Lady Death
The Memoirs of Stalin's Sniper
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Lady Death
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Narrated by:
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Emily Durante
About this listen
In June 1941, when Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa, Lyudmila Pavlichenko left her university studies and ignored the offer of a position as a nurse to become one of Soviet Russia's 2,000 female snipers. Less than a year later, she had 309 recorded kills, including 29 enemy sniper kills. She was withdrawn from active duty after being injured. She was also regarded as a key heroic figure for the war effort.
She spoke at rallies in Canada and the US, and the folk singer Woody Guthrie wrote a song, "Killed By A Gun", about her exploits. Her US trip included a tour of the White House with FDR. In November 1942, she visited Coventry and accepted donations of £4,516 from Coventry workers to pay for three X-ray units for the Red Army. She also visited a Birmingham factory as part of her fundraising tour. She never returned to combat but trained other snipers. After the war, she finished her education at Kiev University and began a career as a historian. She died on October 10, 1974, at age 58, and was buried in Moscow's Novodevichy Cemetery.
©2015 Alla Igorevna Begunova; David Foreman English-language translation copyright 2018 by Greenhill Books; Foreword copyright 2018 by Martin Pegler (P)2018 TantorWhat listeners say about Lady Death
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Extraordinary Gent.
- 09-11-2024
Best Red Army memoir I have yet read. GRIPPING,
A first hand account by the Heroine herself of her life in the Red Army where she used her pre-war training as a 'sniper' at an OSOAVIAKHIM training school to eliminate at least 309 German and Romanian officers and men in the first years of the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945. Her actual tally was likely closer to 500 if unconfirmed by a third party kills are taken into account.
Fancy turning up at the Odesa recruitment centre within days of the launch of Barbarossa on June 22nd 1941 in your street clothes not expecting to be sent straight to the front in them.
On arrival at her assigned unit she was issued with a uni-sex uniform and boots too big, plus her 'kit' of essential items and given behind the lines tasks. "perhaps you are a nurse ?" until she convinced her superiors of her skills with a rifle.
Her coverage of the retreat to Odesa, the fighting there and then evacuation to the Soviet naval fortress of Sevastopol in the Crimea are covered extensively and poignant detail.
A fleeting reference to her 'First Love' gives very little information about her first marriage, at perhaps 16 years old, except that she gave birth to a son -- whom she did not see during the 3 years or so she was active in the Red Army.
Her second husband, whom she met and married at the front, died from wounds within weeks of the marriage.
Her trip to America as part of a student delegation is covered extensively and is NOT IRRELEVANT to her story.
All in all a great memoir of life in pre-war USSR and the Red Army fighting the German invasion of the USSR. I have read perhaps 50 memoirs from veterans of both sides -- this is by far the most frank and most interesting.
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- Kindle Customer
- 25-10-2024
Starts off strongly, however dry writing kills it
Book starts off well with the early life, training and entry into the battlefield, as well as some of the early battles in the infantry and as a sniper. But about halfway through, it becomes incredibly dry and I had to force myself to continue to listen to this. The final 2 hours picks up the pace again, but, I had already soured on the product as a whole. Narrator was excellent.
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