Lev Isaevich Slavin (October 15, 1896 – September 4, 1984) was the first Allied journalist to enter the Reich Chancellery bunker, including the Führerbunker. Slavin was a Soviet playwright, novelist, screenwriter, and war correspondent for the newspapers Krasnaya Zvezda and Izvestia during WW2. Few people are familiar with Slavin's reporting on this first visit because his work was seldom translated into English. 

Mere hours after the Berlin Reich Chancellery and the extensive bunker system beneath it was captured by the Soviets, Slavin walked down a steep subterranean incline that led from the sidewalk in front of the New Reich Chancellery to a long an wide hallway overflowing with the wounded SS men who had defended the capitol complex. There weren't enough cots for all the wounded, bloody, bandaged, groaning men - many were dying. Most sat or lay on the cold, hard, floor. Several doctors and dozens of young, female nurses attended to the men in this improvised field hospital. Slavin navigated a narrow walking path to continue down the main corridor, in search of the Soviet commander, who he was informed was in the deepest bunkers of all. Those bunkers were at the opposite end - one underneath the Old Reich Chancellery, and one, even deeper under ground, beyond the first one. His guide told him that the deeper bunker had served as Hitler's private quarters and command center. 

Slavin explored the bunker system with the aide of an unnamed sergeant from which he learned that the despite the bombing and extensive damage to the above-ground buildings, everything below was intact. Despite the damage, the large coal burning furnaces for heating, the water and electrical systems of the Reich Chancellery complex and bunker system was in perfect working order. In fact, the Germans who manned these systems were still on the job and cooperating with the Soviet conquerors.

Slavin was eventually taken to the Soviet commander, who had established his office just across the corridor from Hitler's private suite in what had been Joseph Goebbels' office during the last days of the war. In Goebbels room, the Soviet commander was being attended to by an older member of Hitler's former wait staff. As the commander explained that nearly all Hitler's servants had remained, the old fellow poured a glass of wine from "Hitler's kitchen" for Slavin.

Next, Slavin was led up to the Chancellery Garden by way of the emergency exit. According to Slavin's guide, the garden had already been given the grim nickname, "Suicide Park", because of the countless German corpses found there with apparently self-inflicted gunshot wounds. There was much discussion about the garden because those remaining in the bunker when the Soviets captured the Chancellery told the commander that Hitler's body had been burned there - somewhere. While Slavin surveyed the horror show, the search for Hitler's corpse was already underway. He noted, "I saw one of 'Hitler’s corpses' in the Chancellery. I say 'one', because there were something like six in all. It was a man strongly resembling Hitler dressed in a black suit and wearing the ribbon of the Iron Cross. When called upon to identify the corpse neither Hitler’s chief physician nor any other member of his household would say it was the Führer; nor would they identify the other bodies that were found". Even more odd, Slavin learned that each of the other 'Hitlers' had a single bullet wound to the forehead, just like the 'Hitler' he viewed.

The number of dead 'Hitlers' raised suspicions.

Over the next few days Slavin found out that General Helmuth Weidling had surrendered to General Vasily Chuikov and was interrogated about Hitler's suicide. Weidling revealed had not been an eyewitness, insisting, instead that he wasn't told about Hitler's death until May 1, when he came to report to Hitler around five in the afternoon, and found Goebbels in Hitler's map room instead. Goebbels told him next to nothing, according to Weidling. 

When Slavin asked General Weidling if he believed Hitler was dead, Weidling said yes, but Slavin spoke with another captured German general who insisted "Hitler fled by plane". This unnamed commander said an airstrip had been established on central Berlin's broadest and longest thoroughfare, that an underground rail line leads directly from the Chancellery to this runway, and that planes departed as late as April 30.

Perhaps the most interesting part of Slavin's article is his mention of later questioning members of "Hitler's bodyguard", who later him that on April 30 they were "mustered" by Mohnke, "who was in charge of the defense of the Chancellery...for a parade in the underground shelter". They told Slavin, "Our colors were unfurled for the occasion", and that "Hitler appeared, dressed in an ordinary black suit but wearing the ribbon of the Iron Cross. He wore his usual pompous air as he goose-stepped past the ranks, pumping his fat legs up and down, and his right arm, noticeably shaking, was outstretched in a gesture he believed to be classical. Everything was as usual with one exception: Hitler did not say a word. The hysterical prattler was silent."