Sologubovka - Maluksa

During that trip we visited two cemeteries – a German military cemetery in Sologubovka and a Russian one in Maluksa. There are 15 kilometers between them a huge gap in attitude to the fallen – the way the former enemies respect their soldiers and the way we treat ours.

A cemetery for German soldiers appeared near a half-ruined church in Sologubovka right after breaking the 900-day siege of Leningrad. On January 21st 1944, Mga and later on Sologubovka were liberated by the Soviet troops. The church looked like ruins without its domes. After the war it was used as a storehouse, however became needless when sovkhozes ceased to exist.  

In the beginning of XXI century, The German War Graves Commission supported the initiative of the common vestry to jointly reconstruct the building and turn it into a memorial church, a symbol of reconciliation. As a result, the first German-Russian peace park was created nearby. It is a memorial area that includes not only the Assumption Church and the German cemetery but an alley of sculptures, pieces of landscape architecture, and the spring. The latter is located below the Holy mountain and has always been revered by villagers. The church cellar houses the German-Russian museum of the church and the war memorial hall.

The large cultural and peacemaking project came into being thanks to the Russian Orthodox Church and priest Vyacheslav Kharinov, the dean of the Assumption Church.

Today, the cemetery houses remains of up to 80,000 German soldiers.

Much less is known of the memorial “Novaya Maluksa”. According to some sources, there are about 22,000 people buried, among them 19,507 are identified and 2,277 are unknown. Several new graves outside the memorial give evidence of the searchers activity. They bury the remains of the soldiers and put rusty military helmets to mark the tombs.