Background

Ekaterina Mikhailova-Demina was born on December 22, 1925, in Leningrad. Her father was a military man and her mother worked as a doctor. A very young, three-year-old girl became an orphan and ended up in an orphanage. Little is known about her early life.

Education

By June 1941, Ekaterina Mikhailova-Demina graduated from the 9th grade, and school nursing courses of the Russian society of the red cross.

After the war, Ekaterina graduated from Saint Petersburg State Medical Academy.

Career

Ekaterina Mikhailova met the Second World War on the train. A 15-year-old schoolgirl was traveling from Leningrad on vacation to her brother, a military pilot, in Brest. After Smolensk, the composition came under fire from German aircraft.

Ekaterina immediately decided to volunteer for the front. And she heard the categorical answer: "We don’t take children!" The next time she acted more cunningly and added two to her 15 years. But the decisive role was played by another - Katya was able to provide assistance to the wounded. She, a schoolgirl, excellently completed the evening courses of the ROCC (Russian Red Cross Society). She signed up when she was refused to take her to the flying club. Katya dreamed of being a pilot, but she was advised to come when she grows up. It was then that an announcement about the ROCC courses came across. In addition, both mom and grandmother Katie were doctors.

Ekaterina was taken as an assistant medical officer in a company heading for the front line. In the fall, on the far approaches to Moscow, near Gzhatsk, she was shot in the leg in three places at once. Together with the hospital, the girl went to Baku. The first time after the operation, the leg did not bend at the knee.

After discharge, from January 1942, Katya served on the military-medical vessel "Krasnaya Moskva", where the wounded were taken from Stalingrad. After the Battle of Stalingrad was completed, Ekaterina Mikhailova-Demina, at her request, was enlisted as a medical instructor in the 369th Separate Marine Battalion, formed from volunteers.

Ekaterina participated in releasing Temryuk. Then there was Kerch. The sailors landed on the shore at night, having won a small bridgehead. Dozens of injured and no drinking water. The only well was in neutral territory. The Germans already managed to find out that among the Marines there was a girl, they even knew her name.

Together with the battalion, she liberated Kerch, Odessa, Belgorod-Dniester, Izmail, the Ilok Fortress, Budapest, Komarno, Belgrade, Bratislava, Vienna. Twice Ekaterina Illarionovna was represented to the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. The first time is for the liberation of Belgorod-Dniester. The battle began on August 22, 1944. Sailors landed at night on boats. The coast was steep - several meters in height. To climb it, the soldiers had to stand on each other's shoulders, and the Germans threw grenades from above. Ekaterina dragged the wounded to the nearest hollow, managing to shoot back, and even suppressed the fire of the enemy’s easel machine gun. When the cartridges ran out, the girl began to catch German grenades with long handles and toss them back. "Sister, go away, and blow us up," the wounded asked. - "If we die, then all together." Ekaterina rescued soldiers, and on the approaches to the hollow after the battle, it was counted more than fifty corpses of the Nazis. But then she could not get the title of hero - someone messed up, and she was awarded the Order of the Red Banner.

Demobilized, Ekaterina graduated from medical school and worked as a doctor all her life. And when the war in Afghanistan began, she again came to the draft board, but she was rejected because of her age.

From 1976 until her retirement heroine worked in Moscow. And only in 1990, she received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. The award has found her after 45 years.

Achievements

• 

  For courage and heroism during the war years, Ekaterina Mikhailova was awarded many orders and medals. She received her first award - the medal "For Courage" - for participating in the landing during the capture of Temryuk. The first order of the Patriotic War II degree - for participating in the battle for Kerch with a landing in a storm and leaving the encirclement with battles and for the removal of the wounded. The first and second orders of the Red Banner - for crossing the Dniester estuary on August 1944 and for participating in the battles for the Ilok fortress on the border of Hungary and Yugoslavia in December 1944.
  
  Later, new ones were added to the above-mentioned awards: Order of the Patriotic War of the 1st degree, medals "For the liberation of Belgrade", "For the capture of Budapest", "For the capture of Vienna", "For the defense of the Caucasus", "For the victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945." In 1961, she was awarded the most honorable award of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement - Florence Nightingale Medal. Ekaterina Demina was also awarded The Order of St. Andrew the Apostle the First-Called. In 1990, when the 45th anniversary of the Victory was celebrated, by the Decree of the President of the USSR for heroism in the fight against Nazi invaders, Ekaterina Demina was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union with the award of the Order of Lenin and the Golden Star medal.

Views

Quotations: "I still have a terrible picture before my eyes: an infant is crawling on the corpse of a mother. He found a breast and began to suck. The surviving passengers went on foot to Smolensk. Many women carried the bodies of children with them. June, the heat, the smell is monstrous..."

Membership

Ekaterina Mikhailova-Demina was a member of the Russian Committee of war veterans, the all-Russian Council of veterans of war and labor.

• the Soviet Red Cross , Soviet Union

• Red Crescent Society

Personality

In 2008, Ekaterina Mikhailova-Demina experienced a severe moral upheaval - military awards were stolen from her. Two fraudsters, taking advantage of the credulity of Ekaterina Illarionovna, under the guise of social workers penetrated her apartment. It was not possible to detain them. In 2010, she was awarded duplicate orders and medals.

Until the last days, Ekaterina Illarionovna tried not to refuse when she was invited to events. Worried about today's youth. If at the meeting she did not see schoolchildren in the hall, she complained: "It is a pity that our company does not have young people. We veterans are dying. And who will protect the homeland?"

Connections

Ekaterina Mikhailova married the former front-line soldier of the communications officer Demin. They had a son Yuri. She had two granddaughters - Galya and Ekaterina.

Son:

Yuri Demin

granddaughter :

Galya Demina

granddaughter :

Ekaterina Demina

References

• Amazons to Fighter Pilots: A Biographical Dictionary of Military Women
  2003
• Women and War: A Historical Encyclopedia from Antiquity to the Present
  2006
• Heroines of the Soviet Union 1941–45
  2003