| Annotation board in St. Petersburg (1) | ||
| Annotation board in St. Petersburg (1) (fragment) | ||
| Annotation board in St. Petersburg (2) | ||
| Bust in the village of Snovyanka |
Portnova Zinaida Martynovna (Zina Portnova) - a member of the underground Komsomol organization Young Avengers, which operated at the Obol station of the Vitebsk region of the Belarusian SSR.
She was born on February 20, 1926 in the city of Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) in a working class family. Belarusian. Member of the Komsomol since 1943. She graduated from 7 classes.
During the Great Patriotic WarDuring the summer school holidays in the village of Zuya near the Obol station (now within the urban-type settlement of Obol, Shumilinsky district) of the Vitebsk region of the Byelorussian SSR, Zina Portnova found herself in the territory temporarily occupied by the Germans.
In 1942, the young patriot joined the Obolsk underground Komsomol-youth organization "Young Avengers" (leader - Hero Soviet Union E. S. Zenkova) and actively participated in the distribution of leaflets among the population and sabotage against the Nazi invaders.
Since August 1943, Komsomol member Zina Portnova has been a scout of the partisan detachment named after K.E. Voroshilov. In December 1943, she was tasked with identifying the reasons for the failure of the Young Avengers organization and establishing contact with the underground. On returning to the detachment, Zina was arrested. During interrogation, a brave girl grabbed the pistol of a fascist investigator from the table, shot him and two more Nazis, tried to escape, but was captured and brutally tortured in January 1944 in the village of Goryany, now in the Shumilinsky district of the Vitebsk region of Belarus.
By the decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of July 1, 1958, for the courage and heroism shown in the fight against the fascist invaders during the Great Patriotic War, Tailor Zinaida Martynovna awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union (posthumously).
She was awarded the Order of Lenin (01.08.1958, posthumously).
In 1969, in the village of Zuya, on the house where Zina Portnova lived from 1941 to 1943, a memorial plaque was opened. On the Vitebsk-Polotsk highway, the Museum of Komsomol Glory and the school are named after her. Many pioneer squads and detachments in schools in Belarus bore the name of the young Hero. A school in the urban-type village of Obol, a street in the hero-city of Leningrad, and a motor ship are named after Zina Portnova. In the capital of Belarus - the hero city of Minsk, there is a bust of Zina Portnova, and an obelisk near the village of Obol.
Sources
The feat of Zina Portnova, summary which will be described in this article is not very widely covered on the Internet. There is little information and it is repeated all the time. There are no sources that would reveal a multifaceted picture of her heroic deed. Basically, only dry facts are cited: she was born in Leningrad in 1926 in a working class family, was a member of the underground youth group "Young Avengers", during the execution of the next assignment she was captured by the Nazis and executed in January 1944.
To understand who this girl was, and to imagine what she thought about during the ordeals, let us turn to the content of the story of the same name.
Character
In this story, the author very vividly describes the fate of Zina, a young Komsomol member and pioneer, who fought against the Nazi invaders and passed with dignity despite numerous difficulties. She never backed down and looked with challenge at new challenges. Even in the most difficult times, the girl never took care of herself, but was more worried about others. Awareness of one's duty, perseverance, a sense of responsibility and ardent love for the homeland - these are the qualities that determine the feat of Zina Portnova.
Joining the ranks of "Young Avengers"
In June 1941, the parents sent the girl to the village of Zuya (Vitebsk region) for school break... It was at this time that the Nazis invaded the USSR, and Portnova ended up in the occupied territory. She was not going to put up with the current state of affairs and decided to fight the enemy. In 1942, Zina Portnova, whose feat will never be forgotten, joined the Young Avengers organization.
Difficult task
Smirnov's story filled the dry facts of the girl's biography with life and made it possible for the reader to mentally be with the pioneer in moments of difficult trials. When Zina got a job in the canteen for the cadets of the Wehrmacht, she received one of the most difficult tasks from the Young Avengers. Portnova was supposed to add poison to the food. After the girl did this, about 100 fascists were killed. Among them were the pilots who on that day were supposed to fly to the bombing of Moscow and Leningrad. Thus, the feat of Zina Portnova saved thousands of lives of her compatriots.
Leaving for the partisans
The Germans immediately began to search for the culprit and brought together the entire canteen staff. Each was offered a bowl of poisoned soup. Portnova ate it without any further ado. The girl was not afraid of being caught, but she was very worried about the fate of her younger sister Gali and her cousins, who remained at her dependents after the arrest of her aunt Ira. The fear that the Germans would take them turned out to be stronger than Weak, and feeling a strong pain in the stomach, the girl thought only about how to take Galya to a safe place - to the partisans in the forest.
Zina Portnova, whose feat is known all over the world, took her sister by the hand and went into the forest through the swampy area. The pain increased, but she did not stop. Zina understood that she was going to die, and the count went to hours. The main thing for the future Komsomol member was to take her sister to the partisans. They found the girls only at dawn. Portnova was lying on the ground unconscious, and Galya was sitting next to her. Doctors diagnosed acute and pneumonia. It was a miracle that the young pioneer survived. In 1943 she was admitted to the Komsomol.
New task
After the Nazis shot most of the "Young Avengers" group, Zina Portnova, whose feat motivated the fighters, together with her brother Ilya and Masha Dementieva, went on reconnaissance to the village of Mostishchi. There, the girl had to meet with a messenger and find out how many Komsomol members survived, what kind of help they needed. Zina went to the meeting alone, and Ilya and Masha had to cover her and wait at the agreed place.
Arrest
Portnova found out the necessary information from the contact and went back. On the way, she met two women, one of whom knew Zina. And the one to whom Portnova was unfamiliar asked the girl's name. The woman replied that it was Zina, Yablokova's granddaughter. Policemen passing by knew this surname well and detained Portnova, deciding to deliver her to the village of Obol. Just on the way there Masha and Ilya were to wait for the girl. But when the Nazis conducted the pioneer next to the agreed place, the comrades did not come to her aid. Only a few years later, when the feat of the pioneer Zina Portnova became public, it turned out that the guys left the observation post for just a few minutes because of the booming sound in the forest. It was at this moment that the fascists conducted the girl.
Escape attempt
Zina Portnova, whose feat is known to all residents of the USSR, was brought in for interrogation to a Gestapo officer. He looked at the Komsomol member with glazed eyes. Then the Gestapo pulled out his pistol and put it on the table. Outside the window, a car engine roared, and the fascist turned away from the girl. Zina reacted instantly - she grabbed a pistol and shot the enemy in the chest. There was another Gestapo in the room, frantically trying to get a pistol. He was also shot. Running out of the building, Portnova killed the sentry point-blank. Firing back from the chase, the girl went down to the river.
Torture and execution
Soon a machine gun fire overtook her, the girl was badly wounded in the leg. But she did not stop and continued to shoot back. Zina kept the last bullet for herself. When the Germans almost overtook her, the Komsomol member directed the barrel of a pistol into her chest and pulled the trigger. But there was a misfire. The fascist who ran up knocked out the pistol and grabbed the brave Komsomol member.
After the incident, Portnova was taken to Polotsk. The torture continued for a month. The Nazis shattered Zina's joints, gouged out her eyes and twisted her arms. They also burned the girl with a hot iron and drove needles under her nails. The Komsomol member did not utter a word and was shot. The unshakable resilience of the girl became another reason that the feat of Zina Portnova, interesting Facts about which are given in this article, will always be an example for young people.
Conclusion
The Soviet people learned about the "Young Avengers" only 15 years after the end of the war. In 1958, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the country issued a decree awarding orders of the USSR to all members of the underground group "Young Avengers".
Time is inexorably running forward, but the feat of Zina Portnova, a summary of which is described above, will live forever in the hearts of people.
Portnova's hero Zinaida accomplished a feat in the terrible years. A city girl who dreamed of becoming a ballerina. just beginning to live, just like the other guys whose lives were taken by the war. In Soviet times, everyone knew their names. Schools, streets and motor ships were named in honor of the young fighters against fascism, monuments and obelisks were erected.
Zina Portnova biography briefly
Zinaida Portnova was born in 1926. After graduating from the seven-year school, in the summer of 1941, the girl, together with her sister, came to visit her grandmother in the village of Zuya near the village of Obol, Vitebsk region, where she, until her arrest, participated along with other underground workers in the fight against the Nazis. The life of the young heroine was cut short in the winter of 1944.
Joining an underground organization
When the Germans captured Belarus, the girl was only fourteen years old. The Germans introduced a curfew, violation of which was punishable by death. Zina did not manage to leave the village, she remained in Oboli and decided to provide all possible assistance to the adult fighters against the Nazi invaders: she copied leaflets and pasted them over the central buildings of the village at night.
She later joined the ranks of the underground organization Young Avengers. The underground workers helped by collecting information on the deployment of German forces and organized sabotage.
Sabotage activities
Working in the canteen at the German commandant's office, Zina put poison into a pot of soup that was intended for the invaders. As a result of this action, hundreds of fascists were seriously injured. To divert suspicion from herself, the girl had to taste the poisoned soup. Zina went out in a partisan detachment, where she continued to fight the fascist invaders.
As part of the reconnaissance group, Zina obtained information for the detachment, and also participated in military operations.
Arrest and heroic death
As a result of the denunciations that clamored into the ranks of the "Avengers" local resident Grechukhin, in the summer of 1943 the underground organization was defeated. Many of its members were arrested and tortured On behalf of the partisan detachment, Zina Portnova appeared in her native places in order to restore contact with the surviving guys from the underground. After the assignment, Zina ran into a patrol.
Despite the presence of documents with a different name, the patrol officers detained her. In the commandant's office, Zina was identified as an active participant in the "Avengers". Interrogations began, during one the little girl grabbed a pistol lying unattended, wounded a German investigator and tried to escape. Zina did not manage to get to the forest, she was overtaken by an automatic fire, shooting through her legs.
Portnova Zinaida, despite the torture, showed incredible fortitude, not betraying any of her comrades. The girl went through suffering that an adult could not stand. At the beginning of January 1944, sunny Chamomile was shot. The memory of the heroes is alive!
Memory in our hearts
13 years after the end of the war, Zinaida Portnova was posthumously awarded. A street in hometown... Peaceful generations have grown up, the acute perception of those events has passed. But modern adolescents need to be told about their selfless peers who have gone into immortality. The memory of the war heroes who were martyred for the country's free future continues to live in people's hearts.
At the turn of the 1980-1990s, during the debunking period soviet heroes, for each of those who were recognized and glorified by the Soviet regime, they looked for compromising evidence.
Find anything that compromises the underground Zina Portnovturned out to be difficult. And therefore, the main complaint against her was that she, glorified among the "pioneer heroes", was not a pioneer!
This is actually true. Zina died as a Komsomol member. But she began her short-lived but fierce struggle against fascism as a pioneer.
About her, like about many young heroes war, one might say a banal phrase - her pre-war childhood was the most common.
Zina was born in Leningrad, in a working class family, on February 20, 1926. She studied at school, studied in a circle and did not think about exploits.
At the beginning of June 1941, few people in Leningrad thought about the war. And therefore, the parents calmly sent Zina and her younger sister Galya for the summer to her grandmother, in Belarus.
In the village of Zuya, in the Vitebsk region, the rest did not last long. The offensive of the Nazis was swift, and very soon the threat of occupation hung over the village where Zina and her sister lived.
The grandmother gathered her granddaughters on the road and sent them along with the refugees. However, the Nazis cut the road, and there was no chance of returning to Leningrad. So 15-year-old Zina Portnova ended up in the occupation.
"Young Avengers"
The resistance to the Nazis on the territory of Belarus was especially fierce. From the first days of the war, partisan detachments and underground groups were created here.
In the Shumilinsky district of the Vitebsk region, a youth underground organization "Young Avengers" was created, the history of which is similar to the story of the legendary "Young Guard". The leader of "Young Avengers" was Fruza (Efrosinya) Zenkova, who rallied the local youth around themselves, ready to resist the Nazis.
Fruza had connections with "adult" underground fighters and with the local partisan detachment. The Young Avengers coordinated their actions with the partisans.
Fruza Zenkova, the leader of the Komsomol resistance, was 17 at the beginning of the war. Zina Portnova, who became one of the most active participants in Young Avengers, is 15.
What could these children oppose to the Nazis?
They started with putting up leaflets, petty sabotage like damage to the property of the Nazis. The further, the more serious the shares became. Undermining the power plant, setting fire to factories, burning at the station wagons with flax, intended to be sent to Germany - in total, the "Young Avengers" was responsible for more than 20 successful sabotage.
Zina Portnova, an active member of the group, who was a pioneer by the beginning of the war, joined the Komsomol underground.
Sabotage in the dining room
Hitler's counterintelligence was on the trail of the underground. The Nazis managed to introduce a provocateur into their ranks, who would betray most of the members of the organization.
But this will happen later. Prior to this, Zina Portnova will carry out one of the most ambitious sabotage in the history of "Young Avengers". A girl who worked as a dishwasher in the cafeteria of refresher courses for German officers poisoned the food prepared for lunch. As a result of the sabotage, about a hundred Nazis were killed.
Furious Nazis arrested the entire staff of the cafeteria. Zina escaped arrest that day by accident. When the first signs of poisoning appeared, the Nazis broke into the dining room and stumbled upon Portnova. They thrust a plate into her hands and forced her to eat the poisoned soup. Zina understood that by refusing, she would betray herself. Retaining amazing composure, she ate a few spoons, after which the Germans, releasing her, were distracted by other kitchen workers. The Nazis decided that the dishwasher knew nothing about the poisoning.
Zina was saved from death by a strong body and her grandmother, who managed to soften the effect of the poison with folk remedies.
The defeat of the underground
Since the summer of 1943, Zina Portnova was a fighter in the Voroshilov partisan detachment, participating in many operations against the Nazis.
On August 26, 1943, German counterintelligence carried out mass arrests of members of the Young Avengers organization. By a lucky coincidence, only a few activists and the leader of the "Avengers" Fruza Zenkov did not fall into the hands of the Nazis.
The torture and interrogation of the underground workers lasted three months. On October 5 and 6, all of them, more than 30 boys and girls, were shot.
When the partisan detachment became aware of the defeat of the youth underground, Zina Portnova was instructed to try to restore contact with those who escaped arrest, and to learn about the reasons for the failure.
However, during this assignment, Zina herself was identified and detained as a member of the underground.
The provocateur did a good job - the Nazis knew almost everything about her. And about her parents in Leningrad, and about her role in the organization "Young Avengers". The Germans, however, did not know that it was she who poisoned the German officers. Therefore, she was offered a deal - life in exchange for information about the whereabouts of Fruza Zenkova and the base of the partisan detachment.
But the carrot and stick method didn't work. Neither buy Zina nor intimidate her.
Step into immortality
During one of the interrogations, the Hitlerite officer was distracted, and Zina reacted instantly, grabbing a pistol lying on the table. She shot the Nazi, jumping out of the office, and ran away. She managed to shoot two more Germans, but could not escape - Zina was shot in the legs.
After that, the Nazis were driven only by rage. She was tortured not for the sake of information, but in order to give her the most terrible torture possible, to make the girl scream, to ask for mercy.
Zina endured everything steadfastly, and this resilience infuriated the executioners even more.
During the last interrogation in the Gestapo prison in the city of Polotsk, the Nazis gouged out her eyes.
Early in the morning in January 1944, the crippled but not broken Zina was shot.
Her grandmother died under German bombs during a large-scale punitive operation of the Nazis. Sister Galya was rescued by a miracle, having managed to take it to the mainland by plane.
The truth about the fate of Zina and other underground workers became known much later, when Belarus was completely liberated from the Nazis.
By the decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of July 1, 1958, Portnova Zinaida Martynovna was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union for her heroism in the fight against the German-fascist invaders.
Childhood
Zina was born on February 20, 1926 in Leningrad in the family of Martyn Nesterovich Portnov, a worker at the Kirov plant. She studied at an ordinary city school number 385, where in 1937 she was admitted to the pioneer organization. The girl studied well, dreamed of becoming a ballerina. In June 1941, seventh-grader Zina and her sister Galya went on vacation to their grandmother in Belarus, to the village of Zuya near the Obol station in the Vitebsk region. There they were caught by the war. Childhood is over. The sisters ended up in German-occupied territory.
"Young Avengers"
Zina and Galya did not want to evacuate along with other civilians. We stayed in the city of Obol. Through her uncle Ivan Yablokov, Zina Portnova got in touch with the partisans. On their instructions, she distributed anti-fascist leaflets, collected and counted the weapons left behind during the retreat of the Soviet troops.
In 1942, the Portnov sisters joined the Young Avengers organization. Almost all of its participants were students of Obolskaya high schoolcollected under the guidance of 20-year-old Efrosinya Zenkova. Very soon Zina earned the trust of her comrades: she was elected a member of the organization's steering committee, and eight-year-old Galya was appointed a liaison. The children vowed to take revenge on the Nazis for the grief and torment of the people, for their native Leningrad, squeezed into a ring of blockade.
For about two years, the "Young Avengers" fought against the invaders. They derailed trains, destroyed railway lines, bridges and highways, blew up water supply facilities, and disabled factories.
The feat of Zina Portnova
Not far from Oboli, in the village of a peat factory, a German officers' school is located. Artillerymen and tankmen of the fascist army came here for retraining from near Leningrad, Novgorod, Smolensk and Orel. In Obol, they simply did not live. Hanging with crosses and medals, they were sure that everything was allowed for them: violence, robbery, robbery.
Oboli's young underground workers decided to exterminate the fascists. Zina Portnova got a job in the officers' mess. The Germans liked the Russian girl with pigtails. Once she replaced a sick dishwasher. This made it easier for her to access food. Seizing the moment, Zina managed to pour powder into the cauldron ...
Two days later, more than a hundred officers were buried at a military cemetery near Oboli, who had lunch that day in the canteen.
The Nazis had no direct evidence against Zina. Fearing responsibility, the chef and his assistant claimed during the investigation that they did not allow the girl who replaced the dishwasher to get to the food pots even to a cannon shot. They made her taste the poisoned soup just in case.
Zina, as if nothing had happened, took a spoon from the chef's hands and calmly scooped up the soup. She did not betray herself and took a small sip. Soon I felt nausea and general weakness. With difficulty I got to the village. I drank two liters of serum from my grandmother. It became a little easier and she fell asleep. To protect Zina from possible arrest, the underground workers took her to the partisans in the forest at night.
Interrogation and escape
Among the partisans, Zina Portnova became a reconnaissance fighter, and Galya was accepted as a nurse's assistant. Meanwhile, the provocateur betrayed several members of the Young Avengers. The detachment commander instructed Zina to establish contact with those who survived. The scout successfully completed the mission, but was unable to report it. Returning back, I came across an enemy ambush near the village of Mostishche. She was detained. A certain Anna Khrapovitskaya identified the girl, and Zina was transported to Obol. There, the Gestapo was closely engaged in her, since she was listed as a suspect in sabotage in the dining room.
During interrogation by the Gestapo, Zina Portnova grabbed the investigator's pistol and instantly shot him. Two Nazis came running to these shots, whom the girl also shot. Then she ran out of the building and rushed to the river, hoping to escape by swimming, but did not manage to reach the water. The pistol is out of cartridges. The Germans wounded Zina, seized and sent to the Vitebsk prison. They no longer had doubts about the pioneer's involvement in the underground, so they did not interrogate her, but simply tortured her methodically. They burned her with a hot iron, drove needles under her nails, and cut off her ears. Zina dreamed of death: once, when she was being transferred across the yard, she threw herself under the wheels of a truck. The driver managed to brake. The torture continued .. The torture lasted more than a month, but Zina did not betray anyone. On the last day before Portnova's execution, her eyes were gouged out.
Death and memory
The Nazis took out a blind and completely gray seventeen-year-old girl to be shot .. She walked, stumbling with bare feet through the snow. She was shot in a ravine next to the railway; her body was left unburied.
On July 1, 1958, by a decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Zina Portnova was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. The name of the brave partisan was carved on the obelisk; it was worn by a battleship and pioneer groups throughout the country.