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  SOVIET WOMEN-EQUAL BUILDERS OF THE SOCIALIST SOCIETY

Women in the Land of Socialism
N. Popova
 

V. In Defence of the Country
Soviet women distinguished themselves by the great fortitude and grandeur of spirit they displayed in the Great Patriotic War, in which they defended the freedom and equality, the happy motherhood and opportunities for creative work they had gained as the result of the victory of Socialism in our country. The high moral standard of our women, infused by the Soviet system and the Communist Party, revealed itself to the full during the late war.

Women replaced men who had gone to the front, became skilled in the most difficult trades, and by their strenuous efforts helped to win the war. Nor did they neglect their children. They took proper care of them and brought them up, staunchly enduring the wartime privations.

Soviet women fought heroically by the side of men in the ranks of the Soviet Army and in partisan detachments. The whole world was impressed by the matchless morale of the Soviet women, their stainless probity, their readiness to give up all, even life itself, for that which was dearer to them than life – for their country and for their people. Soviet women combine majestic simplicity, warm-heartedness, and the indefatigability of worker and mother with, when necessary, the wrath of the valiant soldier.

Joseph Stalin’s appeal to the Soviet people to rise in defence of the honour, the freedom and the independence of our country inspired all Soviet people to perform deeds of valour in battle and in labour. In his historic radio address on July 3, 1941, Stalin, speaking to all the Soviet people, whom he addressed as brothers and sisters, pointed out that the issue was one “of life and death for the Soviet State, of life and death for the peoples of the U.S.S.R., of whether the peoples of the Soviet Union shall be free or fall into slavery.” The beloved leader, friend and father of the Soviet people urged them to reorganize all work immediately on a war footing, to subordinate everything to the interests of the front and to the task of organizing the defeat of the enemy.

Stalin exhorted the Soviet people working in the rear to organize all-round assistance to the Red Army, to ensure the supply of everything the defenders of the country required – food, more rifles, machine guns, guns, cartridges, shells and aircraft.

The great Party of Lenin and Stalin roused the Soviet people to the defence of the country, mustered all their inexhaustible forces, directed them towards the one aim, and thus ensured victory over the strong and treacherous enemy.

Stalin’s appeal sank deep into the hearts of Soviet women, as of all Soviet people. The simple, sincere words of a Stakhanovite woman of a Moscow plant, Comrade Kirpicheva, expressed the feelings of Soviet women at that time.

“As I listened to Comrade Stalin’s speech I kept nodding my head, as if in confirmation of his words. And my heart was so full.... The whole past and the present rose before my eyes, one picture after another. Then I heard Comrade Stalin talking about production, saying that we would defeat the Germans if we worked with all our strength to increase the output of tanks in our country; the output of antitank rifles, aircraft, grenades, mortars. Why, I thought, that’s something that concerns me, too.

“I began to figure – how many parts could I produce in a shift? We must answer Comrade Stalin with deeds. I went back to my machine and as I worked I thought: every screw, every nut will be of help to our country. And it is up to us. We’ll make as many as are needed.”

Women working at a Moscow brake factory wrote to Soviet Army men in the summer of 1941: “Go into battle against the enemy boldly, defend our land, our children, our freedom. You are leaving for the front; we are staying behind in the rear. But there is no difference between the front and the rear in our country. We will give all our strength, all our energy, to replace you in industry, to supply you with everything you need. If necessary, we will work day and night; if necessary, we will help you arms in hand. Don’t worry about us, don’t be anxious – we are wholly conscious of our duty to our country, we fully understand the difficulty and the seriousness of the situation.”

The foremost Soviet women patriots wrote in an appeal addressed to all women of the Soviet Union:

“We know that victory will not come easily. So let our hearts be an inexhaustible spring of courage. Let each of us, seeing a beloved son, husband or brother off to battle, instil confidence and calmness in him. Let our hatred for the enemy, our determination to defend our land unto the last drop of blood, be our maternal blessing. Let our men feel sure that we are calm, cheerful and as indefatigable in labour as they are in battle.”

Soviet people appreciated how grave was the danger that threatened their country.

“Everything for the Front, Everything for Victory!” was the slogan. A mighty wave of socialist emulation swept the whole country – it surged in the factories of Moscow and Leningrad, the Urals, the Volga regions, Siberia, the Far East, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Georgia, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan. The entire nation joined the patriotic socialist emulation movement. “Front teams,” as they were called, formed at many factories. They markedly sped up output.

Undaunted by difficulties, women took up jobs at which they had never worked before. Housewives and office workers went to work as fitters, turners, drillers, miners, engine drivers, weavers – wherever labour power was needed. They worked at their new jobs strenuously and with a will, knowing that their effort was needed to rout the enemy. The number of women employed in industry, especially in its leading branches, increased by leaps and bounds. Already in October 1941 women comprised 45% of all workers in industry. Between 1940 and 1942 the number of women employed increased from 41% to 53% in industry, from 25% to 36% in railway transport, from 58% to 73% in education, from 76% to 83% in the medical services.

In the first year of the war the number of women tractor drivers employed in machine and tractor stations multiplied eleven-fold; the number of women working as combine harvester operators and chauffeurs multiplied sevenfold, tractor brigade leaders – tenfold.

As the result of the Bolshevik policy of industrialization implemented before the war, our people were able to forge the mighty weapons of victory. In the last three years of the war the U.S.S.R. produced – on an average per year – over 30,000 tanks, self-propelled guns and armoured cars, approximately 40,000 aircraft, 120,000 guns of all calibres, 450,000 light and heavy machine guns, 100,000 mortars.

Comrade Stalin’s speech at the celebration meeting of the Moscow Soviet on November 6, 1941, gave rise to a new wave of patriotic enthusiasm among the Soviet people. “Our army and navy,” said Stalin, “must receive active and effective support from our entire country; all our workers and office employees, men and women, must work with might and main in the factories and supply the front with ever-greater quantities of tanks, antitank rifles and guns, aircraft, artillery, mortars, machine guns, rifles and ammunition; our collective farmers, men and women, must work with might and main in their fields and supply the front and the country with ever-greater quantities of grain, meat, raw materials for the industries; our entire country and all the peoples of the U.S.S.R. must organize in a single fighting camp, waging, together with our Army and Navy, the great war of liberation for the honour and freedom of our country, for the rout of the German armies.”41

The Soviet people responded to the leader’s call with fresh deeds of heroism in battle and in labour. The whole country, from end to end, became a single fighting camp. The creative genius of the people gave birth to new methods designed to increase labour productivity to the utmost.

The movement started by Yekaterina Barishnikova, a Young Communist League member employed at the Kaganovich First Ball-Bearing Plant, is a vivid example of the patriotic initiative and devotion displayed by Soviet working women during the Patriotic War.

Yekaterina Barishnikova’s team added the following postscript to a letter written to Comrade Stalin by the young workers of her factory just before the 25th anniversary of the Young Communist League: “Our dear Joseph Vissarionovich, our whole team promises you that we will raise our output to 400% of our quota.”

In response to the beloved leader’s appeal to all Soviet people for a new exertion of effort in order to smash the German aggressors’ war machine, Yekaterina Barishnikova, an energetic Soviet girl, and the other girls working with her resolved that henceforth half the team would produce as much as the whole team had done before.

The team processed important parts on planing machines. “Formerly one girl operated one machine,” relates Barishnikova. “We undertook to operate two machines each. It was considered impossible for one person to operate more than one machine of this type, but we proved that no job is too hard for Young Communists. We planned our day so as to get maximum efficiency: we don’t lose a single minute now. Then we speeded up the machines. And we have rationalized our work so that while one machine is running a new part is being adjusted on the other.”

It was not easy at first for Barishnikova and her friends to do the work of two each. But in their ardent patriotism, in their eagerness to answer the leader’s appeal to help the army, Soviet people, old and young, like Barishnikova, demonstrated that they could perform wonders.

Barishnikova’s example was followed by others, and, before long, the work of the front teams of the plant made it possible to transfer one hundred workers to other jobs. Barishnikova and other girls of her team issued an appeal to the young workers of Moscow factories to follow their example. This appeal met with enthusiastic response among workers in Moscow and in other cities. Within a few months about 20,000 teams were employing Barishnikova’s methods. In this way over 76,000 workers were freed to do other work – enough labour power for a dozen new big factories.

Women went to work in the mining industry, descended into collieries and iron are mines. Thousands of women did men’s work in the collieries, mastered the basic mining trades and covered themselves with glory in the fight for coal. It was not easy for women and girls to learn to do the work of miners – work done exclusively by men from time immemorial. But the country required it, and they gallantly put their shoulders to every kind of work.

“We are perfectly aware of the value of coal,” girl miners wrote in a letter to the men at the front. “We know that coal means iron and steel, new tanks, guns, aircraft. Every one of us will perform her duty to our country with credit.”

Extraordinary valour was displayed by women who worked on the railways in the war area. Hundreds of thousands of women were employed on the railways, many as engine drivers, station chiefs, dispatchers; and they stuck to their jobs under enemy fire. More than 5,000 women were engine drivers and they drove trains not only in the interior, but close to the firing line. Over 20,000 women railway workers were decorated for distinguished services in ensuring the transportation of supplies needed for the front and for the national economy, and for exceptional achievements in restoring railway transport under difficult wartime conditions. The title Hero of Socialist Labour was conferred on the most outstanding women railway workers.

The wives of many Moscow subway workers reo placed their husbands when the latter went to the front. Special short-term training courses were organized where they learned the trades required. They worked as mechanics, crane operators, electricians, train drivers, in charge of power station apparatus, stations and block sections.

Yekaterina Mishina, a senior subway driver, formed the first all-women’s train crew. All the members of the crew became good mechanics. They did all the minor repairs of the electrical equipment themselves and learned everything about their train and how to run it. This train ran strictly on schedule and the crew effected a considerable saving of electricity. Three of Mishina’s assistants soon became train drivers themselves. The Government awarded Yekaterina Mishina the Order of Lenin.

Work on the construction of the third Moscow sub-way line continued during the war. This in itself was a demonstration of the Soviet people’s deep confidence in the invincibility of their country, in ultimate victory over the enemy. Seventy per cent of all the workers and engineers employed on the construction job were women. Many of them were in charge of shifts or worked as foremen and team leaders.

When plants and factories were evacuated from the front areas to the interior of the country, women helped reassemble the machinery of the transferred plants in record time. Staunchly enduring all hardships and privations, women helped expand the country’s powerful arsenal in the east, the arsenal which supplied our army with materiel.

During the war women comprised the majority of workers in the light, food and textile industries. They made clothing and uniforms for the soldiers, leather footwear and felt boots, prepared dehydrated and canned foods.

The defence fortifications built by the people of Moscow played an important part in the heroic defence of the Soviet capital. In response to the appeal of the Moscow Communist Party Committee, 500,000 Moscovites, chiefly women, worked day and night building a belt of fortifications round Moscow. They excavated twice as much earth as was excavated in the construction of the Dnieper Dam and Power Station. The Hitlerites never succeeded in piercing these lines at any point.

Working women of the heroic cities of Leningrad, Stalingrad, Odessa, Sevastopol inscribed immortal pages in the history of the Soviet peoples’ titanic struggle. For twenty months the fighting line was just a few tram stops away from Leningrad. The enemy strove to break the brave spirit of the people of Leningrad by incessant air raids and artillery shelling. He tried to starve the heroic city into submission.

“There is no distinction between the front and the rear in Leningrad,” said Andrei Zhdanov during the heroic defence of the city. “Every inhabitant of Leningrad, man and woman, has found a place in the struggle and is honestly fulfilling the duty of a Soviet patriot.”

Irina Borisovna Bulygina, foreman at the Kirov plant, in Leningrad, relates:

“For 900 days we lived under enemy fire. The fascist murderers fired 10,194 shells at our plant alone; yet in our plant, as in others, there was no absenteeism or tardiness even during the most terrible days of the siege. If I had stayed home instead of going to work I would not only have been ashamed, thinking of the men at the front, of my husband, a captain of the Red Army, and of my comrades at the Kirov plant; I should have been ashamed to face the very buildings of Leningrad.”

She goes on to describe how hungry, half-frozen working women, hardly able to drag their feet, assembled tanks which were immediately sent off to the front.

Olga Kovalyova, of Stalingrad, was a steel smelter during the war. She worked through heavy enemy air-raids until the fascists were at the city walls, and then she left the shop to join the people’s volunteer guard in which she fought heroically till she fell in battle.

* * *

Women played an important part in the advancement of collective farming before the war. During the Great Patriotic War women collective farmers bore the brunt of the effort of providing the Soviet Army and the country with wheat, grain and other agricultural produce. The nation will never forget this great service rendered by women collective farmers during the war.

The work of the Sotsorevnovanye Collective Farm, Moscow Region, during the war is an excellent illustration. The majority of the men from the farm were called up. Most of the work had to be done by the women, and they coped with it splendidly. Whereas during the last four pre-war years the collective farm gathered 7,305 centners of potatoes and 12,330 of vegetables, in the war years, with women doing almost all the work, the farm grew 15,722 centners of potatoes and 28,589 of vegetables. The women collective farmers purchased state bonds and war lottery tickets for millions of rubles, which went for the construction of aircraft and tanks.

In the last year of the war Cossack women of the Kaganovich Collective Farm in the Kuban region planted 2,702 hectares of land to various field crops, a much larger area than was under cultivation before the war when the farm had more workers, more machinery and more horses. They delivered to the state 4.5 times as much grain as in the last pre-war year, thousands of centners over and above their quota. The increased output per member of the collective farm is an eloquent testimonial to the enthusiasm with which the women worked. In the last war year the grain output per able-bodied farmer was 63 centners against 37.6 centners before the war.

In 1943 women earned over 70% of the total number of workday units credited to collective farmers all over the country. During the Patriotic War women became a decisive force in the village.

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin’s prediction that many splendid, talented practical organizers would be discovered among working women and peasant women was fully borne out.

Many women collective farmers were promoted to leading positions during the war. In 1944 over 250,000 women worked as chairmen of collective farms, brigade leaders, managers of stock farms.

Women collective farmers showed some striking examples of socialist labour in the effort to obtain bigger crops. “We Russians are not the kind of people to submit to the enemy,” said Anna Kondratyevna Yutkina, a Siberian collective farmer. “We’ll do everything in our power, we won’t spare ourselves, and we’ll hold out, we’ll beat the enemy.” Anna Yutkina and her field group received a Stalin Prize for introducing improved farming methods several years in succession and for obtaining a record potato crop in 1942 – 1,330 centners per hectare. Anna Yutkina’s methods were emulated by many other women collective farmers.

The importance of tractors in socialist agriculture is well known. As a rule, tractors were formerly driven by men. During the war women began to take the place of men, and with good results. Three of the five tractor brigades that won prizes in the all-Union Socialist emulation drive during the war were made up of women.

Women comprised 62.5% of the specialized agricultural machine operators, on whom the harvests of the war years greatly depended.

In 1944 there were over 100,000 high-yield field groups (i.e., teams who undertook to get extra-high yields) working on the collective-farm fields. “Testimonial Diplomas” were awarded to 1,150 field-group leaders for their outstanding achievements when the results of the all-Union Socialist emulation were summarized, and 968 of these were women.

Millions of Soviet women worked with might and main in industry, transport and agriculture during the war. Comrade Stalin mentioned the great services of this army of ordinary Soviet patriotic women in a speech delivered in 1944: “The unprecedented labour heroism displayed by our Soviet women and our valiant youth, who have borne the brunt of the burden in our factories and mills and in our collective and state farms, will go down in history for ever. For the sake of the honour and independence of our country our Soviet women, youths and girls are displaying courage and heroism on the labour front. They have proved themselves worthy of their fathers and sons, their husbands and brothers who are defending our country from the German fascist fiends.”42

Stalin praised Soviet women for their self-sacrificing work for the front, for their courage in face of all the wartime hardships, for their example which inspired the soldiers of the Soviet Army, the liberators of our country, to perform deeds of valour.

* * *

Not only on the labour front did Soviet women defend their country; they also defended it arms in hand.

Back in the years of the Civil War and foreign intervention thousands of women joined Red Army formations as ordinary soldiers, political instructors and commanders. In those years V. I. Lenin wrote that proletarian women would not look on passively while well-armed imperialists shot badly-armed and unarmed workers, that they themselves would take to arms. And women – factory workers, peasants, and representatives of the intelligentsia, the finest among them – took up arms and selflessly helped their brothers and husbands, fathers and sons rout the Whiteguards and foreign invaders who were pressing in on all sides.

In the Civil War the Red Army had in its ranks women who distinguished themselves as doctors and nurses, as intelligent political instructors, as capable scouts and as valiant soldiers. Nadezhda Krupskaya and Rosalia Zemlyachka were two of the prominent women Communists who conducted important educational and political work in the Red Army in that period.

Rosalia Samoilovna Zemlyachka’s was a life of splendid work and achievement. She was born in 1876 and joined the revolutionary movement at the age of seventeen. At twenty she was a member of the Kiev Committee of the R.S.D.L.P. That same year, 1896, she was arrested and imprisoned for over three years. When Lenin’s newspaper Iskra began to appear she became its earnest supporter, spreading its ideas and working as an agent for the paper.

In 1904 Rosalia Zemlyachka participated in the Geneva “Conference of 22 Bolsheviks” and was elected to the Bureau of the Committees of the Majority.

Zemlyachka took a direct part in the revolutionary events of 1905, first as secretary of the St. Petersburg organization of the Bolshevik Party, and later as secretary of the Moscow committee. After the defeat of the armed uprising in Moscow she continued her work in the underground movement. While attending the all-Russian military conference of Bolsheviks she was arrested together with the other delegates, but soon escaped from prison.

In 1909 the Central Committee of the Party sent Rosalia Zemlyachka to Baku as secretary of the Bolshevik organization there. But, hounded by the tsarist secret police, she had to go abroad. In 1915-16, after her return to Russia, she was a member of the Moscow Bureau of the Central Committee of the Party. During the October Revolution Zemlyachka led the heroic struggle of the workers in the Rogozhsk-Simonov district of Moscow.

The years of Civil War were filled with strenuous work for Zemlyachka, who was in charge of the political department of an army. She was decorated with the Order of the Red Banner for her distinguished services at that time. After the Civil War Zemlyachka devoted her energies to the work for the consolidation of the Soviet State. All her life she was a staunch fighter for the great ideas of Lenin and Stalin, for the purity of the Bolshevik Party line. Rosalia Zemlyachka’s life was a shining example of selfless service to the country.

Working women of Petrograd played an important part in the rout of the Yudenich hordes during the Civil War.

When the Party issued an appeal: “Working women must not lose a single minute; they must do everything they can to help gain victory....” over 11,000 women marched to the front and joined the men as machine gunners, signallers, sappers and nurses. Thousands of women served in the city’s security force. The Women’s Soviet Detachment of the Neva District did especially good work apprehending deserters.

All through the Civil War, wherever the fate of the young Soviet republic was being decided, women shared all hardships and dangers with the men, displaying valour and heroism.

Many valiant deeds performed by women in the Red Army are recorded in the annals of the Civil War. In the Urals there was a plain peasant girl who fought in the ranks of the Red Army under the name of Ivan Penkov. She took part in many a battle. And time and again at critical moments she would rush forward against the enemy and inspire the others by her example. In her last engagement she held advancing Whiteguard Cossacks at bay with fierce machine-gun fire, thereby enabling our men to effect an orderly retreat to new positions. She went on firing even after she was surrounded on all sides by enemies, and she died at her post.

Lyuda Makievskaya was in command of an armoured train, with which she often penetrated behind the enemy lines, opening machine-gun and artillery fire and sowing panic in the ranks of the Whiteguards. Company commander Gedimy, a Buriat girl, often led her unit in attack. Nurse Balandina, a Communist Party member, was always in the front ranks during battle, ministering to the wounded. In an engagement at Yalutorovsky she was taken prisoner and ordered to be shot by the Whiteguard officer. The fearless woman talked to the soldiers who were sent to execute the order, told them the truth about the Red Army and explained the aims of the Soviet government and Communist Party to them. The soldiers not only refrained from carrying out the officer’s order, but joined the Red Army.

The fact that women – factory workers and peasants – took part in the fighting for the establishment of the Soviet system sent Whiteguard commanders into fits of fury. Here, for example, is a document characteristic in this respect. It is an order of the day dated April 23, 1919, issued by the Whiteguard general Tomashevsky to the garrison of the town of Kustanai and made public for the information of the civilian population. It reads as follows:

“I have personally established that not only men but women too actually took part in the rebellion of the Bolshevik bands in the town of Kustanai and villages of the district, and that they made bold to fire from around corners, from windows, roofs and attics.... Heretofore these female criminals have been left alone in most cases and have not received the punishment they deserved. I consider shooting or hanging quite unsuitable and too much of an honour for such female criminals, and I warn that the only form of punishment I shall apply to such persons is flogging to death. I am quite sure that this homely method will have the desired effect on the weak-minded creatures who should busy themselves with pots and pans and bringing up a better future generation, and not meddle with politics which they are absolutely incapable of understanding.”

Those who like the tsarist satrap Tomashevsky spoke of women as “weak-minded,” tried to chain them to pots and pans and doom them to eternal exploitation and oppression, have been flung into history’s refuse heap.

* * *

The shining examples of the intrepid heroines of the period of struggle for the consolidation of the Soviet system have been a source of inspiration to our women, old and young, and also to Soviet writers, poets and artists. The people will never forget the names of the thousands of glorious heroines who fought for the young Soviet republic against the hordes of internal and external counterrevolution in the period of civil war and foreign intervention. But the history of mankind has never before known mass heroism like that displayed by Soviet women in the Great Patriotic War which our people fought against the German fascist invaders.
“How numerous are the women in the literature and history of our country who have been exemplary in the lofty morale they have displayed!” said Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin. “Yet everything that has gone before pales into insignificance when compared with the grand epic of the present war; with the heroism and readiness for sacrifice of Soviet women, their civic valour, fortitude in bereavement, and enthusiasm in struggle manifested with a force and, one might say, majesty, never witnessed in the past.”43

For many generations to come people everywhere in the world will remember the Soviet women, many of them very young girls, who performed deathless deeds. The world, deeply stirred, witnessed how amid the flames of the Patriotic War Soviet woman stood up in her full stature as a staunch and indomitable patriot, a heroine, prepared to sacrifice her own life and encouraging her children to perform deeds of valour and endure every trial in the defence of the honour and independence of the Soviet Motherland. It is characteristic of Soviet women that they take the nation’s interests close to heart, are imbued with ardent patriotism and prepared to sacrifice for their country even what is dearest to them.

At the beginning of the war Zhenya Zhigulenko wrote to her mother:

“I am going to join the air force. Don’t ask any questions, Mother, don’t try to dissuade me and don’t worry. It must be so.” The years went by. Mother and daughter corresponded, and not once did the mother betray her anxiety for her beloved daughter. Only four years later, when Zhenya Zhigulenko came back home a Hero of the Soviet Union, did her mother tell her of her anxiety of her sleepless nights and the tears she had shed.

Alexandra Martynovna Dreiman, a collective farmer, gave her own life and the life of her infant son for her country. She was arrested by the German invaders and was told that her life would be spared if she betrayed the whereabouts of the partisan detachment of which she was a member. The commandant led her naked through the streets of the town, offering to return her clothes to her piece by piece as she pointed out the houses where her friends lived. The Soviet woman did not point out a single house. Furious, the monsters killed her child.

“You have killed my son, but I have a forest full of sons, the whole detachment,” Alexandra Dreiman hurled her defiance at the murderers. Her last words – “Dear mothers, do you hear me? I did not spare my son, I did not betray anyone!” – reached thousands of Soviet women and inspired them to perform fresh deeds of valour.

Soviet women displayed their heroism both on the fighting front and on the home front. Devoted wives and loving mothers, they taught their children to be brave in battle, to endure the greatest trials without flinching for the glory of their beloved country. Women like Yelena Nikolayevna Koshevaya and Alexandra Vasilievna Tulenina, mothers of the young heroes of Krasnodon, embody the noble qualities of millions of Soviet mothers. Alexandra Tulenina, a simple miner’s wife of Krasnodon, together with her son Sergei, a member of the “Young Guard” underground resistance organization, was subjected to terrible torture in the Gestapo dungeons. Not for one minute did it occur to her to save her life and that of her son by shameful betrayal. “Keep quiet, Sergei,” she said to her son in front of the torturers. And when, before her eyes, the fascist monsters thrust red hot iron rods into her son’s wounds, when Sergei’s arm was broken and his face drenched with blood, this Soviet mother had the supreme courage to comfort her son and to support him, to instil Bolshevik courage in him: “Don’t give in, Sergei, my darling, don’t tell them anything, the dogs, not one word!” By their own example Soviet mothers like Alexandra Tulenina taught their children infinite loyalty to their country and their people, taught them not to lose heart, never to submit to the enemy, to avenge their country’s wrongs and fight to the end, unto victory.

It was women like this simple Russian heroine who gave her country a heroic son whom Maxim Gorky had in mind when he said:

“Let us sing the praises of the mother, the inexhaustible source of all-conquering life! Without mothers there are no heroes, no poets.... Everything the world takes pride in comes from mothers.”

Anya Pavlova, a Young Communist League member who died the death of the brave during the siege of Leningrad, wrote in her diary:

“I often think of our country’s fate. For, after all, my country and I are one. If things go well with the country, they will go well with me. When shells burst in Leningrad, when the enemy spoils and demolishes our palaces, museums, houses, I feel as if the Germans were shooting at my heart, and my heart says to me: Be brave, be honest, keep in step with the soldiers.”

Our glorious patriotic women did indeed keep in step with the men. They fought in the front ranks of the defenders of the country, and showed examples of fearlessness and boundless courage.

Our people will never forget Marina Raskova, that outstanding aviatrix and heroine of the Great Patriotic War.

Many heroic deeds were performed by the fliers – all girls – of the 46th Taman Guards light bomber regiment which was decorated with the Red Banner and the Suvorov Order, 3rd degree. This regiment was commanded by Yevdokia Bershanskaya, a Cossack girl from the Kuban, and the personnel consisted of volunteers – former students and working girls. The regiment covered itself with glory in four years of fighting – all the way from the Northern Caucasus to Berlin – and took part in the final bombing of that city. Many of the brave girl-fliers made over ten combat flights per day. They excelled in flying planes by instrument only and in precision dive-bombing. They dropped thousands of tons of death-dealing bombs within enemy lines, annihilating men and materiel. The title of Hero of the Soviet Union was conferred on twenty-one fliers of this regiment.

Guards Major E. Nikulina made 600 night combat flights bombing enemy railway trains, bridges and stores. The squadron commanded by Maria Smirnova made 3,260 combat flights and Maria Smirnova herself dropped 100,000 kilograms of bombs on enemy motorized units. Yevdokia Pasko’s score includes 157 heavy explosions, 109 fires started, 6 fuel and ammunition dumps blown up in the enemy rear. Eugenia Rudneva dropped 80,000 kilograms of bombs on German formations.

Many were the cases of women inspiring the men on the battlefield by their personal example. Hero of the Soviet Union Junior Lieutenant Maria Batrakova, who fought at Leningrad and at Stalingrad, when the officer in charge of an armoured task force, in which she took part, was disabled, assumed command of the force and won the engagement. In another engagement, on the Molochnaya River, Maria Batrakova replaced a disabled battalion commander and directed the action which ended in victory for her battalion after 120 hours of fighting. The Soviet soldiers, who had captured an advantageous position, held it against 53 enemy counterattacks and 18 enemy air raids.

Valeria Gnarovskaya, a young Soviet girl, sacrificed her life heroically. Two German “Tiger” tanks broke through our defences and headed for her regiment’s lines. Valeria Gnarovskaya picked up a heavy bunch of grenades, ran towards the first tank and flung herself under its treads. The tank blew up. In the time thus gained other soldiers succeeded in putting the second tank out of action. Valeria Gnarovskaya’s heroic deed saved the day. She was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

The finest daughters of all the nationalities inhabiting our country defended its freedom and independence on the fields of battle. Shoulder to shoulder with Russian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian girls, fought Tatar girls and Georgian girls, girls from Azerbaijan, Armenia, Bashkiria and Uzbekistan. They fought bravely defending Leningrad, Odessa, Kiev, Sevastopol, Minsk, the Donbas, the Caucasus, the Ukraine.

Machine-gunner Mashuk Mahmetova, a Kazakh girl volunteer, fought till her last breath, repulsing three successive enemy counterattacks. Nineteen-year-old Alia Maldagulova, another Kazakh girl, was an expert scout and supplied our command with valuable information. Fatally wounded, she mustered the strength to kill an enemy officer with her last bullet. Both girls were made Heroes of the Soviet Union posthumously.

Ziba Ganieva, an Azerbaijan girl, was studying at a Moscow theatrical school. When the war broke out she volunteered as a nurse. Before long she learned to handle a mortar and a machine gun. However, Ziba Ganieva found that sharpshooting was her true vocation at the front and in a short time she became a sniper. She shot down 128 Hitlerites.

Burning hatred of the enemy and ardent love for country caused thousands of girls to become snipers – an honourable and difficult job.

Natasha Kovshova, a Moscow girl just out of school, joined a labour battalion as a volunteer as soon as the war broke out and went to the front. The letters this young Communist wrote to her mother are permeated with dauntless courage and grim hatred of the invaders. In one letter she wrote:

“I promise you, my beloved mother, that my rifle will not waver in my hand, that every bullet will hit its mark and strike a fascist swine.” Natasha Kovshova was true to her word.

Natasha Kovshova and Marusya Polivanova, her friend, a girl of her own age, shot down over three hundred German soldiers. Dozens of excellent snipers, both men and women, learned sharpshooting from these two girls. One day Natasha and Marusya were trapped by the enemy while on duty. They fought on till their last bullet was gone, and then, rather than surrender, blew themselves up with a grenade. Both girls were posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

The brunt of the work of saving the lives of the wounded and restoring them to health was borne by the women serving in the medical corps of the Soviet Army. They served as doctors, nurses, medical assistants and orderlies, rendering expert aid to the wounded and taking excellent care of them.

Nina Kluyeva, a trained army nurse, carried six hundred men off the field of battle at the risk of her life.

Medical assistant Maria Pavlenko saved the lives of eighteen men during one operation when a group blundered onto a minefield. She worked through the night carrying these men to safety from the mine-field.

Approximately half a million women were blood donors during the war. Over five thousand of them were awarded orders, medals and “Honoured Donor” badges for their help in saving the lives of Soviet soldiers and restoring them to health. Among those decorated was Nadezhda Arsentievna Skachkova, great-granddaughter of the great Russian general, Mikhail Kutuzov, who gave her blood forty times. She was awarded the Order of the Red Star.

Soviet women sent gifts to the fighting men at the front, cared for the wounded in hospitals, and donated their savings for the construction of tanks and aircraft. Turkmenian women gave up their traditional silver ornaments, contributing more than eight thousand kilograms of silver to the defence fund.

Thousands of Soviet women adopted and cared for orphans, taking the place of the mothers they lost. Thanks to the measures adopted by the Soviet Government – the founding of Suvorov cadet schools, the opening of new trade schools and the organization of children’s colonies to take care of war orphans – the war, despite its vast scale, did not bring in its train any child homelessness, one of the tragic consequences of the war of 1914-18.

The lofty patriotism of Soviet women revealed itself in numerous ways during the Great Patriotic War. Women defended their country alongside of men in all the arms of the service – in the infantry, the tanks, air force, artillery, engineers and communications. They cared for orphaned children, gave their blood for the wounded and contributed their hard-earned savings to the army; they participated in anti-air-raid defence and helped build defence fortifications.

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The large number of Soviet women who took part in partisan warfare was an unexampled manifestation of their patriotism. Women responded enthusiastically to the appeal of the leader of the people, Comrade Stalin, to form partisan detachments on the enemy-occupied territory, to kindle partisan warfare everywhere and make conditions unbearable for the enemy and his accomplices. Members of the Communist Party were the organizers and leaders of the partisan movement. They fought in the front ranks of the people’s avengers, took part in the most difficult operations, were fearless in battle and unwavering in their love for their country; their example inspired Komsomols and non-Party people to perform deeds of heroism. Thousands of women joined the ranks of the people’s avengers and fought side by side with the men. Women who only yesterday followed the most peaceful pursuits boldly chose the hard path of grim struggle.

The names of Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, Liza Chaikina, Ulyana Gromova, Lyuba Shevtsova, Anna Maslovskaya and many other heroic partisans are known and infinitely dear to all Soviet people. These cherished names will go down through the ages as a symbol of heroism, a clarion call to contemporaries and to future generations always to place their socialist country above all things, to uphold its honour, freedom, and independence as true patriots.

The Germans captured a young partisan girl near the town of Vereya, Moscow Region. She was subjected to the cruellest torture, but not a word escaped her lips. She did not betray her comrades, she did not even give her real name. She said she was called “Tanya.” Only some time later was it discovered that “Tanya’s” real name was Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya. People who witnessed her heroic death related how, in her last moments, she had the strength to cheer and encourage those who survived and were continuing the fight for our cause behind the enemy lines.

“Farewell, comrades!” Zoya cried as the noose was put around her neck. “Fight on, do not fear! Stalin is with us! Stalin will come!...”

When Maria Melnikajtes, a valiant Lithuanian partisan, heard the story of Zoya, she said to her comrades: “That is how we should all act if we ever find ourselves in a similar situation.” Some time later Maria was wounded in an engagement with a German punitive detachment, and, all her ammunition gone, she was taken prisoner. The Germans subjected the girl to horrible torture to make her give information about her detachment, but they failed.

Maria stood with her head high beside the gallows on which she was to be publicly hanged. She faced the crowd of local people whom the Germans had ordered to come to witness the hanging. She shouted: “Don’t weep, the Red Army will avenge us. Long live Soviet Lithuania! Long live Comrade Stalin!”

Women and girls were active in the Communist Party and Young Communist League underground resistance organizations that functioned on enemy-occupied territory. They struck terror in the hearts of the Germans, drove them mad with rage. The Germans called the underground workers and partisans “Hell’s fiends” and “night devils.”

The Gestapo offered a reward of 3,000 marks, 5 poods of bacon and 25 hectares of land to anyone who would betray to them “Katya” (Varya Virvich), the leader and organizer of the Young Communist League underground resistance group in the town of Dobrush, Gomel Region. But no one betrayed Katya and her friends, and, supported by other Young Communists, they successfully fought the invaders until Soviet troops liberated the town.

Thousands of girls distributed leaflets, newspapers, Soviet literature to the population in German-occupied towns and villages, disseminating among the people who languished in fascist slavery the fervent word of Bolshevik truth and urging them to sabotage all the Germans’ undertakings.

Hero of the Soviet Union Liza Chaikina travelled from village to village reading Comrade Stalin’s report to collective farmers, instilling in them faith in the victory of the Soviet Army. She was captured and tortured, but, looking straight into the rifle barrels, she flung into the faces of her murderers these words of defiance: “Death to the German invaders! Long live Stalin! Victory will come!”

Hero of the Soviet Union Anna Maslovskaya sheltered escaped Soviet war prisoners and helped them cross back to their own lines or join to form partisan detachments. She connected scattered underground groups left in the rear with the partisan command and obtained arms for the partisans. The information supplied by Anya helped the people’s avengers – Communists, Komsomols and non-Communists – to carry out daring acts of sabotage and raid German garrisons.

Lyolya Kolesova, a Moscow schoolteacher, was put in charge of a sabotage group assigned to operate behind the enemy lines. The group crossed the front line, and moving by compass, sleeping in the snow and keeping out of the way of German patrols, they penetrated far behind the enemy lines and brilliantly carried out their assignment. They blew up stores and routed two German garrisons. Lyolya and her group eluded all the attempts to catch them, even though the Germans sent special detachments to hunt them down. The group made many bold attacks and derailed dozens of enemy trains.

The heroes of the “Young Guard” underground resistance organization in Krasnodon covered themselves with undying glory. Nearly half the members of this organization were Komsomol girls. Ulyana Gromova and Lyuba Shevtsova (posthumously awarded the title Hero of die Soviet Union) were members of the “Young Guard” leadership. They never thought of their deeds as heroism, nor did they perform them for the sake of glory. They were simply doing their duty as young citizens of the splendid Land of Socialism, brought up in the ranks of the Young Communist League, doing it as naturally as they grew, lived and studied. Girls, so different from one another in character and temperament, each with her individual traits, banded together when the country was in danger, and inscribed on their banner Stalin’s sacred words addressed to the partisans, his words about fighting the treacherous and implacable enemy.

The activities of the dauntless Soviet girls and boys filled the fascist oppressors with fear and dismay. Now the whole nation knows of the feats of the young heroes of Krasnodon.

The Young Guards were caught. The Hitlerite brutes flung them, still alive, into a colliery pit. But even in the face of inevitable death the heroes of Krasnodon did not lose heart. Their faith in the final victory of the just cause for which they had sacrificed their young lives remained unshaken. Before the doors of their cells opened for the last time the members of the Young Guard listened to a last message “from headquarters,” tapped on the walls in Morse code: “This is the final order.... We will be led to our death. We will be led through the streets of the town. We will sing Ilyich’s favourite song.” And, their hands bound behind their backs, covered with blood and exhausted, the Young Guard members talked to their graves, and solemn and sorrowful sounded the words of the song: “Dying as martyrs, fighting for freedom, so did we die....”

With soul-stirring power the Young Guard members demonstrated their unconquerable hatred of the enemy and boundless love for their Soviet Motherland – feelings fostered in their hearts by the heroic Bolshevik Party.

The partisans rendered the Soviet Army invaluable assistance. They annihilated enemy personnel and materiel, routed garrisons and severed communications. Women partisans frequently displayed examples of staunchness and endurance in unequal battle, in dangerous and difficult marches through swamps and forests, in enemy encirclement, when superhuman will power was required of mere humans.

There were tens of thousands of women partisans. Thousands of them have been decorated for valour.

The Supreme Commander-in-Chief Comrade Stalin addressed women partisans in his orders of the day and mentioned them in terms of high praise in his historic speeches.

The wellspring of the heroism displayed by Soviet women is their fervent patriotism, love and boundless devotion to their socialist country. The fiery patriotism and unparalleled heroism of Soviet people is eloquent evidence of the vitality and strength of the Socialist system.

Referring to Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya’s heroic deed, Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin wrote that she “attained the summit of patriotism and moral grandeur. She imbibed, as it were, all the finest emotions that have moved our people.”44 These inspiring words are true of thousands of Soviet women and girls, partisans of the Ukraine, Byelorussia, the Baltic region, Smolensk and Moscow regions, the Don and the Kuban; they are true of soldiers of all arms and all fronts, who, like Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, held their country’s interests, the honour, freedom and happiness of their people above everything else.

The country paid homage to the valorous deeds of Soviet women. Over 120,000 women in the armed forces have been decorated for distinguished services on the fronts. The Soviet people are proud of the sixty-nine women who have been made Heroes of the Soviet Union. The memory of the women who gave their lives in the fight for the just cause, for their socialist country, will ever be sacred to the Soviet people.

Speaking to girls demobilized from the Red Army and Navy, Mikhail Kalinin said:

“And there is another thing you have accomplished. Women have enjoyed equal civil rights in our country since the first days of the October Revolution. You have won equality for women in still another field – you have personally defended your country, with arms in hand. You have won equality for women in a field in which they have hitherto not acted so directly.”

Lenin prophetically said that the might of the Soviet State lies in the fact that it is the people’s state, created and administered by the people in the interests of the people.

With the invincible strength of the Soviet State behind them the Soviet people won a world-historic military, economic, moral and political victory in the Great Patriotic War. Our people saved the civilization of Europe from the fascist brigands. This, said Comrade Stalin, is a great historic service the Soviet people have rendered mankind.

The Soviet Army won because it was led by experienced commanders, trained and raised by the Party of Lenin and Stalin; it was guided by the most advanced military science, the science created by Comrade Stalin. The Soviet Army was victorious because the Soviet people and army were led by the heroic Bolshevik Party, which created and trained the Soviet Army, converted the country into a single fighting camp and sent its best sons to the front, where they performed their duty to their country with exemplary staunchness. Within the first five months of the war the Moscow Communist Party organization sent over 100,000 of its members into the ranks of the army; 160,000 members of the Leningrad Party organization joined the Home Guard divisions.

In battle Communists were models of bravery, valour, courage and skill. Sixty-five per cent of the Heroes of the Soviet Union are Communist Party members, and thirteen per cent Young Communist League members.

The Soviet Army was victorious because it fought its enemies in accordance with the plans and under the guidance of Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, leader and general of genius. “It is our good fortune that in the trying years of the war the Red Army and the Soviet people were led forward by the wise and tested leader of the Soviet Union – the great Stalin. With the name of Generalissimo Stalin the glorious victories of our Army will go down in the history of our country and in the history of the world.” (V. M. Molotov.)

The international consequences of the great victory won by the Soviet Union in the war of liberation against German fascism become more tangible all the time. The destructive forces of the imperialist camp have been weakened. The forces of democracy and Socialism on a world scale are now superior to the forces of reaction and imperialism.

The Soviet Union is proud of the fact that women played a big and honourable part in the great efforts and heroism displayed by our people in the war years.

The example of Soviet women shines like a beacon lighting the way for the women of all freedom-loving countries, for those whom fascism brought incalculable suffering, grief and loss. During the war the example of Soviet women taught others not to submit to the enemy, not to lose heart, to take vengeance for the injuries inflicted by the enemy.

The heroic deeds and selfless efforts of Soviet women showed what rich fruit the emancipation of women has borne, what brilliant results have been produced by the great educational work done by our Party and our state, which brought women full equality and wide opportunities for the development of their creative abilities, for the development of all the best that was in them.