Children of the Great Patriotic War

War has no face. War has no age, gender, or nationality. The war is terrible. War does not choose. Every year we remember the war that claimed millions of lives. Every year we thank those who fought for our country.

From 1941 to 1945, several tens of thousands of minor children took part in military operations. The "Sons of the regiment", the pioneers-village boys and girls, children from the cities-they were posthumously recognized as heroes, although they were much younger than you and me. On a par with adults, they suffered hardships, defended, shot, were captured, sacrificing their own lives. They ran away from home to the front to defend their homeland. They stayed at home and suffered terrible hardships. In the rear and on the front line, they performed a small feat every day. They didn't have time for childhood, they didn't have the years to grow up. They grew up by the minute, because the war is not a child's face. 

This collection contains only some of the stories of children who died on the front line for their own country; children who did things that adults were afraid to think about; children who were deprived of their childhood by the war, but not of their strength of spirit.

Marat Kazei, 14 years old, partisan

A member of the partisan detachment named after the 25th anniversary of October, a scout of the headquarters of the 200th partisan brigade named after Rokossovsky in the occupied territory of the Belarusian SSR.

Marat was born in 1929 in the village of Stankovo, Minsk region of Belarus, and managed to finish the 4th grade of a rural school. His parents were arrested on charges of sabotage and Trotskyism, and his brothers and sisters were "scattered" among their grandparents. But the Kazeyev family was not angry with the Soviet government: in 1941, when Belarus became an occupied territory, Anna Kazey, the wife of the "enemy of the people" and the mother of little Marat and Ariadne, hid wounded partisans, for which she was hanged. Marat joined the partisans. He went on reconnaissance missions, participated in raids and blew up train trains. 

And in May 1944, when performing another task near the village of Khoromitskiye, Minsk region, a 14-year-old soldier was killed. Returning from a mission together with the intelligence commander, they came across the Germans. The commander was killed immediately, and Marat, firing back, lay in a hollow. There was nowhere to go, the teenager was seriously wounded in the arm. While there were cartridges, he held the defense, and when the magazine was empty, he took the last weapon — two grenades from his belt. He threw one at the Germans at once, and waited with the second: when the enemies came very close, he blew himself up with them.

In 1965, Marat Kazei was awarded the title of Hero.

Boris Yasen, young actor

Boris Yasen is an actor who played Mishka Kvakin in the film "Timur and his Team". According to some sources, in 1942, he returned from the front to take part in the filming of the film "The Oath of Timur". To date, the young actor is considered missing. In the DB "Memorial" there is no information about Boris.

Valya Kotik, 14 years old, scout

Valya is one of the youngest Heroes. Born in 1930 in the village of Khmelevka, Shepetovsky district, Kamianets-Podil region, Ukraine. In a village occupied by German troops, a boy secretly collected weapons and ammunition and handed them over to the partisans. And he led his own little war, as he understood it: he drew and pasted caricatures of the Nazis in prominent places. In 1942, he began to carry out intelligence assignments from an underground party organization, and in the fall of the same year, he completed his first combat mission — he eliminated the chief of the field gendarmerie. In October 1943, Valya scouted the location of the underground telephone cable of the Hitler headquarters, which was soon undermined. He also participated in the destruction of six railway trains and a warehouse. The guy was fatally wounded in February 1944.

In 1958, Valentin Kotik was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

Sasha Kolesnikov, 12 years old, son of the regiment

In March 1943, Sasha and a friend ran away from school and went to the front. He wanted to get to the unit where his father served as a commander, but on the way he met a wounded tankman who fought in his father's unit. Then I learned that my father had received news of his escape from his mother, and that a terrible scolding awaited him on his arrival at the unit. This changed the boy's plans, and he immediately joined the tankers, who were heading to the rear for re-formation. Sasha lied to them that he was all alone. So at the age of 12, he became a soldier, "the son of the regiment".

Several times he successfully went on reconnaissance, helped to destroy a train with German ammunition. At that time, the Germans caught the boy and, brutalized, beat him for a long time, and then crucified him — nailed his hands with nails. Sasha was saved by our scouts. During his service, Sasha grew up to be a tank driver and shot down several enemy vehicles. The soldiers called him San Sanych.

He returned home in the summer of 1945.

Alyosha Yarsky, 17 years old

Alexey was an actor, you can remember him from the film "Gorky's Childhood", in which the boy played Lesha Peshkov. The guy went to the front as a volunteer when he was 17 years old. He died on February 15, 1943 near Leningrad.

Lenya Golikov, 16 years old

When the war began, Lenya got a rifle and joined the partisans. Thin, small in stature, he looked younger than his then 14 years old. Under the guise of a beggar, Lenya went around the villages, collecting the necessary data on the location of the fascist troops and the number of their military equipment, and then passed this information to the partisans.

In 1942, he joined a partisan unit. I went to the intelligence service, brought important information. One battle Lenya led alone against the fascist general. A grenade thrown by the boy hit the car. The Hitlerite got out of it with a briefcase in his hands and, shooting back, rushed to run. Lenya-follow him. For almost a kilometer, he chased the enemy and killed him. There were important documents in the briefcase. Then the partisan headquarters immediately sent the papers by plane to Moscow.

From December 1942 to January 1943, the partisan detachment in which Golikov was located, with fierce battles, left the encirclement. The boy was killed in a battle with a punitive detachment of fascists on January 24, 1943 near the village of Ostroya Luka, Pskov region.

Volodya Buryak, under 18

It is not known exactly how old Volodya was. We only know that in June 1942, when Vova Buryak sailed as a cabin boy on the ship "Flawless" with his father, he had not yet reached military age. The boy's father was a ship's captain.

On June 25, the ship received cargo in the port of Novorossiysk. The crew was tasked with breaking into the besieged Sevastopol. Then Vova fell ill, and the ship's doctor prescribed bed rest for the guy. In Novorossiysk, his mother lived with him, and he was sent home for treatment. Suddenly Vova remembered that he had forgotten to tell his partner in the calculation where he had put one of the spare parts of the machine gun. He jumped out of bed and ran to the ship.

The sailors understood that this voyage would most likely be the last, because it was becoming more and more difficult to break through to Sevastopol every day. They left memorabilia and letters on the shore, asking them to give them to their relatives. After learning about what was happening, Volodya decided to stay on board the destroyer. When his father saw him on the deck, the boy replied that he could not leave. If he, the captain's son, left the ship, then everyone would definitely believe that the ship would not return from the attack. 

"Flawless" was attacked from the air on June 26 in the morning. Volodya stood at the machine gun and fired at the enemy vehicles. When the ship began to go under water, Captain Buryak gave the order to abandon ship. The board was empty, but the captain of the 3rd rank Buryak and his son Volodya did not leave their combat post.

Zina Portnova, 17 years old

Zina served as a scout for a partisan detachment on the territory of the Belarusian SSR. In 1942, she joined the underground Komsomol-youth organization "Young Avengers". There Zina actively participated in the distribution of propaganda leaflets and organized sabotage against the invaders. In 1943, Portnova was captured by the Germans. During the interrogation, she grabbed the investigator's pistol from the table, shot him and two other fascists, and tried to escape. But she couldn't do it.

From the book by Vasily Smirnov " Zina Portnova»:

"She was interrogated by the most sophisticated torturers.... They promised to spare her life, if only the young partisan would confess everything, give the names of all the underground workers and partisans known to her. Once again, the Gestapo met with a surprising unshakeable firmness of this stubborn girl, who in their protocols was called a "Soviet bandit". Zina, tormented by torture, refused to answer questions, hoping that this way she would be killed faster... Once in the prison yard, prisoners saw a completely gray-haired girl, when she was being led to another interrogation-torture, throw herself under the wheels of a passing truck. But the car was stopped, the girl was pulled out from under the wheels and again taken for questioning…»

On January 10, 1944, 17-year-old Zina Portnova was shot. In 1985, she was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

Sasha Chekalin, 16 years old

At the age of 16, a village boy, Sasha, became a member of the partisan detachment" Vanguard " in the Tula region. Together with other partisans, he set fire to Fascist warehouses, blew up cars, and eliminated enemy sentries and patrolmen.

In November 1941, Sasha fell seriously ill. For some time, he was in one of the villages of the Tula region, near the city of Likhvin, with a "proven person". One of the residents gave the young partisan to the fascists. At night they broke into the house and seized Chekalin. When the door opened, Sasha threw a pre-prepared grenade at the Germans, but it did not explode. 

The fascists tortured the boy for several days. Then he was hanged. The body remained on the gallows for more than 20 days — it was not allowed to be removed. Sasha Chekalin was buried with all military honors only when the city was liberated from the invaders. In 1942, he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.