Lenin's personal secretary and conduit of his final political struggle
On March 5, 1923, Lenin dictated to Fotieva his letter severing relations with Stalin, then told her to inform Kamenev he had allied with Trotsky on the Georgian question. Glyasser told Trotsky: 'Vladimir Ilyich is preparing a bomb against Stalin.'
Lenin's personal secretary (1918–1924), she took dictation of his "Letter to the Congress" (Testament) in 1922, safeguarding it for 30 years until its release in 1956. In 1923 she relayed communications between the incapacitated Lenin and Trotsky.
Career Timeline
- 1899–1917Studied at Moscow Conservatory and Bestuzhev Courses; exiled to Perm for student movement
- 1904–1905Joined RSDLP(b) in Geneva/Paris exile; participated in the 1905 Revolution
- 1917Assistant to Molotov at Pravda; graduated Moscow Conservatory
- 1918–1924Personal secretary to V.I. Lenin; concurrently secretary of Sovnarkom and STO
- 1922–1923Took dictation of Lenin's Testament; analysed Georgian affair materials; relayed Lenin–Trotsky communications
- 1918–1930Continued as secretary of Sovnarkom and STO
- 1938–1941Researcher at the Central V.I. Lenin Museum
- 1941–1945Worked at the Central Committee of MOPR (International Red Aid)
- 1956–1975Personal pensioner of union significance; wrote memoirs
Related historical events
- 1905–1907The Revolution of 1905participated in First Russian Revolution
- 1922.12Formation of the USSRLenin's personal secretary · recorder of his final political struggleIn 1922–23 Lenin dictated to her his 'Letter to the Congress' and his final notes on the national question; she relayed Lenin–Trotsky communications on the Georgian affair while Lenin was incapacitated.
- 1923–1927The Succession Struggle and the Left OppositionLenin's personal secretary who took the Testament postscriptLenin's personal secretary who took the Testament's January 4, 1923 postscript recommending Stalin's removal as General Secretary.
The Testament: Thirty Years of Silence and Revelation
Between December 1922 and January 1923, Lenin, recovering from strokes at Gorki, dictated his "Letter to the Congress" to Fotieva. In the document, Lenin warned that Stalin had concentrated "unlimited authority" as General Secretary and recommended his removal; he also coolly assessed Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Bukharin, and Pyatakov. After Lenin's third stroke in March 1923 left him unable to speak, Krupskaya safeguarded four copies in hope of his recovery; Lenin's sister Maria Ulyanova held a fifth.
Upon Lenin's death in January 1924, Krupskaya handed the document to the Central Committee and asked that it be made available to delegates of the 13th Party Congress. But the ruling triumvirate of Stalin, Zinoviev, and Kamenev restricted it to closed-door readings before each regional delegation: no notes permitted, no reference at the plenary. Once Stalin consolidated power in the late 1920s, any mention of the Testament was treated as anti-Soviet agitation and punished accordingly.
Everything shifted after Stalin's death in 1953. In his February 1956 "Secret Speech" to the 20th Party Congress, Khrushchev quoted Lenin's Testament as a central piece of de-Stalinization; the full text appeared in Kommunist that July. Fotieva herself published her memoir From the Life of Lenin in 1956, at last bringing Lenin's final political legacy into the open after more than thirty years. She was 75.