Original taken from patrick1990 c Russians don't give up! No man is an island!

In the summer of 1941, on a bridge near the village of Sokolnichi, General Guderian’s tank column was stopped by a single soldier, artilleryman Nikolai Sirotinin. He, covering the retreat of his regiment, managed to single-handedly knock out 11 tanks and 7 armored vehicles of the enemy, effectively defeating one of the Wehrmacht tank divisions.

The war with the German invaders claimed millions of lives of Soviet people, slaughtering a colossal number of men, women, children and old people. Every resident of our vast homeland experienced the horrors of the fascist attack. An unexpected attack, the latest weapons, experienced soldiers - Germany had it all. Why did the brilliant Barbarossa plan fail?

The enemy did not take into account one very important detail: he was advancing on the Soviet Union, whose inhabitants were ready to die for every piece of their native land. Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, Georgians and other nationalities of the Soviet state fought together for their Motherland and died for the free future of their descendants. One of these brave and valiant soldiers was Nikolai Sirotinin.

A young resident of the city of Orel worked at the local Tekmash industrial complex, and already on the day of the attack he was wounded during the bombing. As a result of the first air raid, the young man was sent to the hospital. The wound was not severe, and the young body quickly recovered, and Sirotinin still had the desire to fight. Little is known about the hero; even the exact date of his birth is lost. At the beginning of the century, it was not customary to solemnly celebrate every birthday, and some citizens simply did not know it, but only remembered the year.

And Nikolai Vladimirovich was born in difficult times in 1921. It is also known from the testimony of contemporaries and comrades that he was modest, polite, short and thin. Very few documents have been preserved about this great man, and the events at the 476th kilometer of the Warsaw Highway became known, largely thanks to the diary of Friedrich Hoenfeld. It was the German chief lieutenant of the 4th Panzer Division who wrote down in his notebook the story of the heroic deed of a Russian soldier:

“July 17, 1941. Sokolnichi, near Krichev. In the evening, an unknown Russian soldier was buried. He stood alone at the cannon, shot at a column of tanks and infantry for a long time, and died. Everyone was surprised at his courage... Oberst (Colonel) said before the grave that if all the Fuhrer’s soldiers fought like this Russian, they would conquer the whole world.They fired three times in volleys from rifles. After all, he is Russian, is such admiration necessary?»

Immediately after the hospital, Sirotinin ended up in the 55th Infantry Military Regiment, which was based near the small Soviet town of Krichev. Here he was assigned as a gunner, which, judging by subsequent events, Sirotinin clearly succeeded in doing. The regiment remained on the river with the amusing name “Goodness” for about two weeks, but the decision to retreat was nevertheless made.

Nikolai Sirotinin was remembered by local residents as a very polite and sympathetic person. According to Verzhbitskaya, he always helped the elderly carry water or scoop it up from the well. It’s unlikely that anyone could see in this young senior sergeant a brave hero capable of stopping a tank division. However, he still became one.

To withdraw the troops, cover was needed, which is why Sirotinin remained in position. According to one of the many versions, the soldier was supported by his commander and also stayed, but in the battle he was wounded and went back to the main squad. Sirotinin was supposed to create a traffic jam on the bridge and join his own, but this young man decided to stand to the end in order to give maximum time to his fellow soldiers to retreat. The young fighter’s goal was simple, he wanted to take as many lives as possible from the enemy army and disable all equipment.

The placement of the only 76 mm gun, from which fire was fired at the attackers, was well thought out. The artilleryman was surrounded by a thick field of rye, and the gun was not visible. Tanks and armored vehicles, accompanied by armed infantry, quickly advanced through the territory under the leadership of the talented Heinz Guderian. This was still the period when the Germans hoped to carry out a lightning-fast capture of the country and defeat the Soviet troops.

Sirotinin's task was to prevent the advance of the tank division for as long as possible. The senior sergeant's plan was to block the first and last links of the column and inflict as many losses as possible on the enemy. The calculation turned out to be correct. When the first tank caught fire, the Germans tried to retreat from the line of fire. However, Sirotinin hit the trailing vehicle, and the column turned out to be an immobilized target.

The Nazis threw themselves to the ground in panic, not understanding where the shooting was coming from. Enemy intelligence provided information that there was not a single battery in this area, so the division advanced without special precautions. Fifty-seven shells were not wasted by the Soviet soldier. The tank division was stopped and destroyed by one Soviet man. The armored vehicles tried to ford the river, but got stuck in the coastal mud.

During the entire battle, the Germans did not even suspect that they were faced with only one defender of the USSR. Sirotinin’s position, located near the collective farm cowshed, was taken only after only 3 shells remained. However, even deprived of ammunition for the gun and the ability to continue firing, Nikolai Vladimirovich shot the enemy with a carbine. Only after his death Sirotinin gave up his position.

The German command and soldiers were horrified when they realized that only one Russian soldier stood against them. Sirotinin's behavior aroused genuine delight and respect among the Germans, including Guderian, despite the fact that the division's losses were enormous.

The feat of Nikolai Sirotinin was lost among the glorious examples of the courage of Soviet soldiers. Its history was studied and covered only in the early 60s. Then his family also learned about the heroic battle. In the post-war period, Sirotinin’s grave, which was made by the Germans in a village called Sokolnichi, had to be removed. The remains of the valiant warrior were reburied in a mass grave. The cannon from which Sirotinin shot the tank division was scrapped for recycling. Today, the monument has still been erected, and in Krichev there is a street with his name.

A painfully absurd circumstance got in the way: the soldier’s family did not have his photograph. A photo card has become necessary for submitting documents. As a result, a man who gave his life for his country is little known in his Fatherland and was awarded only the Order of the Patriotic War of the first degree.

Who among us in Soviet times did not know about the legendary 28 Panfilov and Young Guards, Alexander Matrosov and Nikolai Gastello, Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya and General Karbyshev, Alexei Maresyev and Musa Jalil.
But few of us have heard about the desperate battle near the Belarusian Krichev in the summer of 41, when a 20-year-old guy - Nikolai Sirotinin - single-handedly stopped a German column, knocking out 11 tanks and 7 armored vehicles. And thus he was able to challenge the saying “Alone in the field is not a warrior.”
It is about this hero and his feat that I would like to talk.

Kolya was born on March 7, 1921 in the city of Orel.
Father - Vladimir Kuzmich Sirotinin (1888-1961), steam locomotive driver.
Mother - Elena Korneevna (1898-1963), housewife.
There are 5 children in the family, Kolya is the 2nd oldest.
Mom noted his hard work, affectionate disposition and help in raising younger children.
After graduating from school, Nikolai went to work at the Tokmash plant as a turner.
On October 5, 1940, Nikolai was drafted into the army.
He was assigned to the 55th Infantry Regiment in the city of Polotsk, Belarusian SSR.
Of the documents about Nikolai, only the conscript’s medical card has been preserved.
According to his medical records, he is not a hero at all. Sirotinin was of small build - 164 centimeters and weighed only 53 kilograms.
By June 1941, the smart, hardworking, lucky, intelligent and skillful gunner boy was already a senior sergeant, a gun commander.
By the beginning of the war, his 17th Infantry Division was redeployed to the line of the Ditva River.

On June 22, 1941, Nikolai was wounded during an air raid.
The wound was slight, and two days later he went to fight at the front.
It so happened that he got separated from his division.

This is what the commander of the 55th regiment, Major Skripka, later wrote, explaining what happened and how then:

“On the evening of June 24, an order was received from the division commander to withdraw to the eastern bank of the Ditva River. Leaving a rifle company at the height as a rear marching outpost, the regiment retreated to a new line at night. The outpost was supposed to join the regiment in the morning. However, at dawn, the roar of a strong battle began to be heard from the heights. In addition, the regiment was ordered to withdraw to Lida without stopping at the Ditva line. As a result, the outpost did not return to the regiment. Her fate is unknown."

Nicholas was part of this outpost, which was surrounded and defeated at dawn on June 25.
But he managed to survive and escape the encirclement with weapons. And he went to his people.
He walked 500 kilometers to the east until he reached the front line, in the Sokolnichi region (July 9-10). His 55th Infantry Regiment retreated in an organized manner in the other direction to the southeast - to Kalinkovichi.
In fact, Sirotinin was under check, almost considered a “penalty.”
Therefore, he was assigned to the combined battalion, which was tasked with holding the defense of Krichev from the west (there are two roads there - Varshavka and the old road, just north of it).
Nikolai was placed at the disposal of Captain Kim.
He was sent to an artillery battery, where a young artilleryman commanded one of the battery's guns.
The battery commander (his last name could not be established) and artilleryman Nikolai settled in the house of Anastasia Evmenovna Grabskaya.
Nikolai Sirotinin was remembered by the village residents as a quiet, polite boy.

Grabskaya’s daughter Maria Ivanovna recalled:

“I remember the events of July 1941 well. About a week before the Germans arrived, Soviet artillerymen settled in our village. The headquarters of their battery was in our house, the battery commander was a senior lieutenant named Nikolai, his assistant was a lieutenant named Fedya, and of the soldiers I remember most of all the Red Army soldier Nikolai Sirotinin. The fact is that the senior lieutenant very often called this soldier and entrusted him, as the most intelligent and experienced, with this and that task.
He was slightly above average height, dark brown hair, a simple face, cheerful, polite, calm, and his eyes were mischievous, with gold in them.” When Sirotinin and senior lieutenant Nikolai decided to dig a dugout for the local residents, I saw how he deftly threw the earth, I noticed that he was apparently not from the boss’s family. Nikolai answered jokingly:
“I am a worker from Orel, and I am no stranger to physical labor. We Orlovites know how to work.”

Village resident Olga Borisovna Verzhbitskaya recalled:

“We knew Nikolai Sirotinin and his sister before the day of the fight. He was with a friend of mine, buying milk.
He was very polite, always helping elderly women get water from the well and do other hard work.
I remember well the evening before the fight. On a log at the gate of the Grabskikh house I saw Nikolai Sirotinin. He sat and thought about something. I was very surprised that everyone was leaving, but he was sitting.”

It must be said that at the beginning of July 1941, the tanks of the 2nd Panzer Group of Heinz Guderian - one of the most talented German generals - broke through the weak, thin and sparse line of defense of our troops near Bykhov and began crossing the Dnieper.
Crushing and knocking down our weak barriers, they rushed east along the Sozh River, to Slavgorod, and further through Cherikov to the city of Krichev, in order to then encircle our troops defending Smolensk with a blow from the south.
On the morning of the 15th, faint sounds of gunfire were heard from Mogilev.
Every hour they became louder, and the previously deserted Warsaw Highway was filled with a stream of refugees and retreating units.
Under the pressure of the 4th Panzer Division, commanded by von Langerman, units of the 13th Army of the Red Army fought back in the face of superior enemy forces.
And they took up defense behind the Sozh, on its low south-eastern bank, in beautiful forests.
The western bank of the Sozh River is very steep and high, in many places cut by deep ravines with very steep slopes and almost treeless. On the road from the city of Cherikov to Krichev there were several such ravines.
It should be noted that by July 16, the encirclement ring north of Krichev was closed, where units of the 16th and 20th armies were surrounded near Smolensk. Therefore, the capture of Krichev, as the last frontier on the right bank of the Sozh River, was given special importance.
Early in the morning of July 17, 1941, in one of the ravines, a group of our soldiers, apparently going on reconnaissance, ambushed a column of units of the 4th Panzer Division of the Wehrmacht. They threw grenades at the head patrol of a huge column, fired at it and left the battle along the ravines. The soldiers managed to cross the Sozh and informed the command about a German tank division approaching Krichev.
In Krichev at that time there were units of the 6th Infantry Division, battered in battles, having lost most of their artillery and other equipment.
After news of the tanks, they received orders to cross the Sozh.
But parts of the division could not do this quickly - there were not enough transportation means.
And therefore it was necessary to delay the Germans for several hours to give everyone the opportunity to cross.
The artillery battery commander made a decision: to leave one gun at the bridge over the Dobrost River at the 476th kilometer of the Moscow-Warsaw highway with a crew of 2 people to cover the retreat with the task of delaying the tank column.
“Two people with a cannon will remain here,” said the battery commander.
Nikolai Sirotinin volunteered.
The commander himself remained second.
The order was brief: to delay the German tank column on the bridge over the Dobrost River as long as possible.
And then, if possible, catch up with your own...
Many years later, reporters found Nikolai’s sister, 80-year-old Taisiya Shestakova, in the city of Orel.
When they asked why Kolya volunteered to cover the retreat of our army, Taisiya Vladimirovna raised her eyebrows in surprise:
“My brother could not have done otherwise.”

It was the 25th day of the war...
Having volunteered to cover the retreat of his unit, Nikolai took up an advantageous firing position. He installed a 45-millimeter anti-tank gun on the outskirts of the village of Sokolnichi - on a low hillock, right on a collective farm rye field near the Dobrost River.
The low green shield of the cannon was almost completely hidden among the ears of corn.
The location was ideal for unnoticed shelling. The road leading to Krichev was about 200 meters away. From here there was an excellent view of the highway, a small river and a bridge across it, which opened the way to the east for the enemy. And near the road there was a wetland. Among the rare tufts of low sedge, water glistened in puddles and barrels - pits filled with water.
And this meant that the tanks would not be able to move either to the left or to the right if something happened.
Sirotinin was alone at the gun. He understood what he was getting into. There was only one task - to hold out as long as possible in order to gain time for the division...

At dawn, the roar of enemy engines came from the forest. The shelling of the village began. Then an enemy column - 59 tanks and armored vehicles with infantry - crawled onto the highway like a giant spotted boa constrictor.
The Nazis were approaching...
Well, the sergeant, who was an experienced artilleryman, chose the moment when to strike the enemy.
When the lead tank reached the bridge, the first – successful – shot rang out. The sergeant hit him.
With the second shell, Sirotinin set fire to an armored personnel carrier at the tail of the column. And thereby created a traffic jam.
The column stopped and panic began. The mousetrap slammed shut.
Thus, the combat mission was completed - the tank column was detained.
And the battery commander, who stood at the bridge and adjusted the fire, was wounded. And he was forced to retreat towards the Soviet positions.
However, Sirotinin refused to retreat.
Nikolai knew that he was needed here and now. He had 60 more shells. And ahead were enemy vehicles that he had to destroy.
The Germans attempted to clear the jam by dragging the damaged tank off the bridge with two other tanks.
The sergeant opened fire again.
And these tanks were hit.
An armored vehicle that tried to ford the Dobrost River got stuck in a swampy bank. There another shell found her.
Nikolai shot and shot, knocking out tank after tank...
German tanks ran into Kolya Sirotinin as if they were facing the Brest Fortress.
It was real hell.
The tanks caught fire one after another.
The infantry, hiding behind the armor, lay down.
The German commanders are at a loss. They cannot understand the source of the heavy fire. It seems like the whole battery is beating. Aimed fire. There are 59 tanks, dozens of machine gunners and motorcyclists in the German column. And all this power is powerless in the face of Russian fire. Where did this battery come from? After all, the day before, their reconnaissance was unable to detect Soviet artillery in the vicinity. And she reported that the way was open. Therefore, the division advanced without special precautions.
The Nazis did not yet know that there was only one soldier standing in their way, and that there was only one warrior in the field, if he was Russian.
Sirotinin fought alone, himself as a gunner, and as a loader.
German tanks tried to move off the road to attack the anti-tank gun, shoot at close range, crush under the tracks, but one after another they got stuck in the swampy area. One fell so deep with its front end into a hole of water that it stood up almost vertically, and Nikolai easily fell into the engine compartment. The tank immediately burst into flames.
The sergeant was already shooting at the seventh tank when the Germans finally pinpointed his firing position and opened heavy fire on the gun.
But due to the fact that she stood on the reverse slope of the peak, the shells either exploded on the slope of the hillock or flew overhead. The low sloping shield rang from bullet hits. One of the shells exploded at the very top of the hillock, about ten meters to the left of the gun. And small fragments touched the left side and arm of artilleryman Sirotinin. He quickly bandaged them and continued shooting, throwing spent cartridges from under his feet.
The road was covered in black smoke from burning equipment.
There were fewer shells. And Nikolai began to aim more carefully and shoot less often. There was no need to rush - the column was locked in front and behind by burning equipment, they had nowhere to move - there was a swamp all around.
He noticed how infantrymen were running across the meadow - trying to get around him.
The cannon began to fire frequently, firing fragmentation shells that exploded under the Germans’ feet. Soon the surviving infantry crawled back.
Soon the German infantry tried once again to bypass the cannon. But after three shots of buckshot, they lay down and began to crawl away.
At that moment, three explosions were heard in the column one after another - tank turrets flew into the sky.
A gust of wind blew the smoke to the side, and Sergeant Sirotinin saw a surviving armored personnel carrier in the column, with two more of the same nearby. He started shooting again. All three caught fire. The Germans, who were hiding behind them, ran to the rear of the column. Sirotinin fought them off with fragmentation shells.
Another gust of wind blew the smoke away, and he discovered another intact tank. The sergeant fired at it several times until it finally burst into flames.
Next he hit an armored car hung with gasoline cans. The column of flame rose ten meters and dispersed the smoke. Nikolai was able to see that a tank was hiding behind the damaged armored personnel carrier, which occasionally fired at it. The sergeant only saw part of the T 2 turret.
He entered into a duel with German tank crews and won it.
Nikolai then turned the barrel to the left and fired several fragmentation shells at the tail of the column.
One after another, he aimed at tanks and armored cars and hit. Everything exploded, flew, and there was black smoke in the air from the burning equipment.
The angry Germans opened mortar fire on Sirotinin.
Mines fell one after another around the gun. The fragments mowed down the rye and rang on the shield. One of them damaged the sight, the other tore the wheel. Two fragments also hit the artilleryman.
The mines howled again. A large fragment hit the frame, half breaking it. Then the cannon shook from the hits and explosions of small shells.
The gun was broken: the shield, wheels, sight and vertical aiming mechanism were damaged.
Nikolai could do nothing more - the cannon could only fire once. At this moment the mortar fire stopped.
He stood up to charge the forty-five for the last time.
At that moment machine guns hit from behind. And Nikolai fell, pierced by bullets, onto a broken gun.
German motorcyclists walked around him through the village, entered the firing position from the rear and hit him in the back with bursts of bursts.
This is how artillery sergeant Nikolai Sirotinin, a simple Russian guy who gave his life to protect his comrades, died.
Our 6th Rifle Division managed to cross the Sozh and take up a defense there, which it, along with other units of the 13th Army, held for almost another month, pinning down Nazi units. And only then, in mid-August, she broke out of the encirclement...

This unique battle lasted two and a half hours.
The Nazis were missing 11 tanks and 7 armored vehicles, 57 soldiers and officers after this battle on the banks of the Dobrost River, where the Russian soldier Nikolai Sirotinin stood as a barrier.

Now there is a monument in that place:

“Here, at dawn on July 17, 1941, senior artillery sergeant Nikolai Vladimirovich Sirotinin, who gave his life for the freedom and independence of our Motherland, entered into single combat with a column of fascist tanks and in a two-hour battle repelled all enemy attacks.”

At first, the Nazis did not believe that only one Soviet soldier was holding them back. They put several villagers against the wall, threatening that they would shoot them if they did not hand over the rest. But there was no one to extradite. They were confronted by one guy - short, frail.
Shocked by his courage and fearlessness, the Germans walked around the gun for a long time, counting empty charging boxes and looking at the highway littered with equipment and corpses.
The tenacity of the Soviet soldier earned the respect of the Nazis.
The commander of the tank battalion, Colonel Erich Schneider (who later became a lieutenant general), ordered the worthy enemy to be buried with military honors.
The Germans gathered the residents of the village of Sokolnichi and held a solemn military funeral for Sergeant Nikolai Sirotinin.
They buried him, walked past in formation and gave the fallen hero a military salute with three rifle salvos. German officers decided to use this feat to make their soldiers the same patriots of Germany as this Russian artilleryman.

Chief Lieutenant of the 4th Panzer Division Friedrich Hoenfeld (died near Tula in the summer of 1942) wrote in his diary:

“July 17, 1941. Sokolnichi, near Krichev. In the evening, an unknown Russian soldier was buried. He stood alone at the cannon, shot at a column of tanks and infantry for a long time, and died. Everyone was surprised at his courage... Oberst said before his grave that if all the Fuhrer’s soldiers fought like this Russian, they would conquer the whole world. They fired three times in volleys from rifles. After all, he is Russian, is such admiration necessary?

Olga Verzhbitskaya recalled:

“In the afternoon, the Germans gathered at the place where Sirotinin’s gun stood. They forced us, local residents, to come there too. As someone who knows German, the chief German, about fifty years old with decorations, tall, bald, and gray-haired, ordered me to translate his speech to the local people. He said that the Russian fought very well, that if the Germans had fought like that, they would have taken Moscow long ago, and that this is how a soldier should defend his homeland - the Fatherland. Then from the pocket of our dead soldier’s tunic they took out a medallion with a note about who and where. The main German told me: “Take it and write to your relatives. Let the mother know what a hero her son was and how he died.” I was afraid to do this... Then a young German officer, standing in the grave and covering Sirotinin’s body with a Soviet raincoat, snatched a piece of paper and a medallion from me and said something rudely. The Germans fired a volley of rifles in honor of our soldier and put a cross on the grave, hanging his helmet, pierced by a bullet. I myself clearly saw the body of Nikolai Sirotinin, even when he was lowered into the grave. His face was not covered in blood, but his tunic had a large bloody stain on the left side, his helmet was broken, and there were many shell casings lying around.
Since our house was located not far from the battle site, next to the road to Sokolnichi, the Germans stood near us. I myself heard how they talked for a long time and admiringly about the feat of the Russian soldier, counting shots and hits. Some of the Germans, even after the funeral, stood for a long time at the gun and the grave and talked quietly.”

Now there is no such grave in the village of Sokolnichi. Because three years after the war, the guy’s body was transferred to a mass grave in the city of Krichev, Mogilev region.

Nikolai Vladimirovich Sirotinin was never nominated for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
And for his feat, only in 1960 he was awarded the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree (posthumously).
The hero's name, unfortunately, never became publicly known.
And this is probably one of the greatest injustices in the history of that time...

One poet (I don’t know his name) wrote a poem about this:

You are boiling with anger at the authorities:
- Why was the feat left forgotten?
- Sirotinin is a hero in people's memory
And why wasn’t he nominated for the Hero Star?

Nikolai in his young years
Voluntarily defended the banner of Freedom
Your Fatherland and its peoples,
When the enemy sowed misfortune to everyone.

The birds didn't sing to the sergeant that day.
They became quiet or flew away somewhere.
We sat waiting for terrible minutes
Alarm bells were ringing in my brain.

It covered the Moscow-Warsaw highway
Near the Dobrost River - near the village of Sokolnichi
In Belarus the battle was bloody,
Threw sword shells at enemy tanks.

Steel monsters sunbathed with a torch
And their towers, like rooks, instantly flew away,
They smoked the blue sky - they threw a stench,
Because they trampled someone else's land.

Column - of fifty-nine cars
And eleven of them tanks were knocked out,
And six armored vehicles went to another world
Dozens of enemies fell from orbit.

Nikolai Sirotinin is the only warrior in the field,
Who had both willpower and fortitude -
He really deserves the title of Hero of the Motherland,
His feat to us, to his grandchildren, is science...

The story of Nikolai Sirotinin first became public knowledge back in 1958. Then, unknown to anyone, the librarian of the village of Sokolnichi, V. Melnik, described the story of the confrontation between an artillery soldier and an enemy tank battalion. who today remains a shining example of the personal heroism of a Soviet soldier, became the main character of this story.

Nikolay Sirotinin: information about the fighter

In the family of Vladimir Kuzmich Sirotinin and Elena Korneevna Sirotinina, a son was born on March 7, 1921, they named him Nikolai. The boy’s father worked as a locomotive driver, his mother took care of the house and raised children; besides Kolya, there were three more in the family. A family lived in the city of Orel. After graduating from school, it is known that Nikolai worked at the Tekmash plant. In 1940 he was called up to the front. Served as an ordinary soldier in the Red Army near Polotsk.

Nikolai Sirotinin: feat

In June 1940, the 4th Group of Forces of Heinz Guderian, one of the outstanding German military leaders, tried to occupy the Belarusian city of Krichev. Separate units of the 13th Soviet Army were forced to retreat. To cover the column's retreat, artillery support was needed. There were two people left at the gun - the battery commander and a twenty-year-old, puny boy Nikolai Vladimirovich Sirotinin. The weapon was hidden on a collective farm field in tall rye. The Russians were well deployed, the gun was on a hill, but the enemy did not see them. The artillerymen had a clear view of the road and bridge over the Dobrost River.

On July 17, 1941, the convoy drove out to the highway. The battery commander coordinated the firing of the guns. With his first shot, Sergeant Sirotinin knocked out the first tank on the bridge, the second hit an armored personnel carrier that was bringing up the rear of the column. So the young fighter managed to create a traffic jam. The enemy, in turn, decided that he was dealing with an entire battery of guns and at least a dozen soldiers.

At this time, the spotter lieutenant was wounded and retreated to the rest of the units. Nikolai should have followed the example of his commander, but Sirotinin saw that he still had 60 shells, he remained to hold back the onslaught of the enemy.

A traffic jam formed on the bridge; two tanks tried to push the damaged car, but the same fate awaited them. As a result, the hero Sirotinin knocked out 11 tanks, 6 armored personnel carriers, and 57 infantry.

Only two hours later did the enemy command determine where Nikolai’s gun was located. By this time he had three shells left. At the end of the battle, the artilleryman fired back from his carbine, but did not survive, although the German commander offered this option.

Who went down in the history of the Great Patriotic War, was buried as a hero in the village of Sokolnichi by the German military. For a long time the enemies could not believe that only one Russian opposed them.

History was restored thanks to the notes of General Friedrich Hendleff, commander of the 4th Panzer Division. And fellow villagers in the village of Sokolnichi heard a triple salvo being fired into the sky.

Fiction or true story?

Nikolai Sirotinin, whose feat became an example of courage and valor on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War, when the enemy was strong and the Russian soldier had only a gun, became famous throughout the country. This story was published by local historian from Krichev M.F. Melnikov in the magazine "Ogonyok" in 1958. Modern researchers decided to track the authenticity of the battle near Sokolniki and found out that such a defensive operation was indeed carried out and the Soviet troops actually managed to delay the enemy on the outskirts of the city.

It is also known today that this feat of the Soviet soldier Nikolai Sirotinin was republished two years later in Literature. In this article, the story is enriched with facts, and there is much more damaged equipment.

In 1987, in the book “Our Land Walked the Road of Centuries,” the same local historian published the story “The Lay of the Great Soldier,” in which he embellished the legend.

Was there Nikolai?

For some reason, among researchers of the Soviet period, such inconsistency of facts did not raise doubts. Modern historians have approached the study of this issue in more detail. They found out that in fact there was such a soldier Nikolai Vladimirovich Sirotinin, but he only served in another division that had never been to these parts.

But be that as it may, the battle near the village of Sokolnichi took place. This is a historically reliable fact, documented.

As for the feat that Sirotinin accomplished, there is no documentary evidence other than the notes of a local historian. There is also no grave of the Russian soldier-hero. According to eyewitnesses, it was moved to another place, and Nikolai’s remains were reburied in a mass grave. The legendary warrior did not receive the title of Hero of the Soviet Union due to the lack of photographs from the relatives of the deceased. He was posthumously awarded only the Order of the Great Patriotic War, 1st degree.

One of the researchers of our time “unearthed” the real story about the battle on the Warsaw Highway, which took place in those days on the outskirts of the city of Krichev. The Red Army troops began to hastily retreat across the Sozh River. The 2nd Infantry Battalion under the command of Nikolai Andreevich Kim, a Korean by nationality, was supposed to cover the soldiers. From the first day of the war, he joined the ranks of the Red Army, walked this path to the end and remained alive. It was his soldiers who completed the task assigned to them, detained the enemy and gave the Russian soldiers the opportunity to redeploy without significant losses.

"Nikolai Sirotinin. One warrior in the field. Feat of 1941"

In 2013, one of the patriotic channels shot a forty-minute film about the heroes of the Great Patriotic War (in particular, the author tried to immortalize the lonely artilleryman Nikolai Sirotinin). Archival evidence from residents of the village of Sokolnichi was provided as documentary evidence. The picture turned out to be very instructive, sincere and motivating. The author tried to show that Nikolai Sirotnin accomplished his feat not because he was fearless, but because of a sense of duty and love for his Motherland.

The role of lone heroes in the Great Patriotic War

During the Great Patriotic War, there were people whose personal example made it possible to raise the morale of the Russian warrior, who was very weak in the first disastrous years of defeats along the entire front line. It was thanks to such heroes, albeit legendary ones, that Nazi Germany was repulsed. Nikolai Sirotinin is a collective image of a Russian soldier, a hero who alone is capable of stopping a division and defeating the enemy with his bare hands.

Such legends are important for education, but we should not forget about real people who accomplished a real feat. At the cost of their lives, they defeated the enemy, giving us, future generations, the opportunity to live in peacetime and breathe deeply.

In September of this year, Oryol school No. 7 was named after Nikolai Sirotinin. For a long time, his feat, the history of which is well known in the Mogilev region of Belarus, was not immortalized in his native land - few people knew about it at all. And he never became a Hero - officially: he was not given the title due to the fact that not a single photograph of the soldier had survived.

This simple Oryol guy in July 1941, near the Belarusian city of Krichev, single-handedly destroyed 11 enemy tanks, 7 armored vehicles and 57 enemy soldiers and officers. During the battle, the Germans were never able to figure out where the Russian battery was dug in. And when we reached Kolya’s position, he only had three shells left. They offered to surrender, but he answered them with fire from a carbine.

“AiF-Chernozemye” tells the story of Nikolai Sirotinin and provides evidence from eyewitnesses and historians.

Nikolay Sirotinin Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org

Hard to believe

For the first time, the public learned about this rare case in the history of the Great Patriotic War only in 1957 - from Mikhail Fedorovich Melnikov, a local historian from the Belarusian city of Krichev, who began collecting details of Nikolai Sirotinin’s feat. Not everyone believed that a man could single-handedly stop a column of tanks, but the more information was obtained, the more authentic the evidence of the guy’s feat became.

Today we can say with confidence that the 19-year-old boy Kolya Sirotinin really alone covered the retreat of the Soviet troops, not letting the enemy down for a second.

From book Gennady Mayorov"Artillery Square":

“On July 10, 1941, our artillery battery arrived in the village of Sokolnichi, which was located three kilometers from the city of Krichev. One of the guns was commanded by the young artilleryman Nikolai. He chose a firing position on the outskirts of the village. In one evening, the entire crew dug an artillery trench, and then two more spare ones, niches for shells and shelters for people. The battery commander and artilleryman Nikolai settled in the Grabskys’ house.”

“At that time I was working at the Krichev main post office,” she recalled Maria Grabskaya.-After finishing my shift, I came to my home, we had guests, including Nikolai Sirotinin, whom I met. Kolya told me that he was from the Oryol region and that his father was a railway worker. He and his comrades dug a trench, and when it was ready, everyone dispersed. Nikolai said that he was on duty and you could sleep peacefully: “If anything happens, I’ll knock for you.” Suddenly, early in the morning, he knocked so hard that the entire window was blown through. We caught up and hid in the trench. This is where the battle began. Next to our hut there was a collective farm where a cannon was installed. Nikolai did not leave his post until his last breath. German cars, armored personnel carriers, tanks were driving along the highway, which was 200-250 meters from the gun. He let them get very close, hiding behind a gun shield. And when the gun fell silent, we thought he had run away. And a little later, the Germans gathered all of us, the villagers, and asked: “Matka, whose son was killed?” They buried Nicholas themselves, wrapping him in a tent.”

On July 17, 1941, a German tank column was moving along the Moscow-Warsaw highway. Our units have already left Krichev and retreated across the Sozh River. The 409th Regiment of the 137th Infantry Division took up defensive positions near the highway with the task of covering the retreating troops. When the tanks approached the village of Sokolnichi, to the bridge over the swampy Dobrost River, a camouflaged artillery gun suddenly came to life near the bridge. The first shots set fire to the lead tank and the trailing armored vehicle. The column stopped. One tank tried to break through and crush the gun, but was shot at point-blank range. Cars could not turn off the highway because there was a swamp all around. Without stopping for a minute, the cannon fired accurately and frequently. A long line of tanks and armored personnel carriers burst into flames. Through the black smoke that enveloped the column, the vehicles fired at the Soviet gun at random. Taking the enemies by surprise, Nikolai could leave the position, since his main mission was completed and time was won. But he continued to stand until the last, until he was killed.”

An example to follow

Near the bridge, tanks and armored personnel carriers were burning out, and corpses were lying. The wounded were loaded into ambulances. In a nearby birch forest, the Germans dug 57 graves for those killed in this duel with the Russian artilleryman. It seemed as if a squadron of Soviet attack aircraft was flying over the tank column. The Germans crowded around the broken cannon, everyone wanted to look into the face of this extraordinary soldier. The Nazis were just starting the war with Russia and did not yet know what a Soviet fighter was. In the presence of specially rounded up villagers, the occupiers buried the artilleryman with honors.

From the diary German Lieutenant Friedrich Henfeld:

“July 17, 1941. Sokolnichi near Krichev. In the evening, a Russian unknown soldier was buried. He alone, standing at the gun, shot at a column of tanks and infantry for a long time, and died. Everyone was amazed at his courage. It is not clear why he resisted so much; he was still doomed to death. The colonel in front of the grave said that if the Fuhrer’s soldiers were like that, they would have conquered the whole world. They fired three times in volleys from rifles. Still, he is Russian, is such admiration necessary?

A few months later, Friedrich Henfeld was killed near Tula. His diary ended up in the hands of military journalist Fyodor Selivanov. Having rewritten part of it, Selivanov handed over the diary to army headquarters and kept the extract.

Resident of the village of Sokolnichi, Krichevsky district, Mogilev region, Olga Borisovna Verzhbitskaya she recalled that after the funeral the German chief told her (the woman knew German): “Take this document and write to your relatives. Let the mother know what a hero her son was and how he died.” But a young German officer standing at Sirotinin’s grave approached and snatched the piece of paper and medallion from her, saying something rude. The Germans fired a volley of rifles in honor of our soldier and put a cross on the grave, on which they hung his helmet, pierced by a bullet.

Today in the village of Sokolnichi there is no grave in which the Germans buried Nikolai. Three years after the war, Kolya’s remains were transferred to a mass grave, the field was plowed and sown, and the cannon was scrapped.

Didn't get a Hero

Mass grave in Krichev on Sirotinina Street. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org

In 1960, Nikolai Sirotinin was posthumously awarded the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree, which is kept in the Minsk Museum. He was also nominated for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, but never received it - the only photograph in which Kolya was captured was lost during the war. Without her, the title of hero was not given.

This is what I remembered about this Nikolai Sirotinin’s sister Taisiya Shestakova:“We had his only passport card. But during the evacuation in Mordovia, my mother gave it to me to enlarge it. And the master lost her! He brought completed orders to all our neighbors, but not to us. We were very sad. We learned about our brother’s feat in 1961, when Krichev local historians found Kolya’s grave. We went to Belarus with the whole family. The Krichevites worked hard to nominate Kolya for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. But in vain, since to complete the documents, a photograph of him, at least some kind, was definitely needed. But we don’t have it!”

Everyone who has heard about this story is very surprised by one important fact. In the Republic of Belarus everyone knows about the feat of the Oryol soldier. A monument was erected to him there, a street in the city of Krichev and a kindergarten school in Sokolnichi were named after him. In Orel, until recently, few people knew about the feat of their fellow countryman. The memory of him was preserved only by a small exhibition in the museum of school No. 17, where Kolya once studied, and a memorial plaque on the house where he lived and where he left for the army. At the initiative of representatives of the Oryol Union of Journalists, it was proposed to perpetuate the forgotten or almost unknown exploits of artillery heroes on one of the city streets. They also proposed a project for a memorial plaque on which the legendary story of Nikolai Sirotinin would be told, and in the future the square was to be replenished with new plaques with photographs and names of the heroes and a brief summary of their exploits. But the city authorities decided to change the idea and instead of the original project they installed a cannon in Artillery Square, assuring that after the opening a competition would be announced among designers for the second stage to organize the adjacent space and create new information elements. A year has passed since that moment, but only a cannon remains standing alone on the site of the Artillery Square.

Photo: Obelisk at the site of Nikolai Sirotinin’s last battle on July 17, 1941. A real 76-millimeter gun was erected nearby on a pedestal - Sirotinin fired at enemies from a similar cannon

In July 1941, the Red Army retreated in battle. In the Krichev area (Mogilev region), Heinz Guderian's 4th Panzer Division was advancing deep into Soviet territory, and was opposed by the 6th Infantry Division.

On July 10, an artillery battery of a rifle division entered the village of Sokolnichi, located three kilometers from Krichev. One of the guns was commanded by 20-year-old senior sergeant Nikolai Sirotinin.

While waiting for the enemy to attack, the soldiers whiled away the time in the village. Sirotinin and his fighters settled in the house of Anastasia Grabskaya.

And one warrior in the field

The approaching cannonade coming from the direction of Mogilev, and the columns of refugees walking east along the Warsaw Highway, indicated that the enemy was approaching.
It is not entirely clear why senior sergeant Nikolai Sirotinin remained alone at his gun during the battle. According to one version, he volunteered to cover the retreat of his fellow soldiers across the Sozh River. But it is reliably known that he equipped a position for a cannon on the outskirts of the village so that the road across the bridge could be covered.

The 76-mm gun was well camouflaged in the tall rye. On July 17, a column of enemy equipment appeared at the 476th kilometer of the Warsaw Highway. Sirotinin opened fire. This is how this battle was described by employees of the archive of the USSR Ministry of Defense (T. Stepanchuk and N. Tereshchenko) in the Ogonyok magazine for 1958.

- In front is an armored personnel carrier, behind it are trucks filled with soldiers. A camouflaged cannon hit the column. An armored personnel carrier caught fire and several mangled trucks fell into ditches. Several armored personnel carriers and a tank crawled out of the forest. Nikolai knocked out a tank. Trying to get around the tank, two armored personnel carriers got stuck in a swamp... Nikolai himself brought ammunition, aimed, loaded and prudently sent shells into the thick of the enemies.

Finally, the Nazis discovered where the fire was coming from and brought all their power down on the lone gun. Nikolai died. When the Nazis saw that only one man was fighting, they were stunned. Shocked by the warrior's bravery, the Nazis buried the soldier.

Before lowering the body into the grave, Sirotinin was searched and found a medallion in his pocket, and in it a note with his name and place of residence written. This fact became known after archive staff went to the battlefield and conducted a survey of local residents. Local resident Olga Verzhbitskaya knew German and on the day of the battle, by order of the Germans, she translated what was written on a piece of paper inserted into the medallion. Thanks to her (and 17 years had passed since the battle at that time), we managed to find out the name of the hero.

Verzhbitskaya reported the soldier’s first and last name, and also that he lived in the city of Orel.
Let us note that employees of the Moscow archive arrived in the Belarusian village thanks to a letter addressed to them from local historian Mikhail Melnikov. He wrote that in the village he heard about the feat of an artilleryman who fought alone against the Nazis, which amazed the enemy.

Further investigation led historians to the city of Orel, where in 1958 they were able to meet the parents of Nikolai Sirotinin. This is how details from the boy’s short life became known.

He was drafted into the army on October 5, 1940 from the Tekmash plant, where he worked as a turner. He began his service in the 55th Infantry Regiment of the Belarusian city of Polotsk. Among the five children, Nikolai was the second oldest.
“Tender, hard-working, he helped babysit the younger ones,” mother Elena Korneevna said about him.

Thus, thanks to a local historian and caring employees of the Moscow archive, the USSR became aware of the heroic artilleryman’s feat. It was obvious that he delayed the advance of the enemy column and inflicted losses on him. But no specific information was known about the number of Nazis killed.

Later there were reports that 11 tanks, 6 armored personnel carriers and 57 enemy soldiers were destroyed. According to one version, some of them were destroyed with the help of artillery fired from across the river.

But be that as it may, Sirotinin’s feat is not measured by the number of tanks he destroyed. One, three or eleven... In this case it doesn't matter. The main thing is that the brave guy from Orel fought alone against the German armada, forcing the enemy to suffer losses and tremble with fear.

He could have fled, taken refuge in a village, or chosen a different path, but he fought to the last drop of blood. The story of Nikolai Sirotinin’s feat was continued several years after the article in Ogonyok.

“After all, he is Russian, is such admiration necessary?”

An article entitled “This is not a legend” was published in Literary Gazette in January 1960. One of its authors was local historian Mikhail Melnikov. There it was reported that an eyewitness to the battle on July 17, 1941 was Chief Lieutenant Friedrich Henfeld. A diary with his entries was found after Henfeld's death in 1942. Entries from the chief lieutenant's diary were made by military journalist F. Selivanov in 1942. Here is a quote from Henfeld's diary:

July 17, 1941. Sokolnichi, near Krichev. In the evening, an unknown Russian soldier was buried. He stood alone at the cannon, shot at a column of tanks and infantry for a long time, and died. Everyone was surprised at his courage... Oberst (Colonel) said before the grave that if all the Fuhrer's soldiers fought like this Russian, they would conquer the whole world. They fired three times in volleys from rifles. After all, he is Russian, is such admiration necessary?

And here are the memories recorded in the 60s from the words of Verzhbitskaya:
- In the afternoon, the Germans gathered at the place where the cannon stood. They forced us, local residents, to come there too,” recalls Verzhbitskaya. - As someone who knows German, the chief German with orders ordered me to translate. He said that this is how a soldier should defend his homeland - the Fatherland. Then from the pocket of our dead soldier’s tunic they took out a medallion with a note about who and where. The main German told me: “Take it and write to your relatives. Let the mother know what a hero her son was and how he died.” I was afraid to do this... Then a young German officer, standing in the grave and covering Sirotinin’s body with a Soviet raincoat, snatched a piece of paper and a medallion from me and said something rudely. For a long time after the funeral, the Nazis stood at the cannon and the grave in the middle of the collective farm field, not without admiration, counting the shots and hits.

Later, a bowler hat was found at the battle site, on which was scratched: “Orphans...”.
In 1948, the remains of the hero were reburied in a mass grave. After the general public learned about Sirotinin’s feat, he was posthumously, in 1960, awarded the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree. A year later, in 1961, an obelisk was erected at the site of the battle, the inscription on which reports the battle on July 17, 1941. A real 76-mm gun is mounted on a pedestal nearby. Sirotinin fired at enemies from a similar cannon.

Unfortunately, not a single photograph of Nikolai Sirotinin has survived. There is only a pencil drawing made by his colleague in the 1990s. But the main thing is that descendants will have the memory of a brave and fearless boy from Orel, who delayed a German column of equipment and died in an unequal battle.

Andrey Osmolovsky