The most popular song of the twentieth century, which is considered to be almost the anthem of the criminal world, is actually nothing more than a song about the secret operation of the Cheka. Marusya Klimova is a real character who has worked all her life in a secret unit of the GubChK, the GPU, and then in the NKVD. Both riddles and answers to them are encrypted in the lyrics. The main question remains about the fate of the heroine of the song, Marusya Klimova …
During the entire last century, many preferred to call the famous song "folk". The name of the author, and he, of course, was, the performers preferred not to pronounce aloud from the stage. The authorship of the "anthem lesson" promised the up to some time unknown poet in big trouble, especially in the 1930s.
Interestingly, even the most famous performer of "Murka" - Leonid Utyosov - at about this time was advised to remove the song from the repertoire. As always happens in such cases, "going underground" only added to the popularity of the song. But then she lived without her progenitor: many still think that "Murka" is a folk epic.
ARRIVED IN ODESSA BAND FROM AMUR
This is not true. Odessa archives, including the archives of the criminal investigation department and the criminal police, have preserved not only the name of the author, but also the lyrics of the song (there were several of them) in handwritten form.
One of the texts also contains the first riddle of "Murka". As many researchers of Russian chanson and the so-called thug poetry of the beginning of the last century know, "Murka" has versions according to which the "gang" arrived in Odessa "from Rostov", "from Petrograd" and "from Amur". And in one of the author's texts it is generally written “because of MUR”. And this option is more interesting than others.
The author of "Murka" is the Odessa poet Yakov Yadov. The song itself was written in Odessa approximately in 1921-1922. This is the opinion of Odessa historians and ethnographers, who are already ready today to conduct excursions to the places of the heroine's military glory. Yakov Yadov, they will tell you during the excursion, was not a fan of criminal chanson, but accurately and ironically described in his poems the brightest images of Odessa during the nascent NEP, encrypting in his songs the events of that time that actually took place in the city.
From under his pen came out such, at first glance, nameless masterpieces as "Bublikki" and "Gop with a Bow". Fearing repression and persecution of the authors of the criminal epic, Yadov really chose to hide his name over time. The song also had a composer - the famous musician Oskar Strok, who set Yadov's poems to music in early 1923. Then the whole Odessa knew the history of "Murka". But even at that time, few knew that she was an agent of the Moscow Criminal Investigation Department …
The Moscow Criminal Investigation Department was founded in 1918 and by the early 1920s had already proved its effectiveness, quickly and toughly suppressing the rampant banditry in the capital. Being under the tutelage of the central apparatus of the Cheka, the Moscow police, whose backbone were both yesterday's workers and former criminal elements amnestied by the new government, did not shy away from any work - their means and methods were not much different from those used by the gangs of that time.
We can say that the image of Dirty Harry, which is often seen in Hollywood cinema, as a policeman without rules, administering his own justice, is a completely real and, in general, an ordinary Moscow policeman of the early 1920s. Over time, the Chekists decided to "export" the MUR's experience to the most problematic regions of the Soviet empire, sending groups of Murovites to suppress riots and centers of banditry. Sometimes such task forces did not take their IDs with them, did not wear uniforms. They only had weapons with them …
AND THE SPONGE WAS FOLLOWING HER
The Provincial Extraordinary Commission existed until early 1922, when it was renamed the GPU. The phrase about the GubChK, written by Yakov Yadov, allows us to assume that the action takes place in Odessa in the period from 1918 (the date of creation of the Moscow Criminal Investigation Department) to 1922. But the mentioned fact of spying on the gang has its own special figurative meaning - what if she oversaw the actions of the “gang” consisting of MUR officers who came to Odessa to establish “world order”?
In 1922, the Civil War continued in the country, yesterday there was a famine in Odessa - the corpses of the dead were removed from the streets by the Red Army on special carts every morning. It made no sense for someone from Amur to come to the seaside town, flooded with an already huge number of local gangs that “covered” the market for drugs and smuggling, precious metals and prostitution. As we understand, they could not come by the high-speed train of the Russian Railways. Airplanes from the Far East to Odessa, for obvious reasons, also did not fly.
But, as the archives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia tell us, which preserved data on secret operations of the early 20s of the last century, only to Odessa from Moscow were sent several special task forces of the Cheka and the Moscow Criminal Investigation Department - both in uniform and "in civilian clothes" …
The first "Varangian" who arrived in Odessa from the capital back in 1919 was the head of the special department of the Cheka Fyodor Timofeevich Fomin. A little later, Stas Redens, the Chekist, who received the nickname Stakh (from the word “fear”, did not pronounce the letter “r”, went to the same place from Moscow), and about 80 security officers and policemen arrived with him. Soon Redens was replaced by Max Deutsch himself, a close friend of Felix Dzerzhinsky, a powerful "gray cardinal" of the central apparatus of the Cheka.
The interest of the Lubyanka leadership in the events in Odessa was not accidental. Odessa is the largest seaport, cargo and goods from Europe were transported through it. Smuggling flourished, representatives of British and Romanian intelligence firmly settled in the city, counterfeiters of all stripes also "worked" here.
There were also drug dens, which were run by the Chinese. Despite the fact that back in 1918 the city was finally conquered by the Red Army, a very tense situation remained in Odessa. A "Makhnovist underground cell" was operating - the return of the troops of the strengthened Nestor Makhno to the south of Ukraine was expected in mid-1922, in the suburbs there were up to 30 scattered gangs, well-armed since the First World War.
Moscow did not trust anyone in the city, and therefore the Odessa Cheka throughout the entire period of time of interest to us - from 1918 to 1922 - was headed by the Moscow Chekists sent with a special mission: to collect all the information for carrying out a large-scale "cleansing" of Odessa from a criminal element.
An information databank with detailed dossiers on the leaders of the criminal world of Odessa was compiled by the beginning of 1922. At the same time, it was obvious to the "Varangians from the Lubyanka" that it was not possible to rely on the local forces of the Odessa police during any serious operation - in the Odessa Ugro, just like the local Cheka, corruption flourished, all information about the upcoming operations leaked directly to the gang leaders. And then a historic decision was made for those times. A special group assembled by the Moscow Chekists will come to the city - now they would be called "cleaners" - to carry out one swift operation, the purpose of which should be to destroy the entire top of the city's criminal world.
Moscow already had such an experience. In 1920, a so-called special strike group came to Odessa under the leadership of one of the most famous Moscow police chiefs, Fyodor Martynov. Then the "shock raid" on Odessa ended with mass executions of bandits right on the streets of the city. But now, they decided at the Lubyanka, it is necessary to act more subtly, since the leader of the Odessa criminal underground - a thief named Brilliant - even the KGB agents and informants did not know by sight. The scenario of the special operation was being worked out in Moscow for about six months.
This scenario assumed that a "group of touring bandits" would go to Odessa, the backbone of which would be the most experienced MUR operatives under the leadership of a Chekist named Berg - the archives have preserved several names for us. The Cheka, however, was well aware that the appearance of such a "stray" gang in Odessa at that time could lead to a serious confrontation and a small civil war. Several large groups operated in the city that did not fight among themselves and even observed the "thieves' concession."
This unspoken set of rules, among other things, assumed the "surrender" of those representatives of the criminal world to the Chekists who refused to pay their share in the thieves' common fund. "Tourists" in Odessa would have to face the most brutal representatives of the gangster underground, who, if they wanted, could lead to the intruders and the local GubChK. Therefore, a whole legend was invented for a group of Moscow policemen in disguise, according to which the operatives were to appear before the leaders of the local criminal community in the form of a reconnaissance group sent to the city by Nestor Makhno himself.
At first, this legend would have helped the Chekists at least gain time. But there was one more detail of the plan developed at the Lubyanka. It was not even a detail, but a whole character. Female. Her name was Murka.
In the photo: Lyricist Yakov Yadov
THE BAB'S SPEECH, HER CALLED MURKA, WAS SLEEP AND BOLD
The appearance of a woman in the MUR task force at that time was not only possible, but even a necessary phenomenon. The woman in the gang could not, however, play the role of the leader. Rather, she was a friend of the leader, as they said then: "A woman in a gang - a thief for luck." Also, a woman, a beautiful and seductive thief, could be a major swindler, a card player, a fortune-teller, or anyone - examples of that time would be enough for a whole book.
The decision to include an operative in the "gang from the Moscow Criminal Investigation Department" was made by the top management of the Cheka. Moscow knew that Brilliant was not indifferent to the fairer sex, and Murka was originally supposed to play the role of bait in this "cover operation" (this is how the special services are called now, when operatives carry out the entire operation in civilian clothes, acting according to a legend - a premeditated story) … It is only important to note that, as often happens now, the main character did not know about the role assigned to her. But the legend was invented for her by the real one - yes, such that it inspired fear even the seasoned Odessa bandits.
By the way, the author of the song Yakov Yadov hinted at the true role of Murka in a line, describing the scene of identification of Marusya Klimova by one of the bandits in an Odessa restaurant: “Murka was sitting there in a leather jacket, and a revolver was sticking out from under the floor.” Not a single girl who connected herself with the criminal world of Odessa at that time would sit in a restaurant dressed in the outfit traditional for the Cheka, and even with a revolver at the ready.
And then there was the special operation itself - of such a level of complexity and secrecy that all the documents shedding light on its details were urgently taken to Moscow, where they were safely hidden from prying eyes under the heading "Top secret". As most often happens, life turned out to be stronger than the plan - even the secret plan of the Cheka. Much did not go as planned in Moscow.
Sometimes the Moscow guests were saved by a miracle, sometimes - by the charm and character of the girl, who, in the course of the operation, became the leader not only of her group, but of almost the entire criminal world of Odessa. It is known for certain that the operation was successful in the end, although how can you measure the success? At what cost - at the cost of lost lives, broken lives, broken hearts?
And finally.
Yakov Yadov's song ends with the words "… and get a bullet for that." These are the words of the leader of the gang, addressed to Murka. Odessa historians and employees of the Odessa City Hall, who conducted a special search for the possible burial place of the heroine of the song, came to a common conclusion - Murka was not buried in local cemeteries. There was, however, one strange story with the funeral of a girl - a Moscow intelligence agent, but in the city then allegedly they said that the body of a girl who played the role of the agent's "double" was lowered into the grave …
In the materials of the Main Information and Archival Center of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia, I managed to find a registration card that was preserved after the destruction of the personal file of one employee of the Moscow Criminal Investigation Department in the late 70s of the last century. The case itself, in case of special secrecy of the agent's legend, is subject to destruction either after his / her death, or after the expiration of the limitation period of the operation.
This card is published for the first time. It says - Maria Prokofievna Klimova, born in 1897. At the time of the secret Odessa operation, Murka was only 25 years old. But here's what's interesting. The rank is indicated in the registration card - captain of the militia of the reserve. The rank of captain, like all the other ranks that have survived to this day, were introduced to the militia in the mid-1930s. Means, Murka lived up to these times? And didn't you die in Odessa? We have yet to reveal this secret …
