Kresty Prison
Encyclopedia
Kresty prison, officially 1st Detention Center of Administration of Federal Service of Execution of Punishments in Saint Petersburg (Следственный Изолятор № 1 УФСИН по г. Санкт-Петербургу) is a detention center
in Saint Petersburg
, Russia
. The prison consists of two cross-shaped buildings (hence the name) and Alexander Nevsky Cathedral. The prison has 960 cells and was originally designed for 1150 detainees.
, Vinny Gorodok (Wine Town) was a warehouse complex where all the wine for the city of Saint Petersburg
was held. After the Emancipation reform of 1861
the need for prison space greatly increased; before the reforms, serfs were incarcerated by their landowners and after the reforms they were put in state prisons. Thus, in 1867 the wine warehouse was transformed into a 700-bed prison separated into female and male areas. The reconstruction of the wine warehouse was developed by Vladislav Lvov, the chairman of the Saint Petersburg Prison Committee.
.jpg)
In 20 years the prison became too small for the city. The project for the new city prison was developed by Antony Tomishko, a citizen of Austria-Hungary
, a member of the Russian Academy of Arts
and a staff architect of the Russian State Prison Administration. He was the designer of the Model Uyezd
Prison originally built in Staraya Russa
and reproduced in Vesyegonsk
, Vyazma
, Tsaritsyn and other places. Tomishko studied the organization of prisons in Germany
and was impressed by the Moabit
prison, with three blocks joining a single one tower. He also appreciated the Philadelphia system that recommended building prisons in the shape of a star with many rays coming from a single observation point. The system was also known as the Panopticon
system.
Tomishko designed a prison consisting of two five-storey cross-shaped buildings. The shape of the buildings allowed observation of all the corridors from a single point and also had religious significance, encouraging penance
among the inmates. The crosses were joined together by a massive five onion domed red brick Russian Revival
cathedral on top of an administrative building. There was also a prison hospital, a ward for infectious diseases, a morgue, an ice-room and a smithy.
Construction started in 1884 and continued until 1890. It was performed by the inmates of the prison who where kept on the site: a part of the old prison was demolished, then the detainees built the new one while continuing to live in the remaining parts of the old building, then the prisoners were moved to the new building, the remains of the old building were demolished and construction continued. The prison was one of the first buildings in Russia that used electric lighting, effective ventilation and central heating. In the center of one of the cross-shaped buildings Tomishko installed a monument to English philanthropist and prison reformer John Howard
. By the time it was built it was considered the most advanced prison in the world and it still remains the largest prison in Europe.
According to an urban legend
, Tomishko was so proud of his creation that he reported to Tsar Alexander III
: "Your Majesty, I have built the prison for you"; "No, you have built it for yourself", supposedly answered the Tsar. The legend continues that besides the 999 official prison cells there is a secret cell number 1000 that still holds the dead body of Tomishko, while his ghost haunts the prison. The legend is almost certainly false (at least there are only 960 cells in the prison).
Alexander Kerensky
, the founder of the Constitutional Democratic party
Pavel Milyukov
, the prominent Bolshevik
revolutionaries Leon Trotsky
and Vladimir Antonov-Ovseenko
, and future first Soviet People's Commissar of Enlightenment Anatoly Lunacharsky.
In 1906 all 200 deputies of the first State Duma of the Russian Empire
who had signed the Vyborg Manifesto
had to spend three months in Kresty Prison.
On the evening of , during the February Revolution
, rebellious soldiers and workers who came to a meeting near the Finlyandsky Rail Terminal were led by Mikhail Kalinin
to storm the Kresty. They freed the inmates and destroyed all the prison paperwork.
_cropped.jpg)
After the February Revolution Kresty became a place of imprisonment for the ministers of the Tsarist government and prominent police officers. After the October Revolution
they were joined by people from the Russian Provisional Government
, non-Bolshevik politicians and intelligentsia
. Among the people imprisoned there were Prime Minister Boris Stürmer
, who died in Kresty in September 1917, Justice Minister Ivan Scheglovitov, Minister of the Interior Alexei Khvostov
, Minister of War Mikhail Belyayev, former Minister of War Vladimir Sukhomlinov
, Chief of Police Yevgeny Klimovich, the great Russian poet Nikolay Gumilyov
and many others.
In 1920 the prison was renamed as the Second Special Camp for Involuntary Labor and was administered by Petrograd Ispolkom. In 1923 the prison became Petrograd District Isolation Prison (Петроградская Окружная Изоляционная Тюрьма), part of the Petrograd Cheka
system.
During the Great Purges, the prison overflowed with inmates accused of state crimes. Often cells designed for solitary confinement held 15-20 inmates or more. Among the inmates were: famous painter Kazimir Malevich
, poet Nikolay Zabolotsky
, historian Lev Gumilyov, actor Georgiy Zhzhonov
, future Marshal of the Soviet Union
Konstantin Rokossovsky
and many others. The prison features prominently in Anna Akhmatova
's poem Requiem. In the Preface to her poem she writes:
On the grounds of the prison operated a sharashka
- a research and development facility called OKB-172 that used inmates as weapons engineers and researchers. The facility developed torpedo boat
s that were widely used by the Soviet Navy
during World War II
.
During the Siege of Leningrad
most detainees were either conscripted into the Penal military unit
s of Soviet Army or transferred to the Eastern regions of the country. The prison was used for detaining those involved in stealing of food or ration cards, and later also for German POWs. Many guards and detainees died of starvation during the siege.
In 1964 the prison became the facility used mostly for pre-trial detentions. It was greatly overcrowded: in the mid-1990s the prison held more than 12,500 inmates. That is more than ten times the design capacity of the prison (1150 inmates). Often in a cell originally designed for solitary confinement during the Tsarist period and according to the Soviet rules suitable for only 6 inmates would actually hold more than 20 inmates taking their turns to sleep on the three-level bunk bed and on the floor. Detention for months or even years in those conditions, often manipulated by the investigators, was often a method to press the suspects. In 1983 the prison was rendered unsuitable for women and minors.
The prison was mostly used for the common criminals but many Soviet dissidents
from Leningrad were also held there during the investigations and trials.
The judicial reforms of the 1990s made long pre-trial detentions available only with approval of the courts. Currently no more than six inmates can be held in a cell originally designed for solitary confinement.
In 1993 a museum was open inside the prison devoted to the history of the prison, famous inmates and unusual objects found on the detainees.
On 28 April 1995 the monument To the victims of Political repressions made by Mikhail Shemyakin was installed on the embankment across the Neva River
from the prison. It depicts two bronze sphinx
es with pretty women's faces as seen from the residential houses on the embankment and bare skulls as seen from the prison's side of the river. There is a stylized window with prison bars between the sphinxes. On the granite base of the monument there are inscriptions with quotes from Nikolay Gumilyov
, Osip Mandelstam
, Anna Akhmatova
, Nikolay Zabolotsky
, Daniil Andreyev
, Dmitry Likhachev
, Joseph Brodsky
, Yuri Galanskov
, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
, Vladimir Vysotsky
and Vladimir Bukovsky
.
On 19 December 2006 a monument to poet Anna Akhmatova
by Galina Dodonova was erected across Neva River opposite to the prison according to her will in her poem Requiem
On 25 December 2006 a copy of the monument was installed in a corridor of the prison itself.
In summer 2006 Vladimir Putin
(then President of Russia) announced that the prison would be relocated to a new facility in the Kolpinsky District
on the outskirts of Saint Petersburg. After the relocation is complete the Kresty building will be sold at auction. It is anticipated that the prison building will be transferred into a hotel-entertainment complex. The available options are limited as the prison is considered a protected architectural landmark and only very limited redesign is possible.
Prison
A prison is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Imprisonment or incarceration is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the commission of a crime...
in Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
. The prison consists of two cross-shaped buildings (hence the name) and Alexander Nevsky Cathedral. The prison has 960 cells and was originally designed for 1150 detainees.
Wine warehouse
The history of the prison starts in the 1730s. During the reign of Anna IoannovnaAnna of Russia
Anna of Russia or Anna Ivanovna reigned as Duchess of Courland from 1711 to 1730 and as Empress of Russia from 1730 to 1740.-Accession to the throne:Anna was the daughter of Ivan V of Russia, as well as the niece of Peter the Great...
, Vinny Gorodok (Wine Town) was a warehouse complex where all the wine for the city of Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
was held. After the Emancipation reform of 1861
Emancipation reform of 1861
The Emancipation Reform of 1861 in Russia was the first and most important of liberal reforms effected during the reign of Alexander II of Russia. The reform, together with a related reform in 1861, amounted to the liquidation of serf dependence previously suffered by peasants of the Russian Empire...
the need for prison space greatly increased; before the reforms, serfs were incarcerated by their landowners and after the reforms they were put in state prisons. Thus, in 1867 the wine warehouse was transformed into a 700-bed prison separated into female and male areas. The reconstruction of the wine warehouse was developed by Vladislav Lvov, the chairman of the Saint Petersburg Prison Committee.
Construction of the new prison
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...
, a member of the Russian Academy of Arts
Imperial Academy of Arts
The Russian Academy of Arts, informally known as the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, was founded in 1757 by Ivan Shuvalov under the name Academy of the Three Noblest Arts. Catherine the Great renamed it the Imperial Academy of Arts and commissioned a new building, completed 25 years later in 1789...
and a staff architect of the Russian State Prison Administration. He was the designer of the Model Uyezd
Uyezd
Uyezd or uezd was an administrative subdivision of Rus', Muscovy, Russian Empire, and the early Russian SFSR which was in use from the 13th century. Uyezds for most of the history in Russia were a secondary-level of administrative division...
Prison originally built in Staraya Russa
Staraya Russa
Staraya Russa is a town in Novgorod Oblast, Russia, located south of Veliky Novgorod. It is a wharf on the Polist River in the Lake Ilmen basin. It serves as the administrative center of Starorussky District, although administratively it is not a part of it...
and reproduced in Vesyegonsk
Vesyegonsk
Vesyegonsk is a town and the administrative center of Vesyegonsky District of Tver Oblast, Russia. Population: The historical part of Vesyegonsk lies under the waters of the Rybinsk Reservoir....
, Vyazma
Vyazma
Vyazma is a town and the administrative center of Vyazemsky District of Smolensk Oblast, Russia, located on the Vyazma River, about halfway between Smolensk and Mozhaysk. Throughout its turbulent history, the city defended western approaches to the city of Moscow...
, Tsaritsyn and other places. Tomishko studied the organization of prisons in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
and was impressed by the Moabit
Moabit
Moabit is an inner city locality of Berlin. Since Berlin's 2001 administrative reform it belongs to the newly regrouped governmental borough of Mitte. Previously, from 1920 to 2001, it belonged to the borough of Tiergarten. Moabit's borders are defined by three watercourses, the Spree, the...
prison, with three blocks joining a single one tower. He also appreciated the Philadelphia system that recommended building prisons in the shape of a star with many rays coming from a single observation point. The system was also known as the Panopticon
Panopticon
The Panopticon is a type of building designed by English philosopher and social theorist Jeremy Bentham in the late eighteenth century. The concept of the design is to allow an observer to observe all inmates of an institution without them being able to tell whether or not they are being watched...
system.
Tomishko designed a prison consisting of two five-storey cross-shaped buildings. The shape of the buildings allowed observation of all the corridors from a single point and also had religious significance, encouraging penance
Penance
Penance is repentance of sins as well as the proper name of the Roman Catholic, Orthodox Christian, and Anglican Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation/Confession. It also plays a part in non-sacramental confession among Lutherans and other Protestants...
among the inmates. The crosses were joined together by a massive five onion domed red brick Russian Revival
Russian Revival
The Russian Revival style is the generic term for a number of different movements within Russian architecture that arose in second quarter of the 19th century and was an eclectic melding of pre-Peterine Russian architecture and elements of Byzantine architecture.The Russian Revival style arose...
cathedral on top of an administrative building. There was also a prison hospital, a ward for infectious diseases, a morgue, an ice-room and a smithy.
Construction started in 1884 and continued until 1890. It was performed by the inmates of the prison who where kept on the site: a part of the old prison was demolished, then the detainees built the new one while continuing to live in the remaining parts of the old building, then the prisoners were moved to the new building, the remains of the old building were demolished and construction continued. The prison was one of the first buildings in Russia that used electric lighting, effective ventilation and central heating. In the center of one of the cross-shaped buildings Tomishko installed a monument to English philanthropist and prison reformer John Howard
John Howard (prison reformer)
John Howard was a philanthropist and the first English prison reformer.-Birth and early life:Howard was born in Lower Clapton, London. His father, also John, was a wealthy upholsterer at Smithfield Market in the city...
. By the time it was built it was considered the most advanced prison in the world and it still remains the largest prison in Europe.
According to an urban legend
Urban legend
An urban legend, urban myth, urban tale, or contemporary legend, is a form of modern folklore consisting of stories that may or may not have been believed by their tellers to be true...
, Tomishko was so proud of his creation that he reported to Tsar Alexander III
Alexander III of Russia
Alexander Alexandrovich Romanov , historically remembered as Alexander III or Alexander the Peacemaker reigned as Emperor of Russia from until his death on .-Disposition:...
: "Your Majesty, I have built the prison for you"; "No, you have built it for yourself", supposedly answered the Tsar. The legend continues that besides the 999 official prison cells there is a secret cell number 1000 that still holds the dead body of Tomishko, while his ghost haunts the prison. The legend is almost certainly false (at least there are only 960 cells in the prison).
Prison in Imperial Russia
In Imperial Russia the prison was officially called Saint Petersburg Prison for Solitary Confinment and was used for the detention of both common criminals and political prisoners. Among the inmates were: future Prime Minister of the Russian Provisional GovernmentRussian Provisional Government
The Russian Provisional Government was the short-lived administrative body which sought to govern Russia immediately following the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II . On September 14, the State Duma of the Russian Empire was officially dissolved by the newly created Directorate, and the country was...
Alexander Kerensky
Alexander Kerensky
Alexander Fyodorovich Kerensky was a major political leader before and during the Russian Revolutions of 1917.Kerensky served as the second Prime Minister of the Russian Provisional Government until Vladimir Lenin was elected by the All-Russian Congress of Soviets following the October Revolution...
, the founder of the Constitutional Democratic party
Constitutional Democratic party
The Constitutional Democratic Party was a liberal political party in the Russian Empire. Party members were called Kadets, from the abbreviation K-D of the party name...
Pavel Milyukov
Pavel Milyukov
Pavel Nikolayevich Milyukov , a Russian politician, was the founder, leader, and the most prominent member of the Constitutional Democratic party...
, the prominent Bolshevik
Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists , derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903....
revolutionaries Leon Trotsky
Leon Trotsky
Leon Trotsky , born Lev Davidovich Bronshtein, was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and theorist, Soviet politician, and the founder and first leader of the Red Army....
and Vladimir Antonov-Ovseenko
Vladimir Antonov-Ovseenko
Vladimir Alexandrovich Antonov-Ovseyenko , real surname Ovseyenko, party aliases the 'Bayonet' and 'Nikita' , a literary pseudonym A. Gal , was a prominent Soviet Bolshevik leader and diplomat. He was born in Chernigov into an officer's family.In 1903, Antonov-Ovseyenko joined the Menshevik party...
, and future first Soviet People's Commissar of Enlightenment Anatoly Lunacharsky.
In 1906 all 200 deputies of the first State Duma of the Russian Empire
State Duma of the Russian Empire
The State Duma of the Russian Empire was a legislative assembly in the late Russian Empire, which met in the Taurida Palace in St. Petersburg. It was convened four times between 1906 and the collapse of the Empire in 1917.-History:...
who had signed the Vyborg Manifesto
Vyborg Manifesto
The Vyborg Appeal was a declaration issued by Kadets and Trudoviks politicians, former deputies of the disbanded Russian First State Duma on July 9, 1906....
had to spend three months in Kresty Prison.
On the evening of , during the February Revolution
February Revolution
The February Revolution of 1917 was the first of two revolutions in Russia in 1917. Centered around the then capital Petrograd in March . Its immediate result was the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II, the end of the Romanov dynasty, and the end of the Russian Empire...
, rebellious soldiers and workers who came to a meeting near the Finlyandsky Rail Terminal were led by Mikhail Kalinin
Mikhail Kalinin
Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin , known familiarly by Soviet citizens as "Kalinych," was a Bolshevik revolutionary and the nominal head of state of Russia and later of the Soviet Union, from 1919 to 1946...
to storm the Kresty. They freed the inmates and destroyed all the prison paperwork.
After the Revolution
October Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...
they were joined by people from the Russian Provisional Government
Russian Provisional Government
The Russian Provisional Government was the short-lived administrative body which sought to govern Russia immediately following the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II . On September 14, the State Duma of the Russian Empire was officially dissolved by the newly created Directorate, and the country was...
, non-Bolshevik politicians and intelligentsia
Intelligentsia
The intelligentsia is a social class of people engaged in complex, mental and creative labor directed to the development and dissemination of culture, encompassing intellectuals and social groups close to them...
. Among the people imprisoned there were Prime Minister Boris Stürmer
Boris Stürmer
Baron Boris Vladimirovich Stürmer was a Russian statesman. He served as Prime Minister, Foreign Minister, and Interior Minister of the Russian Empire for several months during 1916.- Biography :...
, who died in Kresty in September 1917, Justice Minister Ivan Scheglovitov, Minister of the Interior Alexei Khvostov
Alexei Khvostov
Aleksey Nikolayevich Khvostov was a Russian statesman and politician. A nephew of Aleksandr Khvostov.He was Vice Governor and then Governor of Nizhny Novgorod. He was elected to the Fourth Imperial State Duma as a member of one of the right wing parties.He was and Minister of the Interior from...
, Minister of War Mikhail Belyayev, former Minister of War Vladimir Sukhomlinov
Vladimir Sukhomlinov
Vladimir Aleksandrovich Sukhomlinov was a cavalry general of the Imperial Russian Army who served as the Chief of the General Staff in 1908–09 and the Minister of War until 1915, when he was ousted from office amid allegations of failure to provide necessary armaments and munitions.Vladimir...
, Chief of Police Yevgeny Klimovich, the great Russian poet Nikolay Gumilyov
Nikolay Gumilyov
Nikolay Stepanovich Gumilev was an influential Russian poet who founded the acmeism movement.-Early life and poems:Nikolai was born in the town of Kronstadt on Kotlin Island, into the family of Stepan Yakovlevich Gumilev , a naval physician, and Anna Ivanovna L'vova . His childhood nickname was...
and many others.
In 1920 the prison was renamed as the Second Special Camp for Involuntary Labor and was administered by Petrograd Ispolkom. In 1923 the prison became Petrograd District Isolation Prison (Петроградская Окружная Изоляционная Тюрьма), part of the Petrograd Cheka
Cheka
Cheka was the first of a succession of Soviet state security organizations. It was created by a decree issued on December 20, 1917, by Vladimir Lenin and subsequently led by aristocrat-turned-communist Felix Dzerzhinsky...
system.
During the Great Purges, the prison overflowed with inmates accused of state crimes. Often cells designed for solitary confinement held 15-20 inmates or more. Among the inmates were: famous painter Kazimir Malevich
Kazimir Malevich
Kazimir Severinovich Malevich was a Russian painter and art theoretician, born of ethnic Polish parents. He was a pioneer of geometric abstract art and the originator of the Avant-garde Suprematist movement.-Early life:...
, poet Nikolay Zabolotsky
Nikolay Zabolotsky
Nikolay Alexeyevich Zabolotsky - a Russian poet, children's writer and translator. He was a Modernist and one of the founders of the Russian avant-garde absurdist group Oberiu.-Life and work:...
, historian Lev Gumilyov, actor Georgiy Zhzhonov
Georgiy Zhzhonov
Georgiy Stepanovich Zhzhonov was a Soviet actor and writer.Having matriculated from the Leningrad Circus Tekhnikum in 1932, he appeared in several movies, including the legendary Chapaev ....
, future Marshal of the Soviet Union
Marshal of the Soviet Union
Marshal of the Soviet Union was the de facto highest military rank of the Soviet Union. ....
Konstantin Rokossovsky
Konstantin Rokossovsky
Konstantin Rokossovskiy was a Polish-origin Soviet career officer who was a Marshal of the Soviet Union, as well as Marshal of Poland and Polish Defence Minister, who was famously known for his service in the Eastern Front, where he received high esteem for his outstanding military skill...
and many others. The prison features prominently in Anna Akhmatova
Anna Akhmatova
Anna Andreyevna Gorenko , better known by the pen name Anna Akhmatova , was a Russian and Soviet modernist poet, one of the most acclaimed writers in the Russian canon.Harrington p11...
's poem Requiem. In the Preface to her poem she writes:
On the grounds of the prison operated a sharashka
Sharashka
Sharashka was an informal name for secret research and development laboratories in the Soviet Gulag labor camp system...
- a research and development facility called OKB-172 that used inmates as weapons engineers and researchers. The facility developed torpedo boat
Torpedo boat
A torpedo boat is a relatively small and fast naval vessel designed to carry torpedoes into battle. The first designs rammed enemy ships with explosive spar torpedoes, and later designs launched self-propelled Whitehead torpedoes. They were created to counter battleships and other large, slow and...
s that were widely used by the Soviet Navy
Soviet Navy
The Soviet Navy was the naval arm of the Soviet Armed Forces. Often referred to as the Red Fleet, the Soviet Navy would have played an instrumental role in a Warsaw Pact war with NATO, where it would have attempted to prevent naval convoys from bringing reinforcements across the Atlantic Ocean...
during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
.
During the Siege of Leningrad
Siege of Leningrad
The Siege of Leningrad, also known as the Leningrad Blockade was a prolonged military operation resulting from the failure of the German Army Group North to capture Leningrad, now known as Saint Petersburg, in the Eastern Front theatre of World War II. It started on 8 September 1941, when the last...
most detainees were either conscripted into the Penal military unit
Penal military unit
Penal battalions, penal companies, etc., are military formations consisting of convicted persons for which military service in such units was either the assigned punishment or an alternative to imprisonment or the death penalty.-Nazi Germany:...
s of Soviet Army or transferred to the Eastern regions of the country. The prison was used for detaining those involved in stealing of food or ration cards, and later also for German POWs. Many guards and detainees died of starvation during the siege.
Modern days
The prison was mostly used for the common criminals but many Soviet dissidents
Soviet dissidents
Soviet dissidents were citizens of the Soviet Union who disagreed with the policies and actions of their government and actively protested against these actions through either violent or non-violent means...
from Leningrad were also held there during the investigations and trials.
The judicial reforms of the 1990s made long pre-trial detentions available only with approval of the courts. Currently no more than six inmates can be held in a cell originally designed for solitary confinement.
In 1993 a museum was open inside the prison devoted to the history of the prison, famous inmates and unusual objects found on the detainees.
On 28 April 1995 the monument To the victims of Political repressions made by Mikhail Shemyakin was installed on the embankment across the Neva River
Neva River
The Neva is a river in northwestern Russia flowing from Lake Ladoga through the western part of Leningrad Oblast to the Neva Bay of the Gulf of Finland. Despite its modest length , it is the third largest river in Europe in terms of average discharge .The Neva is the only river flowing from Lake...
from the prison. It depicts two bronze sphinx
Sphinx
A sphinx is a mythical creature with a lion's body and a human head or a cat head.The sphinx, in Greek tradition, has the haunches of a lion, the wings of a great bird, and the face of a woman. She is mythicised as treacherous and merciless...
es with pretty women's faces as seen from the residential houses on the embankment and bare skulls as seen from the prison's side of the river. There is a stylized window with prison bars between the sphinxes. On the granite base of the monument there are inscriptions with quotes from Nikolay Gumilyov
Nikolay Gumilyov
Nikolay Stepanovich Gumilev was an influential Russian poet who founded the acmeism movement.-Early life and poems:Nikolai was born in the town of Kronstadt on Kotlin Island, into the family of Stepan Yakovlevich Gumilev , a naval physician, and Anna Ivanovna L'vova . His childhood nickname was...
, Osip Mandelstam
Osip Mandelstam
Osip Emilyevich Mandelstam was a Russian poet and essayist who lived in Russia during and after its revolution and the rise of the Soviet Union. He was one of the foremost members of the Acmeist school of poets...
, Anna Akhmatova
Anna Akhmatova
Anna Andreyevna Gorenko , better known by the pen name Anna Akhmatova , was a Russian and Soviet modernist poet, one of the most acclaimed writers in the Russian canon.Harrington p11...
, Nikolay Zabolotsky
Nikolay Zabolotsky
Nikolay Alexeyevich Zabolotsky - a Russian poet, children's writer and translator. He was a Modernist and one of the founders of the Russian avant-garde absurdist group Oberiu.-Life and work:...
, Daniil Andreyev
Daniil Andreyev
Daniil Leonidovich Andreyev was a Russian writer, poet, and Christian mystic.- Biography :...
, Dmitry Likhachev
Dmitry Likhachev
Dmitry Sergeyevich Likhachov was an outstanding Soviet Russian scholar who was considered the world's foremost expert in Old Russian language and literature. He has been revered as "the last of old St Petersburgers", "a guardian of national culture", and "Russia's conscience".-Biography:Likhachov...
, Joseph Brodsky
Joseph Brodsky
Iosif Aleksandrovich Brodsky , was a Russian poet and essayist.In 1964, 23-year-old Brodsky was arrested and charged with the crime of "social parasitism" He was expelled from the Soviet Union in 1972 and settled in America with the help of W. H. Auden and other supporters...
, Yuri Galanskov
Yuri Galanskov
Yuri Timofeyevich Galanskov was a Russian poet, historian, human rights activist and dissident. For his political activities, such as founding and editing samizdat almanac Phoenix, he was incarcerated in prisons, camps and forced treatment psychiatric hospitals ...
, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn was aRussian and Soviet novelist, dramatist, and historian. Through his often-suppressed writings, he helped to raise global awareness of the Gulag, the Soviet Union's forced labor camp system – particularly in The Gulag Archipelago and One Day in the Life of...
, Vladimir Vysotsky
Vladimir Vysotsky
Vladimir Semyonovich Vysotsky was a Soviet singer, songwriter, poet, and actor whose career had an immense and enduring effect on Russian culture. He became widely known for his unique singing style and for his lyrics, which featured social and political commentary in often humorous street...
and Vladimir Bukovsky
Vladimir Bukovsky
Vladimir Konstantinovich Bukovsky is a leading member of the dissident movement of the 1960s and 1970s, writer, neurophysiologist, and political activist....
.
On 19 December 2006 a monument to poet Anna Akhmatova
Anna Akhmatova
Anna Andreyevna Gorenko , better known by the pen name Anna Akhmatova , was a Russian and Soviet modernist poet, one of the most acclaimed writers in the Russian canon.Harrington p11...
by Galina Dodonova was erected across Neva River opposite to the prison according to her will in her poem Requiem
Requiem
A Requiem or Requiem Mass, also known as Mass for the dead or Mass of the dead , is a Mass celebrated for the repose of the soul or souls of one or more deceased persons, using a particular form of the Roman Missal...
On 25 December 2006 a copy of the monument was installed in a corridor of the prison itself.
In summer 2006 Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin served as the second President of the Russian Federation and is the current Prime Minister of Russia, as well as chairman of United Russia and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of Russia and Belarus. He became acting President on 31 December 1999, when...
(then President of Russia) announced that the prison would be relocated to a new facility in the Kolpinsky District
Kolpinsky District
Kolpinsky District is an administrative and municipal district , one of the 18 in Saint Petersburg, Russia....
on the outskirts of Saint Petersburg. After the relocation is complete the Kresty building will be sold at auction. It is anticipated that the prison building will be transferred into a hotel-entertainment complex. The available options are limited as the prison is considered a protected architectural landmark and only very limited redesign is possible.
External links
- Official site of the prison
- Official site of Russian Federal Penitentiary Service
- Official site of Russian Federal Penitentiary Service north-west region department
- Official delivery service for prisoners of Russian Federal Penitentiary Service
- Unofficial website of workers of The Russian Federal Penitentiary Service