Red Sky, Black Death: A Soviet Woman Pilot's Memoir of the Eastern Front

Images

Volodovo village-My childhood home, 15 October 1988. "With tears in my eyes / and tenderest sorrow, / I wandered my home village, / A place so dear to my hear!." Note: Yegorova may have adapted this poem frolll a similar 1966 verse by "village poet" Nikolai Rubtsov. Above: Vasily Alexandrovich Yegorov, 1934 (my brother). Left: My family. Back Row: Aunt Anisya with her husband, and Mama. First row: Grandfather, Grandmother 's brother the priest, and Grandmother. Above: Printed on front: Metrostroy Aeroclub Glider Pilots, 4/25/1936. Writlen on back: Metrostroy aeroclub pupils at the Maliye Vyazmy aerodrome, with instructor Miroyevsky. In the war, Miroyevsky dies flying Il-2s. (Yegorova is seated, far left.) Left: Anna - Metro engineer Timofeyeva (Yegorova) Anna A lexandrovna. Kuban, 1943. Flew 277 missions in Po-2s and 11-2s. 1943. By the Shturmovik, after a mission. On the right, Konstantin Listarevich, who brought me to the front. On the left, Squadron Commander Pyotr Grishenko. Dronov. 1975. Po-2 mechanic of the 130th squadron. Mikhail Nikolayevich Kozin. Commander, 805th Attack Aviation Regiment of Berlin, Order of Suvorov. Died near Chelm in 1944. Pilots Zubov and Rzhevsky. Misha Berdashkevich's squadron "Storm the Fascists." Berdashkevich sits 2nd from the left, to the right, Vanya Sukhorukov. Standing left to right: Misha Zubov, Zhenya Ageyev, and Ivan Pokashevsky At Ivan Pokashevsky's grave. On the right, Ivan's brother, Vladimir. On the left is Regiment Commander Pyotr Karev. Captain Tit Kirilovich Pokrovsky. Ace pilot with a difficult fate. He died before my eyes-blown up in the air by a Fascist rocket-and fell like a burning torch into the Sea of Azov My tail gunner Dusya Nazarkina. 1943, Timashevskaya. Died August 20, 1944 at the Magnuszew Bridgehead, Warsaw. Pilots of the squadron after a mission. W omen armorers. On the left, our regiment commander Mikhail Nikolayevich Kozin. On the right, MiG-3 fighter regiment commander, who covered us 11-2s on the field of battle. 230th Div., 4th Air Force, 1943. My family: Anna, Vyacheslav, sons Pyotr and Igor, 1952. Kim Green, Anna Yegorova, and Margarita Ponomaryova in Moscow in 2005. '- -- (Anna Yegorova with her husbmld and sons.) In my garden in 1955. Anna with medals. Anna by an ll-2 at the Monino (Air Force) Museum. The Timofeyevs: Vyacheslav Arsenyevich and Anna Alexandrovna. The inmates at the Kustrin camp weaved this purse for me from straw. Georgi Fyodorovich brought it to me under his medical gown. YOll can see the Air Force emblem and my initials on it. I keep it as a symbol of friendship and devotion to the motherland. Photo origin til/known. Pavle Trpinac, (his wife) Milena Trpinac, Anna Timofeyeva-Yegorova, Vyacheslav Arsenyevich Timofeyev (Al1l1a's husbal1d), and (SO il) Dushan Trpinac. Yugoslav Professor Pavle Trpinac, awarded the Order of the Patriotic War for saving Soviet soldiers in the German 3-C Kiistrin camp. JOmur 4tre.IloposHa C ,AO'IKoA JIJo6oA H CWHOM Kone". Yulia Fyodorovna with daughter Lyuba and son Kolya. May 24, 1987. My regimental comrades, 4th Air Force-805th Attack Aviation Regiment, 40 years after the Great Patriotic War, at a reunion at VDNKh. On Victory Day in Red Square, 1994. The surviving veterans of the 805th Shturmovik Regiment. Anna mural portrait. ...