On December 7, 1942, readers of the newspaper Pravda were shocked to see numerous letters "e" decorating its pages. In the header, to the right of the newspaper's title, it read: "Workers, collective farmers, and Soviet intellectuals! By selflessly working, increase your assistance to the front! Faithfully fulfill your civic duty to your homeland and its valiant defenders on the front." Below, there was a decree on the assignment of military ranks, signed by the Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars, I. Stalin and the head of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, Yakov Chadaev, issued a decree on December 6, 1942, which listed the following names: Ilyichev Ivan Ivanovich, Drebeneev Mikhail Fedorovich, Kiselev Anisim Fedorovich, Korolev Ivan Nikolaevich, and Lobachev Alexey Andreevich.

This was the beginning of the process of introducing the letter "e" into print and writing, or, to put it more humorously, the "e-ification" of Russian spelling. However, this process came to an end a few years after Stalin's death in March 1953. Despite this, popular rumors persistently attribute the initiative to Stalin, although no written evidence has been found to support this claim. According to the gray-haired experts, the Supreme Commander-in-Chief was very rude to Yakov Ermolaevich Chadaev, the head of the Council of People's Commissars, because Chadaev had brought a decree for the Supreme Commander-in-Chief to sign on December 5, 1942, in which the names of several valiant generals were printed without the letter "e." The rest was the work of Comrade Chadaev, who used government communication channels, or more simply, the Kremlin's telephone system, to inform those in need of the leader's desire to see "e" in writing and in print. And the process immediately began (trying not to begin), although, as can be seen from the newspapers of that harsh time, it was not without a bit of a struggle, as printing was only in high relief and it was necessary to cast the letters, which was obviously done in a hurry, and therefore it is not uncommon to find very clumsy e's with dots shifted to the left or right. Nowadays, some people reproach Stalin for this orthographic voluntarism: "In such a difficult time, he could think of nothing better than to make the use of E mandatory. However, those who say this do not understand the complexity of that critical period. The truth is quite different. The historical truth, as evidenced by the memoirs of many people who worked with Stalin during the war, is that the Supreme Commander had to overcome not only the weak resistance of the troops, but also the lack of discipline, carelessness, confusion, and inefficiency. General S.M. Shtemenko, the Chief of the Operations Directorate of the General Staff, wrote in his book "The General Staff during the War":quot; wrote: "The Supreme Commander did not tolerate even the slightest lie or inaccuracy, and he severely punished those who were caught in such situations. Naturally, we paid close attention to the wording of our reports at the Stavka. As a result, we established a rule never to report unverified or questionable facts. However, there were still quite a few of them."

It is worth mentioning that at that time, our military faced an unpleasant surprise: it turned out that the German operational maps of our territory were not only topographically more accurate than ours, but they were also toponomically flawless. If it was Orel, then it was Orel, and if it was Berezovka, then it was Berezovka in Ukraine, not Berezovka in Belarus. Imagine, dear reader, the negotiations or correspondence between generals regarding the organization of military operations around these Berezovkas. Isn't it true that the probability of a blunder is very high, and whether we like it or not, the Supreme Commander had to adjust all of this during the retreat and the enormous loss of human resources and territory. Therefore, it is complete nonsense to claim that the introduction of e was a tyrannical folly. No, and again, no. It was a necessity driven by the realities of war. Of course, it was not the only necessity. At the same time, they remembered Russia's great history, the almost forgotten names of Alexander Nevsky, Suvorov, Kutuzov, Ushakov, Nakhimov, and Bogdan Khmelnitsky, introduced the Patriarchate in the Russian Orthodox Church, adopted the Soviet Union's national anthem instead of the previous International, recreated military uniforms with epaulettes, and much, much more.

And what do we have on our maps now? Exactly the same as in 1941. Orel, Psel, Bekhovo, Kishinev, etc.

You look at the modern foreign maps of our territory, which is truncated from the south, and you see that all the names with e are written in Latin, for example, in such an unusual way: Orel, Olenek. Isn't this a serious demonstration of respect for the phonetics and spelling of another nation's language?

Let's return, however, to the newspapers of the late 1940s. They featured reports from the Information Bureau, as well as everyday and cultural news. On December 23, in the 52nd and final issue of the year, the "Uchitelskaya Gazeta" published an intriguing article by Professor Sergei Ivanovich Abakumov titled "On the Letter E."

"An attentive reader of the central newspapers could not help noticing an interesting orthographic innovation: the use of the letter e has been restored. It is necessary to "say a few words" about this e."

The professor then goes on to explain the history of the letter e, its usage, and why it should be mandatory in print and at school.

The professor's call did not take long to be answered. The very next day, on December 24, 1942, the People's Commissar of Education of the RSFSR, Vladimir Petrovich Potemkin, issued an order mandating the use of the letter "e" in school practices. This document essentially legalized the use of "e" in Russian writing. At that time, the People's Commissariat of Education of the USSR did not exist, and therefore, within the framework of the RSFSR and, consequently, within the entire Russian language (as the Union republics had their own languages alongside Russian), Potemkin's order acquired the authority of a directive from the highest authority.

The letter e finally took its rightful place in the Russian alphabet and lived a happy life until 1953, when it began to fall out of use in print, and students were no longer graded on their use of the letter in school. Finally, in 1956, the Orthographic Commission established a special status for the use of the letter e, making it optional to write and print it.

A meticulous reader might ask, "Did the 1956 Orthographic Commission repeal the 1942 Decree of the People's Commissariat of Education of the RSFSR on the mandatory use of the letter 'e' in school practice?" The answer is no, as the Commission did not have the authority to do so. Consequently, the issue was gracefully allowed to fade away naturally. Despite the passage of 44 years, the letter 'e' continues to thrive.

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