Lydia Litvyak is a hero of the Soviet Union. Lily in the fiery sky. War in the sky
On August 18, 1921, Lydia Vladimirovna Litvyak, a legendary fighter pilot of the times, was born in Moscow
Lydia Litvyak lived a short but bright, heroic life, filled with love for her homeland and friends. Her fate, like that of all Soviet girls and boys, was divided into two periods by the most terrible word - “war”.
The girl who dreamed of heaven
Little is known about Lydia's childhood. However, there are several facts that may have predetermined her choice to connect her life with heaven.
Source: interesnoznat.com
First of all, it is worth saying that Lydia was born on August 18 - the day of All-Union Aviation (such a coincidence).
Since childhood, she dreamed of aviation and airplanes. At that time, there was great propaganda in the Soviet Union about air sports and the exploration of the skies. The country gave the young dreamer such an opportunity. Lydia took to the skies for the first time at the age of 14. During her studies at the flying clubs of Moscow, Kherson and Kalinin, she perfectly mastered piloting techniques. Moreover, she herself became an aviation instructor and trained over 40 pilots, future air fighters.
Source: waralbum.ru
She was very inspired by the example of the first Soviet heroines of the sky, Marina Raskova and Polina Osipenko. Lydia did not know that she was soon destined to meet Marina Raskova - only it would happen in the war and as a subordinate.
War in the sky
With the beginning of the Great Patriotic War Lydia tried in every possible way to get to the front: she knocked on the thresholds of military registration and enlistment offices, wrote letters. She was refused all the time. The military commissar could not believe that a short, fragile and blond girl could endure the harsh conditions at the front.
Source: pinterest.ru
In one of the newspapers she read a short article that Marina Raskova, her hero, was gathering a women's air regiment to beat the enemy. Lydia took credit for the missing 100 flight hours and was able to persuade the military commissar of the Comintern RVC in Moscow to take her into the army.
Thus began her short but glorious military journey. First there was combat training. Lydia in short term was able to master the Yak-1 fighter, which, according to veterans, is a rather difficult aircraft to pilot, especially the early modifications.
In the 586th “female” IAP, where she ended up, her first “flight” happened. As senior sergeant I. Passportnikova, who was a technician on Lydia Litvyak’s plane, recalled:
“In October 1941, when we were still training at a training base near Engels, during formation Lily was ordered to get out of formation. She was in her winter uniform, and we all saw that she had cut off the tops of her fur boots to make a fashionable collar for her flight suit. Our commander Marina Raskova asked when she did this, and Lilya answered: “At night...”
Source: waralbum.ru
She was even punished in the guardhouse. Everyone wondered how this little girl would fight. But with her first combat mission in August 1942, she, in a group with her new friend Katya Budanova, sent the enemy Junkers Ju-88 bomber to the ground. A young pilot was noticed in the regiment, and her combat score only began to grow. It was at this moment, on board her plane, that Lydia asked to draw a white lily. At the same time, the call sign “Lily-44” was assigned to her. And so the “white lily of Stalingrad” blossomed.
The next one was the Messer, followed by another bomb carrier. Lydia and her friend were soon enrolled in the 9th GVIAP, where she continued to fight together with Katya Budanova.
Source: soviet-aces.ru
On Red Army Day, February 23, 1943, Lydia receives her first award - the Order of the Red Star. And by May she became a Knight of the Order of the Red Banner.
Our heroine was wounded twice. Once, with a shot in her leg, she managed to land the car at the airfield. And two months later I was back in the regiment. Another time, she landed on a damaged Yak in enemy territory. From there she was taken out by fellow attack aircraft in their Il-2. The skill and luck of this fragile girl were known throughout the front.
Missing but not forgotten
In the regiment, Lydia behaved modestly and did not respond to the advances of men. All because she was in love and then married her only one. The chosen one turned out to be Captain Alexey Solomatin, also a fighter.
Lydia's husband - Captain Alexey Solomatin
Lydia Litvyak - Soviet fighter pilot
Lydia Litvyak - Soviet fighter pilot, Hero of the Soviet Union.
96th birthday.
Famous pilot, Hero of the Soviet Union, commander of an aviation flight, guard Ensign- Lydia Litvyak, possessing a special talent as a fighter and being able to “see the air,” was one of the most successful female pilots of the Second World War, and according to the recollections of her colleagues, she was also a model of femininity and charm. Lydia (Lilya) Vladimirovna Litvyak was born on August 18, 1921 in Moscow, in the family of a railway worker. But in 1937, following a false denunciation, her father was arrested and shot as an “enemy of the people.” Lilya carefully concealed this fact in subsequent years. She “fell ill” with the sky early and at the age of 14 she joined a flying club, and a year later she made her first independent flight. But after finishing the seven-year school, she studied at a mechanical engineering college, and then took geological courses and even took part in an expedition to Far North. But I didn’t forget about aviation...
In 1940, Litvyak graduated from the Kherson Aviation School of Pilot Instructors of Osoaviakhim and got a job at the flying club of the city of Kalinin, where she soon became one of the best instructors and a qualified pilot. By the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, she managed to train 45 cadets - future pilots. And from the first days of the war, she was eager to go to the front.
Having completed advanced training courses for pilots, Lydia joined the active army in the fall of 1941, since in the face of the loss of a large number of career pilots, a decision was made at the state level to form three women's air regiments under the leadership of the legendary pilot M. Raskova. By the way, in order to get into these units, Litvyak attributed 100 missing hours to her flight time and was immediately enrolled in the 586th Fighter Aviation Regiment (IAP), which participated in the defense of Saratov. Having mastered the Yak-1 fighter, it was as part of this regiment in the skies of Saratov in the spring of 1942 that Lydia carried out her first combat missions, and soon had one group victory to her credit - the downing of a German Ju-88 bomber. In September of the same year, she was transferred to the 437th IAP near Stalingrad and literally immediately, during her second flight as part of this regiment, she shot down two German aircraft (a Ju-88 bomber and an Me-109 fighter), and that was only the beginning... It was then that a white lily was painted on the hood of the Litvyak plane, and the pilot received the nickname “ White Lily Stalingrad”, and “Lily” became her call sign on the radio.
After Stalingrad, Litvyak served in a separate women's unit at the division headquarters, then was transferred to the 9th Guards Odessa IAP - a kind of ace regiment, the so-called. a team of the best pilots, created to gain air superiority, and at the end of 1942 - in the 296th IAP. And everywhere she never ceased to amaze her male colleagues with her skill, successfully conducting air battles and shooting down German planes. And it was “in the sky” that Lydia met her love - fighter pilot Alexei Salomatin, with whom they married in April 1943 during a break between battles. However, the happiness was short-lived - soon her husband died in battle, and then her best friend Ekaterina Budanova. By the way, Litvyak herself was wounded three times during her participation in hostilities, twice made an emergency landing on enemy territory, but always returned to her regiment and to duty. But the war still continued... At the end of July 1943, on the Southern Front - at the line of the Mius River, which closed the road to Donbass, there were heavy battles to break through the German defense. The ground operations of the Red Army units were supported by Soviet aviation, stubbornly fighting for air superiority. Among the pilots who took part in these battles was Litvyak.
On August 1, 1943, having made three combat sorties in the Donetsk area, she personally shot down 2 enemy aircraft and 1 in the group, and from the fourth flight, the flight commander of the 3rd squadron of the 73rd Guards Fighter Aviation Regiment of the Guard, junior lieutenant Lydia Vladimirovna Litvyak, did not return... Her plane was attacked by the enemy, shot down, and was never seen again. The command urgently organized a search for her. But neither the plane nor the pilot herself could be found. As it was later established, Lydia Litvyak died while performing a combat mission in a battle over the Mius Front. She was only 21 years old, but during her short combat career during the war, she managed to become a real legend, showing courage and skill in the air, while shooting down the most aircraft among female pilots. In total, she made 186 combat missions, in which she conducted 69 air battles and won 16 victories (4 in the group), and also shot down a German spotter balloon.
Immediately after her death, the division command prepared the pilot’s nomination for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. However, since no remains were found, the performance was postponed. IN post-war years fellow soldiers and enthusiasts continued to search, but only in 1979 it was found and, during further investigation, documented that the remains of Lydia Litvyak were buried in mass grave on the territory of the village of Dmitrievka, Shakhtarsky district, Donetsk region.
By Decree of the President of the USSR dated May 5, 1990, Lydia Vladimirovna Litvyak was finally awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union (posthumously), the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal were handed over to her relatives for safekeeping, and on October 25, 1993, by Decree of the President of the Russian Federation, in recognition for her military merits during the Great Patriotic War, she was also awarded the title of Hero of Russia (posthumously). During her lifetime, the pilot was awarded the Order of the Red Star, the Red Banner and the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree. In Moscow, on the house where Lydia Litvyak lived before the war, a Memorial plaque, at the burial site, in the village of Dmitrievka, Donetsk region, installed memorial stone, and in the city of Krasny Luch in the central square there is a monument to the legendary pilot. https://cont.ws/@user3885/692748
The second stage of the large-scale Operation Bagration was aimed at liberating the Baltic states. The 1st Baltic Front advanced towards the Gulf of Riga to break the connections of the Riga and Kurlnyad groups of the German Army Group North. The German command in the northwestern direction tried to restore the front and sent more and more reserves. The Red Army experienced powerful enemy tank counterattacks.
One of these battles between Soviet artillerymen and German tank formations began in the area of the village of Bagachi (now Dobele region, Zemgale region, Latvia). At the beginning of August 1944, the Germans sent a large group of tanks to the village; the batteries of the 239th artillery regiment of the 77th had to repel the attack. rifle division 51st Army of the 1st Baltic Front.
The battery was commanded by Ukrainian Ivan Vladimirovich Borshchik; he had served in the Red Army since October 1939. During the war, he graduated from the Tbilisi Artillery School named after 26 Baku Commissars. During the war years, he distinguished himself in defensive operations to protect Odessa, Kuban, the Caucasus, and in offensive operations: when breaking through enemy defenses on the Molochnaya River, on Sivash, in the assault on Sapun Mountain.
The award sheet notes his personal qualities and military merits: “thanks to the courage and determination shown, the battery under his command destroyed 5 artillery batteries, 8 heavy machine guns, and up to 2 battalions of enemy infantry.”
Ivan Borshchik was repeatedly wounded during the battles, but refused treatment, remained in service and continued to command.
On August 19, in the town of Bagachi, his battery repelled eight tank attacks, five were hit German tanks. A day later, in the same place, the battle flared up again with renewed vigor. When not a single gunner remained alive, the senior lieutenant himself became a loader and gunner, and set fire to two tanks.
At this time, the wounded batteries fought off the infantry advance with rifles and machine guns. Another “Tiger” crawled towards the defensive positions of the Red Army soldiers. By that time the ammunition had run out, the battery commander, taking two anti-tank grenades in his hands, went towards the enemy tank. A shell fragment that exploded nearby wounded the artilleryman, but he, despite the pain, continued to move towards the tank. Two grenades reached their target, and he stopped the Tiger’s movement at the cost of his life.
Marshal of the Soviet Union Ivan Bagramyan in his memoirs “So We Walked to Victory” noted the heroic actions of the senior lieutenant: he “saved his comrades from death.”
For his accomplished feat, Ivan Vladimirovich Borshchik was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
Lydia Litvyak- the most successful female fighter of the Second World War, whose record for victories in the air is included in the Guinness Book of Records. The personal account of the Hero of the Soviet Union Lydia Litvyak includes 12 shot down enemy aircraft, and she stuck four more vultures into Soviet soil as part of a group, that is, with the help of her fellow pilots. IN in this case this is about confirmed victories. In reality, she shot down a couple more planes. Total: 18 defeated invaders and one more balloon - an artillery fire spotter. At the same time, Lydia Litvyak fought for only one year. During this time, she flew 168 combat missions and conducted 89 air battles. At less than 22 years old, she went missing during the liberation of Donbass...
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Many articles have been written about Lydia Litvyak and several have been filmed documentaries. They describe in great detail the entire combat path of the heroic pilot: where and under what circumstances she punished enemies, over which cities and villages she shot down “Messers” and “Junkers”, for what feats she received awards. I will not duplicate these facts, but will tell you a few stories from the short but very colorful life of the blond beauty Lida Litvyak. Simple “human” stories that I found most interesting.
I'll start with an amazing coincidence - Lida, whom all her family and close friends called Lilya, was born on August 18, 1921 - on All-Union Aviation Day. She was always incredibly proud of this fact. The girl was madly in love with the sky and airplanes. At the age of 14, she enrolled in the Central Aero Club named after Chkalov, and already at 15 she made her first independent flight. After Litvyak graduated from the Kherson Flight School, she became an instructor pilot and managed to place 45 cadets on the wing before the start of the war. Just think about it: the petite nineteen-year-old beauty trained 45 military pilots for the country!
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When the war started Soviet command decided to form three female air regiments from female volunteers under the leadership of the legendary pilot Marina Raskova .
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And Lydia Litvyak made every effort to get into the new part. By the way, in order to be enrolled in the 586th Fighter Aviation Regiment, Litvyak attributed 100 missing hours to her flight time. That is, she committed a serious forgery in the name of a great goal - for the sake of expelling the invaders from the territory of the Motherland.
Lydia successfully mastered the Yak-1 fighter and in her very first battle in the skies over Saratov, as part of a group, she shot down her first enemy bomber, a Junkers Ju-88. But during the second combat flight over Stalingrad, the young pilot did the incredible - she shot down two planes at once: a Junkers Ju-88 bomber and a Messerschmitt Bf.109 fighter. Moreover, she did this while rescuing her friend Raya Belyaeva, who had run out of ammunition, from trouble. Two victories - in one battle! And even during his second (only the second!) flight! You know, not every Soviet male pilot could boast of such an achievement in the fall of 1942. That is, the absence combat experience Litvyak’s skill was completely covered by her amazing flying skills. And probably luck too.
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Some sources report that the German pilot of the downed Me-109 that Lydia landed turned out to be a baron who had previously won 30 air victories. During interrogation, the captive baron wished to meet his winner. A blond, fragile, gentle-looking, blue-eyed girl came to meet him. This simply infuriated the baron. He thought that the Russians wanted to make fun of him! The former German celestial flew into a rage and exclaimed: "You are laughing at me!? I am a pilot who shot down more than thirty planes. I am a holder of the Knight's Cross! There's no way I could have been hit by this girl! That pilot fought masterfully!”
But when Lydia showed with gestures the details of the battle known only to the two of them, the baron changed his face, took off the gold watch from his hand and handed it to her, the girl who overthrew him from heaven.
Even in war, a woman wants to remain a woman. There is one funny memory about this in the memoirs of Litvyak’s colleagues. One day Lydia went out to general construction with a chic and unusual fur collar on the flight jacket. This was not according to the Charter. And then everyone suddenly realized where the fur came from - Lydia cut it off her high boots and decorated her collar with it. Commander Marina Raskova noticed this female “little thing” and ordered Litvyak to fix everything back. And she spent the entire night, instead of sleeping, being under arrest, returning her boots and jacket to their normal appearance.
According to the recollections of fellow soldiers, Lida loved to dress elegantly. She wore unusual things: a white balaclava, a sleeveless vest with the fur turned outward, chrome boots and long scarves made of parachute silk. In the summer, there was always a bouquet of wildflowers in the cockpit of her fighter. After several victories in the skies over Stalingrad, Lydia earned the right to a personal insignia - a white lily appeared on the fuselage of her Yak. And new radio call signs began to sound on the air: either simply "Lily" , or "White Lily - 44" . 44 is the tail number of her plane. And the girl herself was often called not Lida, but Lilya.
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A very interesting incident happened to her in mid-February 1943.
In one of the battles, her Yak-1 plane was shot down, and the pilot made an emergency landing on enemy territory. German infantry soldiers rushed to her and tried to take Lydia prisoner. She began to fire back with a pistol. And when Lida had only one cartridge left, our attack aircraft flew to the rescue. He swept over the heads of the Nazis, and, pouring fire on them, forced them to bury themselves in the ground. And then he landed next to White Lily and took her on board. Well, here's a ready-made tear-squeezing scene for a heroic feature film! Only if you remove it, the audience will say: - We don’t believe it! This doesn't happen!...
However, it happens. It still happens!
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At the beginning of 1943, Lydia Litvyak was transferred to the 296th Fighter Regiment aviation regiment and was assigned as a wingman to squadron commander Alexei Solomatin. For reference, in case anyone doesn’t know: the leading pilot must go on the attack, and the wingman must cover him. Love arose between the leader Solomatin and the wingman Litvyak, and after several months of joint flights, in April 1943, during a break between battles, the couple got married. But front-line family happiness did not last long...
May 21, Lida's husband Hero of the Soviet Union Alexey Solomatin died in a plane crash.
And a month later, Lida’s best friend died from multiple wounds - Katya Budanova .
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This fateful year of 1943 was the last for Lydia Litvyak herself. At the end of July there were terrible battles to break through the German defenses at the line of the Mius River, which closed the road to Donbass. The fighting on the ground was accompanied by a stubborn struggle for air superiority.
On August 1, 1943, White Lily made its last flight. On that day, Guard junior lieutenant Lydia Litvyak made four combat missions, (I especially emphasize: four combat missions!) during which she personally shot down two enemy aircraft and one more in the group. She did not return from the last fourth flight...
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Either physical fatigue and emotional stress took its toll, or the weapon failed. In the frantic whirlwind of the deadly carousel of a hot air battle, the plane with White Lily on board was shot down, but did not fall immediately, but entered the cloud zone and disappeared...
In two weeks, Lida Litvyak would have turned 22 years old.
For a long time, the brave pilot was considered missing. Of course, they were looking for her. And immediately after the liberation of Donbass, and after the war. They searched long and hard. For example, in 1967, in the city of Krasny Luch, Lugansk region, school teacher Valentina Ivanovna Vashchenko founded a search party called RVS, which stands for Scouts of Military Glory. While in the area of the Kozhevnya farm, the reconnaissance guys learned from local residents that in the summer of 1943, a Soviet fighter crashed on the outskirts of the farm. Its pilot, wounded in the head, was a girl. She was buried in the village of Dmitrovka, Shakhtarsky district, in a mass grave. Further investigation established that it could only be Lydia Litvyak. White Lily was identified by her two white pigtails.
Only 45 years after the death of the pilot, in 1988, an entry appeared in Lydia Litvyak’s personal file: “Died while performing a combat mission.”
And in 1990 she was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
P.S.
A selection of colorized photographs about the war. Look - what beautiful faces!
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Lydia (Lilya) Litvyak was born in Moscow on August 18, 1921 - USSR Air Fleet Day. People often joked about this at home: “Yes, she was destined to be a pilot.” Maybe an accidentally thrown joke sparked an interest in the flying profession in the girl’s mind. One way or another, by the age of fourteen Lilya had determined her calling. But you can enter the flying club only after two years. Sit back at home and wait for “coming of age”? And on the day the classes started, she headed to the flying club: from the old brick wing No. 14 on Novoslobodskaya, where Lida lived with her mother, father and younger brother Yura, to the regional flying club was no more than ten minutes on foot.
At the age of fifteen she made her first solo flight. And the war found her at an airfield near Moscow. Behind me is a ten-year course completed with honors, six months of intense study at the Kherson Flight School. And now she is already an instructor at the Kalinin Aero Club, training future pilots. Manages to train forty-five cadets.
The flying club received an order to evacuate to Ufa. In the days of preparation for departure, Lida learned from her longtime friend Raisa Surnachevskaya: by order of the High Command, a women's air group was being formed! Having attributed to herself the missing hundred flight hours, she achieved enrollment in the 586th Women's Fighter Aviation Regiment, formed in the city of Engels near Saratov by the legendary Marina Raskova. Olga Timofeevna Golubeva, a former aviation navigator, reserve captain (city of Saratov), recalls:
“I came there from school, and everything in me trembled: after all, I imagined the war in a romantic way. We, newcomers, yesterday's schoolgirls, looked at the pilots as if they were goddesses. And among them, one stood out, whom I really wanted to be like - cheerful, flirtatious, mischievous... Lilya was good! Slender, green-eyed, with a charming smile and a ringing, musical laugh... They gave her a jumpsuit to match her eye color - green. And his collar was red. It would be nice to decorate with some kind of fur... Conceived - done: Lilya ripped open the white fur ducklings, sewed a collar out of them and attached them to the overalls. Eye-catching!<…>And so they lined up at the airfield, and suddenly Raskova, seeing Lily’s overalls “in furs,” said sternly: “Sergeant Litvyak, get out of formation!” What is it? Take off, rip, sew the ducklings again and report!“ - “Comrade Major! - said Lilya. “Doesn’t it suit me?” - “What-o-o?!” Three outfits out of turn!!“” .
Senior Sergeant Litvyak made her first combat flight in the skies over Saratov in the summer of 1942. Motorized columns of the Wehrmacht rolled along the steppe roads towards the Volga and the Caucasus. In August, having flown out to intercept bombers, Lydia shot down a Junkers 88 in the group. On September 10, together with the three most trained girls, she, as part of a fighter flight, was transferred to the 437th Fighter Aviation Regiment (287th Fighter Aviation Division of the 8th Air Army of the South-Eastern Front). Already on September 13, on the second combat mission over Stalingrad, Lidiya Vladimirovna shot down a Yu-88 bomber and a Me-109 fighter. The pilot of the Messer turned out to be non-commissioned officer of the 53rd fighter squadron “Ace of Spades” Erwin Meyer, who won eleven aerial victories and was a holder of the Knight's Cross. During interrogation, the ace asked to show him the pilot who “landed” his fighter so beautifully. Seeing the fragile blond beauty, he didn’t believe it and asked the translator several times:
"Who is this?" Then Litvyak showed with her palms the maneuvers of the German and her own fighters. He bowed his head respectfully.
On September 27, in an air battle from a distance of 30 meters (as the pilots put it, “with a pistol shot”), Litvyak hit a Yu‑88 bomber, and together with Raisa Belyaeva, a Me‑109 fighter. Then, at Litvyak’s request, a large white lily was painted on the hood of her plane with tail number “44.”
Immediately among the pilots on both sides of the front, the girl received the nickname “White Lily of Stalingrad.” The words “I am Lily” became her radio call sign.
Soon, by order of the commander of the 8th Air Army, General T. T. Khryukin, Litvyak was transferred to the 9th Guards Fighter Aviation Regiment - the “Stalingrad team” of the best pilots. At the end of December, near her airfield, she destroyed a Dornier 217 long-range bomber. The women's aviation unit won new victories after its transfer on January 8, 1943 to the 296th Fighter Aviation Regiment. Despite the difficult meteorological situation, by February Litvyak had completed sixteen combat missions to escort attack aircraft, reconnaissance of enemy troops and cover ground troops. On February 5, Litvyak was presented with the Order of the Red Star. On February 11, the regiment commander, Major Nikolai Baranov, led four fighters into battle. And again, as in September 1942, Lydia won: she shot down a Junkers-88 bomber and, together with the regiment commander, the newest Focke-Wulf-190 fighter.
During one of the flights, covering a group of attack aircraft, the Yak-1 was shot down. Lydia Litvyak made an emergency landing in a wounded car on enemy territory. Jumping out of the cabin, she, firing back with a pistol, rushed to run from the Germans. The distance between them was quickly closing, now the last, eighth cartridge in the TT. And suddenly our attack aircraft flew over the heads of the enemy. Pouring fire on the German soldiers, he forced them to throw themselves to the ground. Then, having lowered the landing gear, he planned and stopped next to Lida. The pilot waved his arms, the girl rushed towards him and squeezed into the pilot’s lap. The plane took off...
On February 23, Sergeant Litvyak was awarded the Order of the Red Star (a little earlier, on December 22, 1942, she was awarded the medal “For the Defense of Stalingrad”).
The front moved west and ran into a powerful line of German defense - the Mius Front. The pilots of the 8th Air Army of the Southern Front also relocated to Don airfields. On March 22, in the Rostov area, Lida and her squadron took part in the interception of twenty-five German bombers. During the battle, they managed to shoot down the Junkers. Having first noticed six Me‑109 fighters, she entered into an unequal battle, allowing her comrades to complete the task. During the battle, she was seriously wounded, but managed to bring the damaged plane to the airfield and lost consciousness only after turning off the engine.
After treatment in the hospital, Litvyak was sent home to the capital for further treatment, but a week later she returned to the regiment. There was a good reason for this. At the front, Lydia met her love - a pilot from their regiment, the guard, Captain Alexei Frolovich Solomatin, a native of Kaluga. The young people fell in love with each other and in April 1943, during a break between battles, they married. On May 1, Alexey was awarded a Hero, the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal.
Alexey and Lida were making plans for the future. The consciousness of great personal happiness gave them strength. On May 5 they flew out to escort bombers. Lida shot down a fighter. On May 6, the commander of the 73rd Guards Fighter Aviation Regiment, Hero of the Soviet Union, Guard Major Nikolai Ivanovich Baranov, tragically died. The next day, the White Lily shot down another fighter. At the beginning of May, the 15-16th issue of the popularly beloved magazine “Ogonyok” was published; on the cover, against the background of the number 12, were printed photos of Litvyak and her fighting friend.
The number of planes shot down by Lida increased, she was awarded the second Order of the Red Banner, promoted to junior lieutenant and appointed flight commander.
But Lily's happiness at the front was short-lived. On May 21, Alexei's fighter exploded over the airfield, right before her eyes... Lily's closest friend was Katya Budanova, who loved Nikolai Baranov. Grief united the girls and helped them endure the harsh everyday life. At the end of May, Litvyak shot down an enemy balloon - an artillery fire spotter - which had been invulnerable for a long time due to strong anti-aircraft cover. Several of our pilots died while trying to destroy the “German sausage.” Lilya acted unconventionally: she flew around the balloon, went deeper into the enemy’s rear and approached the enemy against the sun. For this victory, by order of the commander Southern Front she was awarded the Order of the Red Banner for the third time
On June 15, Lydia Litvyak shot down a Junkers-88, and then, fighting off six German fighters, also a Messer. She was slightly injured and refused to go to the hospital.
On June 19, in a battle with German fighters, Litvyak and Budanova were shot down. Litvyak managed to jump out of a parachute. Katya failed to escape. She had eleven aircraft shot down; in 1998 she was awarded the title of Hero of Russia...
On July 21, in an unequal battle over Mius, the commander of the guard regiment, Colonel Ivan Vasilyevich Golyshev, died. Lydia Vladimirovna Litvyak vowed to take revenge on the enemy.
At the end of July - beginning of August 1943, battles took place to break through the German defenses on the Mius Front. Battles on the ground were accompanied by an uncompromising struggle for air superiority. On August 1, Lydia Litvyak made four combat missions, during which she shot down three aircraft. Didn't return from last flight...
That day, a group of nine Yaks, having entered into battle with thirty Yu-88 bombers and a dozen Me-109 fighters, began a deadly whirlwind. The downed Litvyak Junkers caught fire, and the Messer fell to pieces. Coming out of the next dive, Lydia saw that the enemy had turned west. Our group also gathered. Pressing close to the top edge of the clouds, the pilots flew to their airfield. Suddenly, a Messer jumped out of the white cloud cover and, before diving back into the clouds, managed to fire a burst at the leader of the third pair with tail number “23.” Lidin’s “Yak” seemed to fall down, but the pilot near the ground apparently tried to level it... In any case, that’s what Sergeant Tabunov, Litvyak’s wingman in that battle, told his comrades.
However, neither her nor the plane could be found. After the death of Sergeant Evdokimov in September 1943 - he alone knew in which area the Yak fell - the search was stopped.
It was then that Lydia Vladimirovna Litvyak was awarded the title of Hero by the command of the 73rd Guards Fighter Aviation Regiment. But soon one of the downed pilots returned from enemy territory. He reported that, according to local residents, our fighter landed on the road near the village of Marinovka. The pilot turned out to be a girl - blond, short in stature. A car with German officers drove up to the plane, and the girl left with them...
Most of my fellow soldiers did not believe it. The rumor reached higher headquarters. Since neither the captured nor the missing could be Heroes, the command of the 8th Air Army showed caution, limiting itself to the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree.
...Once, at the moment of revelation, Lilya confessed to Inna Passportnikova, the mechanic who was servicing her plane: “What I am most afraid of is being missing. Anything but this.” There was reason for concern: Lida’s father was shot in 1937 as an enemy of the people. The girl understood perfectly what it meant for her, the daughter of a repressed man, to go missing.
They searched for Lydia, searched long and hard: back in the summer of 1946, the commander of the 73rd Guards Fighter Aviation Regiment, Lieutenant Colonel Ivan Ivanovich Zapryagaev, sent several people to the Marinovka area. Litvyak's fellow soldiers were several days late: the wreckage of the Yak with the number "23" had already been taken out for scrap...
In 1968, Komsomolskaya Pravda made an attempt to restore the pilot’s honest name. Litvyak and fellow soldiers, primarily Pasportnikova and her husband, did not stop trying to find out the place of death. In 1971, pathfinders from school No. 1 in the city of Krasny Luch, together with teacher Valentina Ivanovna Vashchenko, joined the search. And on July 23, 1979, their search was crowned with success! Questioning the old resident of the village of Dmitrievka, Fyodor Andreevich Mikhailov, the guys learned that in the summer of 1943, three kilometers from the village, on the outskirts of the Kozhevnya farm, a Soviet fighter crashed. The pilot, with a bullet hole in his forehead, was a woman. Her decayed remains were discovered by boys, brothers Nikolai and Fyodor Sachek and their friend Sergei Sanitsky, on the edge of a forest belt near the Kozhevnya farm. The unknown pilot was buried on July 29, 1969 in mass grave No. 19 in the center of the village of Dmitrievka. Was it Lydia? This is what Inna Vladimirovna Passportnikova, who took part in the excavations, wrote:
“I personally have no doubt that we found the remains of Lily Litvyak and the landing site of her plane, and here’s why. Firstly, the date matches. Lilya did not return from a combat mission on August 1, 1943, and on August 4, residents of the Kozhevnya farm, who were the first to return from evacuation... discovered a still smoking fighter on the outskirts of the farm.
<…>Secondly... the plane really was a fighter.<…>Thirdly, the location matches. The battle took place in the Marinovka area when Lily’s plane was shot down.<…>Fourthly... almost everyone who took part in the reburial knew that a woman was reburied in 1969. And since in the entire Eighth Air Army, operating along the Mius Front line in August 1943, the only woman was Lilya Litvyak, which means there can be no doubt: she died at the Kozhevnya farm...".
In November 1988, by order of the Deputy Minister of Defense of the USSR, a change was made to paragraph 22 of the order of the Main Personnel Directorate dated September 16, 1943: “Missing on August 1, 1943. It should be read: died while performing a combat mission on August 1, 1943.” . Veterans of the regiment in which Lydia Litvyak fought renewed their petition to award her the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Justice triumphed: on May 5, 1990, M. S. Gorbachev signed a decree. The Order of Lenin No. 460056 and the Gold Star medal No. 11616 were handed over to the relatives of the deceased for safekeeping. In Moscow, at house number 14 on Novoslobodskaya Street, where Lida lived and from where she went to the front, there is a memorial plaque. A memorial plate was installed at the burial site in the village of Dmitrievka, now Snezhnyansky district of the Donetsk region.
Guard junior lieutenant of aviation Lydia Vladimirovna Litvyak in eleven months made one hundred and sixty-eight combat missions, conducted eighty air battles, shot down eleven personally and three in a group of enemy aircraft and a balloon. She became the most successful female fighter pilot of World War II.
Bright memory!
NOTES
1. Agranovsky V. A. Faces. M., 1982.
2. TsAMO RF. F. 73 Guards IAP. Op. 208668. D. 1. L. 242.
3. Vlasov P. White Lily of Stalingrad // Vzor. 2001. No. 3. P. 29-30.
4. Order of the deputy. USSR Minister of Defense for Personnel No. 251 1988 // TsAMO RF. F. 58. Op. 18001. D. 600. L. 389.
Lydia Litvyak, the most successful female fighter of the Second World War, according to the recollections of her colleagues, was a model of femininity and charm. The short, blond girl was very reserved about the enthusiastic looks and words of her fellow soldiers and, what especially impressed the pilots, she did not give preference to anyone. The main thing for her was the fight against fascism, and she devoted all her strength to this.
Liliya Litvyak was born on August 18, 1921 in Moscow. At the age of 14 she entered the flying club, and at 15 she made her first solo flight. Then she took geology courses and took part in an expedition to the Far North.
After graduating from the Kherson pilot school, she became one of the best instructors at the Kalinin flying club. By the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, she managed to “put on the wing” 45 cadets - future air fighters.
From the first days of the war, Litvyak tried to get to the front. And when I found out that I had started forming women’s air regiments, I quickly achieved my goal. By cheating, she managed to add 100 flight hours to her existing flight time and was assigned to Marina Raskova’s air group.
Senior Sergeant Inna Pasportnikova, who was a technician on Lydia Litvyak’s aircraft during the war, recalls:
“In October 1941, when we were still training at a training base near Engels, during formation Lily was ordered to get out of formation. She was in her winter uniform, and we all saw that she had cut off the tops of her fur boots to make a fashionable collar for her flight suit. Our commander Marina Raskova asked when she did this, and Lilya answered: “At night...”
Raskova said that the next night Lilya, instead of sleeping, would rip off the collar and sew the fur back onto the high boots. She was also arrested, put in a separate room, and she really spent the whole night re-sewing the fur.
This was the first time that other women paid attention to Lilya, since no one had even noticed this short, petite girl before. At 20 years old, she was so thin, pretty and very similar to the popular actress Serova in those years. It’s a strange thing: there was a war going on, and this little girl with blond hair was thinking about some kind of fur collar...”
The brave pilot made her first combat missions as part of the 586th Women's Fighter Aviation Regiment in the spring of 1942 in the skies of Saratov, covering the Volga from enemy air raids. From April 15 to September 10, 1942, she carried out 35 combat missions to patrol and escort transport aircraft with important cargo.
On September 10, 1942, as part of the same regiment, she arrived at Stalingrad and in a short period of time made 10 combat missions.
At the end of September, she achieved a transfer as part of a group of female pilots to the 437th Fighter Aviation Regiment, which defended the skies of Stalingrad.
The women's fighter unit did not last long. His commander was soon shot down and, after a forced parachute jump, was treated for a long time. Following her, M. Kuznetsova was out of action due to illness. There were only 2 pilots left in the regiment: L. Litvyak and. It was they who achieved the highest results in battles. Soon Lydia shot down another Junkers.
Since October 10, the female couple was operationally subordinate to the 9th Guards Fighter Aviation Regiment. She has already shot down 3 German planes, one of which she personally had when she joined the regiment of Soviet aces. The short but noticeable stay of Lily Litvyak in the regiment, her technician Inna Pasportnikova and Katya Budanova remained in the memory of the Guardsmen for a long time.
In those days, the main task of the girls was to cover the strategically important front-line center (the city of Zhitvur) and escort transport aircraft. Litvyak completed 58 such combat missions.
For excellent performance of command assignments, Lydia was enrolled in the group of “free hunters” for enemy aircraft. Arriving at the forward airfield, she completed 5 combat missions and conducted 5 air battles. The school of the 9th Guards IAP tempered the brave female pilots and improved their combat skills.
Their glory was crowned with new military victories even after their transfer on January 8, 1943 to the 296th Fighter Aviation Regiment. By February, Litvyak had completed 16 combat missions to escort attack aircraft, reconnaissance of enemy troops and cover our ground forces.
On February 5, 1943, under the command of the 296th IAP, Sergeant L.V. Litvyak was presented with her first award - the Order of the Red Star.
On February 11, 1943, regiment commander Lieutenant Colonel N.I. Baranov led four fighters into battle. And again, as in September 1942, Lida won a double victory: she shot down a Ju-88 bomber personally and in a group.
In one of the battles, her Yak was shot down and Lydia made an emergency landing on enemy territory. Jumping out of the cabin, she fired back and ran away from the German soldiers approaching her.
But the distance between them was quickly closing. Now the last cartridge remained in the barrel... And suddenly our attack aircraft flew over the heads of the enemy. Pouring fire on the German soldiers, he forced them to throw themselves to the ground. Then, having lowered the landing gear, he glides next to Lida and stops. Without getting out of the plane, the pilot desperately waved his hands. The girl rushed forward, squeezed into the pilot’s lap, the plane took off and soon Lida was in the regiment...
On February 23, 1943, Litvyak was awarded a new military award - the Order of the Red Star. A little earlier, on December 22, 1942, she was awarded the medal “For the Defense of Stalingrad.”
In the spring, the situation in the air became even more complicated. On April 22, in the skies of Rostov, she participated in the interception of a group of 12 Ju-88s and shot down one of them. The six Me-109s that came to the aid of the Junkers immediately went on the attack. Lydia was the first to notice them and, in order to disrupt the sudden attack, stood alone in their path. The death carousel spun for 15 minutes. With great difficulty, the pilot, who was wounded in the leg, brought the crippled Yak home. Having reported that the task was completed, she lost consciousness...
After a short treatment in the hospital, she went to Moscow, giving a receipt that she would continue her treatment at home for a month. But a week later Lydia returned to the regiment.
On May 5, not yet fully strengthened, Litvyak flew out to accompany the group to the Stalino area. In the target area, our group was attacked by enemy fighters. In the ensuing battle, Lydia attacked and shot down an Me-109 fighter.
In April 1943, the very popular Ogonyok magazine placed on the front page (cover) a photo of fighting friends - Lydia Litvyak and Ekaterina Budanova and a short explanation: “12 enemy planes were shot down by these brave girls.”
At the end of May, in the sector of the front where the regiment operated, the Germans effectively used a spotter balloon. Repeated attempts to shoot down this “sausage”, covered by strong anti-aircraft fire and fighters, led to nothing.
Lydia solved this problem. On May 31, having risen into the air, it walked along the front line to the side, then went deeper into the enemy’s rear and approached the balloon from the depths of enemy territory, from the direction of the sun. The short attack lasted less than one minute!... For this brilliant victory, junior lieutenant Litvyak received gratitude from the Commander of the 44th Army.
By that time, the name of Lydia Litvyak was already well known not only in the 8th Air Army. The command allowed Lida to fly for “free hunting.” On the hood of her Yak, Litvyak painted a bright, visible from afar, white lily.
On July 16, 1943, accompanying the Il-2 group to the front line, six of our Yaks began a battle with the enemy. 30 Junkers and 6 Messers tried to strike our troops, but their plan was thwarted. In this battle, Litvyak personally shot down one enemy Ju-88 bomber and knocked out an Me-109 fighter. But her plane was also shot down. Pursued by the enemy all the way to the ground, she managed to land her Yak on the fuselage. The infantrymen watching the battle covered her landing with fire. They were delighted to learn that the girl turned out to be a fearless pilot. Despite minor shrapnel wounds in the leg and shoulder, she categorically refused the demand to go for treatment.
On July 20, 1943, under the command of the 73rd Guards Stalingrad Fighter Aviation Regiment, Guard flight commander Junior Lieutenant L.V. Litvyak was presented with the Order of the Red Banner. By that time, according to the award document, she had completed more than 140 combat missions, shot down 5 enemy aircraft personally and 4 enemy aircraft as part of a group, as well as 1 observation balloon.
On August 1, 1943, flight commander of the 3rd squadron of the 73rd Guards Fighter Aviation Regiment of the Guard, junior lieutenant L.V. Litvyak did not return from the combat mission.
According to the last award document dated August 8, 1943, Lydia Litvyak flew 150 combat missions. In air battles, she personally shot down 6 enemy aircraft (1 Ju-87, 3 Ju-88, 2 Me-109) and 1 spotter balloon; as part of the group, she shot down 6 more aircraft and knocked out 2. [indicates 4 individual and 3 group victories.]
The brave pilot was awarded the orders of the Red Banner, Patriotic War 1st degree, and the Red Star.
Describing her as an air fighter, the former commander of the 273rd IAP, with whom Lida had to fight for some time, Boris Eremin recalled:
“She was a born pilot. She had a special talent as a fighter, she was brave and decisive, inventive and careful. She could see the air."
On that fateful day, she flew 3 combat missions. In one of them, together with a wingman, she shot down an Me-109. On the 4th flight, a group of 9 Yaks, having entered into battle with 30 Ju-88 bombers and 12 Me-109 fighters, began a deadly whirlwind. And now the Junkers, shot down by someone, is already burning, then the Messer is falling apart into pieces. Coming out of the next dive, Lydia saw that the enemy was leaving. Our group also gathered. Pressing close to the top edge of the clouds, the pilots flew home.
Yak-1B L.V. Litvyak is her last machine. 73rd Guards IAP, summer 1943.
Suddenly, a Messer jumped out of the white veil and, before diving back into the clouds, managed to fire a burst at the leader of the 3rd pair with tail number “23”. Lidin’s “Yak” seemed to have failed, but near the ground the pilot apparently tried to level it out... In any case, that’s what Lydia’s wingman in this battle, Alexander Evdokimov, told his comrades. This gave birth to hope that Lida remained alive.
A search for her was urgently organized. However, neither the pilot nor her plane could be found. After the death of Sergeant Evdokimov in one of the battles, who was the only one who knew in which area Lidin “Yak” fell, the official search was stopped.
It was then that pilot Lydia Vladimirovna Litvyak was posthumously presented by the regiment command to the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. The front-line newspaper “Red Banner” dated March 7, 1944 wrote about her as a fearless falcon, a pilot who was known to all the soldiers of the 1st Ukrainian Front.
Soon one of the previously shot down pilots returned from enemy territory. He reported that, according to local residents, our fighter landed on the road near the village of Marinovka. The pilot turned out to be a girl - blond, short in stature. A car with German officers approached the plane, and the girl left with them...
This is what fighter pilot Dmitry Panteleevich Panov writes in his memoirs:
“Women aviators were a real barbarity. Not only is it not so easy for a woman to go to a small or large need at airfields, as we know - open spaces, but male pilots decide relatively simply. Moreover, there are no amenities provided on airplanes. For the pilots, they even sewed specially cut overalls with a detachable lower part. And our fathers, the commanders, were not at all interested in the monthly cycles, during which a woman should not be allowed anywhere near the plane. That's how it was real practice participation of women in flying in peacetime.
It was no better during the war. We suffered a lot of grief, in particular, with Lilya Litvyak, who had to be made a heroine and God forbid not to allow the “Messers” to gobble her up. It was not easy to achieve this if Lilya, judging by her maneuvers in the air, often had little idea where and why she was flying. It ended with Lilya being shot down in the Donetsk area and she jumped out with a parachute. Our pilots, who were captured together with Lilya, said that they saw her driving around the city in a car with German officers...”
Most of the aviators did not believe the rumor and continued to try to find out Lydia’s fate. But the shadow of suspicion had already spread beyond the regiment and reached higher headquarters. The command, showing “caution,” did not approve Litvyak’s nomination for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, limiting it to the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree.
Once, at the moment of revelation, Lydia said to the plane mechanic, her friend: “What I am most afraid of is being missing. Anything but this.” There were good reasons for such concern. Lida's father was arrested and shot as an "enemy of the people" in 1937. The girl understood perfectly well what it meant for her, the daughter of a repressed man, to go missing. No one and nothing will save her good name.
Fate played a cruel joke on her, preparing just such a fate. But they searched for Lydia, searched long and hard. Back in the summer of 1946, the commander of the 73rd Guards IAP, Ivan Zapryagaev, sent several people to the Marinovka area in a car to search for her trace. Unfortunately, Litvyak’s fellow soldiers were literally a few days late. The wreckage of Lidya’s “Yak” has already been destroyed...
In 1968, the Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper made an attempt to restore the pilot’s honest name. In 1971, young pathfinders from school No. 1 in the city of Krasny Luch joined the search. In the summer of 1979, their search was crowned with success!
While in the area of the Kozhevnya farm, the guys learned that in the summer of 1943 a Soviet fighter crashed on its outskirts. The pilot wounded in the head was a woman. She was buried in the village of Dmitrievka, Shakhtarsky district, in a mass grave. It was Lida, which was confirmed by further investigations.
In July 1988, the name of Lydia Vladimirovna Litvyak was immortalized at her burial place, and veterans of the regiment in which she fought renewed their petition to award her the title of Hero of the Soviet Union posthumously. And justice triumphed - almost half a century later, by Decree of the President of the USSR of May 5, 1990, this title was awarded to her! The Order of Lenin No. 460056 and the Gold Star medal No. 11616 were transferred for safekeeping to the relatives of the deceased Heroine.
In Moscow, at house No. 14 on Novoslobodskaya Street, where the Heroine lived and from where she went to the front, a memorial plaque was installed. A memorial plaque was also installed at the burial site, in the village of Dmitrievka, Snezhnyansky district, Donetsk region.
List of victories of Lydia Litvyak
| Total aircraft shot down: 5+3; 1 balloon | |||
| date | Enemy aircraft | Air battle location | Notes |
| September 13, 1942 | Junkers Ju-88 | west of Gumrak | in group 1/4 |
| September 27, 1942 | Junkers Ju-88 | Stalingrad (STZ) | |
| September 27, 1942 | Messerschmitt Me-109 | Stalingrad (STZ) | in pair 1/2 |
| February 11, 1943 | Messerschmitt Me-109 | Funny | |
| March 22, 1943 | Junkers Ju-88 | Chaltyr-Sinyavka | |
| May 5, 1943 | Messerschmitt Me-109 | south of Stalino | |
| May 31, 1943 | balloon | Kondakovka | |
| July 19, 1943 | Messerschmitt Me-109 | Pervomayskoye | |
| July 31, 1943 | Messerschmitt Me-109 | west of Petrovsky | in group 1/3 |