Sydir Kovpak
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Sydir Artemovych Kovpak (Ukrainian: Сидір Артемович Ковпак; Russian: Си́дор Арте́мьевич Ковпа́к, Sidor Artеmуevich Kovpak), June 7, 1887 – December 11, 1967) was a prominent Soviet partisan leader in Ukraine.
Kovpak was born in a poor peasant family in Ukrainian village near Poltava (then of Russian Empire). For his military service in the World War I he was awarded two Crosses of St. George personally by the Emperor Nicholas II of Russia (an award for special military heroism). After the Russian Revolution he joined the All-Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) and fought for the Red Army partisan units against the German forces, as well as against Denikin's White Army in a legendary Vasily Chapayev's cavalry division. In the interwar period he was a head of the local government in the town of Putyvl, Sumy Oblast (province). During Stalin's great purge Kovpak narrowly escaped arrest, being warned by the local head of NKVD, Kovpak left the town and spent a month hiding in the forest khutor.
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[edit] World War II
At the time of the German invasion of Soviet Ukraine partisan units led by Sydir Kovpak waged guerrilla warfare against Axis forces originally in partisan strongholds in Sumy and Bryansk regions but later its operation spread deep into German occupied territory including Kiev, Zhytomyr, Rivne, Homyel, Volyn and other regions. These partisan units also fought against nationalist Ukrainian Insurgent Army. In 1944 partisans under Kovpak leadership raided enemy forces throughout western Ukraine and Belarus and even reached Romanian border regions during the famous Carpathian raid inflicting heavy casualties on the Germans.
Kovpak mastered guerrilla tactics and became a living legend in the Soviet Union. In the summer of 1943 Germans managed to hunt down and kill Kovpak's second in command Semyon Rudnev who was replaced by a new right-hand man Petro Vershigora who would later became a writer and dedicate his books to Kovpak's legendary underground resistance.
Sydir Kovpak was awarded Hero of the Soviet Union title twice and in 1943 was promoted to the rank of lieutenant-general. After the end of the Great Patriotic War Sydir Kovpak held key positions in the leadership of Soviet Ukraine.
[edit] Awards and honors
- twice Hero of the Soviet Union (May 18, 1942 and January 4, 1944)
- four Orders of Lenin
- Order of the Red Banner
- Order of Suvorov (1st Class)
- Order of Bogdan Khmelnitsky (1st Class)
- other orders and medals
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- (Russian)/(Ukrainian) "How Sydir Kovpak was a guerilla before the war", Zerkalo Nedeli, (the Mirror Weekly), Kiev, August 11-17, 2001. in Russian, in Ukrainian.
- (Russian) People with clear conscience — Memoires of Pyotr Petrovich Vershigora
