Mariya Oktyabrskaya was born in 1905 to a peasant family living on the Crimean peninsula. Before the war, Oktyabrskaya led a pretty normal life working in a cannery and as a telephone operator. She met and married the love of her life, a Soviet army officer, in 1925 and quickly began to take an interest in his military career by learning how to shoot handguns and drive cars. Then, when World War II broke out in Europe in the early 1940s, her life took a turn toward crazy.
As the Nazis steadily marched further into Russia, Oktyabrskaya was separated from her husband and sent to Tomsk, Siberia. Two years after their initial separation, she got word that her husband had been killed back in 1941 by the German forces in Kiev, Ukraine. Oktyabrskaya became irate and started looking for ways to make the Nazi regime pay for what they’d done.
So Oktyabrskaya decided the best way to get even was to go to war herself. She sold all of her possessions and raised enough money to fund a tank for the Soviet army, which she was only willing to do if they let her drive it. Despite the request’s odd nature, the Soviets agreed to let Oktyabrskaya go to war because it boost morale for the country’s citizens.
After completing her five month training course, Oktyabrskaya became a mechanic/driver of the 26th Guards Tank Brigade. She then entered the war driving her personally funded T-34 tank with the words “Fighting Girlfriend” painted on its turret. On October 21, 1943, at the age of 38, Oktyabrskaya was involved in her first tank battle where she made short work of German artillery and machine gun nests, earning the respect of her comrades and instilling fear in the Nazi forces in the process.
Oktyabrskaya distinguished herself as a superior and fearless driver in November 1943 when, in the midst of a night raid, a shell destroyed her tank’s tracks. She jumped out of the tank and opened fire on the Germans as her crew fixed the broken tracks, eventually warding off the Germans and returning to the rest of their unit two days later.
Oktyabrskaya met her match in January 1944 when, during another night raid, an anti-tank gunner once again disabled her tank by destroying its tracks. Even though she was ordered to stay inside the tank, Oktyabrskaya jumped out of the hatch and began working to repair the broken tracks while shooting at the incoming Nazis. Despite her best efforts, a piece of shrapnel struck her head, sending her into a coma.
She remained unconscious for over two months before finally succumbing to her injuries in March 1944. Upon her death, she received the Hero of the Soviet Union award for bravery, the highest award a soldier could receive in the Soviet Union.
Needless to say, the Nazis had no idea what they were getting themselves into when they killed a Soviet army officer in Kiev.
