Yakov Yurovsky, whose biography will be the topic of our today's article, was a Russian revolutionary, a Soviet state and party leader, a Chekist. He directly supervised the execution of Nicholas II, the last Russian emperor, and his family.
Early years
Yakov Mikhailovich Yurovsky (his real name and patronymic is Yankel Khaimovich) was born on June 7 (19), 1878 in the city of Kainsk, Tomsk province (Kuibyshev since 1935). He was the eighth of ten children and grew up in a large Jewish working-class family.
Mother was a seamstress, father was a glazier. Yakov studied at an elementary school in the river region, and from 1890 he began to learn the craft. Then he worked as an apprentice in Tomsk, Tobolsk, Feodosia, Ekaterinodar, Batumi.
Beginning of revolutionary activity
Yakov Yurovsky (photo below) joined the revolutionary activities in Tomsk in 1905. There is some indirect evidence that at first he took part in the combat organizations of the Bund, and after that, following the example of his close friend Sverdlov, he joined the Bolsheviks.
Yurovsky distributed Marxist literature, and when the undergroundthe printing house failed, he was forced to leave Russia and settled in Berlin, where he converted to Lutheranism along with his entire family (three children and wife Maria Yakovlevna).
Return home
In 1912, Yakov illegally returned to Russia, but he was tracked down and arrested by agents of the security department. Yurovsky was expelled from Tomsk for "harmful activities", but he was allowed to choose a place of residence. So he ended up in Yekaterinburg.
In the Ural city, Yakov Yurovsky opened a watch and photo workshop, and, as he himself describes it, “the gendarmerie found fault with him”, forcing him to take photographs of prisoners and suspicious persons. Nevertheless, at the same time, his workshop was a laboratory for the production of passports for the Bolsheviks.
Yurovsky in 1916 was called to serve as a paramedic in a local hospital. So he became an active agitator among the soldiers. After the February Revolution, Yakov sold the photo workshop and organized a Bolshevik printing house called the Ural Worker with the proceeds. Yurovsky became a prominent Bolshevik, a member of the Council of Soldiers' Deputies and Workers, one of the leaders of the revolution in the Urals.
The execution of the royal family
Yakov Yurovsky went down in history as a leader and one of the main participants in the execution of the sentence to execute Tsar Nicholas II and his family. In July 1918, he was appointed commandant of the Ipatiev House, and by decision of the Ural Council, on the night of July 16-17, he directly led the execution of the royal family.
There is a version thatYakov Yurovsky compiled a special document for the execution, including a list of executioners. However, the results of historical research indicate that such a document, provided at one time by an Austrian, former prisoner of war I. P. Meyer and published in 1984 by E. E. Alferyev in the United States of America, is most likely fabricated and does not reflect the real list of participants in the execution.
Later years of life
When the Whites entered Yekaterinburg on July 25, 1918, Yakov Yurovsky moved to Moscow and became a member of the Moscow Cheka, as well as the head of the district Cheka. After the Bolsheviks returned to Yekaterinburg, he was appointed chairman of the Ural GubChK. Yurovsky settled almost opposite the execution house - in the rich mansion of Agushevich. In 1921, he was sent to head the gold department at Gokhran in order to “bring the valuables stored there into a liquid state.”
Then Yakov worked in the foreign exchange department of the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, where he was the chairman of the trade department, and in 1923 he took the post of deputy director of the Krasny Bogatyr plant. Beginning in 1928, Yurovsky worked as the director of the Moscow Polytechnic Museum. He died in 1938 from a perforated duodenal ulcer (according to the official version).
Yakov Yurovsky: descendants
Yurovsky had a big family. With his wife, they gave birth to three children: daughter Rimma (1898), sons Alexander (1904) and Eugene (1909). They lived comfortably, kept servants. In the upbringing of offspringthe head of the family, constantly employed in the service, did not particularly participate, but in which case he punished severely. All heirs have received higher education.
Yakov was very fond of his daughter - an excellent student, black-haired beauty. She gave him a grandson Anatoly. But, apparently, indeed, the descendants have to pay for the sins of their fathers. All of Yurovsky's grandchildren, by a fatal coincidence, died (one burned down in a fire, another poisoned himself with mushrooms, a third hanged himself, another fell from the roof of a barn), and the girls generally died in infancy. Tolya's grandson, adored by his grandfather, died right at the wheel of a car.
Misfortune overtook Rimma too. She, a prominent Komsomol figure, was arrested in 1935 and sent to the Karaganda camp for political prisoners. She served time there until 1946. Died 1980
Son Alexander was a Rear Admiral of the Navy. In 1952, he was repressed, but soon, when Stalin died, he was released. He died in 1986.
The youngest son was a political worker in the Navy, a lieutenant colonel. Died 1977.
Where Yakov Yurovsky is buried
It is in vain to look for the burial place of the odious “hero of the revolution” in the popular metropolitan churchyards - Vagankovsky, Novodevichy … For a long time it was not known where the grave of Yakov Yurovsky was located. As it turned out, his body was cremated and the urn with the ashes was carefully hidden from prying eyes in a special cemetery area - in a special columbarium at the New Donskoy Cemetery in the historical district of Moscow.
There is evidence that this isolated mausoleum-the columbarium was organized thanks to the assertiveness of Paul Dauge, a prominent party member and the first creator of ORRICK. They equipped the place of "VIP-burial" in the former building of the church. In Stalin's hard times, urns with the ashes of honored personalities were placed here, who by some miracle managed to avoid complete repressions and died a natural death.
Many of the cells are now "nameless", because the glass tightly embedded in the wall is fogged from the inside and covered with a cloudy coating, which makes it impossible to see anything.
In the depths of the structure, in a niche, there are two urns draped with red and black mourning ribbons so that no inscriptions can be seen. This is the ashes of Yurovsky and his wife. There are several artificial flowers with faded fabric around the urns - neglect is visible in everything, it is noticeable that the burial has not been updated for a long time.
They say that fire erases all traces. But for the regicide, whose remains ended up in a special columbarium, this law did not work: his trace did not disappear anywhere. At one time, Yurovsky did everything to hide the corpses of the imperial family forever, but his own grave ended up being carefully hidden from people. The former hero commissar has now been reincarnated as an outcast forever.
