Tank company commander Yevgenia Kostrikova (4 photos). How Kirov's daughter Evgenia Kostrikova fought in a tank

Evgenia Kostrikova was born in 1921. The girl's mother died when Zhenya was still very young. My father was extremely busy with responsible work. He had no time to raise a girl. In 1926 he married another woman. In his new life, he did not find a place for his daughter. Howbeit. Zhenya was brought up in a boarding school.

In 1938, Zhenya entered the Moscow Higher Technical School. Bauman. She was definitely not a humanitarian person. But she did not show any intention to become a scientist or engineer, Kostrikova was eager for war. The end of the Spanish Civil War in 1939 was
The Finnish war of 1940 also passed by Zhenya Kostrikova, but Evgenia still had a chance to fight. And with a vengeance. In fact, from the beginning to the end of the Great Patriotic War she was at the forefront.
At the beginning of the war, she graduated from nursing courses and went to the front as a volunteer. In those years, even the children of high-ranking party members were eager to join the army. Nurse Evgenia Kostrikova was sent to the medical platoon of a separate tank battalion. She bandaged and pulled out the wounded under heavy enemy fire. And not sometime, but in the days of the battle for Moscow. Zhenya, despite her excellent successes as a nurse (for which she was awarded the medal "For Courage", valued and respected by front-line soldiers), dreamed of tanks. Her desires for the time being seemed absurd. It is no coincidence that women are not taken as tankers - after all, for example, in order to squeeze the main clutch pedal of the T-34, an effort of twenty-five kilograms was required.

In October 1942, the battalion in which she served allocated part of the personnel, including almost the entire medical staff, to staff the 79th separate tank regiment. Having unfinished higher education and the qualifications of a nurse, Evgenia Kostrikova became a military paramedic of the regiment.
In December 1942, the 79th Tank Regiment participated in the Battle of Stalingrad as part of the Southern Front. Soon it was renamed the 54th Guards Tank Regiment of the 5th Guards Zimovnikovsky Mechanized Corps of the 2nd Guards Army. For the difficult battles of 1942, Evgenia Kostrikova was awarded the Order of the Red Star.

And then there was the greatest tank battle near Kursk in the summer of 1943.
There, during one of the battles, Evgenia saved the lives of twenty-seven tankers. Zhenya pulled the wounded out of the burning tanks until she was badly wounded by a shell fragment. For this feat, the nurse was awarded the Order of the Great Patriotic War of the 2nd degree, and a little later, after being wounded, the Order of the Red Banner of War.
But this blonde, on whose cheek there was now a scar, still rushed into the ranks. They took pity on Zhenya: they found a job for her at the headquarters. But what is it ... She now stubbornly sought a referral to study at the Kazan Tank School and received refusal after refusal. Only the personal intervention of her old friend, Marshal Kliment Efremovich Voroshilov, forced the leadership of the school to enroll Senior Lieutenant Evgenia Kostrikov as a cadet.
During the Great Patriotic War, about two dozen women became tankmen. All of them with great perseverance achieved. After an accelerated course of study at the Kazan Tank School, Kostrikova returned to the front. She became one of three Soviet women educated in this field.

Evgenia Kostrikova became not just a tanker. She, so to speak, made a career in tank troops Oh. There were no similar precedents in the Red Army at that time.
After graduating from college, Senior Lieutenant Kostrikova became the commander of a tank platoon in her native 5th Guards Mechanized Corps. She fought in Ukraine, and in January 1945, when the corps was included in the 1st Ukrainian Front, she took part in the Vistula-Oder offensive operation.


Pay attention to the patronymic and surname? Yes, yes, it own daughter S.M. Kirov (Kostrikov) - an outstanding Soviet and party leader.

Born in 1952

POSITION

Leading Researcher

ACADEMIC DEGREE

Doctor of History (2011)

TOPICS OF DISSERTATIONS

Kandidatskaya: “Sources of foreign policy information of Russian bourgeois newspapers. 1907-1914" (1983)

Doctoral: “Foreign policy in Russian public opinion on the eve of the First World War. 1908-1914" (2011)

AREA OF SCIENTIFIC INTEREST

Foreign policy of Russia at the beginning of the 20th century, the relationship between power and society and public opinion at the beginning of the 20th century, the history of the Russian press and telegraph agencies.

Contact Information

MAIN PUBLICATIONS:

Monographs:

  • Russian press and diplomacy on the eve of the First World War. 1907-1914 / E.G. Kostrikova. - M.: IRI RAN, 1997. - 176 p.
  • Russian society and foreign policy on the eve of the First World War. 1908-1914 / E.G. Kostrikova. - M.: IRI RAN, 2007.- 410 p.
  • Geopolitical interests of Russia and the Slavic question. Ideological struggle in Russian society at the beginning of the twentieth century. M., Kuchkovo field, 2017. 380 p.
  • locomotives of history. Revolutionary 1917. M., Algorithm, 2017. (Co-authored with S.P. Kostrikov)

Chapters and sections in collective works:

  • Russian-German newspaper war // History of Russia's foreign policy (end of the 15th century - 1917). In 5 vols. T.5. The end of the XIX-beginning of the XX century (From the Russian-French Union to the October Revolution). - M.: International relationships, 1997. - S. 418-425.
  • The struggle of Russia for the revision of the status of the Straits in the early twentieth century. // Russia and the Black Sea Straits (XVIII-XX centuries). - M.: International relations, 1999. - S. 253-304.
  • Diplomacy and activities of the Russian Foreign Ministry from the end of the war with Japan to the February Revolution // Essays on the history of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia. In 3 vols. T.1. - M.: OLMA-PRESS, 2002. - S. 515-582. (co-authored with A.V. Ignatiev).
  • Russian politicians, publicists and public figures on the geopolitical interests of Russia at the beginning of the twentieth century // Geopolitical factors in Russia's foreign policy. Second half of the 16th - early 20th century. - M.: Nauka, 2007. - S. 308-331.

Articles:

  • Sources of foreign policy information of Russian bourgeois newspapers (based on materials from the archival funds of "Rech" and "Russian Word" // Historical Notes. - 1979. - T. 103. - P. 275-298.
  • Organization of the foreign information service of the St. Petersburg Telegraph Agency. Bulletin of the Moscow University. Series 8. History. - 1981. - No. 4. - S. 47-59.
  • The structure of foreign policy information in the largest newspapers in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century. (On the example of the Balkan crisis at the end of 1912) // Foreign Policy of Russia. Sources and historiography. - M.: IRI RAN, 1991. - S. 170-181.
  • Controversy in the Russian press on the issue of railway construction in Persia. The project of the "Great Indian Way" // Russia at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Materials of scientific readings in memory of V.I. Bovykin. Moscow, Moscow State University, January 20, 1999 - M.: ROSSPEN, 1999. - S. 336-347.
  • Press and Foreign Ministry at the beginning of the 20th century // Russian diplomacy: history and modernity. Materials Scientific-practical. Conf. dedicated to the 450th anniversary of the creation of the Posolsky Prikaz. October 29, 1999 MGIMO. - M.: ROSSPEP, 2001. - S. 313-327.
  • The Russian Foreign Ministry in the struggle for European public opinion during the First World War // Russia in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Materials of II scientific readings in memory of V.I. Bovykin. Moscow, Moscow State University, January 22, 2002 - M.: ROSSPEP, 2002. - S. 199-215.
  • From the Potsdam meeting to the agreement. Russian press about relations with Germany // European almanac. - 2003. - M.: Nauka, 2004. - S. 138-159.
  • The State Duma of Russia and the reform of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs // National history. - 2007.- No. 1. - P. 40-62.
  • German breakthrough to the Bosphorus and Russian society// Scientific notes of the Russian State Social University. - 2008. - No. 3 (59). - S. 162-170.
  • The Bosnian Crisis of 1908 and Public Opinion in Russia // Russian History. - 2009. - No. 2. - P. 42-54.
  • The First Balkan War and Russian Society // Bulletin of the Peoples' Friendship University. Series "History of Russia". - 2009. - No. 4. - S. 97-110.
  • "Bridge over the abyss". Press Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Russian press at the beginning of the 20th century” // Russian History. 2010. No. 5. S. 183-193.
  • Newspaper "New time" and diplomacy of the Triple Alliance on the eve of the First World War // Clio. - 2010. - No. 4 (51). - S. 83-86.
  • The Bosnian fiasco of A.P. Izvolsky and Russian society. 1908–1909 // Proceedings of the Institute Russian history. - 2008. - Issue. 9. - M., 2010.- S. 425-451.
  • St. Petersburg Telegraph Agency and the First Russian Revolution // Scientific Bulletin of Belgorod state university. Series: History. Political science. Economy. Informatics. - 2010. - No. 19(90). - Issue. 16. - S. 145-152.
  • Information "at the root" // Motherland. - 2011. - No. 3. - S. 72-74.
  • Russia and the problem of military-political alliances at the beginning of the 20th century: a geopolitical aspect // Russian geopolitics in the 20th centuries. Continuity and contradictions. M., IRI RAN, 2013. S. 16-69. (3 p.l.)
  • The First Balkan War and Russian Society. Correspondents of Russian newspapers in the theater of military operations // Prvi Balkan Rat 1912/13: Drushtveni and civilizational smisao. Nish, 2013, pp. 473-484. (1 p.l.)
  • Information and propaganda activities of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs during the First World War // Russia during the First World War. 1914-1918. M., 2014. S. 517-722. (0.75 p.l.).
  • Vtorata of the Balkan War and Russia: Position on Diplomacy and More Thought // Bukureshkiot Peace Treaty, Macedonia and the Balkanot. Skopje, 2014, pp. 91-99. (0.5 p. l.).
  • Two peoples - one sudbina // Iskon. 2015. No. 9. P.84-87. (0.3 p. l.).
  • The movement in support of the Serbs in Russia on the eve of the First world war (July 1914). // The Serbs and the First World War 1914–1918. Belgrade, SASA, 2015, pp. 205-218. (1 p. l.).
  • Events of the first Russian revolution in the coverage of the St. Petersburg Telegraph Agency // Russian History. 2016. No. 4. S. 118-123. (0.3 p.l.)
  • Russians in Bulgaria during the First Balkan War // Russia between the West and the Outflow. Politics and diplomacy. Sofia, 2016. (2 sheets).
  • Plans of the Russian military command to save Serbia in the autumn of 1915. Based on the materials of the RGVIA // "The Age of the Srpske Golgote (1915-2015)". I-III. Book I. Kosovska Mitrovica, 2016. P.271-290. (1 p. l.)

Sergey Kirov, real name whom Kostrikov was, was not only a well-known politician, but also the father of the famous tanker Evgenia Kostrikova. In the Great Patriotic War, Evgenia did not take advantage of the high position of Kirov and voluntarily went to the front. But one day she still had to resort to her connections in the highest echelons of power.

Dream of QMS

Eugenia's mother died early. Kirov entered into a second marriage, and sent Zhenya to a boarding school. In 1934, Kirov was killed, and the girl became an orphan. Apparently, she did not hold a grudge against her father, because, having barely learned about new development Soviet engineers - the SMK tank, named after Sergei Mironovich Kirov, Evgenia wanted to become a tanker.
However, Kostrikova began her front-line path as a nurse. After graduating from special courses, the girl immediately went to war.

commemorative scar

Evgenia Kostrikova, along with the rest of the nurses, saved the wounded soldiers. In 1942, she became a military assistant of the 79th separate tank regiment, which, among other things, participated in the battle of Stalingrad. And on Kursk Bulge Yevgenia was seriously injured: a fragment of a mine literally cut her cheek. This scar reminded Kostrikova of the war all her life.
As a paramedic, Evgenia Kostrikova saved dozens of lives and was awarded the Order of the Red Star.

Only three

One would think that the girl forgot about her cherished dream. But it's not. After treatment, Evgenia Kostrikova was sent to the headquarters. However, she did not enjoy working there. And she began to demand that she be sent to the Kazan Tank School. Having been refused, Evgenia turned to Marshal Kliment Voroshilov. So she still entered the school.
It is worth noting that during the Great Patriotic War, besides Kostrikova, only two female representatives became graduates of the tank school: Irina Levchenko and Alexandra Boyko. Girls were reluctantly taken to such educational establishments. After all, to control a tank, you need appropriate physical strength and endurance. For example, in order to squeeze the main clutch pedal of a tank, a force equal to 25 kilograms is needed.

Tank company commander

After graduating from college, Evgenia Kostrikova first commanded a tank platoon, and by the end of the war, she already had a whole company. The military exploits of the tanker Kostrikova were written many times by the journalists of the army newspaper Krasnaya Zvezda.
Eugenia's battle road ended in the capital of the Czech Republic, Prague, from where she safely returned to her homeland. By that time she was only 24 years old.
Evgenia Kostrikova died in 1975 and was buried at the Vagankovsky cemetery.

On the same topic:


Evgenia Kostrikova: how Kirov's daughter fought in a tank Evgenia Kostrikova: Kirov's daughter who fought in a tank How Maria Oktyabrskaya fought against Hitler on a personal tank Did Stalin need to kill Kirov

Evgenia Sergeevna Kostrikova(1921-1975) - Soviet officer, participant in the Great Patriotic War, captain of the guard. Daughter of the Soviet statesman and politician S. M. Kirov (1886-1934, real name - Kostrikov).

During the Great Patriotic War - military assistant of the 79th separate (54th guards) tank regiment of the 5th guards mechanized corps, then commander of a tank, tank platoon, tank company.

Biography

early years

Born in 1921 in Vladikavkaz. Daughter of S. M. Kirov (1886-1934, real name - Kostrikov), a Soviet statesman and politician, at that time a member of the Revolutionary Military Council of the 11th Army of the Red Army, which entered Baku in the spring of 1920 to establish Soviet power. Here, then still Kostrikov, he met a woman who became his first wife. But soon she fell ill and died. In 1926, Kirov (party pseudonym of Sergei Mironovich) was elected first secretary of the Leningrad Provincial Committee (regional committee) and the city committee of the party, he is constantly busy with state and party affairs. The second wife - Maria Lvovna Markus (1885-1945) - did not accept little Zhenya into the family, and she was assigned to an orphanage.

After the murder of S. M. Kirov in 1934, Evgenia was left all alone. She graduated from a secondary boarding school at one of the orphanages " special purpose”, established by the Soviet government for the “children of war” from Spain. In 1938 she entered the Bauman Moscow Higher Technical School.

Among her close friends from the children of the party elite were the Mikoyan brothers and Timur Frunze (who at that time were studying to become pilots), the Spaniard Ruben Ibarruri (studied at the Moscow Infantry School named after the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR). Evgenia Kostrikova, like many of her peers, also dreamed of military exploits. But April 1, 1939 Civil War in Spain ended, and on March 13, 1940, the Soviet-Finnish war also ended.

Nurse

In 1941, with the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, having an incomplete higher education, she completed a three-month nursing course and volunteered for the front. Nurse E. S. Kostrikova was sent to the medical platoon of a separate tank battalion, in which she participated in the battles on Western front during the Moscow battle.

In October 1942, part of the battalion's personnel, including almost the entire medical staff, was sent to staff the 79th separate tank regiment. E. S. Kostrikova became a military assistant of this regiment.

In December 1942, the 79th Tank Regiment participated in the Battle of Stalingrad as part of the Southern Front. In January 1943, it was renamed the 54th Guards Tank Regiment of the 5th Guards Mechanized Corps of the 2nd Guards Army. As part of the Voronezh and Steppe fronts, the regiment participated in Battle of Kursk.

On the Kursk Bulge, the military paramedic E. S. Kostrikova saved the lives of 27 tankers of the regiment and was awarded the Order of the Red Star. After being wounded, in December 1943, Guards Senior Lieutenant Kostrikova was sent to the Operations Department of the 5th Guards Mechanized Corps, where she did not stay long. With the support of the head of the operational department of the corps, Colonel A.P. Ryazansky, she was sent to study at the Kazan Tank School.

Tank company commander

In 1944, she graduated with honors from an accelerated course at the Kazan Tank School and returned to her 5th Guards Mechanized Corps as commander of a T-34 tank. According to some reports, she took part in the liberation of Kirovograd in January 1944.

During the years of World War II, less than two dozen women became tankers. There were only three women who graduated from tank schools. Former medical instructor I. N. Levchenko - in 1943 she graduated from an accelerated course at the Stalingrad Tank School and served as a communications officer in the 41st Guards Tank Brigade, commanded a group of T-60 light tanks. Junior technician-lieutenant A. L. Boyko (Morisheva) - in 1943 she graduated from the Chelyabinsk tank school and fought on the heavy tank IS-2. And only E. S. Kostrikova, after graduating from the Kazan Tank School, commanded a tank platoon, and at the end of the war - a tank company.

Kostrikova's tanks as part of the 5th Guards Mechanized Corps crossed the Oder, Neisse, and by April 30, 1945, reached the southeastern outskirts of Berlin. On May 5, her combat vehicles were withdrawn from participation in Berlin operation and aimed at the liberation of Prague. 24-year-old Evgenia Kostrikova completed her combat path in Czechoslovakia.

Postwar years

After the war, the captain E. S. Kostrikova was demobilized from the army and became a housewife. Lived in Moscow.

She died in 1975. She was buried at the Vagankovsky cemetery in Moscow.

Awards

Soviet state awards:

  • Order of the Red Banner (August 11, 1943)
  • Order of the Patriotic War, 1st class (May 5, 1945)
  • Order of the Patriotic War II degree (July 5, 1943)
  • two Orders of the Red Star (October 2, 1942, October 14, 1943)
  • medals including:
    • medal "For Courage" (January 2, 1942)
    • Medal "For the Defense of Stalingrad"

Family, personal life

The personal life of E. S. Kostrikova did not work out. During the war, she married a colonel, a staff officer. Taking advantage of her connections in the highest circles of power (Evgenia Sergeevna helped her tank regiment with supplies), he soon received the rank of general, and after the war it turned out that he already had a family. Evgenia Sergeevna did not marry again, she had no children. Died alone. Of her fellow tankers, only one closest military friend, Antonina Alekseevna Kuzmina, a former military doctor, buried her.

During perestroika, the Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper published an article “Kirov's daughter liberates the city named after her father”: it was about Kirovograd. And just the other day, by chance, while searching for information on a completely different topic, the author came across an article about Evgenia Sergeevna Kostrikova, the daughter of Sergei Mironovich Kirov. What can be learned from this material?

None of the Kirov historians has so far been interested in publishing in Krasnaya Zvezda. This, as it turned out, was done by a painstaking historian from Kazan, whose article I recommend to readers.

Kirov historians wrote a lot about Sergei Mironovich, but the Urzhum period of his life is still poorly studied. I was also interested in the biography of the "Great Citizen" and studied the archival fund of the school where Sergei Kostrikov studied (this is Kirov's real name). And he was very surprised to learn that, according to the registration sheet, none of the historians looked into these cases. I will say more: Antonina Golubeva, the author of the book about Kirov "The Boy from Urzhum", has confused a lot. So the biography of the "Great Citizen" is still fraught with many mysteries. It is gratifying that, thanks to the efforts of a person who is not indifferent to Russian history, we can shed light on the fate of the descendants of an outstanding political figure in our country.

Far - close

Sergei Mironovich Kirov (real name - Kostrikov), one of the prominent Soviet state and party leaders, graduated from the Kazan Industrial School in 1904. Created on the basis of this school, the Kazan Institute of Chemical Technology (now the Kazan National Research University of Technology) bore his name from 1935 to 1992. Since 1935, the administrative district of Kazan, which occupies the western part of the city, has been called Kirovsky.

But few people know that the daughter of S. M. Kirov graduated from the Kazan Tank School. The Museum of Military Glory has a photograph of a graduate of the school in 1944, senior lieutenant of the tank troops Evgenia Sergeevna Kostrikova.

The childhood of the daughter repeated the childhood of the father. In 1953, A.G. Golubeva's book "The Boy from Urzhum" was published - a story about the childhood and youth of S.M. Kirov. In the chapter "Orphans", the author describes the hard life of a boy in the Urzhum orphanage - a town on the banks of the Urzhumka River, which flows into the Vyatka. Sergey lost his parents early: his father abandoned his family, his mother died. His "shelter life" began at the age of 8. In the parish school where the boy studied, he was given the nickname Priyutsky.

From 1910 to 1918, S.M. Kirov led the Bolshevik work in the North Caucasus. In 1919 he became a member of the Revolutionary Military Council of the XI Red Army.

In 1920, Kirov, as part of the Red Army, established Soviet power in Baku. Here Sergei Mironovich, then still Kostrikov, met a woman who became his first wife. In 1921 their daughter Evgenia was born. However, Kirov's wife soon fell ill and died. The girl had to experience all the hardships of orphanhood.

In 1926, Kirov (this surname became the party pseudonym of Sergei Mironovich) was elected the first secretary of the Leningrad Provincial Committee (regional committee) and the city committee of the party. He deals with state and party affairs around the clock. At this time, he had a new wife - Maria Lvovna Markus. Little Zhenya is assigned to an orphanage.

S.M. Kirov was killed in Smolny on December 1, 1934. Evgenia was left completely alone. The second common-law wife of Sergei Mironovich, although she was seriously ill and had no children, did not accept Zhenya. The only daughter of Kirov had to get used to independence and work from childhood.
Children of war

On June 18, 1936, the Spanish Civil War broke out. In the spring of 1937, the first steamer arrived in the Soviet Union from Valencia with Spanish children on board, who had fled from the bloody military mutiny of General Franco.

By the end of 1938, 15 “special purpose” orphanages were established in the USSR, established by the Soviet government for “war children” from Spain. In one of them she graduated from the secondary boarding school Evgenia Kostrikova. Then she entered the Bauman Moscow Higher Technical School.

The young Komsomol member Zhenya, like many of her peers, dreamed of exploits as part of international brigades in distant Spain. But on April 1, 1939, the civil war ended there.

Having learned about the creation of a heavy tank SMK ("Sergey Mironovich Kirov"), Evgenia got the idea to become a tanker and go to the Soviet-Finnish war. But she was too late for this war.

Close friends of Kostrikova from the children of the party elite - the Mikoyan brothers and Timur Frunze - at that time were studying to become pilots. Another of her acquaintances, the Spaniard Ruben Ibarruri, studied at the Moscow Infantry School named after the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR. With the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, Lydia, the daughter of one of the organizers of the Red Army N.I. Podvoisky, went to the front as a medical instructor.

Yevgenia Kostrikova also completed a three-month nursing course and voluntarily went to the front.
Nurse - military paramedic

As part of the medical and sanitary platoon of a separate tank battalion, nurse Kostrikova took part in the battles on the Western Front during the Battle of Moscow. There began the first kilometers of its front-line roads.

In October 1942, the battalion allocated part of the personnel, including almost the entire medical staff, to staff the 79th separate tank regiment. Yevgenia Kostrikova, who had an incomplete higher education and qualifications of a nurse, became a military paramedic of the regiment. This corresponded to the rank of lieutenant of army units.

In December 1942, the 79th Tank Regiment participated in the Battle of Stalingrad as part of the Southern Front. A month later, it was renamed the 54th Guards Tank Regiment of the 5th Guards Zimovnikovsky Mechanized Corps of the 2nd Guards Army.

In the fierce battles near Stalingrad, when, according to Marshal Soviet Union V.I. Chuikova, “... it seemed that it was impossible to raise a hand above the ground”, military assistant Kostrikova directly on the battlefield provided first aid to the wounded and carried them out under heavy enemy fire.

After Stalingrad, the 54th Guards Tank Regiment, as part of the Voronezh and Steppe Fronts, participated in the Battle of Kursk. Leonid Yuzefovich Girsh, a retired colonel who became a poet and writer after the war, was a participant in a significant tank battle near Prokhorovka. The slightly wounded communications officer of the 55th Guards Regiment, Junior Lieutenant Girsh, received medical assistance from military assistant Kostrikova.

L.Yu.Girsh recalls this moment: “... The captain of the medical service told me that I met on the battlefield with the daughter of Sergei Mironovich Kirov. As you know, his real name was Kostrikov. On the way back (from the medical battalion) I did not find Evgenia Sergeevna. She was seriously wounded by a shell fragment. The brave military paramedic was sent to the hospital ... ".

On the Kursk Bulge, Evgenia Sergeevna saved the lives of twenty-seven tankers and was awarded the Order of the Red Star.

staff member

After being wounded, in December 1943, Guards Senior Lieutenant Kostrikova was sent to the Operations Department of the 5th Guards Mechanized Corps. This is evidenced in his memoirs "In the fire tank battles» former head of the department, General A.V. Ryazansky.

“... The general asked:“ Who wants to draw a conclusion about the situation? ”After a short pause, Kostrikova stood up:“ Allow me? She had a deep scar on her right cheek. She only recently returned to the building from the Moscow hospital.

But staff work did not please Evgenia Sergeevna. From front-line reports, she knew that many women served in armored units. With the support of the head of the operational department of the corps, Colonel Ryazansky, she began to petition to be sent to study at the Kazan Tank School.

At first, Kostrikova was refused in every possible way, saying that a tanker is not a female profession: “It’s hard for guys on a tank!”, “Armor does not like the weak.” I had to turn to Marshal of the Soviet Union K.E. Voroshilov himself, whom she convinced that she had already sat down at the levers of a tank more than once in her regiment and could master a formidable combat vehicle no worse than men.

cadet

Veterans of the Kazan Tank School recalled that the head of the school, Major General of Tank Troops Vladimir Isidorovich Zhivlyuk, was very surprised when a young woman arrived to study, even if she had the rank of senior lieutenant. “Yes, it's like a woman on a ship,” was all he could say. The general was even more surprised when later an order came from the commander of the armored and mechanized troops of the Red Army to award E.S. Kostrikova with the medal "For the Defense of Stalingrad."

Meanwhile, the stubborn senior lieutenant, along with men, mastered driving and shooting from a tank at the training ground, taught the material part, the performance characteristics of weapons and military equipment in classrooms, on simulators and in the park.

Fragile in appearance, Evgenia Kostrikova endured heavy physical exertion. After all, in order to drive a tank, it really takes man's strength. For example, pressing one of the two side clutch levers required a force of 15 kg, and pressing the main clutch pedal required 25 kg. Here, Evgenia was helped by the hardening of a nurse and a military paramedic, obtained by carrying dozens of wounded at the front.

Evgenia graduated with honors from the accelerated course of the Kazan Tank School and returned to her 5th Guards Mechanized Corps as commander of a T-34 tank.

tank girl

Becoming a tanker during the war years for a woman is already heroism. During the years of World War II, less than two dozen women became tankers. The most famous among them is Maria Vasilievna Oktyabrskaya, a tank driver. Fighting girlfriend”, built on her personal savings.

There were only three women who graduated from tank schools. Former medical instructor Irina Nikolaevna Levchenko completed an accelerated course at the Stalingrad Tank School in 1943 and served as a communications officer in the 41st Guards Tank Brigade. She was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union on May 6, 1965 for her exemplary performance of command assignments and for her bravery and courage.

Alexandra Leontievna Boyko (Morisheva) graduated from the Chelyabinsk Tank Technical School in 1943 and fought in heavy tank IS-2.

But only one and only Evgenia Sergeevna Kostrikova, after graduating from the Kazan Tank School, commanded a tank platoon, and at the end of the war - a tank company.

The history of the war did not yet know an example of a "tank girl" leading formidable vehicles into battle. The name of the brave tanker Evgenia Kostrikova, whose tanks fought in Moravia and Upper Silesia, often began to appear on the pages of the all-army newspaper Krasnaya Zvezda. Already in the rank of captain Kostrikova was awarded the medal "For Courage".

Tanks Kostrikova under the battle banner of the 5th Guards Zimovnikovsky mechanized corps crossed the Oder, Neisse and by April 30, 1945 reached the southeastern outskirts of Berlin. On May 5, her combat vehicles were withdrawn from participation in the Berlin operation and sent to the liberation of Prague. The combat path of the twenty-four-year-old "tank girl" ended in Czechoslovakia.

The war is over. The brave military paramedic-tanker Kostrikova, who fought on a par with men, became a simple housewife and lived 30 peaceful years after the Victory. She passed away in 1975. Guards captain of the tank troops Evgenia Sergeevna Kostrikova was buried at the Vagankovsky cemetery in Moscow.

Evgeny Panov,
Corresponding Member of the Academy of Military Historical Sciences,
associate professor of Kazan VVKU

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