Legends of the Smolensk fortress: Orel Tower

Legends of the Smolensk fortress: Orel Tower

The Smolensk fortress wall is the third longest in the world and the second (after Constantinople) in Europe. It was built in 1595-1602 and entered the history of Russia heroic defense of 1609-11 against the Poles. Today, less than half of the wall remains from almost 7 kilometers, 18 of the 38 towers have survived, and almost every tower deserves a separate story. But the history of the Eagle Tower is unique even by Smolensk standards. To begin with, this multifaceted tower was built one of the first, and, according to legend, while the construction of the rest of the fortress wall continued, the nest of eagles built on this tower, who left the tower only after the outbreak of hostilities. There is a less romantic version of the name of the tower. Its original name - "Gorodetskaya" - the tower received from the earthen fortification located in front of it from the outside, called the "town", and only after its destruction changed its name to Orel - from the Orlov fortification, located on the slope of the mountain below the tower. It should be noted that the Eagle Tower was one of the most powerful eastern knots of the fortress. The shape of the base of the tower is a 16-faceted, but from afar it seems that the Eagle Tower is round. Due to the fact that the tower strongly protruded from the line of the fortress wall (the so-called “deaf” tower), it provided both frontal combat and defense of the adjacent spindles. The tower towered above the Devil's Moat, a densely overgrown shrub. During its construction, an auditory passage was built under the foundation to detect excavations. The tower took on the blows of the Poles (1609-11), suffered during the siege of the voivode Shein (1632-34), and the troops of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich (1654). To the tower constantly tried to make excavations, to destroy them, counter-extractions were laid to meet, so the entire space in front of it was full of moves, trenches and trenches. However, no one, including the Polish corps of Napoleon’s army during the assault of Smolensk in 1812, failed to break the defenses on this section of the fortress wall. However, as it sometimes happens, the Eagle Tower entered the history not for military merits. In the middle of the XVIII century, Count Zmejawski arrived in Smolensk from Poland. In Catherine’s time, the case is quite ordinary. The count quickly entered the higher Smolensk society, twisted an affair with the merchant of the 1st guild, whose husband left as conveniently as possible for trade affairs, and she gave the count located near the tower Orel brick factory. And then there was a rumor among the townspeople that there was an evil spirit in the tower. And indeed, at night, strange silhouettes wrapped in white shrouds began to appear on it, making dull sounds. Later, the investigation found out that the difference in mentalities of Russians and Poles played a role. The last such “bad” places went as far as possible, but the Smolensk people massively stretched to look at the evil spirits. Including those who needed it on duty. It turned out that the brick factory was a disguise for the activities of a gang of fugitive convicts and deserters engaged in counterfeiting, then exchanging fake money for real money in Poland. The production was organized in the dungeon under the tower of the Eagle, and a secret passage was dug to the factory, along which allegedly the brickworks of the master fell to the main place of work. To scare off ordinary people, Zmeyavsky and his accomplices disguised themselves as representatives of evil spirits. According to the official version, the activities of the gang were stopped when the former valet Zmeyavsky died, who was preparing to become a monk of the Trinity Monastery. He allegedly found a penitential note in which he exposed his master. There is a version that this note was invented by the police themselves, but in fact there was a traditional introduction into the gang of their man, to divert suspicions from whom they came up with this very repentance. Be that as it may, the units of the Smolensk garrison raised at night on alarm cordoned off the Orel Tower. Through a secret passage in a brick factory, they went down to the dungeon, where twenty gang members, including Zmeyavsky, were arrested, and a large number of counterfeit coins and bags of coins intended for melting were discovered. There, in a separate cell, they found a poor merchant, whom the attackers kidnapped so as not to interfere with an affair with his wife, although the real purpose of this novel was a brick factory. The gang did not dare to commit murder, punishable by death, so the counterfeiters were sent to hard labor, the factory was destroyed, the passage into the dungeon was swamped, and how the relationship between the merchant who returned to life and his windy wife developed, history is silent. So, on the basis of this story, the Smolensk writer by the name of Etinger wrote the story “Tower”, in which all the events that took place were described in a mystical-vaudeville style. This is the story of Alexey Tolstoy and reworked in the famous “Count Cagliostro”. And on the basis of this story, the famous film by Mark Zakharov “Formula of Love” appeared, the action of which takes place in the Smolensk region. So for knowledgeable people, the view of the Eagle tower recalls not only four wars, which it with honor withstood, but also the song “Uno momento”, and a lot of immortal phrases from the magnificent Zakharov comedy. Now for the sad. In 2011, in connection with the upcoming 1150th anniversary of Smolensk, money was allocated for the restoration of the Smolensk fortress wall - a cultural object of federal significance. The tower was reconstructed, building materials were stored inside. The workers had just pulled off a huge crack, almost everything was ready for the construction of a wooden roof. However, on February 17, 2012, a fire suddenly broke out in the Eagle Tower. It is still unknown whether it was an arson or an accident. In a burnt-out form with a pile of broken brick and beams of reinforcement conquered by fire, the tower stood until the summer of 2015, when the entrance to it was generally walled up. How long the tower of the Eagle of the Smolensk fortress wall will stand in this form, closed from tourists, only time will tell, but next to it there is an open exit and a staircase leading to the spines of the walls, from where a stunning panorama of old Smolensk opens.