Anna Yegorova
| Anna Yegorova | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Native name | Анна Александровна Тимофеева-Егорова |
| Born | 23 September 1916 |
| Died | 29 October 2009 (aged 93) |
| Allegiance |
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| Service/ |
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| Years of service | 1941–1945 |
| Rank | Senior Lieutenant |
| Unit |
130th Air Liaison Squadron (1941–1942) 805th Attack Aviation Regiment (1943–1944) |
| Awards |
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Senior Lieutenant Anna Alexandrovna Timofeyeva-Yegorova (Russian: Анна Александровна Тимофеева-Егорова; 23 September 1916 – 29 October 2009) was a pilot in the Red Army Air Force (VVS) during the Second World War. She flew a total of 277 missions that included liaison, reconnaissance and ground-attack missions. She was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
Early years
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Anna Yegorova was born into a peasant family in the village Volodovo (now in Tver Oblast). She had sixteen siblings, eight of whom died in infancy. Her father, Alexander Yegorov, fought in the First World War as well as the Russian Civil War as a Bolshevist. Combat stress and other hardships deteriorated his health, and in 1925 he died at 49 years of age.
After seven years of school, Yegorova joined Mosmetrostroy, where she worked as a steelman, and then as a tiler on the construction of Krasnye Vorota station.
Working for Mosmetrostroy allowed her to fly in the Mosmetrostroy aero club.
In 1938, she was recommended to attend the Ulyanovsk flight school, but was soon expelled due to her brother's arrest as an "enemy of the people".
After her expulsion, Yegorova worked as a bookkeeper's assistant at a weaving factory in Smolensk, while tutoring members of the factory's aero club.
Yegorova was recommended to attend the Kherson flight school, graduating in 1939. Soon after, Yegorova became a flight instructor for the Kalinin (now Tver) municipal aero club.
Military career
After the start of Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the U.S.S.R by Germany, Yegorova volunteered for combat service. From 1941 to 1942, Yegorova flew 233 reconnaissance and delivery missions[1] for the 130th Air Liasion Squadron in a Polikarpov Po-2, and was subsequently awarded the Order of the Red Banner for distinguished service.
After an aircrash, which was determined to be pilot error, Yegorova was transferred to a training air regiment. In 1943, Yegorova was transferred to the 805th Attack Aviation Regiment and flew 41 missions in the Ilyushin Il-2. These missions included the battles above the Taman Peninsula, Crimea, and Poland .
During an August 1944 mission, while in an attack formation of 15 aircraft over the Magnuszew bridgehead ,near Warsaw, Poland , Yegorova's plane was hit by anti-aircraft fire.
With her gunner killed, and the plane heavily damaged,Yegorova exited the aircraft while the plane was inverted, and suffered serious thermal burns.Yegorova's parachute only partially opened, and was seriously wounded, again, after landing.
After receiving medical treatment by her German captors, Yegorova was taken to a prisoner of war camp where her wounds were treated further by Dr. Georgy Sinyakov. Back at her air base, Yegorova was presumed dead and was recommended for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, but this resulted in the awarding of the Order of the Patriotic War 1st class instead.
On 31 January 1945, Soviet forces overran the Küstrin prisoner camp where she was being held. Yegorova was interrogated as a potential traitor for eleven days at an NKVD filtration camp for returning Soviet prisoners.
After witnesses testified to the validity of her injuries and conduct, Yegorova was released from custody, but was medically discharged from the Soviet Arned Forces in 1945.
After the War
After her discharge from the Soviet Union Armed Forces, Anna Yegorova married Vyacheslav Timofeev, the commander of her last air division, and became a housewife. Against the advice of physicians Yegorova bore two sons named Pyotr and Igor, respectively.
Because of her former P.O.W status, Yegorova's membership in the Communist Party was suspended and to forfeit her party's card "...for the failure to pay the membership dues during five months.".
She struggled to be reinstated to the Communist Party, and succeeded only after the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
Anna Yegorova was the subject of a feature article in the Literaturnaya Gazeta in 1961, and in 1965, she was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
Honours and awards
- Hero of the Soviet Union
- Order of Lenin
- Two Orders of the Red Banner
- Two Orders of the Patriotic War 1st class
- Medal "For the Defence of the Caucasus"
- Medal "For the Victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945"
- Jubilee Medal "Twenty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945"
- Jubilee Medal "Thirty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945"
- Jubilee Medal "Forty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945"
- Jubilee Medal "50 Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945"
- Jubilee Medal "60 Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945"
- Jubilee Medal "30 Years of the Soviet Army and Navy"
- Jubilee Medal "40 Years of the Armed Forces of the USSR"
- Jubilee Medal "50 Years of the Armed Forces of the USSR"
- Jubilee Medal "60 Years of the Armed Forces of the USSR"
- Jubilee Medal "70 Years of the Armed Forces of the USSR"
See also
References
Bibliography
- Cottam, Kazimiera. Women in War and Resistance: Selected Biographies of Soviet Women Soldiers. Nepean, Canada: New Military Publishing, 1998.
- Noggle, Anne. A Dance With Death: Soviet Airwomen in World War II. College Station, TX: Texas A&M University Press, 1994.
- Timofeyeva-Yegorova, Anna. trans. Margarita Ponomaryova, Kim Green. ed. Kim Green. Red Sky, Black Death: A Soviet Woman Pilot's Memoir of the Eastern Front. Bloomington, IN: Slavica Publishers, 2009.
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