Today, April 16, marks exactly 90 years since the establishment of the title Hero of the Soviet Union. Just four days later, on April 20, 1934, the first to receive this highest award of the Motherland were seven legendary Kamanin pilots who, with unparalleled courage, rescued polar explorers from the ice-crushed steamship Chelyuskin. During the existence of the USSR, about 13,000 people were awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union. Ten of them are connected with the Alexandrov region.
Their lives and feats were described by P.I. Khmelevskoy. Pavel Ilyich was a multifaceted figure: a local historian who wrote the first guidebook to Alexandrov, a poet, a writer, an active member of the All-Russian Society for the Preservation of Historical and Cultural Monuments and of the Alexandrov historical and local lore club 'Otechestvo' (Fatherland), and an Honorary Citizen of the towns of Alexandrov and Strunino. He also collaborated almost constantly with the newspaper 'Golos Truda' and never tired of writing and writing, of telling and telling about fellow countrymen whose lives were acts of heroism and for whom the Hero's Star cost their lives. Practically until his last days this indefatigable man and patriot enjoyed communicating with young people. He was a great friend of the museum, says Andrey Shuysky, an employee of the Alexandrovskaya Sloboda museum-reserve.
Pavel Ilyich compiled his painstaking and vast work on fellow-countrymen heroes into a book for the 40th anniversary of the Great Victory; it was published in 1985. It was a separate booklet of essays about nine fellow countrymen who received the title Hero of the Soviet Union: commander of a self-propelled artillery battery Petr Ivanovich Galin; artillery gunner-radio operator Nikolai Prokhorovich Gusev; pilot Pavel Semenovich Dokuchalov; company commander Frol Andreevich Ermakov; scout Nikolai Georgievich Molev; commander of a mortar platoon Anatoly Alexandrovich Perfiliev; tank company commander Ivan Ivanovich Proshin; commissar of an aviation squadron Alexei Petrovich Chulkov; and naval aviation pilot Sergei Mikhailovich Shuvalov…
The author immediately donated the book of essays to the museum. Ten years later, as a result of his research, P.I. Khmelevskoy added a tenth name to the list of Heroes — commander of an army corps, Lieutenant General Dmitry Sergeyevich Zherebin. Our collections include photos, documents, and memoirs about these courageous fellow countrymen. On significant dates, in their honor we invariably stage exhibition projects and hold patriotic events, but most importantly — we preserve and will continue to preserve this sacred memory always, as long as the Fatherland lives, which our fellow countrymen — the Heroes of the Soviet Union — defended, said Elena Zhestkova, collections curator of the Alexandrovskaya Sloboda museum-reserve.
