The pioneer hero Marat Kazei died in 1944 in an unequal battle with the Nazis. Nobody knows what the boy was thinking in the last minutes of his life. Perhaps he dreamed that he could send as many enemies to the next world as possible and thereby avenge the suffering and death of his loved ones.
Marat Ivanovich Kazei: biography
The future young hero was born in the Belarusian village of Stankovo on October 29, 1929. His father was a staunch communist. In the past, he served in the Baltic. He chose the name for his son in honor of the battleship on which he served. And he named his daughter Ariadne - in honor of the heroine of one of the Greek myths.
In 1927, Ivan Kazei came home on leave and met his future wife Anna, who a few years later became Marat's mother. The father of the future pioneer-hero was actively involved in party life. His colleagues respected him. Ivan Kazei headed the comrades' court, taught at the training courses for rural machine operators. But in 1935 he was arrested on a false denunciation, accused of sabotage. The verdict was harsh: Ivan was exiled to the Far East. Marat's father was rehabilitated only in 1959.
Marat in those years did not understand what was happening. After the trial of his father, the boy's mother was kicked out of work and from the apartment. She sent the children to relatives. And she did the right thing, because after a while Anna was arrested, accused of aiding the Trotskyists. She was released only before the start of the war.
From the first days of the German occupation, Anna, who remained a staunch Bolshevik, collaborated with the underground. However, soon members of the underground group, who had no experience of such work, were seized and thrown into the dungeons of the Gestapo. Anna Kazei and several of her comrades were hanged by the Nazis.
Pioneer hero
The death of his beloved mother pushed Marat and his sister Ariadne to an active struggle against the invaders. In 1942 they were admitted to the partisan detachment. The girl at that time was sixteen years old, Marat was thirteen. The boy was entrusted with participation in intelligence operations. Marat, with extraordinary dexterity, inaccessible to an adult, penetrated the enemy garrisons, where he collected important information. In 1943, Marat was wounded. He more than once participated in sabotage operations at especially important facilities of the Nazis. Kazei was directly involved in the rescue of the Furmanov partisan detachment.
In the winter of 1943, the detachment where Kazei served was surrounded. When the ring broke, Marat's sister received severe frostbite. To save the girl's life, both of her legs were amputated in the field, after which she was taken to the rear by plane. Marat remained at the front to take revenge on the Nazis for the crippled Ariadne and his murdered mother.
In the spring of 1944, Soviet troops carried out Operation Bagration, during which the liberation of Belarus took place. However, Marat could no longer see this. In early May, Kazei died when he was returning from a mission. A group of partisans stumbled upon the enemy. The squad leader fell in battle. Marat fired back as long as there were cartridges. Realizing that he was surrounded, the young hero embarked on a feat: letting the Nazis approach him, Kazei blew himself up and the Germans with two grenades hanging from his belt.
The feat of the pioneer hero is still remembered in his homeland. In 1965, Marat Kazei was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
