Tank Rider: Into the Reich with the Red Army

Colonel Grigori Vasilievich Starovoit, Deputy Brigade commander. Born in 1915. Apparently he served in the army until 1965 and settled down in Kiev. I met him at the Brigade’s veterans meeting in Kiev (as he left for Kiev for the office of Brigade commander in 1946). Passed away in 1985.

Lieutenant-Colonel Afanasi Grigorievich Skryago. Born in 1906. Settled down in Kiev after retirement. Passed away in 1966. I did not have any contact with him.

Major-General Vasili Ignatievich Koretski, Chief of Staff of the 6th Guards Mechanized Corps. Born in 1913, retired from the office of chief of staff of the 5th Guards Tank Army. He lived in Dnepropetrovsk. Passed away on 23 August, 1986.

Lieutenant-Colonel Terenti Grigorievich Kozienko, battalion commander. Born in 1914. Served in the army until 1955. Retired as deputy regiment commander and settled down in Cherkassy. He passed away on 30 January, 1995 after a prolonged illness. Our families stayed in touch with him and often visited each other.

Major Abram Efimovich Gerstein. Born in 1912, former political officer of the battalion. He was in the army until 1955. After his retirement he lived in Moscow. He died in 1995. I used to meet him often at the veteran meetings. I visited him when S. N. Kostenko and I. S. Tsikanovski visited Moscow.

Major Petr Sergeevich Shakulo. Born in 1923, served in the army until 1971. He did not have any higher military education, this is why his career was so slow. He served in the local army recruitment office in town of Essentuki. This is where he died on 6 July, 1986 after a serious illness.

Colonel Fedor Grigorievich Popov. Born in 1925. He was in the army for over 40 years, until 1985. He retired at the age of 60. Together with him I served in the head personnel section of the Defence Ministry. After that he was transferred to the office of head of personnel department of the Engineer department of the State Committee of external relations (there was such a body during the soviet times). Fedor died on 10 April, 1994.

Lieutenant-Colonel Nikolai Danilovich, mortar platoon leader. Born in 1923. Retired in 1947 and joined the service again in 1957 – he entered the military institute of conductors (there was such a college, later it was reformed and made the military faculty at Moscow Conservatoire). After graduation he served in the Baltic Military district. Later, in 1957, he was transferred to the Ministry of the Interior and appointed the military conductor of Irkutsk military academy of the Ministry of the Interior. He died in February 1996 after a prolonged illness.

Colonel Alexander Danilovich Stolyarov, Commander of the tank regiment of the Brigade. Born in 1914, served in the army in different offices after the war. After his retirement from the army he settled down in Gomel (Belorussia). He passed away on 4 December, 1999.

Colonel Vladimir Dmitrievich Belyakov, Company commander. Born in 1924. Retired from the office of military commissar of Chimkent (Kazakhstan). Passed away on 24 June, 1989. He lived in town of Troitsy, Moscow region.

Colonel Alexander Ivanovich Traiduk, deputy chief of staff of the battalion. Born in 1923. Was the deputy chief of staff of the battalion. Later served as military prosecutor in Nizhni Tagil, Sverdlovsk region. He passed away in 1990.

Colonel Nikolai Dmitrievich Tsygankov, the Brigade’s HQ commandant. Born in 1923. After the war he served as the military commissar of Timiryazevo district in Moscow. Passed away on 22 October, 1991.

Nikolai Konstantinovich Chernyshov, Senior Lieutenant, 1st company commander of the battalion. Born in 1924. They said that he drank himself to death, selling all his war decorations. He died in 1978.

Lieutenant Alexei Kuzmich Belyakov, commander of the 2nd company of the battalion. He lived in Podolsk. Passed away in 1987.

Lieutenant Israel Solomonovich Tsikanovski, machine-gun platoon leader of the 3rd company of the battalion. Died in Tashkent in 1990.