If you want to establish the fate of your relative, who died or went missing during the Great Patriotic War, then get ready for a long and laborious work. Do not expect that it is enough to ask a question and someone will tell you in detail about your relative. And there is no magic key to the secret door, behind which there is a box with the inscription "The most detailed information about Sergeant Ivanov II for his great-grandson Edik." Information about a person, if preserved, is scattered across dozens of archives in tiny, often unrelated fragments. It may turn out that after spending several years searching, you will not learn anything new about your relative. But it is possible that a lucky break will reward you after only a few months of searching.

Below is a simplified search algorithm. It may seem complicated. In fact, everything is much more complicated. Here are described ways to search for information, if it has been preserved somewhere. But the information you needed might not have been preserved at all: the hardest of all wars was going on, not only individual servicemen died - regiments, divisions, armies died, documents disappeared, reports were lost, archives burned ... It is especially difficult (and sometimes impossible) to find out the fate of servicemen , who died or went missing in encirclement in 1941 and in the summer of 1942

Total deadweight loss armed forces USSR (RKKA, Navy, NKVD) in the Great Patriotic War amounted to 11.944 thousand people. It should immediately be noted that these are not dead, but for various reasons excluded from the lists of units. According to the order of the Deputy People's Commissar of Defense N 023 dated February 4, 1944, irretrievable losses include "those who died in battle, went missing at the front, died from wounds on the battlefield and in medical institutions, died from diseases received at the front, or died at the front from other causes and captured by the enemy. Of this number, 5,059 thousand people went missing. In turn, of the missing, most of them ended up in German captivity (and only less than a third of them survived to liberation), many died on the battlefield, and many of those who ended up in the occupied territory were subsequently re-conscripted into the army. The distribution of irretrievable losses and missing by the years of the war (I remind you that the second number is part of the first) is shown in the table:

Year	Dead Losses (thousand people)		Killed and died from wounds (thousand people)
	Total	Missing
1941	3.137	2.335
1942	3.258	1.515
1943	2.312
1944	1.763
1945
Total	11.944	5.059	9.168

In total, 9.168 thousand military personnel died and died from wounds in the Great Patriotic War, and the total direct casualties Soviet Union for all the years of the Great Patriotic War are estimated at 26.6 million people. (The numerical data on losses are taken from the works of Colonel-General G.F. Krivosheev, 1998-2002, which seem to us the most reliable and least politicized of all known estimates of the losses of the USSR in the Great Patriotic War.)

1. First steps

1.1. Home search

First of all, you need to know exactly the last name, first name, patronymic, year of birth and place of birth. Without this information, it will be very difficult to search.

The place of birth must be indicated in accordance with the administrative-territorial division of the USSR in prewar years. The correspondence between pre-revolutionary, pre-war and modern administrative-territorial division can be found on the Internet. (Handbook of the administrative division of the USSR in 1939-1945 on the site SOLDIER.ru.)

Usually it is not difficult to find out the time of conscription and the place of residence of the conscript. By place of residence, you can determine which District Military Commissariat (RVK) he was called up to.

Ranks can be determined by the insignia in the surviving photographs. If the rank is unknown, then belonging to the rank and file, command and political composition can be very approximately determined by the education and pre-war biography of the serviceman.

If a medal or order has been preserved that a soldier was awarded during the war, then by the number of the award, you can determine the number of the military unit and even find out a description of the feat or military merits of the recipient.

Be sure to interview the relatives of the soldier. Much time has passed since the end of the war, and the soldier's parents are no longer alive, and his wife, brothers and sisters are very old, much has been forgotten. But when talking with them, some insignificant detail may come up: the name of the area, the presence of letters from the front, words from a long-lost "funeral" ... Write everything down and for each individual fact, be sure to indicate the source: "Smirnova S.I. story 10.05 .2008". You need to write down the source because conflicting information may appear (grandmother said one thing, but another is indicated in the certificate), and you will have to choose a more plausible source. It should be borne in mind that family legends sometimes convey certain events with distortions (something was forgotten, something was mixed up, something the narrator "improved" ...).

It is very important at this stage to determine in the troops of which People's Commissariats (People's Commissariats, or in modern terms - ministries) your relative served: the People's Commissariat of Defense (ground forces and aviation), the Navy (including coastal units and aviation of the Navy), People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD troops, border units). Cases of different departments are stored in different archives. (Addresses of departmental archives on the site SOLDAT.ru.)

The main task at the first stage should be set - finding out the date of death and the number of the military unit in which the soldier was at least for some time.

1.2. If letters from the front are preserved

All letters from the front were viewed by military censors, the servicemen were warned about this, therefore, usually the letters did not indicate names and numbers military units, names of settlements, etc.

The first thing to determine is the number of the Field Post Station (PPS or "field mail"). By the PPP number it is often possible to determine room military unit. ("Handbook of field postal stations of the Red Army in 1941-1945", "Handbook of military units - field mails of the Red Army in 1943-1945" on the SOLDIER.ru website. ) It should be borne in mind that in this case it is not always possible to determine a specific unit (regiment, battalion, company) as part of a military unit. ("Recommendations" on the website SOLDAT.ru. )

Until September 5, 1942, the address of a military unit usually consisted of the number of the PPS and the numbers of specific military units served by this PPS (regiment, battalion, company, platoon). After September 5, 1942, the actual numbers of military units were not indicated in the address, and instead of them, within each specific PPS, conditional numbers of addressees were introduced. Such conditional numbers could include from two to five or six characters (letters and numbers). It is impossible to determine the actual number of the military unit by the conditional number of the addressee. In this case, only the number of the division or army can be determined by the PPS number, and the number of the regiment, battalion, company will remain unknown, because. each army had its own unit coding system.

In addition to the PPP number, the stamp (in the center) has the date the letter was registered at the PPP (actually the date the letter was sent) - it will also come in handy in further searches. The text of the letter may contain information about the rank of a serviceman, about his military specialty, about rewarding, about belonging to an ordinary, junior command (sergeant), command (officer) or political composition, etc.

2. Internet search

2.1. United data bank "Memorial"

2.1.1. The largest resource on the Internet is the official website of the Ministry of Defense "Joint data bank "Memorial"". The data bank was created on the basis of documents stored in TsAMO: reports of irretrievable losses, journals of those who died in hospitals, alphabetical listings graves, German personal cards for prisoners of war, post-war lists of those who did not return from the war, etc. At present (2008), the site is working in a test mode. The site can be searched by last name, place of conscription, year of birth and some other keywords. It is possible to view scans of original documents in which the found personalities are mentioned.

When searching, you should also check consonant surnames and first names, especially if the surname is poorly perceived by ear - with repeated rewriting, the surname could be distorted. The operator could also make a mistake when entering handwritten information into the computer.

In some cases, there are several documents per soldier, for example: a report on irretrievable losses, a nominal list of those who died from wounds, an alphabetical list of those who died in a hospital, a military burial record card, etc. And of course, very often there are no documents for a serviceman - this mainly applies to missing persons in initial period war.

2.2.1. In addition to the site of the OBD "Memorial", there are several available databases on the Internet with a search by surnames (Page of links on the site SOLDIER.en).

2.2.2. Regardless of the search results on the OBD Memorial website and databases, it is necessary to search in several search engines on the Internet, specifying known information about the relative as the search string. Even search system will tell you something interesting on your request, you should repeat the search for various combinations of words, check synonyms and possible abbreviations of terms, names, names.

2.2.3. You should definitely visit genealogical and military-historical sites and forums, look through the catalogs of sections of military literature on the sites of electronic libraries. Read the memoirs of soldiers and officers found on the Internet who served on the same sector of the front as your relative, as well as descriptions of the military operations of the front, army, division in which he served. This will help you a lot in your future work. . And it’s just useful to know about the everyday life of that big war.

2.2.4. You should not completely trust the information received from the Internet - often no one is responsible for its reliability, so always try to check the facts obtained from other sources. If verification fails, then make a note or just remember which of the information was obtained from an unverified source. In the future, you will often come across information that is unlikely, unreliable, doubtful, or even, most likely, false. For example, very soon you will have a list of namesakes, a wanted relative, who have some biography facts that match the ones you need. You don’t need to throw anything away, but be sure to indicate the source from which you received it for each new fact - maybe in a year you will have new information that will make you evaluate the information collected in a new way.

2.2.5. If right now you have a desire to ask your question at the military-historical forum, do not rush. To get started, read the posts on this forum in recent weeks. It may turn out that such questions have already been asked more than once, and regular forum visitors have already answered them in detail - in this case, your question will cause irritation. In addition, each forum has its own rules and traditions, and if you want to get a friendly answer, then try not to violate the norms of behavior adopted on the forum. Usually, the first time you post to a forum, you should introduce yourself. And don't forget to include an email address for those who want to reply to you by email.

2.3. Books of Memory

2.3.1. In many regions of the country, Books of Memory have been issued, which contain alphabetical lists of the inhabitants of the region who died or went missing during the Great Patriotic War. Books of Memory are multi-volume publications, they can be found in the regional library and in the military registration and enlistment offices of the region, but it is difficult to find them outside the region. In some regions of the country, in addition to the regional Book of Memory, Books of Memory of individual regions have been issued. Some Books are available in electronic versions on the Internet. Since the publications of different territories, regions, republics and districts were prepared by different editorial teams, the set of personal information and design of different publications are different. As a rule, military personnel born or drafted into the army in this region are indicated in the Books of Memory of the Regions. Both Books of Memory should be checked: the one published at the place of birth and the one published at the place of conscription of the serviceman. (Links to electronic versions of the Books of Memory on the Internet on the site SOLDAT.ru.)

In the Books of Memory of some areas on the territory of which fighting, provides information about the military personnel who died and were buried in the region. If you know in which region the serviceman died, you need to check the Memory Book of the corresponding region.

2.3.2. A large database of dead servicemen is available at the museum on Poklonnaya Gora in Moscow, and museum staff provide information both in person and by phone, but the database installed in the museum is abbreviated (contains only last name, first name, patronymic and year of birth), and the complete database, funded by public funds, is now privately owned and virtually inaccessible. In addition, with the appearance of the OBD Memorial website on the Internet, both databases can be considered outdated.

2.3.3. If you yourself cannot get access to the necessary Books of Memory, then you can ask to check the book of the desired area on an Internet forum with military history or genealogical topics. In addition, many cities have their own websites on the Internet, and most of these sites have their own regional forums. You can ask a question or make a request on such a forum, and you will most likely be given advice or a hint, and if the settlement is small, then you may be asked some question in the military enlistment office or museum.

It should be borne in mind that there are also errors in the Books of Memory, their number depends on the conscientiousness of the editorial team.

3. Getting information from the archive

3.1. On the personal account of the dead and missing military personnel

3.1.1. This subsection provides brief information about the personal account of servicemen who died and went missing during the Great Patriotic War. Knowledge of the basic features of documentation is necessary for further work with archival documents.

3.1.2. It should be noted that during the war, the accounting of dead servicemen was organized quite clearly (as far as it was possible in the conditions of war). With an interval of 10 days (sometimes less often), each military unit of the Active Army sent a list of irretrievable losses to the higher headquarters - "Report on irretrievable losses ...". In this report, for each deceased soldier, the following was indicated: last name, first name, patronymic, year of birth, rank, position, date and place of death, place of burial, conscription office, address of residence and names of parents or wife. Reports from various units were collected at the Directorate for Manning the Troops of the General Staff of the Red Army (later - at the Central Loss Bureau of the Red Army). Similar reports were submitted by hospitals about military personnel who died from wounds and diseases.

After the war, these reports were transferred to TsAMO, and on their basis a file of irretrievable losses was compiled. Information from the report of the military unit was transferred to the personal card of the serviceman, the number of the military unit and the number under which this report was taken into account were indicated in the card.

3.1.3. A notice of the death of a serviceman was sent by the headquarters of the unit in which the deceased served, as a rule, to the draft board. The military registration and enlistment office issued a duplicate of the notice, which was sent to relatives, and on its basis a pension was subsequently issued. The original notices remained in storage at the military registration and enlistment office. The original notice had a round seal and a corner stamp with the name of the military unit or its conditional five-digit number. Some of the notices were sent by the headquarters of the military units directly to relatives, bypassing the military enlistment office, which was a violation established order. Part of the notices of post-war issuance was issued by the district military registration and enlistment offices on the proposal of the Central Bureau of Losses. All notices issued by the military registration and enlistment offices bore the seal and details of the military registration and enlistment office, and the number of the military unit, as a rule, was not given.

The notice of the death of a serviceman indicated: the name of the unit, rank, position, date and place of death of the serviceman and the place of burial. (Image of a notice of the death of a serviceman on the SOLDIER website.en.)

3.1.4. Two ways of indicating the names of military units in open (unclassified) correspondence should be distinguished:

a) in the period 1941-42. the documents indicated the actual name of the unit - for example, 1254 rifle regiment(sometimes with the division number);

b) in the period 1943-45. the conditional name of the military unit was indicated - for example, "military unit 57950", which corresponded to the same 1254 sp. Five-digit numbers were assigned to NPO units, and four-digit numbers were assigned to NKVD units.

3.1.5. A serviceman who was absent from the unit for an unknown reason was considered missing, and the search for him within 15 days did not yield any results. Information about the missing was also transmitted to the higher headquarters, and a notice of the missing was sent to relatives. In this case, the notice of the missing serviceman indicated the name of the military unit, the date and place of the missing serviceman.

Most of the servicemen who are listed as missing died during the retreat, or during reconnaissance in battle, or in the environment, i.e. in cases where the battlefield was left behind by the enemy. It was difficult to witness their death for various reasons. Also missing were:

- Soldiers taken prisoner

- deserters,

- business travelers who did not arrive at their destination,

- scouts who did not return from the mission,

- the personnel of entire units and subunits in the event that they were defeated and there were no commanders left who could reliably report to the authorities about specific types of losses.

However, the reason for the absence of a serviceman could be not only his death. For example, a soldier who lagged behind a unit on the march could be included in another military unit, in which he then continued to fight. The wounded from the battlefield could be evacuated by soldiers of another unit and sent directly to the hospital. There are cases when relatives during the war received several notices ("funeral"), and the person turned out to be alive.

3.1.6. In those cases when no information about irretrievable losses was received from the military unit to the higher headquarters (for example, when the unit or its headquarters died in the environment, the loss of documents), the notification to relatives could not be sent, because. the lists of the military personnel of the unit were among the lost staff documents.

3.1.7. After the end of the war, the district military commissariats carried out work to collect information about servicemen who had not returned from the war (household survey). In addition, the relatives of a serviceman who did not return from the war could, on their own initiative, draw up a “Questionnaire for a non-returning from war” at the military registration and enlistment office.

On the basis of information from the military registration and enlistment offices, the card file of losses was replenished with cards compiled based on the results of a survey of relatives. Such cards could contain the entry "correspondence was interrupted in December 1942", and the number of the military unit was usually absent. If the number of the military unit is indicated in the card drawn up on the basis of a report from the military registration and enlistment office, then it should be treated as probable, presumptive. The date of the disappearance of a serviceman in this case was set by the military commissar, usually by adding three to six months to the date last letter. The directive of the MVS of the USSR recommended that the district military commissars set the date of missing according to the following rules:

1) if the relatives of a serviceman who did not return from the war lived in the non-occupied territory, then three months should be added to the date of the last letter received,

2) if the relatives of a soldier who did not return from the war remained in the occupied territory during the war, then three months should be added to the date of liberation of the territory.

Household survey sheets and questionnaires are also stored in TsAMO (department 9), and they may contain information that is not in the card. When filling out the card, not all the information given in the household survey sheet was usually entered into it. or questionnaire, since there was no opportunity to verify the information recorded from the words of relatives. Therefore, if it is known that the family of a serviceman received letters from him from the front, but later these letters were lost, then some information from these letters (the number of the teaching staff, the date of the letter) may be in the records of the door-to-door survey. When answering an inquiry about the fate of a serviceman, archive workers are not able to find the statements of the door-to-door survey. You will have to look for them on your own, but, most likely, with a personal visit to the archive. The number of the RVC report with the year indicated on the back of the personal card. After the appearance on the Internet of the website of the OBD "Memorial", it became possible to conduct an independent search for source documents.

3.2. Brief information about the archives

Most of the documents relating to the period of the Great Patriotic War are stored in the Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense (TsAMO). Below, the search for military personnel of the People's Commissariat of Defense (NPO) will be mainly described and, accordingly, references will be made to the TsAMO archive, since it is in it that the archives of the People's Commissariat of Defense (and then the Ministry of Defense) are stored from June 22, 1941 to the eighties. (Addresses of departmental archives on the site SOLDAT.ru.)

The card index of the dead and missing servicemen of the NPO during the years of the Great Patriotic War is stored in the Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense (TsAMO). Similar loss files are available in:

a) the Central Naval Archive in Gatchina - for the personnel of the fleet, coastal service and aviation of the Navy,

b) the Russian State Military Archive in Moscow - for persons who served in the bodies, formations and units of the NKVD,

c) the archive of the Federal Border Service of the FSB of the Russian Federation in the city of Pushkino, Moscow Region - for border guards.

In addition to the listed archives, the necessary documentation may be in the state regional archives and departmental archives.

Part of the information can be obtained on the OBD Memorial website

To obtain information about the fate of a serviceman, it is necessary to send a request to TsAMO (or to other archives indicated above), in which briefly indicate the known information about the serviceman. It is also recommended to include a postal envelope with a stamp and your home address in the envelope to expedite the response. (Postal address of TsAMO and a sample application on the site SOLDAT.ru.)

If a military rank serviceman is unknown or there is reason to believe that he could have been awarded an officer rank, then in the application to TsAMO you should write "Please check the personal file cabinets and file cabinets of losses of the 6th, 9th, 11th departments of TsAMO" (in departments 6, 9, 11, file cabinets, respectively, for political, private and sergeant, officer corps).

It is recommended to simultaneously send an application in the same letter with a request to "Clarify the awards" and indicate the surname, name, patronymic, year and place of birth of the serviceman. TsAMO has a card file of all awarded Red Army servicemen, and it may turn out that the serviceman you are looking for was awarded a medal or order. (The image of the "Account card of the awarded" and the application form on the SOLDIER.ru website.)

Due to the insufficient funding of the archive, the answer from it may come by mail in 6-12 months, therefore, if possible, it is better to visit the archive in person. (TsAMO address on SOLDAT.ru website.) You can also make a request at the military commissariat, in which case the request to the archive will be issued on the form of the military commissariat with the signature of the military commissar and the seal.

Since 2007, only citizens of the Russian Federation have been allowed to enter TsAMO - this is the instruction of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, which, apparently, has forgotten that natives of all the republics of the USSR fought and died in the war.

3.4. Received a response from TsAMO. Response Analysis

Thus, a letter from TsAMO (or the result of an independent search in the Memorial OBD) can contain 4 possible answers:

1) A report on the death of a serviceman indicating the number of the military unit, the date and place of death, rank and place of burial.

2) A report of a missing serviceman, indicating the number of the military unit, date and place of loss.

3) A report of a missing serviceman, compiled on the basis of a survey of relatives, with incomplete, unverified or inaccurate information.

4) Reporting the absence of information about the serviceman in the loss card file.

If you are lucky, and the answer from TsAMO contains the name of the military unit, then you can proceed to clarify the combat path of the serviceman (see below)

If you are VERY lucky, and in the card file of the awarded TsAMO there was a registration card for your relative, and an extract from it was sent to you in the archive response, then you should familiarize yourself with the award sheet in the same TsAMO, which contains short description feat or merit of the awarded. The description of work in TsAMO is given below, and the description of the search in the military registration and enlistment office can be skipped.

If, however, it was not possible to establish the number of the military unit in which your relative served, then you will have to continue the search in the military registration and enlistment office and in other departmental archives. More on this below.

4. Search for information on the place of conscription

4.1. Brief information about the organization of work in the RVC for the staffing of the Active Army

4.1.1. In order to correctly make a request to the district military registration and enlistment office (RVK), you should familiarize yourself with the organization of the work of the RVC on staffing the Active Army (DA).

4.1.2. RVC carried out the call and mobilization of citizens, as well as their distribution to duty stations.

Citizens drafted into the army (that is, those who had not previously served) could be sent

- to a reserve or training regiment or brigade stationed at that time near the place of conscription,

- to the military unit formed in the area.

Citizens mobilized from the reserve (i.e., already serving in the army) could be sent immediately to the front as part of marching companies or battalions.

4.1.3. Marching companies (battalions) were usually not sent directly to the combat unit, but first arrived at the army or front transit point(PP) or to an army or front-line reserve rifle regiment (or reserve rifle brigade).

4.1.4. Newly formed, reorganized or understaffed military units were sent to the front and participated in hostilities under their own numbers.

4.1.5. Reserve regiments and brigades accepted unprepared military contingents, carried out initial military training and sent military personnel to the front or to educational establishments. Sending to the front was usually carried out as part of marching companies or battalions. It is necessary to distinguish between permanent and variable composition of spare military units. The permanent staff included military personnel who ensured the functioning of the military unit: the headquarters of the regiment, management, commanders of battalions, companies and platoons, employees of the medical unit, a separate communications company, etc. The variable composition included military personnel enlisted in the spare part for military training. The period of stay in spare parts of variable composition ranged from several weeks to several months.

4.1.6. In the military enlistment office of conscription for each conscript (that is, for the first time called up and who had not previously served in the army), a "Conscription card" was drawn up. It contained information about the conscript, the results of a medical examination and information about the parents. On its reverse side, the penultimate paragraph contains the number of the draft team and the date the team was sent. (Image of the recruiting card on the SOLDIER website.en.)

4.1.7. A conscripted reserve is a person who has passed a valid military service in the Red Army and the RKVMF, and in the reserve of 1 or 2 categories. Upon arrival at the RVC at the place of residence from service (or for other reasons), a “Regular Service Card” was issued, in which there was no information about relatives, medical data was briefly given, the dates of issue of the mobilization order and the place of registration, the conditional number of the draft team were indicated , to which the person liable for military service was assigned when mobilization was announced. Also, information about the issuance of a military ID, place of work, position, home address was entered into the registration card. The second copy of the registration card was at the headquarters of the unit to which the citizen was assigned. (The image of the registration card of a person liable for military service on the SOLDIER website.en.)

Under the numbers of draft teams, the already existing personnel formations and their parts were specially encrypted, which, when mobilized, were supposed to deploy to the number of wartime states due to the call-up of military reserve assigned to them. Accordingly, lists of such recruiting teams may be preserved in the RVC, and in different RVC for the same personnel military unit, the number of the draft team was the same, because. the personnel military unit, where specific conscripts followed, is the same.

4.1.8. In addition to the above documents, each RVC kept the following journals:

- Alphabetical books drafted into the Soviet Army during the Great Patriotic War...,

- Alphabetical books for registering the dead...,

- Nominal lists of privates and sergeants, recorded as dead and missing ...

The above "Alphabetical books called up to the Soviet Army ..." were compiled on the basis of draft cards and registration cards of a person liable for military service, but they have a much smaller set of information compared to the original documents. In many military registration and enlistment offices, draft cards and registration cards were destroyed after the expiration of the storage period. In some military registration and enlistment offices these documents are still kept.

4.1.9. When sending a draft team, the military registration and enlistment office compiled a "Nominal list for the draft team." In addition to the nominal list of military personnel, it contains the number of the military unit (conditional - "military unit N 1234", or valid - "333 s.d.") and the address of this unit. (Image of the name list per team on the SOLDIER website.en.) In many military registration and enlistment offices, "Name lists ..." were destroyed after the expiration of the storage period. In some military registration and enlistment offices they are still kept.

4.2. Search for information in the military registration and enlistment office

4.2.1. If the answer from the archive does not indicate the number of the military unit or if there is no information about the serviceman in the archive, then you will have to continue the search at the military registration and enlistment office at the place of conscription. You can send an application to the military registration and enlistment office by mail or appear in person. The latter is, of course, preferable. If the exact address of the military enlistment office is unknown, then only the name of the city can be written on the envelope (without specifying the street and house), and in the column "To" write: "Rayvoenokat" - the letter will reach. The application must include all known information about the serviceman. (Sample application to the RVC and postal codes on the SOLDIER website.en.)

Since conscripts and mobilized were drawn up accounting documents with different names, and it is not always known whether the wanted person served in the army before the war, then in a statement to the RVC it ​​is recommended to ask for copies of both documents: the Conscription card and the Registration card of the person liable for military service.

4.2.2. If the response received from the RVC contains the conditional number of the military unit, then you need to determine the actual number. ("Directory of conditional names of military units (institutions) in 1939-1943" and "Directory of military units - field mails of the Red Army in 1943-1945" on the site SOLDAT.ru.)

4.2.3. It should be recalled that the archives of the military commissariats located in the temporarily occupied territories in the western regions and republics of the Soviet Union could be lost.

4.2.4. The search for information about the personnel and direction of marching companies and battalions is very difficult, because. in the process of moving to the front line, marching units could be redirected at transit points (PP) located along the route, or re-staffed in reserve rifle regiments and brigades of armies and fronts. The marching companies that arrived at the combat unit were sometimes, due to circumstances, immediately put into battle without being properly enrolled in the unit's staff.

4.3. Spare parts and military units of local formation

4.3.1. If it is not possible to find out at the recruiting office where the conscript was sent, then the search should be continued in the funds spare and training units stationed at that time near locality call. Usually they were sent to train previously non-serving recruits. Further search for information should be made in the documents of these parts. at TsAMO. (Handbook "Dislocation of spare and training units" on the SOLDIER.ru website.)

Irina Kobak "We will not stand up for the price" (The Great Patriotic War through the eyes of a corporal guard)"

The history of our country raises many questions for us. One of these questions is about the price of victory over fascism. We do not know everything about the Great Patriotic War and will never know, because the whole war is, in addition to its general structure, course and meaning, the fate of every person who survived (or did not survive) it. The history of each such life adds something to our knowledge of war.

In literature, we can find many examples of the heroism of Soviet soldiers and civilians, confirming that the war was popular, sacred, that the people fought courageously and deservedly won. It certainly is. But along with manifestations of selflessness and heroism of the people fighting the Nazis, there were also cowardice, betrayal, indifference, and cruelty ... War is an extreme situation in which character traits, both positive and negative, are unusually pronounced. At the same time, war is essentially mass murder. Can the moral level of the people as a whole be preserved under these conditions? Can a person remain a person, not cross the line beyond which immorality and betrayal begin? Not always and not everyone succeeded. In the story of Nikita Mikhailovich Gerngross - an interlocutor chosen virtually at random - I found vivid confirmation of this. However, it will not only be about lowering the moral standards of specific people. Some facts from the story of Nikita Mikhailovich suggest the inhumanity and immorality of the entire system and the system that called itself the best, and show how this manifested itself in the extreme conditions of the war.

Acquaintance with N.M. Gerngross
His military fate cannot be called typical, but before the war it was similar to the fate of hundreds of thousands of teenagers who were united by one thing: their parents were repressed. Thus, his biography from the point of view of the “competent authorities” turned out to be “stained” from adolescence. Ultimately, it was this fact that played a huge, if not decisive, role in the military fate of Nikita Mikhailovich and, perhaps, paradoxically, saved his life. However, this will be seen from his story:

“For each participant, the war had its own face, which in no case, probably, was the same. Therefore, each memory is a grain that complements a large common monument. It should also be remembered that the outlook of an ordinary soldier is rather narrow, he does not know much and therefore is not able to build a coherent picture of events. In addition, an ordinary soldier could be a witness to such facts that, until recently, could not be mentioned in any literature. During the war, I kept a "soldier's diary", but the front-line situation left no opportunity detailed description events, so the diary gradually took the form of a brief enumeration of events ".

Nikita Mikhailovich Gerngross was born in May 1924 in Leningrad. He was a teenage schoolboy when, in early December 1937, his father, Mikhail Fedorovich Gerngross, who worked as an economist at the Krasnaya Zarya plant, was arrested, and he and his mother, Valentina Nikolaevna, were deported to the Orenburg region, to the district center Kashirin, which was soon renamed in Oktyabrsk. In 1941 he graduated from high school with honors, June 14 was a graduation party ...

Back to Memoirs:

“Life went on as usual. In June 1941, I graduated from the 10th grade with an excellent student's certificate. On June 14th was the graduation party, on the 22nd the war began, on June 28th my mother was arrested. She was taken from work. Childhood is over."

Work on a collective farm
Nikita Mikhailovich had a “white ticket” - exemption from military service - due to severe myopia, therefore, unlike most classmates who received summons in the first days of the war, he was not subject to conscription into the active army.

Here is what Nikita Mikhailovich himself told about his life at the beginning of the war:

“When my mother was arrested, I, a city boy, was somewhat confused, because I did not work anywhere and was not adapted to anything. Meanwhile, the district authorities announced the recruitment of high school students and graduates for the harvest of the forty-first year, and the harvest was very large. I also joined in this and went to the Novy Sargul collective farm. Such a small collective farm, fifteen yards. I worked there for a month. And when they found out about my uncertain position, they offered me to stay and work there. I returned to Oktyabrsk, settled my affairs, namely: I sold the dugout, I sold the goat ... In general, I bought the necessary clothes with the proceeds and moved to the collective farm. The work there was real: in the spring I had to plow, harrow, sow - it was work on two horses; in the summer they mowed wheat with a reaper - “bobograyka” - the most difficult of field work, in the fall they transported grain, and all winter I went for hay or straw for livestock feed.

The reason why the urban, initially inept young man was offered to stay on the collective farm is clear: the lack of men.

The war was somewhere far away, information about what was happening at the front was scarce and contradictory. Collective farmers learned about the course of hostilities mainly from the lips of soldiers returning after being wounded.

Nikita Mikhailovich worked on the collective farm for quite a long time - until March 1943.

Fit for non-combatant
Nikita Mikhailovich continues his story.

“... Apparently, the country is already running out of people. And on March 3, 1943, I received a summons. They brought us to Orenburg, Chkalov was then called. The whole team of recruits was kept in a grove beyond the Urals, where there were such summer houses. Type of pavilions for entertainment, something like that, summer. And it was March, and, in general, it was still not hot ... We lived there for a little over a month, and we built a dam there to protect the railway bridge across the Urals. The work was decent: to carry stones, stretchers with earth, logs, sleepers. We all had our own, as they used to say, "sidors". “Sidor” is a bag with a supply of food. These reserves gradually ran out, which, in general, we have already begun to feel. At this time, we were all gathered together, loaded into a train and sent. This echelon is what I remember. We were not well fed there. We were given a loaf of bread for two days, well, there was a little sugar, a piece of herring. We ate the loaf, of course, on the same day, well, young, gluttonous ... And then - the teeth on the shelf. And that's what we did. It was the end of April, spring was raging all around and vegetable gardens were being planted. The train stops at the station, we jump out and, five or six people run to the nearest houses to hire themselves to dig a garden. We run up to some owner: “Come on, we undertake to dig up a garden, and you give us two buckets of potatoes.” We dig and look at the echelon: is it leaving or not leaving? Because if he leaves, then we may turn out to be deserters and get the full extent of the tribunal. It was crazy work. I don't remember ever working like this. Sometimes we managed to get a couple of buckets and happily run to our car, bake potatoes or boil them. But there were times when I had to drop everything halfway through and run to the echelon, which began to move. They brought us to the Oryol region, to the Russkiy Brod station. It was the end of April - the beginning of May ... "

Here he received "baptism of fire". Here is how Nikita Mikhailovich describes the first bombing in his Memoirs:

“Finally, the echelon stopped at the semaphore of the Russky Brod station, in the Oryol region, and almost immediately it was heard: “Air!” The people began to scatter in different directions when explosions and machine-gun bursts thundered at the station. The Germans bombed the station. Our echelon passed this fate, but when we arrived at the station, the picture for the recruit seemed terrible. The trip was over, we continued on foot. We walked all day and all night, making stops for five minutes every hour. In the morning we reached the place, many fell on the grass and immediately fell asleep ... By 12 o'clock we reached our destination - the village of Mokhovoe. It was, of course, very difficult to walk, especially at night, we fell asleep on the go, stumbled over the one walking in front ... Well, these are details, trifles. All were subjected to the hardships of the war...

And there we were divided into platoons, we received a tool - for each simple and shovel shovels - and set off to dig trenches. They didn’t give us uniforms, except for boots with wooden soles (to better dig) ... "

On the Oryol-Kursk Bulge
It so happened that the recruit Nikita Gerngross from the deep rear got to the Oryol-Kursk Bulge, formed during the winter-spring offensive of the Red Army, to the area where it was planned to organize an offensive and, having developed success, complete a radical change in the course of the war.

Nikita Mikhailovich says:

“The norm was ferocious: six meters of a trench, a depth of seventy meters, at the bottom - seventy, at the top - ninety. All this volume of land had to be taken out, planned, made a parapet and disguised with turf. It was a difficult job, only a few coped, mainly those who got out of prison and worked on earthworks. Thus, we prepared the second and third echelons of defense on the Oryol-Kursk salient. I must say that this spare defense belt of ours was not useful. Hitler went on the offensive on July 5 and advanced for ... I don’t know, whether twelve, or more, but he didn’t reach our line. And on July 12, ours had already gone on the offensive and left these lines far behind.

We were then threatened: if you don’t fulfill the norm, you won’t get dinner. I really don't know of anyone not getting supper. I personally didn't follow through. But the platoon commander saw that I was so urban, frail, but I tried, so he did not deprive me. But there was one man from Western Ukraine. In general, in this construction brigade, the people were like this: from Western Ukraine, from Western Belarus, from prison, like me, children of “enemies of the people” - this was such a “rabble”. So, there one man flatly refused to work. Absolutely. He was of medium height, strong, dense, with a black beard. I don’t know, they fed him, didn’t feed him, planted him somewhere, didn’t plant him, but he never took a shovel. It showed how we are treated in Western Ukraine and Western Belarus.”

Military transit points
Nikita Mikhailovich continues his story:

“So, we dug trenches all June, prepared a reserve line of defense before Hitler's attack. Yes, I must say, the feeding was disgusting, there was a “second ration”. The second ration is 600 grams of crackers, or something, for two days, I don’t remember. Well, welding was there, but very, very poor. And the work was, as you can see, exhausting. Some began to swell, went to ask for help from the population, but the locals lived in poverty and were unable to help us. I also swelled up, looked for some kind of grass, ate it ... It ended up that I had a trophic ulcer on my leg, I could not dig, then the bleeding began. I was sent to the medical battalion.

So, they sent me to a field hospital in Dubki. I was on the table, the doctor looked, my leg was in plaster ... And I ended up in a hospital, where everyone was slightly injured: with a leg, with an arm, some with crutches, but not seriously injured. In mid-July, together with a group of lightly wounded, I was sent by car to the city of Yelets to an evacuation hospital, then in an ambulance train to Ryazan and further to Kazan. He lay in Kazan for three months, and then in mid-October came interesting point. You have to sign out, go to the commission. And the commission looks like: “Hands and legs are intact? Well, go ahead!” Walked. “Well, wave your hands! Bend your hand! Fit for combat.” And I have myopia, I have a “white ticket”! It was until I passed it, when they took me to the army. And they wrote to me: “Fit for combat.” I almost became a guardsman right away ...

After that, I ended up at a military transit point in Gorky. They looked - oh, ten classes! There weren't many, by the way. All my classmates in the tenth grade were taken literally in the first days. They sent me to the 62nd separate reserve radio regiment, in Gorky. The radio regiment trained radio operators of various specialties. And I was sent to a company that trained radio operators for front-line and army-scale radio stations. The radio station was called so - RAF (radio station army and front). I studied there with pleasure, I lived normally, as in a reserve regiment ... I studied there almost until March 1944 and was going, like everyone else, to take an exam for a radio operator of the 3rd class. And suddenly the political officer calls me. Well, first questions, they say, who by nationality and where did they live ... And then the question was asked: “Where are the parents?” I was a boy, so honest, and I answered: "Father is sitting, mother is sitting." A couple of days later I was kicked out of there. It was the end of February."

After the exam, novice radio operators received a referral to serve in army headquarters. Information transmitted and received by radio operators, as a rule, secret and top secret, amounted to military secret, so it is not surprising that a special department carefully checked all the graduates of this radio regiment. A man with a German-sounding surname, and even with repressed parents, could not but arouse suspicion.

“And I again ended up at the same military transit point in Gorky. The surname is noticeable: not Ivanov, not Petrov - memorable, Gerngross, there were no others like that. They took a look and decided to send me to an iron foundry near Murom.

It can be assumed that officials from the WFP, sending Nikita Mikhailovich to the iron foundry, decided to play it safe. If SMERSH counterintelligence decided that this person should not be used in work related to information containing military secrets, then the safest thing is to send him to work that is guaranteed not to be associated with any secrets - this was probably the train of thought of these officials.

“I arrived at the plant in mid-March, settled in a hostel, and began working as a slinger. The plant produced such healthy items as sleepers, cast iron ingots, they had to be loaded onto platforms, unloaded, moved. I worked with a crane. The crane had pincers, I put these pincers on a blank, lifted it, carried it, set it. But I did not work for long, about a month. One night, on the night shift (and we worked twelve hours, then we rested for twelve hours), a blank fell on my leg, though not directly, there was no fracture, but the bruise was severe, and I lay in the hospital for several days. And then the thought began to torment me: rather than get a disability or something else at this unfortunate factory, it would be better to be killed or wounded at the front. When it was necessary to register - for the military, by the way, registration, I was still listed as liable for military service - I came to the military commissar, I said that I wanted to join the army. He was so happy (people are required from him, there are no people) and says: “Oh, come on! Where do you want: in the infantry, in the artillery, in the tank unit?” I say: "Wherever you want." And I came for the third time to the military transit point in Gorky. Imagine how these officials were scratching their turnips, what to do with me now! What they came up with was completely unpredictable. They sent me to the Czechoslovak army. It was in April 1944."

I first heard about the existence of the Czechoslovak army on the territory of the USSR from Nikita Mikhailovich. This fact is interesting if only because in Russia it was not the first Czechoslovak army. The First Army (more precisely, the Czechoslovak Corps) was created back in the days of civil war. This second army was created in 1943 on the initiative and under the command of Ludwig Svoboda.

Probably the third appearance of the conscripted Gerngross on this runway in half a year led the officials to despair and forced them to make a completely ridiculous decision regarding the “unreliable son of an enemy of the people.”

“So, as part of a team of three Czechs, real Czechs, speaking Czech, I rode, the fourth, a Russian soldier. We went to Buzuluk, where the headquarters of the Czechoslovak army was located. There were no fools at the headquarters. They ask: "Are you Czech?" - "Not". – “Is your father a Czech citizen?” - "Not". – “Mother is a Czech citizen?” - "Not". “So why the hell did they send you to us?” And they sent me to a Russian military transit point, but not to Gorky, I didn’t get there, thank God, but ended up in Tula. Tula twisted and twisted and eventually assigned me to the 42nd separate training tank regiment of self-propelled artillery, which was stationed near Moscow (Kosterevo station). Crews were trained in the regiment self-propelled units SU-76".

Commencement of military service
“I arrived there around May 1944. You see, I've been hanging around to no avail for a year now. I arrived there, began to study, and they began to teach me to be a gunner. With my eyesight. No one knows this, and no one cares. And these SU-76 self-propelled guns, with a 76-mm cannon, were popularly called - "Farewell, Motherland!", And another name - "Thunderstorm to Hitler, death to the crew." So they were called because thin armor, the top of the tower was covered with a tarpaulin, runs on gasoline. Imagine, a driver is sitting, on the left is a gasoline engine, on the right is a tank of gasoline. They burned like candles, even when hit by a small-caliber projectile. So, I studied there until August ... Practice shooting began. It's funny to think: I am a gunner, I go to a firing position, the instructor says: "Look for a target, shoot." I'm looking, looking, I can't see a damn thing. And there is a time limit! He lost his patience, pushed me away and said: "Wait, I'm on my own." I shot myself. Now I think: what would I be like if I was still released as a gunner, with my eyesight? This is certain death for the entire crew.

The commander of the regiment has changed, a new one has appeared. In his "throne" speech, he said: "I will bring the regiment to the front, I will drive out all drunkards, truants and other suspicious personalities." As a result, they began to pass the entire composition of the regiment through a special department. Ivanov arrives. They ask him: “Was he under occupation?” - "Was not". “Was he in captivity?” - "Was not". - "Was he in prison?" - "I did not sit." - "Go." Gerngross arrives. Well, as it comes to the parents, so everything.

It was not the first time that Nikita Mikhailovich had to answer questions about his parents to representatives of the special department, and such conversations never bode well (remember how his studies as a radio operator ended). It would seem that the war equalizes everyone, everyone is united by one goal - victory. However, from the story of Nikita Mikhailovich, we see that it is not the first (looking ahead, one might say - and not the last) time that he is recognized as a “second-class” person, not trustworthy, not very reliable.

A lot has already been said about the moral level of the repressive system created by Stalin, and I will not repeat myself. I will only note how this level manifested itself in the conditions of war: a person is humiliated with distrust only because he has a German surname (although he, like his parents, lived all his life in the Soviet Union) and his parents were repressed (it does not matter that when his father was arrested , he was not yet fifteen years old).

“I and several other people from this regiment were sent to Vladimir, no one knew why, they said that they were in a marching company. It was the end of July. Finally, in early August 1944, I found my final home: the 354th Guards Heavy Self-Propelled Artillery Regiment of the High Command Reserve. Since that time, I began to fight for real. But that was already 1944. Can you imagine? For a year and a half I was shaken by these officials. Thanks to them for saving my life, maybe.

So, in this regiment there were heavy 122-mm self-propelled guns, with thick, good armor, the Germans were very afraid of them. And I was assigned there to a company of submachine gunners. I went there with a team of ten people. We came, and the commander was away there. We are told: “Wait, there is no one to write you down in the book, we have just come from near Minsk, we have killed a clerk of a company of submachine gunners.” We waited and waited, then I say: “Let me write it down.” I took a book, wrote down everyone as it should. And then the company commander appeared, looked and said: “You will be a clerk in my company.”

I began to submit drill notes, study plans - in general, paper work. At the headquarters of the regiment they saw that I was neat, the handwriting was good, and they took me to the headquarters of the regiment, for operational work. What was this work? It was necessary to glue topographic maps in the direction of our proposed offensive for each battery commander. And in the regiment - twenty-one self-propelled guns: four batteries of five self-propelled guns and one command battery, which means that all the battalion commanders had to be provided with maps, plus the chief of staff and regiment commander. So I glued these cards. Then the duty was as follows: when the regiment moves, in a new place I have to make a clipping from the map, copy and send the deployment of the regiment to the headquarters of the corps. We were subordinate to the 1st Tank Guards Corps, this was our command. I quickly learned to type. Well, all sorts of soldierly affairs, of course, and above all, dig trenches in a new place ...

We were standing in Latvia (Radziviliski), suddenly an order: “Urgent!” We were alerted. We were then preparing an offensive in Latvia, everything was quiet, camouflage, no cigarettes, no fire, nothing, no movement. But the Germans got wind of it. And about twenty kilometers from our place of deployment, they went on the offensive. The fighting went on for two days. Our regiment knocked out thirteen tanks, and the Germans calmed down, we repulsed the attack. But they still knew that we were going to attack.”

The story of Nikita Mikhailovich is the point of view of an ordinary person who knows only what is happening next to him. And here is how Marshal A.M. Vasilevsky: “On the 18th, I reported to Headquarters: “On the front of the 6th Guards Army of Chistyakov southwest of Dobele, the enemy launched an offensive in the east direction on the morning of September 17 with the forces of the 5th, 4th tank divisions and a motorized division” Greater Germany." In total, about 200 tanks and self-propelled guns took part in the battle. Before we approached the area of ​​operations with the necessary tank and anti-tank weapons, the enemy managed to penetrate our defenses from 4 to 5 km. Further advance of the enemy is suspended. During the day of the battle, up to 60 tanks and self-propelled guns of the enemy were knocked out and burned ... From 10.00 on September 18, the enemy resumed the offensive. Until 13.00 all his attacks were repulsed.. The German attack near Dobele was repulsed. The war continued...

Self-propelled
“Then it was already going according to the plan that ours had learned from the Germans: the concentration of forces on the sly, the strongest artillery preparation, the infantry breaks through the defense sector - 3, 5, 7 kilometers wide - and immediately into this sector an avalanche of tanks, tanks, tanks, self-propelled guns, motorized infantry ... Just like the Germans fought with us in the beginning. The Germans, of course, ran great, because they were terribly afraid of encirclement, and as soon as we went a little to the rear, they immediately fled.

At the end of January 1945 there was a change in my fate. The fact is that once a representative of a special department from the corps comes to the headquarters of the regiment, comes to the headquarters. He asks: “And what kind of soldier is this?” - "Yes, they took on operational work." - "Well, let him help, just let him write an autobiography and fill out a questionnaire."

What were the profiles then, you know. I wrote, filled out and two days later the order: for self-propelled guns! And a self-propelled gun, it is supposed to have a squad of submachine gunners, five people (actually there were three, no more). And these five people should be literally chained to the self-propelled gun, not a step away from it. She goes on the attack - we ride on the armor behind the tower. She stopped - we are on the ground. And guard her day and night, prevent her from being bombarded with grenades or set on fire with a faustpatron. From that moment on, I began to fight for real, not at headquarters.

I kept a diary until I was put on a self-propelled gun. There were no more diaries. All this was preserved in the memory as night marches, fires, shelling, bombing. I remember how we advanced: when you enter the city - there are no Germans, the electricity is on, the houses are open, there is a warm dinner on the tables, take what you want ... Ours, of course, took trophies, whoever could. What will the soldier take? He has a duffel bag over his shoulders and nothing else. Tankers were strictly forbidden to take any trophies on self-propelled guns. Therefore, they basically did what they did: they took a box of cognac and a box of canned food and tied it behind - these are their trophies. Everyone was allowed to send parcels home, with trophies, eight kilograms a month. Here who knew how. Someone does not send, so the officers ask him to send from themselves, that is, they could send two or three parcels. Who was near the car (for example, we had a company technical support), they could accumulate as much as they wanted in their car.”

In general, trophies are an integral element of any war, but it should be remembered that there are both military (banners, weapons, etc.) and non-combat trophies, which include the property of the civilian population. Taking non-combat trophies involves robbery to one degree or another. The moral level of Soviet soldiers can also be judged by how shamelessly they devastated houses in captured cities. East Prussia. From the story of Nikita Mikhailovich it is clear that, unfortunately, not everyone was able to resist and not cross the line beyond which real barbarism begins. An example from "Memoirs" by Nikita Mikhailovich:

“Not far from us, behind the station, stood an abandoned landowner's house, which our guys discovered. Immediately there was organized a campaign for mirrors, mattresses, folders for papers and similar rubbish. I also took part in the campaign, found several English magazines there and witnessed an ugly incident. There was a piano in the hall, and one of the junior officers sat down at the piano and began to beat the keys with his feet. I was struck by the manifestation of such savagery.

It can be objected: the Germans in the occupied territories of the USSR did such atrocities that the behavior of our soldiers looks like an act of just revenge, but I cannot agree with this. Revenge is not a creative, but a destructive and, therefore, immoral feeling. And it is very sad that our soldiers behaved like invaders, and not like liberators in relation to civilian population East Prussia.

However, Nikita Mikhailovich continues the story:

“And I was looking for boots to get rid of the windings, which the soldiers called “boots - forty times around the leg.” But the damned German boots did not climb in the rise. I tried ten couples - none of them climbed. The guys also said that they had some kind of stupid rise - very narrow. Well, it's all the little things...

As part of the 43rd Army, we liberated Tilsit, received the name "Tilsit regiment" ...

Then we fought in East Prussia.”

Assault on Koenigsberg
For participation in the assault on Koenigsberg, Nikita Mikhailovich was awarded the medal "For the Capture of Koenigsberg."

Details about the preparations for this assault are written in "Memoirs":

“But then April 1945 came, and we received an order to take up our original positions. When we were driving to the indicated place, I was struck by a huge amount of fire equipment. Almost every ten meters there were either guns, or mortars, or rockets, a little to the side - "Katyushas". The assault was about to begin.

I have one such vivid memory: I stood before the assault on the clock at some warehouse. Lilacs are all around, nightingales sing... I stood and thought: will I survive after this assault or not. We were pretty scared, that is, we were told that there were impregnable forts, ditches with water, that nothing trophy could be taken there - everything could be poisoned. Maybe it was so, but I only know that on the eve of the assault, a company of penitentiaries went into battle and a few hours later the Soviet flag was hoisted on the fort. Penalty, you know, they have no way out. And then, it means that we stormed them. That is, how they stormed: self-propelled guns fired, and we sat nearby and guarded them. It didn’t come to hand-to-hand combat, of course. But we were exposed to shelling in the first place, because the favorite target of shelling was tanks and self-propelled guns ... I remember how Koenigsberg burned, especially burned. And here's why: our people come to the house - and the assault was on April 6, and it was still cool - they lay a fire on the floor, warm themselves, cook food and leave, the fire remains. The house caught fire.

At the beginning of the assault, there was one case that was enough for me ... shocking, or something. A new commander of a platoon of submachine gunners came, a boy from junior lieutenant courses. The first time I got to the front after the courses, I was quite young. And we somehow walked with him, checked the houses next to the self-propelled gun. And now we enter one house, a figure stands up, raises his hands: “I am a Pole, a Pole!” And he is in German uniform. The lieutenant says: "What kind of Pole are you, let's go!" He took him to the rear and shot him. So easy, no way. It seems to me that this boy wanted to see how it is to kill people. There was no need, and he had no right to shoot like that. Because he had to take him to the headquarters of the regiment, they will sort it out there. What could I say? He is a commander, I am a soldier, I am silent ... "

This episode, narrated by Nikita Mikhailovich, shocked me too. It has two aspects: legal and moral. The first one is clear. The junior lieutenant violated the decision of the Council of People's Commissars of July 1, 1941, which prohibited the "cruel treatment of prisoners of war." The prisoners were supposed to keep their personal belongings - from uniforms to orders and medals; provide all the wounded and sick with the necessary medical assistance; provide prisoners of war with food and other supplies in accordance with generally accepted standards. From my point of view, no less important is the second aspect, which determines the price of victory in one small episode of a big war. It would seem: what does the death of one German mean in a war in which millions and tens of millions of lives were counted? It's not about the German, but about the young junior lieutenant. What moral shift had to take place in his mind, so that he would kill an unarmed enemy in battle, performing military duty, not a bandit in self-defense, killed in a state of passion, struck by the death of friends or relatives before his eyes (then it could be called lynching ). He killed "just like that", violating the order that the prisoners should be delivered to the headquarters. In peacetime, he most likely would not have taken the life of a person even unpleasant to him, would not have crossed the line that he crossed with such ease in the war. Perhaps he was guided by the common expression "the war will write off everything", perhaps he was afraid that the war would end soon and he would not have time to personally destroy a single fascist. But be that as it may, his act is immoral.

"We have no prisoners..."
“After that, we went to the Samland Peninsula, which was still in the hands of the Germans. This is north of Koenigsberg. And here, too, there was one case that shocked everyone. We were driving along some highway. A column of captured Germans is coming towards them. They were brought closer - it turns out, Uzbeks in German uniforms. Ours were ready to tear them apart, but the convoy would not let them in. Can you imagine what it is? Bastards, sorry for the expression.

You can not talk about the moral character of traitors, traitors. At all times they were despised. However, one cannot judge all the captured fighters by those who began to cooperate with the Nazis. The problem of prisoners had another side. Here is how Nikita Mikhailovich says about it:

“Those who were in captivity, who were liberated by our own, then went to the camps as traitors. As they began to say, "we have no prisoners, we have only traitors." I don’t know what word to call this meanness for the people, for the people. The man fought, endured so many hardships, was, perhaps, wounded, and then ... "

Of course, people of different nationalities fell into captivity, but at the same time, feats were performed by people of different nationalities. However, in the most difficult period of the war, fearing treason and going over to the side of the Nazis, Stalin carried out the deportation of individual peoples: in August 1941, 950 thousand Germans were deported (among them 500 thousand Volga Germans), thereby, as it were, he branded an entire people as potential traitors; as the Caucasus was liberated in October 1943 - March 1944, about 700 thousand inhabitants were deported North Caucasus. The consequences of this Stalinist "national policy" affect the life of our country to this day. It is in the North Caucasus that the most “hot spots” of our current life ...

Stalin's decision to deport entire peoples naturally aroused in these peoples a feeling of anger, a thirst for revenge, which in its essence is not a moral feeling.

“And they fought excellently, especially Ukrainians, Tatars, Georgians, Armenians. For example, when we drove the Germans out of Lithuania, they filed for the commander of the self-propelled gun, an Armenian, award documents for conferring the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, but a few days later, on a night march, his self-propelled gun overturned and there were victims. They immediately sent a retreat. Well, everything happened in the war ... "

Victory!

O last days Nikita Mikhailovich recalls the war like this:

“Advancing along the Zemland Peninsula, we came to a spit cutting off the Curonian Lagoon, at the end of which was the German naval base Pillau ... The spit was covered with a pine forest, from which only split stumps and fallen trees remained. The fact is that the Germans evacuated their troops to Germany through the port of Pillau, and all the units that were waiting to be sent fired continuously at the spit. In addition, mutually perpendicular clearings were made on the spit, which greatly interfered with tanks and self-propelled guns. As soon as the self-propelled gun leaned out at the intersection of the clearings, it immediately received a blank or a charge of a Faustpatron on board. On top of that, German ships from the sea also fired on the spit. As a result, only one self-propelled gun remained in our regiment when the order came to withdraw from the battle. The self-propelled gun, on which I was also riding, went to the rear and carried on the armor of the gunner of one of our self-propelled guns, burned by the Germans. The gunner named Lopatchenko was terribly burned, but we all hoped and passionately wished that he would remain alive.

After leaving the battle, the regiment without combat vehicles was withdrawn to the rear and placed in the city of Gumbinnen. The service went on without much difficulty, when suddenly one night we were awakened by intensified shooting. We jumped up, thinking that some German unit coming out of our rear came across us, but when we went out into the street, we saw that the entire horizon was sparkling with multi-colored rockets, and people were shouting “Victory!”, dancing and rejoicing. We dragged a box of rockets and a rocket launcher out into the street and took part in the general rejoicing.

The Great Patriotic War is one of the most tragic periods in the history of our country. For some, this is already a distant history, but for people who survived the war, it is the border between life “before” and “after”. The people who survived it, especially those who fought, kept in their memory the years of the most difficult trials for the rest of their lives. The story of Nikita Mikhailovich Gerngross made me think about what I previously knew only abstractly, without connecting it with specific people. From those who fought at the front, from ordinary people with their advantages and disadvantages, the war required the maximum exertion of all forces, physical and mental. Victory, so necessary for everyone Soviet people, the country, the whole world, was given at a very high price. The war did not write off anything. She left terrible wounds on the bodies and souls of people ... But two sides always participate in a war, and she is ruthless towards both: both the aggressors and the liberators. War exposes people to a severe test, with all its weight falls on the moral prohibitions that are in each of the people. It devalues ​​human life and sometimes makes people be unreasonably cruel. It makes people do things they shouldn't be proud of. This is the immorality and immorality of war.

In addition, the state itself turned out to be ruthless in relation to its citizens, expanding the categories of people subjected to repression during the war.

I want to finish with the words of Nikita Mikhailovich Gerngross:

“It was a holy war, you can’t say anything. It is terrible to think what would have happened if Hitler had won. We defeated fascism, but not with “little blood, a mighty blow”, as the song sang ... "

Employees of our information retrieval center are conducting consulting work to search for places of death of missing soldiers. In addition, we have accumulated a database of more than 3.5 million servicemen who died,

missing and died from wounds during the Great Patriotic War

Information and search center "Fatherland" is not a subdivision of any

a state institution that, on duty, performs work to perpetuate the memory of the fallen, store archival

funds and search for information about the dead. We carry out our work on a voluntary basis.

Start your search by interviewing all living relatives. Remember that every little thing

or the most unexpected family legend may turn out to be the key to discoveries, or at least indicate the direction of the search.

Very important information is often found on the backs of military photographs and letters, such as their postmarks,

from there you need to write out the date of sending the letter and the field mail number.

If you have not found your relative in our database, in Generalized Data Bank "Memorial" of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation(Pay attention to the tab "Additional search in the list of military transit points" on the website www.obd-memorial.ru - it is conducted separately) and Publicly accessible electronic bank of documents "Feat of the people" of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation or the information found did not answer your questions, we advise you to make inquiries to the following authorities:

at the address: 142100, Moscow region, Podolsk, st. Kirova, 74 (stores documents of the Armed Forces from 1941 to the present.).

The answer will be received faster if you leave a request at the TsAMO reception (this can be done by a relative of the wanted person or an authorized representative of a relative).

2) To the Military Commissariat at the place of conscription, with a request to indicate, in addition to other information about the fate

wanted and the number of the military unit to which he was sent on conscription and from where the notice of death or missing was received.

3) Information about those who did not return from the war can also be in the Books of Memory of the regions at the place of his birth,

residence, conscription and death, sometimes in several at the same time. Therefore, it is worth trying to study all the necessary books, send

requests to the editors of the Books of Memory of these regions. Books of Memory of all regions of the former USSR are stored in the Museum of the Great Patriotic War

on Poklonnaya Hill in Moscow, where there is also a computer database. Books of Memory of many regions of the Russian Federation are exhibited in the Generalized Data Bank "Memorial" of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation.

4) Try to contact the Department of the Pension Fund of the Russian Federation at the place where the family members of the deceased received pensions, in the archive of which a notice may be stored on the basis of which the pension was paid to the family, it may contain information about the number of the military unit and even about the place of death.

5) Information about injuries can be obtained from

at the address: 191180 St. Petersburg, Lazaretny per., 2 (you should write there even if you are not sure if the wanted person had any injuries).

6) Information about the fate of the military units of the Navy, including coastal defense

can be obtained from the Central Naval Archive of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation (TsVMA of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation), at the address: 188350, Leningrad Region, Gatchina,

Krasnoarmeisky per., 2.

7) Information about the fate of the military units of the border troops can be obtained

in the Central Archive of the Federal Border Service of the Russian Federation (CA FPS RF), at the address: 143413, Moscow Region, Pushkino,

as well as in the Russian State Military Archive (RGVA),

8) Information about the fate of the NKVD servicemen can be obtained from the Russian State Military Archive (RGVA),

at the address: 125212, Moscow, Admiral Makarov st., 29.

9) Information about the fate of servicemen who went missing during the period of hostilities near the Khalkhin-Gol River in Mongolia,

as well as during the Soviet-Finnish war of 1939-1940. can be obtained from the Russian State Military Archive (RGVA),

at the address: 125212, Moscow, Admiral Makarov st., 29.

10) For confirmation of the assumptions that the serviceman you are looking for could have been captured,

According to the ELAR corporation, which is engaged in the technical implementation of this nationwide project, 15 million records about the places of death (departure) and primary burials of the defenders of the Fatherland have become available on the portal - with linking such places to modern maps of the area. Over the past year, more than 3 million additional entries were made from digitized documents of military transit points and military commissariats. In addition, more than 250,000 documents (of war and post-war times) clarifying losses have been transferred to a publicly accessible electronic form.

In total, by this day, the portal has collected and opened information about the places of primary burials of more than 5 million soldiers and officers who died in battle or died of wounds and diseases in hospitals and medical battalions, - Maxim Bayuk from the ELAR project department gave clarification to RG. - Relatives and friends, having learned the address of the primary burial and finding this place on historical and modern maps, will be able to expand their understanding of combat way father, grandfather or great-grandfather...

Throughout the past year, work with award documents did not stop. Introduced 6 million new records of medals for the defense, capture and liberation of cities and territories. Taking into account the information previously entered into the electronic database of award documents, 12.5 million records have been supplemented with the place and date of the feat.

In addition to the united Internet portal "Memory of the People", information about the dead and data on awards are available, as before, on the portals of the OBD "Memorial" and "Feat of the People", respectively.

According to the Deputy Minister of Defense of Russia, Army General Dmitry Bulgakov, the combination of these two resources within a single Internet portal, combined with advanced IT technologies, makes it possible for users to search for information from consolidated sources using intellectual system search. On the "Memory of the People" portal, it automatically displays a selection of data on one or another participant in the war, including information about awards, exploits, the place of death or burial. In most of these cases, users can also see the combat path of a war participant. Place of conscription, participation in military operations, deployment of military transit points and military units marked on a modern map, correlated with wartime maps.

The developers of the resource recreated the structure of the Red Army on a particular date and published more than 425 thousand documents of armies and fronts on 216 military operations. More than 100,000 digitized maps of military operations are already in the public domain. And one more useful innovation: users can save the found information in the "Personal Archive" and access it from any electronic devices.

Inviting readers of "RG" to independent work with digital databases of archival documents, we want to give one practical advice. If the last name, first name, patronymic of the wanted person can allow (suggest) discrepancies in letters or their combination, try entering different options - just do it sequentially, changing one thing, in one place. Start with a last name, for example: Pashentsev - Pashintsev - Pashentsov - Pashintsov - Pashentsev, etc. Name, examples: Eustache - Estafiy - Efstafiy; Gabriel - Gabriel - Gabriel - Gabriel. Middle name: Nikitich - Nikitovich; Methodievich - Methodievich - Methodievich - Methodich - Mifodievich - Mifodievich - Mifodievich - Mifodich.

Go ahead and remember: success does not come "with the first click."