Pavel Fyodorovich Gushchin

Pavel Fyodorovich Gushchin – lieutenant of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, participant in the Great Patriotic War, Hero of the Soviet Union (1945). He was born in the village of Antusheva Gora (now Totemsky District, Vologda Oblast) into a peasant family. After seven years of schooling he enrolled in secondary school, but due to financial difficulties he left his studies and worked at the Seredsk butter factory and on a collective farm. In 1942 he was drafted into the Red Army and took part in the fighting of the Great Patriotic War from September of that year. In 1944 he graduated from the Lepel Infantry School.

By June 1944 Lieutenant Gushchin commanded a rifle company of the 787th Rifle Regiment. He distinguished himself during the liberation of the Belarusian SSR. On 27 June 1944 his company was the first to cross the Dnieper, seizing a bridgehead and repelling several enemy counterattacks. Thanks to Gushchin's actions, the other units of the regiment successfully crossed the river. Pavel Fyodorovich Gushchin was killed in action on 15 February 1945 and was buried in Lidzbark Warmiński (Poland). For the courage and heroism shown in battle, he was posthumously awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union (Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of 24 March 1945) and was awarded the Order of Lenin.