Barbarossa

1943 · 190315 — Leningrad/St Petersburg: 3rd Military-Topographic Detachment Leningrad Front 17 June 1943. German occupation of Tsarskoye Selo Fascinating and extremely rare Soviet photo-reconnaissance piece from the notorious siege of Leningrad September 1941 - January 1945; records in detail the defensive works on a 10 km sector of the German line around the invested city which tracks through the Tsarist palace complexes in the south sites such as the White Tower and St Catherine's Cathedral visible in the tree line. Unsurprisingly we have been unable to trace another example or similar; although clearly such visual intelligence would have been of vital importance copies being generated commensurately with need. However the supersession of the information contained and general conditions on campaign must have ensured a high rate of attrition. The panorama very much has the feel of having been improvised in the field but the information is conveyed with precision and clarity and evidently follows some earlier more formally produced model. The capture of Leningrad was one of the key targets of Nazi Germany's operations against Russia. Not only was the city the base for the Soviet Baltic Fleet and one of the major hubs of Russia's military-industrial complex it also embodied considerable political status both as the former capital of Russian Imperial greatness and as symbolic capital of Bolshevism and the Revolution. When the German High Command's expectation of a rapid collapse evaporated both sides settled in for what was to become one the longest and most costly sieges in history with Hitler's intended endgame apparently the complete destruction of the city and the "dispersal" of its population. During the siege Nazi headquarters was located in the Alexander Palace in Tsarskoye Selo and the complex of buildings - "a magnificent symbol a supreme gesture of the Russian autocracy. a miniature world as artificial and as fantastic as a precisely ordered mechanical toy" Massie p.117 - stripped of their treasures and systematically slighted leaving little intact on their withdrawal. It was of course from the Catherine Palace that the fabled Amber Room was removed crated and shipped to Königsberg now Kaliningrad where it was installed in the castle museum and from whence it disappeared before the Allies could secure it. Landscape quarto 210 x 330 mm 22 sheets of light olive card jointed leporello-style with moderate blue cloth printed labels neatly completed in ink to the front cover 51 original silver gelatine prints numbered in the negative c. 100 x 150 mm mounted as a continuous panorama c. 7260 mm inked identifications of villages significant landmarks and defensive structures machine gun dug outs bunkers reconnaissance posts. Relevant section of a detailed map mounted inside the front cover neatly keyed in manuscript to the images. Externally rubbed and soiled front panel with accession wet stamp and inked details some marks internally latter half hole-punched where previously laced together a bit shaken images clean and with good contrast remains very good. Robert K. Massie Nicholas and Alexandria 1967. hardcover