war, Sochi;11 the vaulted dining room where he enjoyed long Georgian feasts;11 his specially built paddling pool;11 his post-war holiday headquarters, Coldstream;10 the millionaire’s mansion in Sukhumi;10 and Museri. 10

General Vasily Stalin: over-promoted, alcoholic, unstable, cruel and terrified. 1

After the war, General Vasily Stalin persuaded General Vlasik to give him his exquisite town house not far from the Kremlin.10

At the end of the war, a tired but cheerful Stalin sits between the two rivals, Malenkov and Zhdanov.2

1945–1953

After victory, Stalin fell ill with a series of minor strokes or heart attacks.3

On 12 August 1945, Generalissimo Stalin cheerfully leads his magnates for the parade.8

Zhdanov and the charlatan Trofim Lysenko.10

The exhausted Stalin gloomily leads Beria, Mikoyan and Malenkov through the Kremlin to the Mausoleum for the 1946 May Day parade.4

Stalin leads the mourning at Kalinin’s funeral in 1946.2

Stalin, Voroshilov and Kaganovich follow Zhdanov’s coffin at his funeral. 2

In late 1948, Stalin sits with the older generation, Kaganovich, Molotov and Voroshilov, while an intrigue is being prepared behind them among the younger.2

Mikoyan and others at Stalin’s house in the summer.3

At his seventieth birthday gala, on stage at the Bolshoi, Stalin stands between Mao Tse-tung and Khrushchev.10

Stalin’s restless last holiday in 1952: his new house at New Athos; 10 the Likani Palace, which once belonged to Tsar Nicholas II’s brother Grand Duke Michael;10 his remote house at Lake Ritsa, where he spent weeks;10 green metal boxes containing phones were built by his guards so that Stalin could call for help if he was taken ill on his daily strolls.10

The sofa at Kuntsevo on which Stalin died on 5 March 1953.10

The ageing but determined Stalin watches Malenkov give the chief report at his last public appearance at the Nineteenth Congress in 1952.6

Khrushchev, Bulganin, Kaganovich, Mikoyan, Beria, Malenkov, Molotov and Voroshilov face each other over Stalin’s body.4

Stalin at the 1927 Congress: in his prime.2

The author and the publishers offer their thanks to the following for their kind permission to reproduce images:

1 Alliluyev Family Collection

2 RGASPI

3 Vlasik Family Collection

4 AKG

5 Poskrebyshev Family Collection

6 David King Collection

7 Camera Press

8 Stalin Museum, Gori, Republic of Georgia

9 Hugh Lunghi Collection

10 Photographs by the author/Author’s own collection

11 Victoria Ivleva-Yorke

List of Characters

Joseph Stalin, born Djugashvili, known as “Soso” and “Koba.” Secretary of Bolshevik Party 1922–1953 and Premier 1941–1953. Marshal. Generalissimo

FAMILY

Keke Djugashvili, Stalin’s mother

Kato Svanidze, Stalin’s first wife

Yakov Djugashvili, son of Stalin’s first marriage to Kato Svanidze. Captured by Germans

Nadya Alliluyeva, Stalin’s second wife

Vasily Stalin, Stalin’s son by Nadya Alliluyeva, pilot, General

Svetlana Stalin, now known as Alliluyeva, Stalin’s daughter

Artyom Sergeev, Stalin and Nadya’s adopted son

Sergei Alliluyev, Nadya’s father

Olga Alliluyeva, Nadya’s mother

Pavel Alliluyev, Nadya’s brother, Red Army Commissar married to

Zhenya Alliluyeva, Nadya’s sister-in-law, actress, mother of Kira

Alyosha Svanidze, brother of Kato, Georgian, Stalin’s brother-in-law, banking official married to

Maria Svanidze, diarist, Jewish Georgian opera singer

Stanislas Redens, Nadya’s brother-in-law, secret policeman, married to

Anna Redens, Nadya’s elder sister

ALLIES

Victor Abakumov, secret policeman, head of Smersh, MGB Minister

Andrei Andreyev, Politburo member, CC (Central Committee) Secretary, married to

Dora Khazan, Nadya’s best friend, Deputy Textiles Minister, mother of Natasha Andreyeva

Lavrenti Beria, “Uncle Lara,” secret policeman, NKVD boss, Politburo member in charge of nuclear bomb, married to

Nina Beria, scientist, Stalin treated her “like a daughter”; mother of

Sergo Beria, scientist, married to

Martha Peshkova Beria, granddaughter of Gorky, daughter-in-law of Beria

Semyon Budyonny, cavalryman, Marshal, one of the Tsaritsyn Group

Nikolai Bulganin, “the Plumber,” Chekist, Mayor of Moscow, Politburo member, Defence Minister, heir apparent

Candide Charkviani, Georgian Party chief and Stalin’s confidant

Semyon Ignatiev, MGB Minister, master of the Doctors’ Plot

Lazar Kaganovich, “Iron Lazar” and “the Locomotive,” Jewish Old Bolshevik, Stalin’s deputy early 1930s, Railways chief, Politburo member

Mikhail Kalinin, “Papa,” the “Village Elder,” Soviet President, peasant/ worker

Nikita Khrushchev, Moscow, then Ukrainian First Secretary, Politburo member

Sergei Kirov, Leningrad chief, CC (Central Committee) Secretary, Politburo member and Stalin’s close friend

Valerian Kuibyshev, economic chief and poet, Politburo member

Alexei (A. A.) Kuznetsov, Zhdanov’s deputy in Leningrad; post–World War II, CC (Central Committee) Secretary and curator of MGB, Stalin’s heir apparent as Secretary

Nestor Lakoba, Abkhazian boss

Georgi Malenkov, nicknamed “Melanie” or “Malanya,” CC (Central Committee) Secretary, allied to Beria

Lev Mekhlis, “the Gloomy Demon” and “Shark,” Jewish, Stalin’s secretary, then Pravda editor, political chief of Red Army

Akaki Mgeladze, Abkhazian, then Georgian boss; Stalin called him “Wolf”

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