Pavel Nikolaevich Shiryaev - Colonel of the Soviet Army. Member of the Soviet-Finnish war, as well as the Great Patriotic War. Hero of the Soviet Union.
Biography
Pavel Nikolaevich was born in 1914, on June 19. It happened in Narovchat, a small settlement not far from Penza. At school he studied only until the seventh grade, and in 1929 he went to receive further education in the organization of factory apprenticeship in the city of Zlatoust. Pasha graduated from his studies in the 32nd year and stayed to work in Zlatoust as an assistant driver.
In the same year, the Saransk regional commissariat called Shiryaev into the ranks of the Red Army. During the service, he entered the Leningrad Artillery School, which he successfully graduated in 1936. After that, he underwent special training, then called "Refresher courses for command personnel."
With the beginning of the Soviet-Finnish military conflict, he was sent to the front. At the end of the winter of 1940, during the assault on the Mannerheim line, he was seriously wounded, and spent the rest of the war in a hospital. Despite this, Pavel Shiryaev was awarded the first Order of Lenin in his career.
Participation in the Great Patriotic War
Shiryaev began his military path in the Second World War from the first day of Germany's attack on the USSR. As commander of an artillery regiment, he took part in the defense of Kiev on the southwestern front. In the fall of the same year, he was seriously wounded and was out of action until the early spring of 1942. After recovering, he was appointed assistant commander of the reconnaissance section of the 171st Infantry Division of the Third Shock Army, in which he went through the entire war.
From the end of the spring of 1941, the 171st division fought the encircled first SS division "Death's Head". In February 1943, the division was sent to the southeast of Staraya Russa, where the main task was to stop the retreat of Nazi troops from the Demyansk bag. Until September, there were battles for the city of Staraya Russa, for his courage shown Shiryaev was awarded 2 orders.
Since July 1944, Shiryaev's division took part in the liberation of the Baltic states. The operation was completed in November in the territory of Latvia, where the remnants of the Tukums group of Nazi troops were destroyed. The next month, the division was sent to the first Belarusian front.
Later Shiryaev took part in the famous Vistula-Oder operation, his division with heavy battles advanced six hundred kilometers and reached the city of Zilberg. Until the spring of 1945, Pavel Nikolaevich participated in liberation operations throughout Europe.
In April, Colonel Shiryaev commanded the shelling of Berlin. On the 29th, his unit shelled the Reichstag, and this fire support greatly facilitated the assault on the Nazi citadel.
Post-war years and death
After the victory, Pavel Nikolaevich remained in military service. He entered the Dzerzhinsky Military Academy, which he successfully graduated in the 51st. He was demobilized in 1971 and went to live in Kuibyshev, worked as an engineer, now giving all his time to his personal life, family and active work in the local council of veterans. He died in May 1994. His bust is installed on the grave in Samara (former Kuibyshev) and on the Heroes' Alley in his native village.
