Leningrad siege: The captive's diary

Tanya Savicheva. The name of this girl, who died aged 14, is associated with the siege of Leningrad during the Second World War. She is considered to be a symbol of the tragedy that all residents of the city went through during those days. The diary of Tanya Savicheva consists of nine notes. These notes impressively reflect the palette of tragic feelings of a child, losing her relatives every month.

The 5th child in the family, Tanya was born on January 25th, 1930. The whole family was going to leave the city in the beginning of the summer 1941, but they didn't manage to do this. So they were stuck in Leningrad, like millions of other confused citizens.

This notebook remained after Tanya's elder sister that went missing. Following that event, little Tanya started to make these notes, marking the most frightful events in her life. Here they are:

1) Zhenya died on December 28th, 1941 at 12.30 pm

2) Grandmother died on January 25th, 1942 at 3 pm

3) Lyoka died on March 17th, 1942 at 5 am

4) Uncle Vasya died on April 13th, 1942 at 2 am

5) Uncle Lesha died on May 10th, 1942 at 4 pm

6) Mother died on May 13th, 1942 at 7.30 am

7) Savichevs died.

8) Everyone died.

9) Only Tanya is left.

She died on July 1st, 1944. She didn't know that her sister Nina and brother Misha actually were rescued.

Tanya's diary was put in evidence during the Nuremberg Trials.

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