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| Anna Reid 31-03-2020 |
A few years ago I wrote a book about the siege of Leningrad, a brutal chapter of World War II history. Sitting in my office, working my way through dozens of heart-wrenching siege diaries, the cheerful noise of children in the school playground opposite came as a blessed relief.
Today I’m at my desk in the same room. The playground — like the whole street — is oddly quiet; the school closed and neighbours behind doors so as to slow the spread of the coronavirus. And though the crises are so different as to make direct comparison absurd, in the silence faint — very faint — echoes can be heard of Leningrad’s great urban Calvary of nearly eighty years ago.
Starting in September 1941, when the Germans ringed the city, and ending in January 1944, when the Red Army finally smashed German lines and started pushing towards Berlin, the siege of Leningrad killed somewhere between 650,000 and 800,000 people. Some were killed by bombs or artillery, others by dysentery and typhus.
Starting in September 1941, when the Germans ringed the city, and ending in January 1944, when the Red Army finally smashed German lines and started pushing towards Berlin, the siege of Leningrad killed somewhere between 650,000 and 800,000 people. Some were killed by bombs or artillery, others by dysentery and typhus.
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