HGB Ep. 462 - Haunted Saint Petersburg, Russia

Moment in Oddity - Insect Fairies 

Most people find butterflies and similar insects to be quite beautiful. Sadly, they don't typically have long lifespans. However, one artist in the Netherlands gives these creatures a second life by turning the carcasses into art. Let me introduce you to Cedric Laquieze. This artist creates fairies from ethically sourced insects' exoskeletons and wings. He gingerly dissects them and rearranges their parts to produce one of a kind sculptures. Some of his fairies use up to ten different insects. Cedric stated to Gloomth Magazine, “The aspect of the fairies that I like the most is that over the span of almost 20 years and hundreds of fairies, I’ve never made the same piece twice, and the shapes, colors and designs are extremely diverse. From dark and intimidating, to almost cartoon like or Victorian and classic, each one has found its counterpart”. His pieces of art are quite beautiful and delicate, but one thing is for sure, creating fairies out of dead insects, certainly is odd. 

This Month in History -  The First Female Medical School

In November, on the 1st, in 1848, the first medical school for women was opened in Boston Massachusetts. The school founder, Samuel Gregory, began with just twelve students and two faculty members. Initially graduates were referred to as "Doctresses of Medicine", which the female graduates did not care for. Twelve years after the school began, the college started graduating women as "Doctors of Medicine". This began the Boston Female Medical College, and in 1852, it changed its name to the New England Female Medical College. This was the first female medical school in the United States—and in the world. Prior to the college's opening, women could train to be a midwife or nurse, but not a doctor. The schools' graduation requirements consisted of previous medical study, two years of attendance at NEFMC, a final thesis, and passing a final exam. Despite the women earning their medical degree, the female physicians did have a difficult time being accepted like their male counterparts. Due to financial burdens on the school after being open 26 years, and having granted 98 medical degrees, the New England Female Medical College merged with Boston University to become the co-educational Boston University School of Medicine in 1874.

Haunted Saint Petersburg, Russia

Saint Petersburg is the former capital of Russia and has existed for over 300 years. This is the second largest city in Russia and was home to tsars. The city is replete with beautiful historic structures, many of which still hold spirits from the past. Join us as we share the history and haunted locations of Saint Petersburg in Russia!

Saint Petersburg was founded by Tsar Peter the Great in 1703 and was named for the apostle Saint Peter. It was hard for some to believe that Peter would want this as a capital because it was a swamp and an unforgiving climate. His vision and unrelenting work ethic that he pushed on the soldiers and peasants that lived there, grew a big and powerful city. What that means is that Tsar Peter drove those workers hard to the point of even death for some of them. This city served as the capital of Tsardom and the Empire of Russia from 1713 to 1918, when the Bolsheviks moved their government to Moscow. The city has hundreds of years of history and is considered Russia's cultural center. One of the largest art museums in the world, the Hermitage, is located here. Fyodor Dostoevsky wrote of Saint Petersburg, "There’s nothing you can’t find in Saint Petersburg." Living conditions in Saint Petersburg were very tough throughout its history as newly freed serfs flowed into the city and Bloody Sunday in the early 19th century lead to the Russian Duma. The city was even named Leningrad for a time after the death of Lenin who led Russia into Soviet control. During World War II, the city was besieged by German forces. In 1991, the city became Saint Petersburg again and millions of tourists visit the city every year. Many sites here are reputedly haunted.

The Bronze Horseman

The Bronze Horseman stands on Senatskaia Ploshchad, which means Senate Square, facing the Neva River. It is surrounded by historic religious and political buildings, the Admiralty, St Isaac's Cathedral and the buildings of the former Senate and Synod. This statue was ordered built by Catherine the Great in 1782 and features Peter the Great sitting atop a horse that is reared up on its hind legs. The horse is stepping on a snake that symbolizes the enemies of Peter and his move to reform the country. His right hand reaches out as he leads the country forward. The pedestal is made from a single piece of red granite that is shaped like a cliff and an inscription on it reads, "Petro Primo Catharina Secunda - To Peter the First from Catherine the Second." This stone is called the Thunder Stone and is said to be the largest stone ever moved by humans. The sculpture was created by French sculptor Etienne Maurice Falconet. A 19th century legend claims that enemy forces will never take Saint Petersburg as long as the statue stands. And indeed, Leningrad didn't fall during the 900-day Siege.

The ghost of Peter the Great is seen in many places in the city. His favorite spot seems to be this statue. People claim that if you approach the statue at night that you should be careful as you may see the spirit of a very tall, dark figure walking near the statue. Even more bizarre are the stories that the statue itself comes to life and Peter steps down from the horse and patrols the streets of his city. And there are some 19th century police reports that claim that a couple of people were found during that era with their skulls crushed, not far from the Bronze Horseman. Alexander Pushkin, the founder of modern Russian literature, wrote a poem in 1833 entitled “The Bronze Horseman” that reads, "One night, while passing by the Bronze Horseman, Evgeny starts cursing Peter the Great for founding the city in such a dangerous location. Out of his mind over the loss of his fiancée, Evgeny fancies that the statue angrily glares at him. Rushing away, he keeps on hearing hooves clattering behind him, and later, the madman is found dead."

Griboedov Canal

The Griboedov Canal twists through the center of Saint Petersburg with more than 21 bridges crossing it. This was once known as the Catherine Canal. One of the highlights along the canal is a mansion that was built in 1759 for General Villebois. Millionaire Baron Vasily Engelhardt owned it during the 1820s and 1830s and hosted extravagant balls and masquerades. Today, the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic plays there. Russia's first banknotes were printed along the canal and the Bank Bridge is near where this happened. The bridge features four griffin sculptures with gilded wings. And some of the grandest churches in Saint Petersburg lie along the canal. Something mysterious lurks on the embankments of the canal and its connected to the murder of Tsar Alexander II. 

Alexander II was Emporer of Russia from 1855 to 1881 and was known as Alexander the Liberator. In the late 19th century, a far-left revolutionary political organization known as Narodnaya Volya, which translates to People's Will, was growing in membership. This was a group that focused on assassinating government officials. On March 13, 1881, Tsar Alexander II was their crosshairs. This was a Sunday and the Tsar had just finished attending the Mikhailovsky Manège military roll call. He travelled along Catherine's Canal in a closed bullet-proof carriage followed by two sleighs carrying a security detail with both the chief of police and the chief of the emperor's guards. One of the members of People's Will, Nikolai Rysakov, threw a bomb at the carriage, but only damaged it. He was quickly apprehended and the Tsar stupidly got out of the carriage to survey the damage and confront the young man. Rysakov yelled out to another person in the crowd and this man threw another bomb that landed at the Tsar's feet and exploded. The Tsars legs were ripped away and his stomach was blown open. He was rushed to the Winter Palace where he died. The spot where the attack occurred is now marked by the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood. 

All members of the People's Will were rounded up, brought to trial and executed by hanging. One of those members was Sophia Perovskaya. Her spirit has returned here to the canal and is said to be mischievous. She is seen wearing a long dress with a big red mark around her neck and a blue face and waving a white handkerchief, much like she did on the day the Tsar was murdered and this served as a signal to the bombers. Legend claims that if you happen to see this spirit, you will fall into the canal and possibly even die. She usually appears in early March on foggy and quiet nights. She has been seen for more than 100 years by many eyewitnesses. Also on the spot where the Tsar died, people claim to hear disembodied moans and sometimes even see the Tsar.

Mikhailovsky Castle/St. Michael's Castle

St. Michael's Castle was originally known as Mikhailovsky Castle and sits at the corner of the Fontanka and Moika Rivers. The castle is the only one in Saint Petersburg. It was built to replace the small wooden palace of Empress Elizabeth Petrovna. St. Michael's Castle is a very unique structure featuring four different architectural styles like baroque, classicist, Romantic and early Empire and drawbridges because the two rivers and two man-made canals, basically made the castle an island unto itself. The castle is in the shape of a square with an octagonal inner courtyard. This structure was designed over many years by Tsar Paul I, but was built in great haste, leading it to be thought of as one of the most uninhabitable places for a long time. The reason for the quick build was because the Tsar was a paranoid man and he wanted something that would protect him. The building was freezing in the winter with ice forming on the inner walls and in the summer, the castle was incredibly humid. Paintings were damaged and the walls began to peel. The Tsar would only live here for 40 nights.

Tsar Paul I was born Pavel Petro on October 1, 1754. He was the son of Catherine the Great and Peter III. Peter III was emperor of Russia for only six months in 1762 and was overthrown by his wife Catherine and her lover Grigory Orlov. He was later killed, but not before Catherine became empress of Russia. She reigned for thirty-four years and never allowed her son Paul to help with anything politically. She didn't want Paul to succeed her, but he did when she died in 1796. Tsar Paul reversed much of what his mother had done for Russia and he imposed limits on Russian nobility, which they were not happy with. On top of that, he provoked the anger of the military by ordering harsh disciplines and giving preference to his Gatchina troops, which were the Imperial guards. He also led Russia in war with France and Great Britain. 

Tsar Paul had a target on his back and it was only a matter of time before someone was going to end him. He was incredibly paranoid for good reason. His own father had been overthrown and murdered. Tsar Paul himself had premonitions that he would be assassinated. He hoped his castle would protect him, but he had very few guards who could stand to live there. Counts Peter Ludwig von der Pahlen, Nikita Petrovich Panin, and Admiral de Ribas and British ambassador in Saint Petersburg, Charles Whitworth, all conspired to assassinate Paul. Generals Bennigsen and Yashvil led a group of dismissed officers to the castle and they first tried to get Paul to abdicate the thrown so his son Alexander I could reign. He refused. He was stabbed, strangled and trampled to death. His son had given his consent for the overthrow, but he didn't support an assassination. He was made emperor and never punished the officers. The court physician declared that Paul died of apoplexy, which is basically a stroke. The Tsar had ruled for exactly four years, four months and four days, and he lived in his castle for only 40 days. He was buried in the St. Peter and Paul Cathedral.

The castle was left abandoned for 18 years. There were drawings that revealed the castle's secret vaults, but these were destroyed by Brenna who was an architect of the castle. Supposedly, a hidden treasure box is in a vault and holds mystical relics. The castle became Engineer's Castle in 1823 when the army's Main Engineering School moved in. Today, it is a branch of the Russian Museum. Weird stuff started happening at the castle. Disembodied footsteps were heard and moaning. A weak dim light was seen moving about the corridors. A group of soldiers who were staying there had been walking the castle when they all came running out of a room, crossing themselves and yelling that they had just seen Tsar Paul I holding a candle in there. The Tsar loved the violin and he himself played. Legends claim that he can sometimes be seen playing his favorite instrument at one of the windows. There is a metal figure outside the castle guarding it near one of the drawbridges and if you throw a coin at its head, it will predict your future.

Peter and Paul Fortress

The Peter and Paul Fortress was established in May of 1703 by Peter the Great and has 24 buildings or other structures to see. This original citadel of Saint Petersburg sits on Hare Island by the north bank of the Neva River. Being that this was the first structure built in the new city, it is considered the birthplace of the city. The fortress was mainly used to hold political prisoners of high-ranking and to house the city garrison. In 1712, the Peter and Paul Cathedral was started and took 21 years to complete. This has a 404 foot bell tower that makes this the tallest in the city center and it is actually the tallest Orthodox bell tower in the world. There is a gilded angel-topped cupola as well. The Russian Orthodox cathedral was designed by Domenico Trezzini and has a unique iconostasis. The Flemish city of Mechelen, Flanders gifted a Flemish carillon to the cathedral. The cathedral became a museum in 1924, but religious services started again in 2000. This is also a mausoleum with nearly all of the Russian emperors and empresses from Peter the Great to Nicholas II buried here.

In 1724, one of the world's largest mints was founded here at the fortress by Peter the Great. This is the Saint Petersburg Mint. It started out as just a coinage workshop that made money and medals, but in 1800, the main building of the mint was started. It was completed in 1805 and was designed by A. Porto in the classical architectural style. The building was expanded in the 1830s and then again in the 1840s. A stone wall completed the complex. The Capital Funds Building is also part of the Mint and was completed in 1843. In the 1870s, the prison block was rebuilt and is known as the Trubetskoy Bastion, named after Count Yuri Trubetskoy. The disgraced son of Peter the Great was tortured and died here. He had worked with others to attempt to overthrow his father. This is a museum sharing the history of the prison and its inmates. The Alexeevskiy Ravelin was built in 1733 and housed many prominent inmates, including Fyodor Dostoevsky. The Zotov Bastion was named for Count Nikita Zotov, a tutor and close friend of Peter the Great. This once housed the offices of the Secret Chancellery, the Tsar's feared secret police force.

The Golovkin Bastion was completed in 1730 and named after Count Gavriil Golovkin, the first Chancellor of Russia. A small building in the fortress serves as the ticket office and is known as The Boathouse. The structure was finished in 1765 and had housed Peter the Great's small sailboat that he used to learn naval principles as a youth from 1767 to 1931. This boat was known as the Grandfather of the Russian Navy. The Ioannovskiy Ravelin is the main visitor entrance to the Peter and Paul Fortress and was named for Tsar Ivan V. This was built in 1731 and housed a guardhouse and barracks. Today, tourists can see the Museum of Cosmonautics and Rocket Technology here. There is a daily firing of the cannon from the Naryshkin Bastion at noon. This structure was built in 1725 and named for Kirill Naryshkin, one of the leading military commanders and administrators of Peter the Great's reign. The Flagstaff Tower was added in the 1730s and features the fortress's own flag, or the Imperial standard on holidays back in the day. The Menshikov Bastion was built in 1729 and named for Peter the Great's closest confidant and the first governor of Saint Petersburg, Alexander Menshikov. This held the torture chambers of the Secret Chancellery, which was the Imperial regime's secret police. This became a barracks later.

One of the spirits that wanders the grounds here is thought to be Princess Tarakanova who was born in 1745 and went by the name Knyazhna Yelizaveta Vladimirskaya, Princess of Vladimir. The name she is known by today, Tarakanova, means cockroach in Russian and she got that name because she was apparently a fraud. She claimed to be the daughter of Alexei Razumovsky and Empress Elizabeth of Russia. Empress Catherine II ordered her arrested and that happened in February of 1775. She was here at the Peter and Paul Fortress and died from tuberculosis. She was buried in the graveyard of the fortress, although there are legends that her death was faked and she became a nun named Dosifea who lived in the Ivanovsky Convent from 1785 until her death in 1810.

The Rotunda

The Rotunda is located at the corner of Gorokhovaya Ulitsa and the Fontanka River Embankment, inside the Evmentev House, which was built in the 18th century. The Rotunda has a mystical reputation. The Rotunda is formed from six free-standing columns and a cast iron staircase that looks to almost rise endlessly upwards along the curves of the walls. Legends claim that Freemasons gathered here and also Satanists. During the 1970s and 1980s, members of subcultures made this their hangout. They started the idea that dreams and wishes written on the walls of the Rotunda would come true. Another legend claims that a young man who went down into the basement of the house ended up in a parallel universe for about 15 minutes. When he came back up, he was a white-haired 70 year-old-man. And then there's this, at midnight one can meet Satan here. Grigory Rasputin enjoyed the Rotunda, so perhaps that is true.

Obvodny Canal

The Obvodny Canal is the longest artificial canal in Saint Petersburg and was once the southern boundary of the city. Unfortunately, the canal is a favorite spot for people seeking to end their lives and many have been successful. But those might not all be by choice. Some who have been rescued have claimed that they didn't mean to jump into the canal, but that they were overwhelmed by a compulsion to jump. Could it be that the restless spirits in the canal are compelling people to join them.

Rasputin’s Apartment

And our final location was once home to one of the most infamous and mysterious people in history, Grigori Rasputin. Rasputin has been called the "Mad Monk" by many and his connection with the family of the final tsar of Russia is legendary. Some believed he was a charlatan, while others thought of him as a mystic and a prophet with amazing powers of persuasion. Rasputin was born in 1869 in the village of Pokrovskoye, on the Tura river in Siberia. Nothing about his early life seemed remarkable. He got into a bit of trouble with authorities when he was young, but when he reached adulthood, he worked on his family farm, married a local girl and they had seven children, three of which survived to adulthood. Everything shifted for Rasputin at the age of twenty-eight when he had a spiritual conversion of some sort and decided to go find himself. He left his wife, who was pregnant at the time, and his children. In 1897, he ended up at the St. Nicholas Monastery at Verkhoturye and he spent many months there learning to read and write and studying. When he returned to his wife, he looked disheveled and started behaving strangely.

The next few years were spent wandering away from home on pilgrimages, visiting holy sites, and then returning home and leaving again. He gathered a small group of followers with whom he prayed and that's when the rumors about him started. It sounds very much like he was forming a cult. The group met in secret to avoid the anger of local priests and the women in the group were said to ritually wash Rasputin before he would deliver messages. There were tales of self-flogging, sexual orgies and the singing of strange songs. While Rasputin avoided his local clergy, some other Russian Orthodox clergy were impressed with his charisma and they introduced him around. He began to climb the ranks of Russian society until he was finally introduced to the family of Tsar Nicholas II Romanov. The Tsar wrote of this first meeting in October of 1906, "A few days ago I received a peasant from the Tobolsk district, Grigori Rasputin, who brought me an icon of St. Simon Verkhoturie. He made a remarkably strong impression both on Her Majesty and on myself, so that instead of five minutes our conversation went on for more than an hour."

Rasputin had a way of reading people and he gained the trust of the Imperial family. They were open to his mysticism as they had consulted other spiritual advisors that were similar to Rasputin. Spiritualism and Theosophy were becoming very popular. Rasputin was great at telling them what they wanted to hear and he claimed to be able to heal people. Nicholas and his wife Alexandra were so impressed with Rasputin that they decided to ask for his help in healing their son Alexei. Alexei had hemophilia and although there is no historical proof, there are those who say that Rasputin did help alleviate the symptoms. Alexandra’s lady-in-waiting said that she believed that Rasputin used peasant folk medicine from Siberia that helped with internal bleeding. Modern historians think that Rasputin protecting the boy from doctors who were giving him aspirin was probably the real cure. This success garnered him more favor with the family and during World War I, Rasputin was giving Nicholas political advice. 

Rasputin appeared as a holy man to the Imperial family, but on the side, he was anything but that. He was frolicking with women in the city and was seen drunk in public many times. Rumors about Rasputin having relations with the Tsarina and her four daughters started circulating and got so bad that Nicholas asked Rasputin to leave for a time, so he went on a pilgrimage to Palestine. He returned after awhile and the Imperial family was happy to have him back. But the officials around the family were not happy and they knew they needed to do something as Nicholas continued to value Rasputin's advice over all others. Rasputin continued to brag about his relationship with the Tsar's family as he showed off embroidered shirts Alexandra made for him.

Rasputin was murdered on December 29, 1916 at Moika Palace. This was the residence of Felix Yussupov, the richest man in Russia at the time, and Rasputin was told that Felix's wife wanted to meet with the mystic. She was the only niece of the Tsar. This was a ruse planned by a group of conspirators that wanted to protect the Tsar and his family. Rasputin accepted the invitation and was served almond cakes. These were laced with potassium cyanide, but the mystic remained unscathed. The conspirators were dumbfounded. They decided to shoot the guy, so they sprayed him with dozens of bullets. Rasputin bolted from the Palace, ran across the yard and climbed over the fence. The conspirators took off after him and finally caught up with him at the Malaya Nevka River near Kamenny Island. There, they drowned him in the icy waters. Yussupov wrote in his memoirs, "This devil who was dying of poison, who had a bullet in his heart, must have been raised from the dead by the powers of evil. There was something appalling and monstrous in his diabolical refusal to die."

The body was retrieved shortly thereafter when authorities followed the blood trail, so Rasputin clearly was hit by at least one bullet. The corpse was embalmed and buried at Aleksandrovsky Park at Tsarkoe Selo, on the site of the Seraphim Sarovsky Cathedral, which was being built at the time. A little over a year later, the body was exhumed by soldiers and they burned the body in a furnace and scattered the ashes to the wind. The displeasure of certain segments of society with tsarism was only more inflamed by the relationship that Rasputin had with the Romanov family. Provisional Government leader Alexander Kerensky went so far as to say, "Without Rasputin there would have been no Lenin." The Romanov family was eventually executed.

This wasn't the end of Rasputin. His spirit still seems to be in Saint Petersburg. Rasputin had a flat on the second floor of a building located at 64 Gorokhovaya Street. People who have lived here claim to see the apparition of Rasputin wandering the halls. They hear his disembodied quiet muttering. And there is the clunky footsteps that cause the floorboards to squeak. His ghost doesn't seem to be threatening.

And then there is this weird story from the website Russia Beyond, "In St. Petersburg there are many famous cemeteries, and even more stories and legends about them. They say that in the 1970s the monk Prokopiy lived near Nikolskoye Cemetery. He was known for practicing witchcraft and black magic. One day, supposedly the devil appeared before him and offered him a deal: His soul in exchange for immortality. Fulfilling the terms of their agreement, on the night of Easter, the monk lured a young, promiscuous girl to the cemetery. He tied her to a cross, gouged her eyes out, cut out her tongue, and filled a church’s cup with her blood. Then, he had to curse God 666 times and drink the cup of blood before dawn. But the monk ran out of time, and when the first rays of sun shone, he fell dead upon the ground. Witnesses swear that the right leg of the man became a cat, and that since then, visitors to the cemetery started witnessing a huge black cat with grey fur on its chin."

Fun Fact on Peter the Great: He liked to collect oddities and had a cabinet of curiosities. He sent a decree out to Russia to send "monsters", "ugly ones", and other marvels to the Museum. He wrote that these items were "to instruct and teach about Nature - living and dead - and about the artistry that flows from the hands of men." Much of these items were put into Russian's first museum opened for the public, the Kunstkammer. There is a collection of artistically prepared specimens of human fetuses fabricated by Frederik Ruysch. The most interesting specimen is Nicholas Bourgeous, or at least his skeleton. Nicholas was from France and he was considered a giant at 7 feet, 2 inches. Peter the Great made him his bodyguard and his main job was to stand on the footboard at the back of Peter's carriage. He died at the age of 42 and the Tsar preserved his skeleton. Peter's death mask is also at the museum.

Saint Petersburg is a city full of grand historical structures representing centuries of Russian history. Are some of these structures haunted by the spirits of that historic past? Is Saint Petersburg haunted? That is for you to decide!

HGB Podcast 23 - The Haunted Kremlin

Moment in Oddity - Blue Exoplanet Rains Glass

Way out in the middle of interstellar space sits a planet with a very familiar blue.  At first glance, one may think that this may be an Earth-like planet, possibly able to sustain life.  There is carbon dioxide, methane and water vapor in its atmosphere.  The planet has been named HD 189733b and it was discovered in 2005.  This exoplanet is approximately 63 light years from Earth.  Unlike Earth, it orbits far closer to its sun than we do.  A year on this planet lasts only 2.2 days.  Boy, does one age fast there!  And you might want some major sunblock on this planet where surface temperatures reach 1551 degrees.  The Hubble Space Telescope was used to study the planet and they found that the blue of the planet is a deep azure due to many elements in its atmosphere that are similar to Jupiter's elements creating solid cloud particles.  Sodium atoms in those clouds absorb red and green wavelengths and then give off the deep blue.  The sodium atoms are created by silica, which basically means that the clouds are made up of grains of glass.  These grains of glass then most likely fall from the clouds resulting in a planet that rains glass.  Now that certainly is odd.

This Day in History - Roots Mini-series Premieres

On this day, January 23rd, in 1977, the Roots mini-series premieres on ABC-TV based on the novel "Roots: The Saga of an American Family" written by Alex Haley.  ABC was apprehensive about how audiences would receive the series and so they ran it on a unique schedule and made sure to advertise it using more of the white actors.  Their fears were unfounded as Roots broke viewership records and won several awards.  An estimated 140 million Americans watched.  The mini-series' finale holds the record as the second most watched series finale in television history.  Roots was nominated for 37 Emmys and won nine of them and it won a Peabody Award and Golden Globe.  The plot of the series follows a black family's history from Africa to America and through the 18th and 19th century past the Civil War.  Stars of the series include LeVar Burton, Cicely Tyson, Louis Gossett, Jr., Ben Vereen, Ed Asner, Loren Greene, Sandy Duncan, Llyod Bridges, Burl Ives, Maya Angelou and O.J. Simpson.  The series was not without controversy as it came to light that Alex Haley had plagiarized several parts of his novel, stealing from Harold Courlander's book "The African."  Courlander sued and Haley settled out of court.  Two sequels were made later and the History Channel is currently working on a remake of the mini-series. 

The Haunted Kremlin

Kremlin is a Russian word meaning a fortified complex found inside a city.  There are many kremlins in Russia, some of which that are in use and others that are just ruins.  Our focus is on the Moscow Kremlin, which is simply known today as The Kremlin.  The area upon which the Kremlin is built has thousands of years of history behind it and the Kremlin itself does as well.  As the seat of government, the Kremlin has seen many leaders come and go.  Some of those leaders never left.  Not only does the spirit with which they lead the country remain, but in some cases, their actual spirits still roam the halls of this magnificent building.

Archaeological digs have revealed that humans lived in the area where the Kremlin now stands as far back as 500 BC.  The area was a prime spot for living because two rivers, the Moskva and the Neglinnaya, come together there.  Yuri Dolgorukiy, the founder of Moscow, was born sometime in the 1090s - no one has ever been able to pinpoint his year of birth - during the Rurik Dynasty to Vladimir II Monomakh, the Grand Prince of Kievan Rus'.  Kievan Rus' was a federation of East Slavic tribes and modern day Russia, Ukraine and Belarus all come down from these tribes.  The capital of Kievan Rus' was Kiev and Vladimir ruled there from 1113-1125.  In 1108, Vladimir sent Yuri to govern the Rostov-Suzdal Province, which was in the northeast.  Yuri founded many cities while he was in this territory and he allied himself with Sviatoslav Olgovich, who was a prince himself.  The two met in Moscow in 1147 and Yuri stayed there and fortified the walls of Moscow, earning him the moniker, "Founder of Moscow."  A wooden fort was built on the spot where the Moskva and Neglinnaya Rivers converged by Yuri and the city of Moscow grew.  A monument and a coin were made in Yuri's honor and a Russian submarine was named for him as well.

The Mongols came in the early 13th century and they razed the wooden fortress.  A hundred years passed before the Kremlin was rebuilt in 1339 by Prince Ivan Kalita.  He enclosed the Kremlin within fortified oak walls.  It was at this same time that the Kremlin was first mentioned in Russian Chronicles.  In 1366, Dmitry Donskoy who was the Prince of Moscow at the time, replaced the wooden oak walls with white limestone.  Ivan III Vasilyevich, famously known as Ivan the Great, became Grand Prince of Moscow in 1462 and things really began to grow for the Kremlin.

Under Ivan the Great, the Kremlin became the seat of power as the Russian territories were unified.  Ivan commenced a rebuilding of the Kremlin, inviting Italian Renaissance architects to help with the design.  New walls, a new tower and a new palace were all built as well as three extant cathedrals, the Palace of Facets and the Deposition Church.  The Palace of Facets was built as the throne room where state receptions were held and today is the official representative hall of the Russian government.  The Deposition Church is known today as the Church of the Deposition of the Robe and the robe part of the name is for the robe of the Virgin Mary.  The church was a private chapel for the Patriarch of Moscow, who was the head of the Russian Orthodox Church in Moscow, but was later taken over by the Russian royal family.  The walls of the Kremlin were finished in 1495 and they are the same walls that can be seen today.  Ivan the Great decreed that nothing could be built near the Kremlin and a 30 foot moat was placed around the Kremlin.

Ivan the Terrible was the next czar to hold court at the Kremlin and he became the first czar over all the Russias.  He was crowned the Prince of Moscow at the age of three and his mother served as regent for him until she died when he was eight.  At just sixteen, he was crowned Czar of Russia.  Ivan was a wise and powerful ruler bringing the printing press to Russia for the first time, but he also established serfdom and was terrifying at times.  He found it hard to control his temper and he was given to bouts of mental illness.  This mental illness was on display during the Massacre of Novgorod and also when Ivan killed his hand picked successor who also happened to be his son Ivan Ivanovich by hitting him in the head with his staff.  The first strains of paranoia came when his first wife died by poisoning and he blamed his advisers, but his mental instability showed as a child and the narrative is similar to that of any garden variety serial killer.  He enjoyed torturing and killing animals as a child and he ran with mobs as a teenager beating women and children.  Ivan would never trust his advisers and would kill many of them through the years.  But he was also a man of art and letters that he wrote have been described as Shakespearean in content.  Ivan continued the building that had been ongoing at the Kremlin.  He had Saint Basil's Cathedral built over the moat and renovated the palace.  He also had a palace and a cathedral built for his sons.

The Time of Troubles followed this period and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth occupied Russia from 1610-1612.  Famine in the area killed two million people.  The volunteer army of Prince Dmitry Pozharsky liberated the Kremlin and a new czar was elected.  Czar Romanov added the eleven-domed Upper Saviour Cathedral, Armorial Gate, Terem Palace, Amusement Palace and the palace of Patriarch Nikon to the Kremlin and their construction was completed during the reign of his son.

In the year 1682, the reigning czar died and an uprising resulted known as the Moscow Uprising of 1682.  It was at this time that a ten year old Peter the Great became the new Russian czar.  He would rule until his death in 1725 and he was so traumatized by the uprising that he moved the seat of Russian power to St. Petersburg.  The Kremlin was still used for certain events and it continued to be improved with tiled tent-shaped tops added to all its towers.  According to the famous historian I.F. Zabelin, the addition of the tent tops to the towers "did not strengthen the Kremlin’s defense but gave it some other, eternal, strength and expressed the poetry and spirit of the old pre-petrin Rus."  Peter the Great had the Kremlin Arsenal built.  The building was commissioned in 1702, but due to the Russo-Swedish War, it took until 1736 for it to be completed.  It was built in the shape of an elongated trapezium with a large central courtyard and was used as a museum and then later as a barracks.  The Arsenal has endured much destruction.  In 1737, it was heavily damaged by fire.  The reconstruction took until 1796 and then in 1812, Napoleon blew the building up.  That reconstruction took until 1828.

In the late 18th century, the Kremlin Senate was built and its architecture is done in the Moscow Classical style.  The Senate has a circular hall that has been dubbed the Russian Pantheon.  Colonnades run around the outside of the circle and rise to over 88 feet and the hall is topped by a dome that has twenty-four windows.  This building held the private studies for both Lenin and Stalin and has wonderful bas-relief sculptures.  A secret tunnel beneath the area was probably used for spying.  Since 1991, the Senate has been the home for the President of the Russian Federation.

The Great Kremlin Palace was built in 1849 over the area where Ivan III's Palace once stood.  The building has wide-bayed brick arches and while the outside is not considered to be anything special, the inside of the Palace is extraordinary featuring styles from the Renaissance to the Byzantine.  There are five halls inside, each dedicated to an order of the Russian Empire.  The Georgievsky Hall has marble plaques that are engraved with the names of more than ten thousand Russian officers who have received the highest honor of the Russian Army, the Order of St. George.  The Andreevsky Hall is the throne room and built from pink marble with a spherical dome.  Vladimirskiy Hall is in the form of an octahedron and is domed as well.  When the Soviet Union existed, the Andreevsky and Aleksandrovsky Halls were combined to form the seat of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.

World War I had broken out in 1914 and Russia's participation proved to be the initial undoing of the Czars.  Two separate revolutions took place in 1917, known as the Russian Revolution, and Vladimir Lenin and the Bolsheviks overthrew Czar Nicholas II.  Civil war ensued and the Communist Era began.  The Kremlin again became the seat of power at this time and large red stars were placed around the towers.  Lenin became the architect of the Soviet State and its first leader.  His last name is not his birth name.  It is a name he chose for himself while working in the political underground.  During the Civil War, Lenin launched the Red Terror that killed any opposition in the civilian population.  Lenin's dreams of a perfect society never came to fruition.  The same lower classes he had used to rise to power turned on him and strife was a part of the new USSR.

Joseph Stalin became the leader of the USSR in 1924 and he rules for two decades until 1953.  His was a reign of terror that sent the peasants back into serfdom and millions of people starved to death under his leadership.  Continuing what his predecessor Lenin had begun, Stalin removed all reminders of the czars from the Kremlin.  Statues were destroyed and the Golden Eagles on the towers were removed and replaced by Kremlin stars.  Stalin also pulled down some of the cathedrals and replaced them with a military school.  The Kremlin was closed to foreign visitors at this time as well.

The Kremlin would not open for visitors until 1955 and the Kremlin Museums were opened in 1961.  Nikita Khrushchev had the Kremlin Palace of Congresses built in the 1960s and it clashes horribly with the rest of the Kremlin's architecture.  Current leader Vladimir Putin added a unique feature to the Kremlin, a helipad, which was finished in 2013.  The Kremlin is open every day of the week for tours except Thursdays and tours begin at 10am.  There are individuals tickets for different areas, the museum tickets run under $10.

Based on this history, one can see that the Kremlin is the heart of Moscow and contains some of the oldest structures in Russia.  A place with such a rich history and veiled in mystery is the perfect setting for hauntings and the Kremlin is notoriously haunted.  The main hauntings are attributed to three of Russia's leaders:  Ivan the Terrible, Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin.  The interesting point to keep in mind when talking about ghosts and Russia is that Communism forced a type of atheism on the people.  Telling ghost stories was almost a forbidden act.  So image the irony of Communist leaders haunting their people.

Ivan the Terrible is thought to mainly haunt the Ivan the Great Bell Tower.  His heavy booted footsteps have been heard and a shadow figure resembling the crazy leader has been seen on multiple occasions.  Several times, Ivan's ghost has appeared engulfed in flames.  Nikolay II was the last czar in Russia before the Soviet State was installed and he and his wife claimed that they had a visitation from a full bodied apparition of Ivan the Terrible on the evening before Nikolay's coronation.  Many look back on this event as a bad omen for the Romanov royal dynasty, which was going to collapse. 

In 1923, a security chief reported seeing the ghostly apparition of Lenin.  The weird thing about this sighting is that Lenin was still alive at the time.  The chief had thought it was odd that Lenin was wondering about without a security detail.  Perhaps he was preparing to chew some people out for this lack of protection, but instead of finding the lazy security detail, the chief found out that Lenin was not even at the Kremlin.  He was away in Gorky.  Was this Lenin's doppelganger?  A doppelganger is a look-a-like of a living person and is read about mostly in folklore.  Seeing a doppelganger is generally considered a sign of bad luck.  Lenin would die three months after this incident.  Even more bizarre is that there were other witnesses who saw Lenin that same evening and claim that the leader who was ill and needed a cane was walking about just fine and seemed very healthy.  Lenin's body is still around and on display in the Lenin Mausoleum.  The macabre display features Lenin in a suit that is washed and ironed regularly and changed out every three years, lying in a glass coffin that is kept at a constant temperature and humidity.  His skin is regularly treated with a bleach solution to prevent mold.  Lenin can be viewed in small groups for up to five minutes under the watchful eye of several guards.  Lenin's spirit might still be hanging out since his body was never buried like he had requested before his death.  The apartment he had lived in is locked and sealed, but people say they hear papers rustling, furniture creaking and pacing footsteps as if someone were inside.

A woman by the name of Fanny Kaplan was accused of trying to assassinate Lenin and although no proof was ever given and no trial was held, Kaplan was executed by being shot and then stuffed in a barrel and set on fire at the Kremlin.  She is said to haunt the Komendantskaya Tower where her apparition is seen with unkempt hair, holding a gun and trembling.

Joseph Stalin's ghost is the most seen specter.  If a room in the Kremlin suddenly gets cold, people believe that Stalin is there particularly if the country is facing some kind of crisis.  The scent of urine occasionally accompanies the cold spots because Stalin was found lying in his own urine after he was poisoned with rat poison, most likely by one of his generals.  Stalin's special service chief Ezhov has been seen wandering the halls, particularly where Stalin's private residence, the Patriarch Chambers, once was located. The ghost of Stalin's secret police chief, Lavrenty Beria, has been seen within the Kremlin.  He and his men tortured and killed hundreds of people who opposed Stalin.  The haunting sounds of screams and footsteps can still be heard in the dungeons below the residence.

False Dimitriy claimed to be the youngest son of Ivan the Terrible, although those claims were never proven.  He overthrew the czar at the time and ruled for a short time.  He fell out of favor with the people and they revolted.  Several assassins climbed the walls and False Dimitriy jumped from a window breaking his leg.  He was then shot to death.  His ghost has been seen wandering among the battlements of the Kremlin.  He was last seen in 1991 by a group of employees.  They claimed he was waving his arms as if warning them of something.  The next day a Communist coup d'etat was staged that Boris Yeltsin defeated.

Workers at the State Archives of the Russian Federation claim to see a woman in a white robe who wanders the aisles there as if protecting the historical accounts.  Some claim she is a member of the Romanov family, the last czar line.  Figures dressed in shrouds are witnessed in the corridors of the Kremlin Palace of Congresses.

The Kremlin was built as a fortress of protection.  It appears to be no match for the restless spirits of those long dead.  Are Russia and the USSR's former leaders still holding court in their former residence?  Are the spirits of those tortured and killed still trapped within the walls of their former prison?  That is for you to decide!

Additional show notes

Tour tickets for the Kremlin:  http://www.kreml.ru/en/museums-moscow-kremlin/
Sound effects courtesy of:  http://www.freesfx.co.uk/
Russian song can be found here:  http://www.last.fm/music