Major Gavrilov is one of the most famous heroes of the Great Patriotic War. His feat is still remembered by the descendants of the winners, and the life path of Peter Mikhailovich is an example to the younger generation.
The defender of the Brest Fortress - the first frontier of resistance to the Nazi occupation - surpassed the physical and moral abilities of man, thereby immortalizing and writing his name in history forever.
Biography: youth
Major Gavrilov was born in 1900 in the territory of the modern Pestrechinsky district. His family was ordinary peasants. Left without a father, Peter worked hard since childhood. To provide for his family, he helped the household chores. And at the age of fifteen he already worked as a farm laborer. After that he went to Kazan, where he got a job at a factory and was a laborer. The inhuman working conditions and the arbitrariness of the authorities caused Gavrilov sincere hatred of the regime existing in the Russian Empire and social inequality.
When the first unrest began, he immediately joined the revolutionaries. He took a direct part in the proclamation of the power of people's councils in Kazan and the okrug. With the outbreak of the Civil War at the age of eighteen, he volunteered to join the created Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army. He is fighting at the front against the White Guards. Personally participated in battles with units of Kolchak and Denikin. He visited many fronts. Two years after the end of the Civil War, he joined the Bolshevik Party. Starts to study. Graduates from the infantry school. A few years later he marries and adopts a child.
First war
Career moves up. At thirty-nine, the newly minted Major Gavrilov graduated from the Higher Military Academy. He is entrusted with a rifle regiment. In the same year, another war begins. Gavrilov goes to the cold forests of Finland to participate in the Winter War. The Red Army is fighting in the most difficult conditions of food shortages and the actions of Finnish saboteurs. Despite this, the Gavrilov division fulfills the tasks assigned to it. After the war, Gavrilov was transferred to Brest. This city became Soviet as a result of the Polish campaign of the Red Army. There, soldiers are located in the old fortress.
The first attack on the fortress
In June 1941, about nine thousand people were in the Brest Fortress. Major Gavrilov with the fighters was also housed inside the old castle. Given the current conditions of the war, the fortress was not at all a serious fortification, and the soldiers were placed there solely for reasons of logic. In the event of an attack by Nazi Germany, the soldiers who were in the fortress had to occupy the Brest line of fortifications. However, on June 22, at night, the old walls suddenly shuddered from artillery strikes. The shelling lasted about 10 minutes. Taken aback, the Red Army perished in their own beds. Due to surprise, as well as turmoil, panic began. On the territory of the fortress were also families of commanders with children. Many tried to escape beyond the ramparts, but were caught in enemy fire.
Storm
Immediately after the shelling, the first attack began. A special Nazi battalion broke through the gate and almost captured the citadel. However, the Soviet forces managed to group up and launch an attack. Gavrilov led one of the units. By morning, almost all of the Nazis who had entered the fortress were destroyed. But then in the afternoon reinforcements approached them. The defenders lost contact with the command and were not aware of the situation in the surrounding territories. Under almost constant shelling, the remnants of the military managed to gather and draw up an action plan. They were divided into several groups, one of which was headed by Major Gavrilov. The Brest fortress was half destroyed, and the Germans in the evening organized a new attack. The defenders fought both day and night. Despite the lack of ammunition and provisions, they even managed to make sorties. The hardest thing was with water, since the water supply did not work for several days. Gavrilov with fighters took refuge in East Fort, where he managed to organize stubborn resistance. For several days the Nazis unsuccessfully stormed the fort and could not take it.
The destruction of the citadel
By twenty-ninth, the Nazi command decided to drop a heavy aerial bomb weighing about two tons. After her hit, the ammunition depot detonated, many fighters died. A handful of defenders survived, among whom was Major Gavrilov. The Brest fortress was almost completely captured by the Germans. Separate groups of fighters barricaded themselves on the premises and continued their resistance.
Major Peter Gavrilov and a dozen Red Army soldiers leave the ruined fort and take refuge in the casemates. In addition to personal weapons, they had only four machine guns and some ammunition. While in the dungeon, they made sorties and fought off German attacks. The defense of the dungeon lasted almost a month. In conditions of poor diet, darkness and a lack of ammunition, the defenders stubbornly resisted. These events had a bad effect on the fighting spirit of the Nazis. At the beginning of the war, Hitler promised to enslave the Soviet Union in a year. And the Nazis tried unsuccessfully to take the old castle for several weeks.
Last fighter
On July 29, Major Gavrilov Peter Mikhailovich was left alone. The Nazis found him in one of the basements. Despite extreme exhaustion, he entered into battle with them. Using hand grenades and a pistol, he killed and wounded several Germans. After a serious wound, he was captured unconscious. The Germans were shocked. The major was exhausted and looked like a corpse. Gavrilov was dressed in a tattered, decaying parade officer uniform. Doctors could not believe that some time ago this man could fight. After the capture of Gavrilov sent to a concentration camp. There he meets, among others, General Karbyshev.
After the war
In the spring of forty-fifth, he was released from the camp. In autumn, he was reinstated and assigned the post of head of the Japanese prisoner camp. In this service, he also distinguished himself by preventing an epidemic. After being fired, he went to Kazan and found his family. In the fifties, excavations of the fortress begin, and the world learns about the heroic resistance of its defenders. In 1957, Major Gavrilov, defender of the Brest Fortress, was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union. He participated in writing a book about the defense of the fortress, gave interviews that helped shed light on the events of the summer of 1941. He spent the last years of his life in Krasnodar, where he died in 1979. He was buried in Brest, in the garrison cemetery.