Female Red Army snipers

[Larry]

FSUW, FSUW with rifles, FSUW killing Nazis with rifles!

The EnglishRussia photoblog has a nice piece on female snipers who served with distinction in the Great Patriotic War (WW2, to most of us).

Lyudmila Mykhailivna Pavlichenko was born in the Ukrainian town of Belaya Tserkov on July 12th, 1916. She moved to Kiev with her family at the age of fourteen. There she joined a shooting club and developed into a sharpshooter, while working as a grinder at the Kiev Arsenal factory. In June 1941, 24-year old Pavlichenko was in her fourth year of studying history at the Kiev University when Nazi Germany began its invasion of the Soviet Union. Pavlichenko was among the first round of volunteers at the recruiting office, where she requested to join the infantry and subsequently she was assigned to the Red Army’s 25th Rifle Division.

... Lieutenant Pavlichenko participated in battles in Moldavia and Odessa. When the Germans gained control of Odessa, her unit was pulled to be sent to Sevastopol on the Crimean Peninsula, where she fought for more than 8 months. Her total confirmed kills during World War II was 309,including 36 enemy snipers. Besides, she became an instructor and trained Soviet snipers until the war’s end.
 

Not exactly my image of 24 year old university students in Kiev (I immediately think nightclubs and iPhones).

Later in the war she was withdrawn from duty and sent to tour the US.  I especially liked this line from one of her speeches:

During a meeting in Chicago, making her speech Pavlichenko said, “Gentlemen, I am 25 years old and I have killed 309 fascist occupants by now. Don’t you think, gentlemen, that you have been hiding behind my back for too long?!” After a short pause, the crowd met her statement with great approval.

The Red Army had the largest and most effective sniper program of any of the combatant nations during the war and there were quite a number of FSUW in it.

I thought I should include a couple of pictures.  Too bad neither is carrying a rifle.  I should point out that neither is of Lt. Pavlichenko, but you can see several photos of her here:

http://englishrussia.com/2012/03/08/outstanding-soviet-female-snipers-of-wwii/2/

[Slumba]

There is a movie about an all-female detachment of gunners (not snipers, artillery)  called "The Dawns Here Are Quiet" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dawns_Here_Are_Quiet

You can watch it for free with English language subtitles, here:

http://video.kylekeeton.com/2009/05/russian-video-dawns-here-are-quiet.html

Yes, there is a no-clothing banya scene, for those who want to know...