They plundered and despoiled the house where the great Russian composer, Tschaikovsky, lived and worked. In this house Tschaikovsky created the world-famous operas Eugen Onegin and The Queen of Spades.
In Taganrog they destroyed the house where the great Russian writer Chekhov lived; in Tikhvin they destroyed the residence of the Russian composer Rimsky-Korsakov.
As evidence, Your Honors, I shall read into the record an excerpt from the note of Foreign Commissar Molotov, dated 6 January 1942. This document has already been submitted to the Tribunal as Document Number 51(2). This excerpt is on Page 317 of the document book. I quote:
“For a period of 6 weeks, the Germans occupied the world-famous property of Yasnaya Polyana where Leo Tolstoy, one of the greatest geniuses of mankind, was born, lived, and created. This glorious memorial to Russian culture was wrecked, profaned, and finally set on fire by the Nazi vandals. The grave of the great writer was desecrated by the invaders. Irreplaceable relics relating to the life and work of Leo Tolstoy, including rare manuscripts, books, and paintings, were either plundered by the German soldiers or thrown away and destroyed. A German officer named Schwartz, in reply to a request of one of the museum’s staff collaborators to stop using the personal furniture and books of the great writer for firewood and to use wood available for this purpose, answered, ‘We don’t need firewood; we shall burn everything connected with the name of your Tolstoy.’
“When the town of Klin was liberated by the Soviet troops on 15 December, it was ascertained that the house in which P. I. Tschaikovsky, the great Russian composer, had lived and worked and which the Soviet State had turned into a museum, had been wrecked and plundered by fascist officers and soldiers. In the museum building proper, the Germans set up a garage for motorcycles, heating this garage with manuscripts, books, furniture, and other museum exhibits, part of which had in any case been stolen by the German invaders. In doing this, the Nazi officers knew perfectly well that they were defiling one of the finest monuments of Russian culture.
“During the occupation of the town of Istra, the German troops established an ammunition dump in the famous ancient Russian monastery known as the New Jerusalem Monastery, founded as far back as 1654. The New Jerusalem Monastery was an outstanding historical and religious monument of the Russian people and was known as one of the most beautiful specimens of religious architecture. This did not, however, prevent the German fascist vandals from blowing up their ammunition dump in the New Jerusalem Monastery on their retreat from Istra, thereby reducing this irreplaceable monument of Russian church history to a heap of ruins.”
I omit the next paragraph and close this quotation.
Acting upon directions of the German Military Command, the Hitlerites destroyed and annihilated the cultural-historic monuments of the Russian people connected with the life and work of the great Russian poet, Alexander Sergeivitch Pushkin.
The report of the Extraordinary State Commission of the Soviet Union, the original copy of which is now submitted to the Tribunal as Document Number USSR-40 (Exhibit Number USSR-40), reads as follows:
“To preserve the cultural and historical memorials of the Russian people connected with the life and creations of the gifted Russian poet and genius, Alexander Sergeivitch Pushkin, the Soviet Government, on 17 March 1922, declared the poet’s estate at Mikhailovskoye, as well as his tomb at the monastery of Svyatogorsky and the neighboring villages of Trigorskoye, Gorodischtsche, and Voronitch, a state reservation.