There is a street in the capital of Belarus, Minsk, which is named after the heroine of the civil and Great Patriotic Wars - Vera Zakharovna Khoruzhey. An ordinary Belarusian woman died for the freedom of her native country and her people. She was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union after death. What feat did Horuzhai Vera Zakharovna accomplish? You will learn about this after reading the article.
Children's years V. Khoruzhey
The biography of Vera Horuzhey began in 1903, September 27. She was born in Bobruisk, Minsk province, in the family of a Belarusian official. My father was a policeman until 1908, unemployed for several years, then worked as a foreman on draining swampy places. After the revolution, he was an employee in various organizations; died in 1940. Mother was engaged in housework.
After a short time, the family moved to the city of Mozyr, where Vera Zakharovna Khoruzhaya was educated in the gymnasium and in the second-level school, which she managed to finish in 1919. I had to work as a laborer, then as a teacher in Polessky village.
Her relatives were outside politics, however, from a young age, the girl irrevocably devoted herself to Bolshevik ideology.
Fighting youth
At the age of 16, Vera Horuzhaya, whose photo you have the opportunity to see in the article, said goodbye to her family and went to fight to the front. As part of the Red Army Komsomol detachments of the CHON, as a volunteer, Vera took part in battles with the brigade of General Bulak-Balakhovich. In 1920, she became a Komsomol member, and in 1921 joined the party.
After the end of the military campaign, Vera Zakharovna Khoruzhaya taught children at school, and later headed the political enlightenment department in the district committee of the Komsomol in Mozyr and Bobruisk. Her wonderful organizer abilities and charm allowed her to become one of the Komsomol leaders.
What did Vera contemporaries see?
A contemporary, describing her portrait, noted that Verochka, as she was called, had gray eyes with a bluish tint, crafty and glowing. She was a blond brown-haired woman with a short haircut of slightly curly and disheveled hair. Faith could not be called a beauty, it lacked sophistication and grace, it was angular and sharp. However, she was very attractive. Her face was rather pleasant, and a sweet smile illuminated him. She was thin, tall, full of energy, vigor, amazed with her cheerfulness and love of life.
Vera Zakharovna was a supporter of the absolute truth by her principle, truth-loving nature, she was not afraid to express her opinion if it did not coincide with the official one.
I’m not only respected, but also loved. She studied brilliantly, had the ability to do this, quickly orientated herself in the material, easily remembered him. Vera Khoruzhaya participated in the newspaper, carried out public assignments for the city committee of the Komsomol.
At the Komsomol work
After the party school, Vera Horuzhuy was invited to work in the Central Committee of the Komsomol of Belarus. At the same time, she begins to print her first literary and journalistic articles. Her works, hot and inspired, were filled with young enthusiasm and attracted the attention of major contemporary writers. Acquaintance with them favorably reflected in her journalistic and artistic work.
After a short time, she was appointed editor of the Komsomol newspaper Young Plowman. But even Vera Zakharovna did not work long in this work.
Beginning of underground activities
As a result of the Polish-Russian war of 1920-1921. Poland occupied the territory of Western Belarus. In the occupied regions, the new authorities tried to assimilate the local population of Belarusian origin, to make it stronger.
Horuzhaya Vera Zakharovna, whose biography became an example of real courage and dignity, always burst into the most difficult places. At the very beginning of 1924, she disappeared from Minsk. She is sent to the territory occupied by the Poles in order to organize underground activities there. The girl becomes the secretary of the West Belarusian Central Committee of the Komsomol and at the same time is elected a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the region. Thanks to the active propaganda of the Khoruzhey, the number of Polish invaders who entered into an active confrontation is growing very rapidly.
The young party Vera Horuzhaya embarked on the difficult and dangerous road of the underground struggle. She had to dwell and carry out work in harsh conditions: the police in the west of Belarus terrorized the population much harder than in Poland itself. Conspiracy had to be strictly observed. In the harsh conditions of the underground and the arbitrariness of the police, Khoruzhaya actively created revolutionary youth associations, traveled many towns and villages in Western Belarus, was in Brest, Grodno, Bialystok, Slonim, Kobrin and other cities.
From the beginning of her underground work, the girl served as secretary of the West Belarusian Central Committee of the Komsomol. At the same time, she was elected a member of the Polish Central Committee of the Komsomol and the Central Committee of the Communist Party of her region. The role of Vera in organizing the mass revolutionary movement of the population, increasing every hour, despite the repressions, is invaluable.
First arrest
Vera Horuzhuy was arrested in Bialystok in the autumn of 1925. Details of the Brest “thirty-one trial”, in which Vera Khoruzhuy was sentenced to six years in prison for participating in illegal revolutionary work, for membership in the Communist Party, became public only in 1927. At the next, Białystok “trial of one hundred thirty-three” Khoruzhey, the term was increased and sentenced to eight years already.
The will of the young revolutionist did not succeed in breaking either the unrighteous sentence or the harsh conditions of imprisonment. She continued to fight there, being elected to the prison party committee. Even from there, Horuzhai sent messages about the desire to bring her business to a victorious end. In 1931, these messages from the dungeon will be printed in the Soviet Union as an individual publication, the book was called Letters to Freedom.
In 1930, Khoruzhuy was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor for participating in the organization of the liberation of Western Belarus .
Peaceful Times: Party Affair
In 1932, Horuzhaya Vera Zakharovna, a brief biography of which should be known to all who are interested in history, returned to Russia: under an agreement she was exchanged for Polish political prisoners. With joy, she begins to collaborate with the editorial board of publications for the West Belarusian underground, and then travels to Kazakhstan, on Balkhashstroy. After the liberation of Western Belarus by Soviet troops, in 1939, she was again sent to the regions associated with her youth. Vera enthusiastically, energetically works in the district committee in Telekhany, later in the Pinsk regional committee.
And again she is transferred to the Union, where she is busy with party affairs in Minsk and at large construction sites. A huge amount of party work did not interfere with the personal life of a charming girl: Vera became a happy wife, and in 1936 she had a daughter, Anechka, when a young mother managed the Balkhashstroev House of Party Education.
Arrest on denunciation and acquittal
The principle party Khoruzhaya Vera Zakharovna could not only carry out orders, but also express doubts, criticize what she disagrees with. Not everyone liked this position. In 1937, in August, the honored Belarusian underground activist was taken into custody by the NKVD. She was charged with provocations against the state and espionage in the interests of Poland. It’s not exactly proven who the scammer was. However, there are suggestions that he was the activist’s husband, Stanislav Mertens, Ani’s father.
But not one of all four investigators was able to force the communist Haruzhuy to confess to espionage. The trial took place in August 1939 and lasted two days. He became the triumph of a young woman who convinced everyone of innocence. Faith was acquitted and released from custody.
And a month later the lands of Western Belarus were liberated by the Red Army.
And again in 1940, Vera returned with her daughter to her small homeland, again working on the party line.
Vera Zakharovna is again happy in her personal life: she remarries for Sergey Kornilov, who was a military pilot, and now worked with Khoruzh.
Vera Horuzhaya - the hero’s wife
On June 22, almost immediately after the declaration of war, the couple went to the regional party committee. There they were met by an old partisan, the former commander of the Spanish Inter-Brigade, Vasily Zakharovich Korzh. He put Vera and Sergey on the list of the forming partisan detachment first.
Soon the detachment, led by Vasily Korzh, had grown to sixty people and intended to begin the fighting. Sergey Kornilov became the leader of the battle group. He was overtaken by a heroic death in one of the very first battles with German troops in the Pinsk district. But Vera Khoruzhuy, the hero’s wife, was sent to the mainland in the autumn of that year with the task of reporting the existence of partisan detachments. On the way to the front line, in the enemy rear, Khoruzhey had to observe all the nightmares of fascist capture, the calamities of the common people.
Having got to hers, Vera realized that she would not be allowed to return back. The management recommended that the pregnant partisan leave for evacuation with relatives. After the birth of her son, Vera also did not sit idly by, trying to benefit her country in the rear. On the collective farm, she worked as an accountant, but for a long time could not stand such a way of life.
Formation of a group to work behind the front line
Leaving the children to her sister, Vera leaves for Moscow and begins to prepare for illegal work in the occupied territory. After all, she had great experience in such activities. Vera Zakharovna begins by picking up cadres for illegal work at the headquarters of partisan detachments. This will later help her to equip a girl’s team for illegal work behind German fascists.
Vera Zakharovna received a pseudonym - Anna Kornilova. Under this name, she was supposed to act in the den of the enemy, in frontal Vitebsk, captured by the invaders.
Frontline situation in Vitebsk region
At the end of the summer, Verina team was preparing to cross the front line. Partisan operatives were supposed to help them. The combat situation at that moment was not too favorable for the partisans. The offensive was stopped. The Vitebsk partisans had direct contact with the military front units, they could easily move through frontal barriers, delivered replenishment, food supplies and fodder to the regular army, and they themselves brought weapons and ammunition from there. But this did not last long. The Germans pulled fresh forces into this sector of the front in order to block the resulting breakthrough. This led to heavy fighting and the partisan zone was completely blocked. At the end of the summer of 1942, the German army pushed back partisan detachments, and then completely turned off the “Vitebsk gate”. At this very moment, here, in the small village of Pudot, was Anna Kornilova’s group.
The German command assigned a large role to the position of occupied Vitebsk. He was located next to the front line and was considered the second gate after Smolensk on the way to Moscow. The city was overwhelmed by troops. Therefore, even the most experienced conspirators quickly failed. In addition, it was difficult to work without communication: radio communication was categorically prohibited. Direction finding was very well established in the city.
Subversive activities of girls
The partisans had a rather great need to maintain communications with the headquarters exclusively with the help of liaisons. October 1, Vera was in Vitebsk, in the very den of the enemy. Twenty partisans worked with her. They seeped into railway stations, made their way to airfields, factories, and the commandant's office.
The most important thing for Vera was the fate of people, their sorrows. When the general forced sending of citizens to work in Germany began, an underground organization led by Anna Kornilova tried to disrupt this action. The partisans burned documentation at the labor exchange, destroyed the passport office in the gendarmerie, organized the transfer of entire families to partisans, even freed people from trains traveling to Germany. The girls provided great assistance to prisoners of war fleeing the camps. They were preparing actions at the airport, at the railway station, an explosion in the cinema for the Nazis. Regular raids and terror did not prevent the echelons of troops and equipment from falling almost every day. Girls distributed leaflets with Sovinformburo summaries.
The Nazis hunted for a united military underground. Disturbing news began to come from Vera. The leaders of the underground tried to prevent failure and were going to withdraw Vera and her friends from the city. But she didn’t even want to hear about it.
Failure
It is not known why the underground workers failed. To date, no place has been found where the patriots died. No documents were found, only testimony exists. They reported that on November 13, 1942, Khoruzhaya was to meet with the liaisons from the partisan command. When she came to the safe house, there were two Germans - officers. Vera was not at a loss and spoke German to them. They liked the fact of a meeting with a Baltic German woman, who accidentally ended up in Vitebsk, they were even going to help her. The final was completely unforeseen. In fact, the house was already surrounded by policemen. Most likely, the Nazis did not have anything to do with the capture of the heroine. The officers did not expect the policemen to break into the hut.
Faith and the Vorobiev family were arrested. Patrols were set up around their homes. At that moment two more girls were going there, who didn’t notice the kids jumping out into the street and showing them a danger signal. The girls did not know about the danger, did not notice the conventional signs.
The death of the heroine
At the first interrogations, it turned out that the Germans did not have information about the Moscow group. The enemies managed to establish the identity of the scout, which had long been hunted by the police and the commandant's office. The traitor Petrov managed to decrypt the message of Vera intercepted from the liaison officer. The girls were immediately transferred to the basement on the Assumption Hill. It was a dungeon specially equipped with fascists for the most valuable prisoners - raw casemates. Above them were clerks and a torture chamber. It became clear that the team was exposed.
The girls suffered terrible torment, but none of them became a traitor. The Nazis in the courtyard of the SD shot several people from the group. One can only guess about the fate of the rest. There is no doubt that they are not alive. Some eyewitnesses reported that the patriot was shot outside the city, in the Ilovsky ravine, when it was a rainy cool morning. It seems that one local inhabitant accidentally heard the noise of a car drove up, the German team screamed and the sounds of gunfire, and after the Germans left the land still moved on the spot of execution: people were buried alive.
There is one more assumption that Vera Horuzhuy with her friends, like other war heroes - Julius Fucik and Musa Jalil, was taken to the Moabit fortress in Berlin.
That's just on the wall in one of the terrible dungeons there was a short inscription: "Khoruzh ...". It was unlikely that one could get out of this place alive. Nowadays, there is a branch of the regional museum, and the street was named after the heroine.
The feat of Vera Khoruzhey (briefly described in the article) was not forgotten. In 1960, May 17, a remarkable partisan was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union posthumously.
Lilac Vera Horuzha
In memory of the Hero of the Soviet Union, a well-known Belarusian underground worker who did not spare her life for the sovereignty and happiness of the Motherland, a wonderful lilac variety was bred.
This variety is distinguished by the tenderness of the color of rather large and lush inflorescences. They are purple-pink in the center with unusual bluish arrows. In diameter, the flowers are large - up to 2.8 cm, their design is similar to other plants - hyacinths. The bushes are quite sprawling, but not too tall.
Many argue that this kind of lilac is as gentle and at the same time persistent, like Vera Horuzhaya, whose biography was told to you in the article.