It was decided to dismantle the main bell, but the problem was that it weighted 16.6 tonnes. This giant was cast in 1895 in honor of the accession to the throne of Emperor Nicholas II. It looked like the perfectly made thing from the “old world” couldn’t bear such mistreatment. It dropped down through all the five tiers of the tower. To raise it from the water was impossible, and the bell was forgotten.
It’s said that in early June of 1941, people started to hear rare and initially quiet strikes of the flooded bell. Strikes became increasingly louder and more frequent, and in the night of June 21/22, the bell was ringing almost continuously. In the morning, people heard that Hitler’s army had attacked their motherland, but they had already been warned about the approaching disaster by the bell of the flooded city of Kalyazin.
After the war, the administration of the Tver region decided to “calm” the troublemaker. Divers immobilized the bell clapper to exclude the possibility of ringing, but in 1979, people heard it again, and on 25th December, Soviet troops crossed the border of Afghanistan. The bell had warned people, again. This time, the administration created a tiny artificial island around the bell tower to bury the restless bell not only under water, but also underground.