of our country back in 1721, when Peter I defeated the Swedes in the Northern War. In 1920 it unexpectedly became part of independent Finland. After 20 years he returned to us again. After three years the Finns and Germans ruled there. Since 1944 he has been Russian again.
Throughout the post-war period, these eight square kilometers of stone and taiga have been empty: unnecessarily. Yes, and dangerous. Until 2005, when sappers from the Ministry of Emergency Situations came to the island, it was filled with shells and mines.
From the porthole, Tyuters looks like a cozy green fluffy hat in the middle of the water. When lowered, extensive sand dunes on the banks, stepped rock formations. On the western shore there is a lighthouse match. A thread of forest road stretches through the island. And the expedition camp: white military tents, cargo equipment.
Key to the Gulf of Finland
Let's unload. The strong smell of pine hits your nose. There is an unusual silence in my ears.
We change into a UAZ and, using the cab to pick up tree branches along the winding path, we drive to the site of one of the finds. A month ago, there, in the windfalls, they discovered a curious specimen - a Wehrmacht anti-aircraft gun.
The island, I must say, looks truly wild. But in past centuries there was a large Finnish fishing village, there were wooden church, a school, and later a narrow-gauge railway.
During World War II, the garrison of German troops on Tyuters amounted to 2 thousand soldiers: one person per four square meters! And it is no coincidence - together with neighboring Gogland and a couple of smaller islands, this ridge played a strategic role - the key to the Gulf of Finland. Whoever owned the archipelago controlled the entrance to the bay. Between the islands, the Germans stretched anti-submarine nets and laid mine chains. Gogland was controlled by the Finns, Bolshoi Tyuters by the Germans. Ours made attempts to return them, but to no avail. That is why our Baltic Fleet stood, not entering into major battles until 1944, locked in Kronstadt and Leningrad...
Each field kitchen tank contains a grenade
On one of the hills across the road there is a Ural tractor and a truck crane. Nearby is the same gun - an 88-mm Bofors cannon.
“It was made in Sweden,” the expedition leader, General Valery Kudinsky, explains. — One of the best examples of anti-aircraft weapons of that time: automatic, reliable. Her condition is currently satisfactory. Clean, restore - and almost like new. They also found ammunition in the ground nearby: 80 shells in oiled paper. They used these very guns to hit our planes.
The search work, the general explains, has now been completed. From May to June, members of the expedition combed the island length and breadth: they walked in chains, 20 - 30 meters from each other. Now the task is to deliver what was found to the pier. A total of 207 objects were discovered. 137 of them need to be pulled out using heavy equipment - these same tractors and cranes. Half are already on the shore, half in the forest. Among the finds are anti-aircraft guns, anti-tank guns, anti-aircraft fire control posts, field kitchens, searchlights, trailers of various capacities, and fuel barrels.
All without exception, it must be said, are out of order. The Germans left the island hastily. They abandoned everything and left this land on September 18, 1944. Guns and trailers were blown up. There is a grenade in each field kitchen tank. There are several through shots into each barrel...
All-terrain vehicles and helicopters
It takes about half an hour to load the cannon. Despite its seemingly compact size, it does not fit entirely onto the tractor. During transportation, on one of the hills it falls creakingly onto the stones. Again we have to adjust the crane, hook the cable...
At the pier we are met by the deputy head of the director of the expedition center of the Russian Geographical Society and the main inspirer of the entire process, Artem Khutorskoy.
“You have to tinker with almost every object like this,” he says. — But some things cannot be removed with wheeled vehicles at all - rocks, windbreaks. We will try by air, using a helicopter.
And he adds that, despite the difficulties, all the work is a joy. They dreamed of this project for many years and studied archives, including German ones. But it was impossible to just pick up and go here—considerable funds were needed. Last December, the project was presented to the President of the Russian Geographical Society Sergei Shoigu, and the Minister of Defense gave the go-ahead: go ahead.
Three-inch gun, unfound aircraft
The result of the work of the military and geographers is obvious: there is a picturesque pile of metal near the pier. For specialists, all of these are valuable exhibits, which in the near future will probably take their place in various military museums across the country.
“Here are the fuel barrels, standard, two-hundred-liter,” says Khutorskoy. — From several countries at once. German, Finnish, Latvian, French. Look at their round timbers - you can make a whole collection here! Or even very interesting object: three-inch gun, manufactured in 1917 at the Putilov plant. It went to independent Finland. And she fought against us during the Great Patriotic War...
- What about the people who died? - I’m interested.
— As for the Germans, from 1941 to 1944 about 20 soldiers died on Bolshoi Tyuters for various reasons. We found the site of a possible cemetery - eight name tags were found there, which were attached to grave crosses. But the Nazis suffered the main losses in neighboring Gogland. In 1944, when Finland had already withdrawn from the war, the Germans decided to intercept Gogland - after all, it could have gone to us! At first they tried to negotiate peacefully, then they began to intimidate, and in the end they sent their troops there. And the Finns - yesterday's German allies - gave them a serious rebuff. Moreover: they requested air assistance from the Soviet troops - this was the only such case during the Great Patriotic War. Then ours and the Finns completely defeated the Nazis: up to 700 Germans died, went missing, and were wounded.
- And ours are here, on Bolshoi Tyuters?..
— There were losses. And when we left in '41. And when in 1942 they tried to storm it twice. It is known that later two of our scouts landed here. But they went missing. There are Soviet planes lying in the swamps - one or two. The lighthouse says that as a boy he remembers the tail of a plane in one of the swamps. But where is unclear. We found parts of the fuselage skin. Nothing else…
Delivery of equipment to the pier will continue in the next two weeks. Then - sending on landing boats to Kronstadt, placement at one of the military arsenals of the Leningrad region. It is likely that in the coming years, teams will begin work on this patch in the middle of the Gulf of Finland to search for dead soldiers.
By the way
As part of the expedition of the Russian Geographical Society and the Ministry of Defense, search activities are also carried out on the island of Gogland in late July - early August. Unlike Bolshoi Tyuters, only search engines work on Gogland, who are engaged in discovering the graves of our soldiers (military equipment was removed from here almost immediately after the war). According to preliminary data, about 500 Red Army soldiers died and were buried here. Work on the island is carried out by a search group of the North-West association of 16 people (including various detachments of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad region). This is the first such large-scale event. Currently, many household items and weapons of both Soviet and Finnish soldiers have been discovered - grenades, shells, rifle shields, communication coils, flasks, mugs, spoons, teapots, sanitary stretchers. And the remains of one Red Army soldier: on a cigarette case found nearby, the surname is Sapozhnikov. The search is complicated by the rocky nature of the soil. The island's landing areas are currently being combed.