For which Valentina Grizodubova received the Star of the Hero of the USSR, and then almost fell under the tribunal

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

A legendary man, a famous woman aviator - Valentina Stepanovna Grizodubova. She has several world records on her account, dozens of trained pilots, commanding a regiment (not for women, but for men). In love with the sky, devoted to her work with all her soul, she lived a bright and eventful life. She did everything and did everything. Except for one thing - a general, as she dreamed (to prove - women can too), she never became. Uncompromising, direct and courageous - such “far away” people are not allowed on the career ladder.

Where was she born, who was raised and where did the Russian "Hanna Reitsch" study?

Valentina Stepanovna was born in Kharkov in 1910. Her father is a talented self-taught aviator Stepan Vasilievich Grizodubov, who built four aircraft models. In order to prove the reliability of the latter, Stepan Vasilyevich takes his two-year-old daughter Valya with him on the flight. It was a big risk, but luckily the flight ended successfully.

The growing daughter very often spent time with her father, her vocabulary from early childhood was enriched with the terms - "console", "chassis", "motor", "fuselage". Nadezhda Andreevna, Grizodubova's mother, delicately tried to correct the situation: a girl, she might still need to develop in the humanitarian sphere. And she was heard. The daughter successfully graduated from the general education and music school (piano class) and entered the Institute of Technology and the Music College. And soon, as a talented and promising musician, she was enrolled in the conservatory.

In parallel with this, Valentina enrolled in the flying club (only guys were accepted there, but she achieved her goal), the annual course of which she completed in three months. She never graduated from the institute - she realized that she had a different vocation. Tula flight-sports school, Penza school of pilot-instructors, gliding sports, and then - three years of work as a pilot-instructor in the Tula flying club. In 1934 she was already an instructor at the Tushino flight school (near Moscow). He flies as part of a propaganda squadron throughout the country: Transcaucasia, Kabardino-Balkaria, Bashkiria, Fergana Valley, Belarus, Ukraine.

Record flight, force majeure and the star of the Hero of the USSR

The 20-30s of the XX century are a time of records in aviation and the study of opportunities in this area. In 1927, Charles Lindbergh made the first ever transatlantic flight. His achievement in 1928 will be repeated by the American pilot Amelia Earhart. To confirm the superiority of the socialist system over the capitalist, Soviet aviation champions were urgently needed. And, of course, Valentina Grizodubova did not stand aside. In 1937 alone, she set five world records at once (for which she was awarded the Order of the Red Star), leaving far behind the achievements of American pilots - Annette Jinson, Mowry, Margarita Tanner.

Having learned about the flight of the Frenchwoman Dupeyron (4360 km), Grizodubova decided for herself that she would fly more. In 1937, Soviet pilots Valery Chkalov, Georgy Baidukov and Alexander Belyakov fly non-stop on the USSR-USA route, after which a non-stop flight from Moscow to the Far East is planned, which should be made by not only male but also female crews. Working to the limit and risking one's life is what lies behind such heroic experiments. But that was exactly what Valentina Stepanovna liked.

On September 24, 1938, Grizodubova's crew took off from Moscow. The navigator in it was Marina Raskova, and the co-pilot was Polina Osipenko - both of them at that time were no less famous pilots and record holders than their commander.

However, at the expected time, their plane never appeared at the Far Eastern airfield. During the search operation, due to inconsistency of actions, the crews of two aircraft are killed. When the pilots were finally discovered, it turned out that the flight did not work out from the very beginning. Because of the strong cloud cover, we had to change the flight altitude (7450 meters - a record altitude for that time!) And fly blindly for a long time. The icing of the car began, the equipment began to work poorly. And then the new engineer forgot to give them the codes, so after the Urals, the connection with the ground was interrupted.

To navigate the stars, navigator Raskova opened the astroluk, and her flight map was blown out. Her cabin froze, equipment failed. Grizodubova had to navigate the plane using a magnetic compass. In the region of the Sea of Okhotsk, the clouds parted, the crew commander turned the plane towards the Komsomolsk-on-Amur airfield. But they did not reach him, they put the plane "on its belly" in the taiga near the Amgun River. At the same time, the plane was almost not injured, only the blades of the car were slightly bent. It was dangerous for the navigator to remain in the glazed cockpit during landing, so Grizodubova ordered her to jump with a parachute. Raskova wandered through the taiga for ten days before reaching the plane's landing site. Despite difficult circumstances, the distance record was set, and the participants in the flight were awarded the Hero's Star in the Kremlin.

Appointment as a regiment commander and achievements at the front "Grozny Frau"

In 1939, Grizodubova was appointed head of the Aeroflot International Lines Directorate. With the same pilots and on the same aircraft, she makes the first combat sortie in 1941 as the commander of a ship of a special-purpose group, and their combat mission is to throw troops into the deep rear of the enemy.

In 1942, she became the commander of the 101st (first transport, and then the night bomber) regiment. She gets down to business with her usual grip and solidity.

During the operation called "Rail War" pilots must help the partisans in the occupied territory of Belarus and Ukraine to disrupt the transfer of German troops, destroying railways and highways, stations and bridges. The outcome of the key battle of the Great Patriotic War - the Battle of the Kursk Bulge - depended on this.

The pilots of Grizodubova performed dangerous and difficult work. It was necessary to cross the front line on an aircraft loaded to the eyeballs, overcome the anti-aircraft barrage and fire of German fighters, and then land a large and heavy transport aircraft on an unsuitable site for this (in a field, on a forest clearing, on a frozen lake), take off from it in order to go back and then cross the front line again. The planes remained in the location of the partisan units for the "day" in order to bomb the enemy positions at night. The joint activity of the regiment No. 101 and the partisans was so successful that the German command appointed a large reward for the head of Grizodubova.

Fatal conflict and unfulfilled dream of the legendary pilot

To become the first female general, the commander of a male regiment - this is what Valentina Stepanovna was striving for. She was confident in her strengths and capabilities. But it wasn’t that simple. All that she managed to achieve was the appointment of the commander of the male transport regiment, who was entrusted with the delivery of ammunition and food to the partisan detachments, the removal of the sick and wounded from there.

In 1944, Colonel Grizodubova had a conflict with the commander of the air force division, General Alexander Golovanov. She wrote a report to Stalin stating that, despite all her personal achievements and the merits of the regiment she leads, Golovanov does not allow her to advance in service and does not confer the rank of guards on the regiment.

The commander-in-chief instructs Malenkov to sort out the situation. Golovanov convinces him that Grizodubova is not such a good commander, there are allegedly many problems in the regiment. In his memoirs, Golovanov claims that Malenkov called Grizodubova “on the carpet”, threatened her with expulsion from the party and a tribunal. Perhaps Valentina Stepanovna really had some claims, but she was unlikely to face expulsion from the party and a tribunal. She never realized her dream of becoming a general - she was removed from the post of regiment commander.

How was the fate of Comrade Stalin's beloved pilot after the war

After the war, Valentina Stepanovna Grizodubova was for several years the deputy head of Research Institute No. 17. At this time, the famous pilot saved many people from repression, unfair decisions and tyranny. Her papers contain a notebook in which the names of four thousand people are recorded, in whose lives she played the role of an intercessor. On the envelopes of their letters, people wrote: “The Kremlin. Stalin and Grizodubova . In the second half of the 60s, she was the head of the flight test center. Later, she returned to her native research institute.

In 1986, Grizodubova was awarded the Star of the Hero of Socialist Labor. The personal life of the famous pilot was not as successful as the professional one: they parted with her husband, test pilot Viktor Sokolov. He loved Valentina very much, but could not stand the endless reproaches of her mother, who believed that he was not doing enough to be worthy of her daughter. Their only son died at the age of 50. Valentina Stepanovna herself, who until the very end had an active life position and worked for the good of her Fatherland, died in 1993.

And some famous and legendary pilots were disabled. But even this did not prevent them from fulfilling their dream.