MARAVAR TRAGEDY 334 OF THE GRU SPECIAL FORCES DETACHMENT If you analyze the memories below, then, as they say, an “oil painting” turns out. Poor elaboration of the operation, lack of interaction with the artillery of the 66th Motorized Rifle Brigade and helicopter pilots, multiplied by the completely unfired composition of the battalion, ignoring the experience of neighbors - infantrymen (we are special forces, we are tough) - led to such sad results. Memoirs of participants and eyewitnesses of the tragic battle in the Maravar gorge, April 21, 1985. Eternal memory to all those who died in that battle, good health and long life to those living today. (see the beginning of the topic) Igor Semenov, an officer of the detachment, recalls: “The detachment was formed mainly from volunteers. The order was signed by a directive of the General Staff on December 30, 1984 with the location in Maryina Gorka (Belarusian Military District). In some places these were really guys who went of their own free will, in others they were those who got rid of. But, to be honest, there was not a single scoundrel in this large mass of people who arrived from different parts of the Union. There were young guys, full of energy and strength, sometimes overflowing. They came from our brigades in Izyaslav (Ukraine), Ussuriysk, and there were many Belarusians from Maryina Gorka. It was hard at first. And the vodka often had to be confiscated, and many had enough bruises. There was a so-called grinding in of people in the team.” The detachment was preparing to be sent to Afghanistan. Until January 10, there was continuous training; the personnel slept six hours a day. Equipment and weapons were being prepared. According to eyewitnesses, “at least a little, we learned something at the shooting range.” This will also play a fatal role in this tragedy. They sent 18-year-old boys to war who didn’t even really know how to handle weapons... On January 10, 1985, at intervals of one day, three echelons left Belarus for the special forces training center in the city of Chirchik (Uzbekistan). Yuri Filippovich, the foreman of the detachment, recalls: “We arrived in Chirchik in January. There they practiced combat coordination, driving, shooting, and performed forced marches. People have already gotten used to it and become acquainted. The first group was the most friendly; they were mostly from Izyaslav, so they knew each other well. And the platoon commander was Lieutenant Nikolai Kuznetsov, a graduate of the Leningrad Suvorov Military School and the Leningrad Combined Arms Command School, “Grasshopper,” as we called him. Well, in the second platoon, Sergeant Viktor Tarasov distinguished himself. He was a sociable, cheerful guy and played the guitar.” On March 11, the detachment loaded onto platforms and headed to Termez, where they received combat kit. At ten in the evening on March 17, an order was received to cross the border. The guys walked towards their death... Sergeant Viktor Tarasov, as if anticipating trouble, wrote in his notebook several years earlier: Well, here are the first signs of autumn, The cold, monotonous cry of rain. The last verses of September are sung by the colorful leaves and the wind. September, autumn, a shroud of fog hides the bustle with a milky carpet. The cloudy dope makes me sad, my head is in a dope, but I’m walking. I'm walking, what's ahead? Luck, joy, pain or loss? Is it not for me that the tears are pouring rain, Foreseeing the imminent death of a soldier? And autumn dreams began to disturb the soul. One and the same endless dream - In the hands of a grenade, the cranes were screaming, An explosion, silence and a mother's moan... Yuri Filippovich, the detachment sergeant, recalls: “On March 28, our company arrived in Asadabad. And somewhere around April 15, we flew by helicopter to Jalalabad, where our company, together with the first battalion, carried out a combat operation. Actually, the operation was carried out by the first battalion, and our company remained in secondary roles, in the second echelon. Thus, according to the plans of the authorities, they decided to “shoot at us.” But, according to the soldiers, this operation did not yield anything. They never felt the real battle. Many people have the wrong idea that the enemy is not serious. This operation only added to the soldiers’ self-confidence.” Sergei Taran, an officer of the detachment, recalls: “Many in the detachment had the idea that the “spirits” were afraid of us, that they were not warriors; ready to drop everything and run away at our very appearance, that our main task was only to have time to destroy or capture them before they ran away.” On April 20, 1985, at 22.00, the 1st company of the 334th Separate Special Forces Detachment moved from Asadabad to the ferry crossing across the Kunar River, having received an order to comb the village of Sangam, located in the Maravar Gorge just three kilometers from the unit’s location. According to intelligence data, there was a Dushman post with a permanent staff of 8-10 people. From the dominant heights on both sides of the gorge, the 1st company was supposed to be covered by two others - the 2nd and 3rd. At the same time, an armored group consisting of eight infantry fighting vehicles and two tanks began to carry out a diversionary maneuver and was obliged to provide support to the foot detachment in an emergency. The task was posed in such a way that even the battalion officers considered the operation more of a training operation than a combat one. We emphasize that both the officers and soldiers of the 1st company until that day participated in hostilities only once, as cover, and did not have direct contact with the enemy. Simply put, they were not fired upon. The personnel were eager to fight. Everyone was in a joyful and excited mood. He was not influenced by the alarming hints of the Afghan ferrymen during the crossing of Kunar, nor by the disappearance of two local guides immediately after it. By 5.00 on April 21, the 1st company reached the eastern outskirts of Sangam, located five kilometers from the border with Pakistan, and combed it. There was no enemy in the village, although traces of his recent presence there were found. In fact, the task was completely accomplished. From this moment, according to the official version, the battalion commander, Major Terentyev, lost radio contact with the 1st company, which was divided into four groups and began moving deeper into the gorge to the village of Daridam. Eyewitnesses claim that the company commander, Captain Nikolai Tsebruk, received an order for further combing personally from the battalion commander. One way or another, two groups were drawn into Daridam on the left and two led by a company commander on the right side of the Maravar Gorge. Thus, the company was left without cover from above - Daridam was visually observed from his OP (observation point) only by the commander of the 3rd company, who reported to the battalion commander about what was happening. The first to notice the enemies was the group of Lieutenant Nikolai Kuznetsov. He contacted Tsebruk and said that he was pursuing two dushmans going towards the village of Netav and further to Chinau. Soon the company commander's group heard shots, and then intense firefight. Tsebruk, leaving his signalman with the group and taking four fighters, went to where the battle broke out, while the rest climbed the right slope and lay down on a stone terrace. Witnesses and people who later analyzed the events of that day are unanimous in their opinion: the company commander was the first to understand and realize what had already happened and what was inevitably going to happen. And he went to seek his death. And he found her - he was killed by a bullet in the throat. The groups on both sides of the gorge - both the Kuznetsov group and the one that tried to gain a foothold on the slope - came under targeted fire from the dushmans and the Pakistani black stork special forces. The Russians were expected - the day before, the battalion commander and company commanders were studying the site of the upcoming operation from the post of the “greens”, i.e. Afghan army. Everyone who fought in Afghanistan is familiar with information leakage through the “greens”; it was a massive and, in general, common occurrence. In this case this was not taken into account. Yuri Filippovich, the foreman of the detachment, recalls: “On April 20, 1985, the mission to Maravary was received. According to the battalion commander's plan, the first company was supposed to comb the villages in the gorge, the other two were to cover us on the mountains to the left and right. The crossing of the Kunar River began at ten in the evening and ended at one in the morning. At about three o'clock we were in the village of Maravara, and at four they began to comb Sangam, then Daridam. Having combed the first two houses and not finding anyone there, Kolya Tsebruk divided us into two groups. At five thirty in the morning a battle broke out, and the company commander gave the command to retreat. They shot us like rabbits at a shooting range. The company had never been on combat missions before. She had no combat experience. The commanders are all “green”. At the command to “retreat,” everyone began to retreat chaotically. Sergeant Matoh died while covering Tsebruk. We cut off the company commander from the “spirits” with fire, but he too was killed by a bullet in the neck. The first group retreated centrally. Kuznetsov was dragging the wounded Igor Bakhmutov (the ensign remained alive, having received a severe wound to the face). Then he ran after the other wounded, was surrounded and blew himself up with the last grenade. Kisten and I cut off the “spirits” from the guys as best we could, and they walked to their full height. As they later said, these were “black storks” (Pakistan special forces). Then they started to bypass us too, and we began to roll back. We realized that if we don’t retreat, we won’t save the guys and we’ll die ourselves. During the withdrawal of our group, Volodya Nekrasov, a machine gunner, died. At this time, one combat vehicle with Semenov broke through, and only thanks to it we were able to get out. Kuznetsov’s group, having passed Sangam and Daridam, even went to Chinau, they saw two “spirits” and chased them. And this was bait. After all, they were already waiting for us there...” Anatoly Pashin, the detachment’s scout, recalls: “The Spirits” cut off both platoons in a double ring and began to shoot the guys. Panic set in. Nobody knew what to do. Both platoons were almost completely killed, however, when the firefight began, several people managed to escape from this ring. The other two platoons tried to come to the rescue, but the ring was very tight, and we had losses.” The commander of the 3rd company witnessed how the trap slammed shut - the enemy went to the rear of the 1st company, going down the dry riverbed east of Daridam. The battalion commander did not call artillery in time, mistaking the descending enemies for his group. This allowed the dushmans to bring about 50 more people there. Some of the Basmachi, with fire from the DShK (Degtyarev-Shpagina large-caliber machine gun), small arms and light mortars, repelled the attempts of the 2nd and 3rd companies to go down to the aid of their surrounded comrades. The other methodically shot the soldiers who had broken up into small groups. They lit signal smokes, hoping for helicopters, but in doing so they finally exposed themselves and their already precarious shelters. In Asadabad, a combined detachment was hastily created from the remaining soldiers at the location, and an armored group rushed to help. But the tanks hit mines and were blown up, and the infantry fighting vehicles got stuck on rocky ground - only one vehicle broke through. Precious minutes were running out, the wounded and several times surrounded soldiers were running out of ammunition. Those of them whose machine gun magazines were empty took up grenades... In the same battle, a feat unprecedented in the history of the Afghan war was accomplished - seven guys (Gavrash, Kukharchuk, Vakulyuk, Marchenko, Muzyka, Mustafin and Boychuk), wounded, preferring death to captivity and torture, blew themselves up with an assault grenade made from an OZM-72 mine... In the afternoon of April 21, when the combined company and armored group entered the Maravar Gorge, the surviving soldiers were already walking towards them, leading out and carrying out their wounded comrades. Towards the morning of the next day, a soldier came out to his friends and told about the terrible reprisal of our wounded who remained on the battlefield, enraged by the furious rebuff of the enemies. One of the guys, Corporal Vasily Fediv, when the dushman bent over him to finish him off, cut the enemy’s throat. He was tortured longer than the others. For the next two days, having lost three more soldiers, they carried out the mutilated bodies of their comrades under fire. Many had to be identified by tattoos and clothing details. This is how the body of Sergeant Viktor Tarasov was identified, who was allegedly captured and died from a salvo of NURS (unguided rockets) from our helicopters. Allegedly, because the helicopter pilots saw a man in a “sandbox” and light overalls being taken away towards Pakistan, while Tarasov was dressed in a regular field uniform. Pyotr Sevko, the detachment’s reconnaissance officer, recalls: “Our armored group under the command of Lieutenant Dorogin advanced to the Maravar Gorge area. Everything would have been completely different if not for the road. We didn't make it literally a kilometer, maybe two. On our way there is a dry riverbed. That’s where we got stuck, sat there all day and almost all night. Moreover, in the morning two tanks arrived and began to shoot at the boulders that were blocking the passage of the equipment. As a result, one car gets through, the second one goes and takes off its shoes on the way up. Meanwhile, our guys were dying there. To this day, this fatal coincidence of circumstances haunts me... A battalion from Jalalabad came to our aid. With these guys, we moved into the gorge in order to pick up all the dead comrades. This “work” lasted for the whole day, night and the next day.” Yuri Filippovich, the foreman of the detachment, recalls: “On the morning of April 23, we went down the mountain to the village of Daridam, where we were lined up by the chief of staff of the army, who led the operation. Our unsuccessful battle became known in Moscow. They brought in a lot of equipment and people to help us out. They thundered throughout Afghanistan. The conclusion was this: people without combat experience, without commanders who had already fought, soldiers and officers who had not been fired upon were thrown into battle.” Recalls Maxim S., intelligence officer of the 66th Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade: “In general, in order to understand what happened there, it is necessary to tell the background story. From the second half of March 1985. The fact is that Kunar province is located along the border with Pakistan. In the middle it is crossed by a river of the same name. According to old Pakistani maps, the left bank of the river is already Pakistan. According to our modern standards, from the river to the border is from 0 to 15 km. According to modern Pakistani maps, an area of compact residence of Pashtun tribes extends deep into the territory of Pakistan, which is not controlled by the Pakistani authorities to this day. According to our advisers, the total number of “spirits” in the province in 1984-85 was about 7,000 fighters (the figure is from memory, I could be wrong). And this is only from the Afghan side. From Pakistan there were numerous camps for training militants, as well as the actual bases of all sorts of “black storks” and other professional mercenaries. Ours in the province was one infantry battalion of the 66th brigade, the actual strength of which, with all the attached units, was about 300 people. The battalion changed sometimes. According to my information, until 1983, the second battalion was stationed in Asadabad (and even partially in Barkandai). After him the third, and in February 1984 the second again. And only in the second half of March 1985, an additional special forces battalion arrived from the Union in Asadabad. I especially want to draw your attention: on March 17, 1985, a special forces detachment with guys who had only seen about the war in movies crossed the border of Afghanistan. And on April 21 they lose 26 people and three more in the next two days. For comparison, the losses that the special forces suffered during the first month of their stay in Asadabad exceed the losses that the infantry battalion suffered over the previous year. The first few weeks the guys settled in, set up tents, and dug toilets. In principle, nothing special, if not for one small “but”... During rare meetings with motorized rifles, we were repeatedly told that we, the infantry, do not know how to fight, and they, the special forces, came to restore order here. In principle, nothing surprising. Everyone has their own job. We listened to them in silence. But no one from the detachment command bothered to ask our intelligence about the situation in the gorge! And then it happened. The main improvement work is already behind us, and the special forces are leaving for their first independent mission in the Maravar Gorge, three kilometers from the battalion’s location. Now about the Maravara Gorge. The entrance to the gorge is, if viewed visually from the battalion, right in plain sight. You can “shoot” with small arms. But then the gorge goes into a bend - right up to the border with Pakistan. That is as much as 10 km. And you don’t have to be a great strategist to understand: if the detachment goes deeper into the gorge a couple of kilometers, it will find itself right in the middle between the Pakistani border and Assadabad. But for armor the difference will be absolutely stunning: it cannot cross the ferry. She needs to cross the bridge. And since this was not taken into account, then it is not a matter of strategy and not of bad textbooks, but of self-confidence. It was self-confidence that ruined the guys then. Once upon a time someone lived in Maravara. This is evidenced by the ruins of duvals at the entrance to the gorge. Apparently, before the entry of Soviet troops, this was a busy caravan route. People actually lived deeper in the gorge. And they were not subordinate to the official Afghan authorities, but to the Mujahideen. Plus, there were always “spiritual” posts around the battalion, from which we were fired upon with enviable regularity. Plus, at the entrance to the gorge there was a “tsarandoy” (Afghan army) post. Plus Afghans are ferry operators. What else needs to be added to understand that the exit of the special forces detachment was known throughout the entire surrounding area! Well, then everything is simple. The guys are completely relaxed. Complete incompetence of commanders. Radio commands on the open air in the spirit of “films about the great victory.” Dispersal of fighters throughout the gorge. Attempts to first play “war” and then play secrecy. Finally, the information reaches the brigade, a single infantry fighting vehicle reaches the gorge, and it is disabled. The helicopters, our battalion, the Airborne Assault Battalion from the brigade somehow remove the special forces from the mountains, collect the corpses and search for Sergeant Viktor Tarasov for almost two more days. From the turntables, indeed, on the very first day they talked about “ours” in the “sand”, who was being taken away by “spirits”. It’s hot, the “spirits” managed to mock the bodies. The special forces are in a state close to shock. I don’t know... No matter how prepared the fighters were, it was necessary to “dilute” them with experienced guys. And so... First euphoria, then complete despondency. Everything that is typical of young fighters, only on the scale of an entire squad. That's basically it. Eternal memory to the dead. Long days of living alive." Igor P., the detachment’s radio operator, recalls: “In those terrible days when the operation took place in Maravary, I spent two days in communication with headphones, heard everything that was happening there. .. Tsebruk reported to the battalion commander that he intended to pursue the “spirits”. The battalion commander gave the go-ahead, although he knew that the cover on either side was not yet ready. By the end of the second day, a group was assembled from those who remained in the detachment to carry out the dead and wounded. We pulled out the bodies of the guys (the “spirits” carried them all over this nasty gorge), which almost all showed signs of torture. The guys were put at the headquarters. Then all sorts of generals arrived and made patriotic speeches. Well, okay, a lot of water has passed under the bridge since then. Eternal memory to them!” Igor Nepomnyashchiy, an officer of the detachment, commander of the company “covering” the guys from above, recalls: “After such a “baptism of fire,” some lost their nerves, we could not take the weapon from their hands... Many turned completely gray - at the age of 18... Then that morning, few people understood what really happened. Let’s remember the guys...” In this unequal battle, four hundred dushmans and special forces from Pakistan were opposed by a group of three dozen Soviet soldiers.
On April 19, the commander of the 5th Separate Motorized Rifle Regiment, Major Terentev, carried out reconnaissance with the company commanders of his battalion in the Maravar area. This settlement is located on the eastern bank of the Kunar River, three kilometers from the city of Asadabad. A gorge stretches from Maravar towards the Afghan-Pakistan border, which the Soviet military called Maravar. The major had no combat experience, so the reconnaissance took place completely openly, in full view of the locals.
Major Terentyev decided to comb the village of Sangam, which is located deep in the gorge. Intelligence reported that the Mujahideen posted 8 to 10 sentries in the village at night. The major decided that such a combat mission against a small enemy detachment would be excellent training for the combat personnel of his unit. The 5th Infantry Infantry was recently introduced into Afghanistan and has not yet had combat deployments. It is not surprising that this raid, quite combat-oriented in terms of its assigned tasks, was considered by the soldiers and commanders as a training raid.
The next day at 20.00 the 5th Separate Motorized Rifle Regiment moved out from Asadabad and began crossing the Kunar River. Major Terentyev, already on the march, announces to the commanders of the 1st and 2nd companies about a change in the combat mission: if the enemy is not found in Sangam, the Daridam village should also be combed. Previously, during the general statement of tasks, the capture of Daridam was not discussed.
The battalion began to move deeper into the Maravar Gorge. The 1st company walked along the bottom of the gorge, which was covered from the heights on both sides of the gorge by the 2nd and 3rd companies.
By two o'clock in the morning the 1st company reached the village of Sangam. The company was commanded by Captain Nikolai Tsebruk. They combed the village. There was no enemy in it. After this, the captain informed the officers about Major Terentyev’s new order: to go to the village of Daridam, where, according to intelligence information, there was a detachment of Mujahideen and an American military instructor. The village had to be combed and captured, while trying not to miss the American.
The 2nd and 3rd companies remained in Sangam, the 1st company went on alone.
Captain Tsebruk divides his company into 4 groups. The 1st group goes to comb the village of Daridam, followed by the 2nd group. 3rd Group remains at a house on the road between Sangam and Daridam to cover the rear. To cover the 3rd group, Captain Tsebruk sends the 4th group to the ridge on the southern side.
The death of the Maravar company is an episode of the Afghan War (1979-1989), during which on April 21, 1985, in the Maravar Gorge in the province of Kunar, the 1st company of Soviet special forces under the command of Captain N. Tsebruk was surrounded and destroyed.
The death of the Maravar company is an episode of the Afghan War (1979-1989), during which on April 21, 1985, in the Maravar Gorge in the province of Kunar, the 1st company of Soviet special forces under the command of Captain N. Tsebruk was surrounded and destroyed. The company carried out a training trip to the village of Sangam, located at the beginning of the Maravar Gorge, 10 km from the border with Pakistan. There was no enemy in the village, but dushmans were seen in the depths of the gorge. During the pursuit, the company was ambushed.
On March 27, 1985, less than a month before the events described, the 334th OO Special Forces, part of the 15th Special Operations Brigade (5th Separate Motorized Rifle Regiment), arrived in Asadabad from Maryina Gorka (BVO). On April 20, 1985, at 10 p.m., the detachment set out from Asadabad via the ferry crossing on the Kunar River, having received orders to comb the Sangam village, located in the Maravar Gorge, only 3 km from the unit’s location. According to intelligence data, an observation post of 8-10 dushmans was spotted in the village. From the dominant heights on both sides of the gorge, the 1st company was to be covered by the 2nd and 3rd, respectively. This was the detachment’s first independent exit after entering Afghanistan and it was treated as a training exit.
By 5 am on April 21, the company reached the eastern outskirts of Sangam and combed it. There was no enemy in the village, but two dushmans were spotted hiding in the depths of the gorge. The detachment commander, Major Terentyev, led the exit from an observation post at the entrance to the gorge. Having received a report about a group of dushmans, he gave the order to capture or neutralize the enemy. From that moment on, the 1st company of Captain Nikolai Tsebruk, splitting into four groups, began advancing deep into the gorge along its left and right sides to the village of Daridam. Thus, the company was left without cover from above. Daridam was located 2 km deeper in the gorge near the village of Sangam and was visually observed from his observation post only by the commander of the 3rd company, who reported to the detachment commander about what was happening.
The battle.
The group of Lieutenant Nikolai Kuznetsov was the first to enter the battle on the outskirts of the village of Daridam. The company commander, Captain Tsebruk, leaving a signalman with his group and taking four soldiers, went to the battlefield; those who remained climbed up the right slope and lay down on a stone terrace, trying to gain a foothold on the slope. Witnesses and people who later analyzed the events of that day are unanimous in their opinion: the company commander was the first to understand and realize what had already happened, and what was inevitably going to happen. He was killed by a bullet in the throat.
From this moment on, the squad leader actually loses control of the battle. The trap around the company separated from the main forces slams shut. Along the dirt road running along the bottom of the gorge from Pakistan on burbukhaiks, the dushmans quickly pull up reinforcements and go to the rear of the 1st company. On the approaches to Daridam towards the 2nd and 3rd companies, the dushmans set up posts armed with DShK heavy machine guns. The fighters of the 1st company, left without the support of the main forces, are trying to cling to where the battle caught them. Someone, as a last hope, lights orange smoke. Several small groups establish themselves in duvals. The forces are not equal, and the ammunition that the special forces took with them on the training trip is enough for a few minutes of real combat.
At this time, a consolidated detachment was hastily created in Asadabad from the soldiers remaining at the unit's location; the armored group of the detachment, reinforced by tankers from the neighboring infantry battalion, moved to help. However, heavy equipment could not cross the Kunar River by ferry and had to go down to the Naubad Bridge 10 km downstream of the Kunar and only then return 13 km towards the Maravar Gorge. Three kilometers on the map, which seemed so close when planning a training excursion, turned into 23 km across Afghan soil filled with mines and corroded by dry riverbeds and ravines. Of the entire armored group, only one vehicle broke through towards Maravar. She could no longer change the fate of the Tsebruk company, but if this infantry fighting vehicle had not arrived then, it is unknown what would have happened to the 2nd and 3rd companies, which were fighting off the attacks of the spirits at that moment.
Nikolai Kuznetsov dragged warrant officer Bakhmetov, who was wounded in the arm, leg and face, to shelter (he remained alive), and returned to his own. A few minutes later the last path to salvation was cut off. Left without ammunition, the seriously wounded Lieutenant Kuznetsov blew himself up with an F-1 grenade. In the same battle, seven fighters (Boychuk, Vakulyuk, Gavrash, Kukharchuk, Marchenko, Muzyka and Mustafin), preferring death to captivity and torture, blew themselves up with an assault grenade made from an OZM-72 mine...
In the afternoon of April 21, when the combined company and armored group entered the Maravar Gorge, survivors walked towards them, leading out and carrying out their wounded comrades. They talked about the terrible reprisal of those who remained on the battlefield, enraged by the furious rebuff of the enemies: their stomachs were ripped open, their eyes were gouged out, and they were burned alive. Corporal Vasily Fediv, when one of the dushmans decided to finish him off, was the first to cut the Basmach’s throat.
On alert, the 1st Motorized Rifle Brigade (154th Special Forces) special forces and the air assault battalion of the 66th brigade were transferred from Jalalabad on helicopters. The 2nd battalion of the 66th brigade, based in Asadabad, entered the mountains. A small training retreat actually resulted in a small army operation with four battalions. Despite the proximity of the border, helicopters and front-line aviation were constantly operating in the sky.
On the very first day, civilians flocked from the depths of the gorge towards Pakistan. The Dushmans knew that the Soviet army would not leave a single soldier, alive or dead, on the battlefield. And yet, they put up fierce resistance. Over the next two days, the 5th Motorized Rifle Regiment lost three more soldiers. Despite active hostilities, the remaining three battalions did not lose a single person in the Maravara Gorge.
31 Soviet soldiers died in battle:
TSEBRUK Nikolay Nesterovich, captain;
KUZNETSOV Nikolay Anatolyevich, lieutenant;
BOYCHUK Vladimir Vasilievich, private;
VAKULYUK Alexander, corporal;
GAVRASH Yuri Cheslavovich, junior sergeant;
ZHUKOV Andrey Mikhailovich, private;
KASYMOV Oleg Musurmankulovich, sergeant;
KOLMOGORTSEV Nikon Nikolaevich, corporal;
KULNIS Stanislav Iosifovich, sergeant;
KURYAKIN Vladimir Pavlovich, private;
KUKHARCHUK Vasily Fedorovich, junior sergeant;
MADIEV Ismatullo Shamsoevich, private;
MARCHENKO Vyacheslav Valentinovich, corporal;
MATOKH Mikhail Alekseevich, sergeant;
MORYAKHIN Viktor Gavrilovich, private;
MUSIC Vasily Nikolaevich, private;
MUSTAFIN Nail Maratovich, private;
NAPADOVSKY Igor Anatolyevich, junior sergeant;
NEKRASOV Vladimir Leonidovich, sergeant;
NOVIKOV Andrey Konstantinovich, private;
OVCHINNIKOV Oleg Pavlovich, private;
POPOV Vladimir Viktorovich, private;
SLIVKO Alexander Germanovich, private;
SULIN Vyacheslav Anatolyevich, private;
Tarasov Viktor Vasilievich, sergeant;
URAZBAEV Dzhumabek Geldyevich, sergeant;
FEDIV Vasily Ivanovich, corporal;
KHAIDAROV Sahob Saatovich, private;
CHIKHUNOV Andrey Mikhailovich, private;
CHUTANOV Abdurakhman Tazhievich, junior sergeant;
SHAPOVALOV Yuri Nikolaevich, private.
Memories
Igor Semenov, an officer of the detachment, recalls: “The detachment was formed mainly from volunteers. The order was signed by a directive of the General Staff on December 30, 1984 with the location in Maryina Gorka (Belarusian Military District). In some places these were really guys who went of their own free will, in others they were those who got rid of. But, to be honest, there was not a single scoundrel in this large mass of people who arrived from different parts of the Union. There were young guys, full of energy and strength, sometimes overflowing. They came from our brigades in Izyaslav (Ukraine), Ussuriysk, and there were many Belarusians from Maryina Gorka. It was hard at first. And the vodka often had to be confiscated, and many had enough bruises. There was a so-called grinding in of people in the team.”
The detachment was preparing to be sent to Afghanistan. Until January 10, there was continuous training; the personnel slept six hours a day. Equipment and weapons were being prepared. According to eyewitnesses, “at least a little, we learned something at the shooting range.” This will also play a fatal role in this tragedy. They sent 18-year-old boys to war who didn’t even really know how to handle weapons...
On January 10, 1985, at intervals of one day, three echelons of the detachment left Belarus for the special forces training center in the city of Chirchik (Uzbekistan).
Yuri Filippovich, the foreman of the detachment, recalls: “We arrived in Chirchik in January. There they practiced combat coordination, driving, shooting, and performed forced marches. People have already gotten used to it and become acquainted. The first group was the most friendly; they were mostly from Izyaslav, so they knew each other well. And the platoon commander was Lieutenant Nikolai Kuznetsov, a graduate of the Leningrad Suvorov Military School and the Leningrad Combined Arms Command School, “Grasshopper,” as we called him. Well, in the second platoon, Sergeant Viktor Tarasov distinguished himself. He was a sociable, cheerful guy and played the guitar.”
On March 11, the detachment loaded onto platforms and headed to Termez, where they received combat kit. At ten in the evening on March 17, an order was received to cross the border. The guys walked towards their death... Sergeant Viktor Tarasov, as if sensing trouble, wrote in his notebook several years before:
Well, here are the first signs of autumn,
The cold, monotonous cry of rain.
Colored leaves and blown by the wind
The last verses of September.
September, autumn, veil of fog
The milky carpet hides the vanity.
The cloudy dope makes me sad,
My head is in a daze, but I'm walking.
I'm walking, what's ahead?
Luck, joy, pain or loss?
Is it not for me that the tears are pouring,
Anticipating the death of an ambulance soldier?
And autumn dreams began to disturb the soul.
The same endless dream -
In the hands of a pomegranate, the cranes were screaming,
Explosion, silence and maternal moan...
Yuri Filippovich, the foreman of the detachment, recalls: “On March 28, our company arrived in Asadabad. And somewhere around April 15, we flew by helicopter to Jalalabad, where our company, together with the first battalion, carried out a combat operation. Actually, the operation was carried out by the first battalion, and our company remained in secondary roles, in the second echelon. Thus, according to the plans of the authorities, they decided to “shoot at us.” But, according to the soldiers, this operation did not yield anything. They never felt the real battle. Many people have the wrong idea that the enemy is not serious. This operation only added to the soldiers’ self-confidence.”
Sergei Taran, an officer of the detachment, recalls: “Many in the detachment had the idea that the “spirits” were afraid of us, that they were not warriors; ready to drop everything and run away at our very appearance, that our main task was only to have time to destroy or capture them before they ran away.”
On April 20, 1985, at 22.00, the 1st company of the 334th Separate Special Forces Detachment moved from Asadabad to the ferry crossing across the Kunar River, having received an order to comb the village of Sangam, located in the Maravar Gorge just three kilometers from the unit’s location. According to intelligence data, there was a Dushman post with a permanent staff of 8-10 people. From the dominant heights on both sides of the gorge, the 1st company was supposed to be covered by two others - the 2nd and 3rd. At the same time, an armored group consisting of eight infantry fighting vehicles and two tanks began to carry out a diversionary maneuver and was obliged to provide support to the foot detachment in an emergency.
The task was posed in such a way that even the battalion officers considered the operation more of a training operation than a combat one. We emphasize that both the officers and soldiers of the 1st company until that day participated in hostilities only once, as cover, and did not have direct contact with the enemy. Simply put, they were not fired upon. The personnel were eager to fight. Everyone was in a joyful and excited mood. He was not influenced by the alarming hints of the Afghan ferrymen during the crossing of Kunar, nor by the disappearance of two local guides immediately after it.
By 5.00 on April 21, the 1st company reached the eastern outskirts of Sangam, located five kilometers from the border with Pakistan, and combed it. There was no enemy in the village, although traces of his recent presence there were found. In fact, the task was completely accomplished. From this moment, according to the official version, the battalion commander, Major Terentyev, lost radio contact with the 1st company, which was divided into four groups and began moving deeper into the gorge to the village of Daridam. Eyewitnesses claim that the company commander, Captain Nikolai Tsebruk, received an order for further combing personally from the battalion commander. One way or another, two groups were drawn into Daridam on the left and two led by a company commander on the right side of the Maravar Gorge. Thus, the company was left without cover from above - Daridam was visually observed from his OP (observation point) only by the commander of the 3rd company, who reported to the battalion commander about what was happening. The first to notice the enemies was the group of Lieutenant Nikolai Kuznetsov. He contacted Tsebruk and said that he was pursuing two dushmans going towards the village of Netav and further to Chinau.
Soon the company commander's group heard shots, and then intense firefight. Tsebruk, leaving his signalman with the group and taking four fighters, went to where the battle broke out, while the rest climbed the right slope and lay down on a stone terrace. Witnesses and people who later analyzed the events of that day are unanimous in their opinion: the company commander was the first to understand and realize what had already happened and what was inevitably going to happen. And he went to seek his death. And he found her - he was killed by a bullet in the throat.
The groups on both sides of the gorge - both the Kuznetsov group and the one that tried to gain a foothold on the slope - came under targeted fire from the dushmans and the Pakistani black stork special forces. The Russians were expected - the day before, the battalion commander and company commanders were studying the site of the upcoming operation from the post of the “greens”, i.e. Afghan army. Everyone who fought in Afghanistan is familiar with information leakage through the “greens”; it was a massive and, in general, common occurrence. In this case this was not taken into account.
Yuri Filippovich, the foreman of the detachment, recalls: “On April 20, 1985, the mission to Maravary was received. According to the battalion commander's plan, the first company was supposed to comb the villages in the gorge, the other two were to cover us on the mountains to the left and right. The crossing of the Kunar River began at ten in the evening and ended at one in the morning. At about three o'clock we were in the village of Maravary, and at four they began to comb the villages. Having combed the first two houses and not finding anyone there, Kolya Tsebruk divided us into two groups. At five thirty in the morning a battle broke out, and the company commander gave the command to retreat.
They shot us like rabbits at a shooting range. The company had never been on combat missions before. She had no combat experience. The commanders are all “green”. At the command to “retreat,” everyone began to retreat chaotically. Sergeant Matoh died while covering Tsebruk. We cut off the company commander from the “spirits” with fire, but he too was killed by a bullet in the neck. The first group retreated centrally. Kuznetsov was dragging the wounded Igor Bakhmutov (the ensign remained alive, having received a severe wound to the face). Then he ran after the other wounded, was surrounded and blew himself up with the last grenade. Kisten and I cut off the “spirits” from the guys as best we could, and they walked to their full height. As they later said, these were “black storks” (Pakistan special forces). Then they started to bypass us too, and we began to roll back. We realized that if we don’t retreat, we won’t save the guys and we’ll die ourselves. During the withdrawal of our group, Volodya Nekrasov, a machine gunner, died. At this time, one combat vehicle with Semenov broke through, and only thanks to it we were able to get out. Kuznetsov’s group, having passed Sangam and Daridam, even went to Chinau, they saw two “spirits” and chased them. And this was bait. After all, they were already waiting for us there...”
Anatoly Pashin, the detachment’s scout, recalls: “Spirits” cut off both platoons in a double ring and began to shoot the guys. Panic set in. Nobody knew what to do. Both platoons were almost completely killed, however, when the firefight began, several people managed to escape from this ring. The other two platoons tried to come to the rescue, but the ring was very tight, and we had losses.”
The commander of the 3rd company witnessed how the trap slammed shut - the enemy went to the rear of the 1st company, going down the dry riverbed east of Daridam. The battalion commander did not call artillery in time, mistaking the descending enemies for his group. This allowed the dushmans to bring about 50 more people there. Some of the Basmachi, with fire from the DShK (Degtyarev-Shpagina large-caliber machine gun), small arms and light mortars, repelled the attempts of the 2nd and 3rd companies to go down to the aid of their surrounded comrades. The other methodically shot the soldiers who had broken up into small groups. They lit signal smokes, hoping for helicopters, but in doing so they finally exposed themselves and their already precarious shelters.
In Asadabad, a combined detachment was hastily created from the remaining soldiers at the location, and an armored group rushed to help. But the tanks hit mines and were blown up, and the infantry fighting vehicles got stuck on rocky ground - only one vehicle broke through. Precious minutes were running out, the wounded and several times surrounded soldiers were running out of ammunition. Those of them whose machine gun magazines were empty took up grenades...
In the same battle, a feat unprecedented in the history of the Afghan war was accomplished - seven guys (Gavrash, Kukharchuk, Vakulyuk, Marchenko, Muzyka, Mustafin and Boychuk), wounded, preferring death to captivity and torture, blew themselves up with an assault grenade made from an OZM-72 mine ...
In the afternoon of April 21, when the combined company and armored group entered the Maravar Gorge, the surviving soldiers were already walking towards them, leading out and carrying out their wounded comrades. Towards the morning of the next day, a soldier came out to his friends and told about the terrible reprisal of our wounded who remained on the battlefield, enraged by the furious rebuff of the enemies. One of the guys, Corporal Vasily Fediv, when the dushman bent over him to finish him off, cut the enemy’s throat. He was tortured longer than the others.
For the next two days, having lost three more soldiers, they carried out the mutilated bodies of their comrades under fire. Many had to be identified by tattoos and clothing details. This is how the body of Sergeant Viktor Tarasov was identified, who was allegedly captured and died from a salvo of NURS (unguided rockets) from our helicopters. Allegedly, because the helicopter pilots saw a man in a “sandbox” and light overalls being taken away towards Pakistan, while Tarasov was dressed in a regular field uniform.
Pyotr Sevko, the detachment’s reconnaissance officer, recalls: “Our armored group under the command of Lieutenant Dorogin advanced to the Maravar Gorge area. Everything would have been completely different if not for the road. We didn't make it literally a kilometer, maybe two. On our way there is a dry riverbed. That’s where we got stuck, sat there all day and almost all night. Moreover, in the morning two tanks arrived and began to shoot at the boulders that were blocking the passage of the equipment. As a result, one car gets through, the second one goes and takes off its shoes on the way up. Meanwhile, our guys were dying there. Until now, this fatal coincidence of circumstances haunts me...
A battalion from Jalalabad came to our aid. With these guys, we moved into the gorge in order to pick up all the dead comrades. This “work” lasted for the whole day, night and the next day.”
Yuri Filippovich, the foreman of the detachment, recalls: “On the morning of April 23, we went down the mountain to the village of Daridam, where we were lined up by the chief of staff of the army, who led the operation. Our unsuccessful battle became known in Moscow. They brought in a lot of equipment and people to help us out. They thundered throughout Afghanistan. The conclusion was this: people without combat experience, without commanders who had already fought, soldiers and officers who had not been fired upon were thrown into battle.”
Recalls Maxim S., intelligence officer of the 66th Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade: “In general, in order to understand what happened there, it is necessary to tell the background story. From the second half of March 1985. The fact is that Kunar province is located along the border with Pakistan. In the middle it is crossed by a river of the same name. According to old Pakistani maps, the left bank of the river is already Pakistan. According to our modern standards, from the river to the border is from 0 to 15 km. According to modern Pakistani maps, an area of compact residence of Pashtun tribes extends deep into the territory of Pakistan, which is not controlled by the Pakistani authorities to this day. According to our advisers, the total number of “spirits” in the province in 1984-85 was about 7,000 fighters (the figure is from memory, I could be wrong). And this is only from the Afghan side. From Pakistan there were numerous camps for training militants, as well as the actual bases of all sorts of “black storks” and other professional mercenaries.
Ours in the province was one infantry battalion of the 66th brigade, the actual strength of which, with all the attached units, was about 300 people. The battalion changed sometimes. According to my information, until 1983, the second battalion was stationed in Asadabad (and even partially in Barkandai). After him the third, and in February 1984 the second again. And only in the second half of March 1985, an additional special forces battalion arrived from the Union in Asadabad. I especially want to draw your attention: on March 17, 1985, a special forces detachment with guys who had only seen about the war in movies crossed the border of Afghanistan. And on April 21 they lose 26 people and three more in the next two days. For comparison, the losses that the special forces suffered during the first month of their stay in Asadabad exceed the losses that the infantry battalion suffered over the previous year.
The first few weeks the guys settled in, set up tents, and dug toilets. In principle, nothing special, if not for one small “but”... During rare meetings with motorized rifles, we were repeatedly told that we, the infantry, do not know how to fight, and they, the special forces, came to restore order here. In principle, nothing surprising. Everyone has their own job. We listened to them in silence. But no one from the detachment command bothered to ask our intelligence about the situation in the gorge! And then it happened. The main improvement work is already behind us, and the special forces are leaving for their first independent mission in the Maravar Gorge, three kilometers from the battalion’s location.
Now about the Maravara Gorge. The entrance to the gorge is, if viewed visually from the battalion, right in plain sight. You can “shoot” with small arms. But then the gorge goes into a bend - right up to the border with Pakistan. That is as much as 10 km. And you don’t have to be a great strategist to understand: if the detachment goes deeper into the gorge a couple of kilometers, it will find itself right in the middle between the Pakistani border and Assadabad. But for armor the difference will be absolutely stunning: it cannot cross the ferry. She needs to cross the bridge. And since this was not taken into account, then it is not a matter of strategy and not of bad textbooks, but of self-confidence. It was self-confidence that ruined the guys then.
Once upon a time someone lived in Maravara. This is evidenced by the ruins of duvals at the entrance to the gorge. Apparently, before the entry of Soviet troops, this was a busy caravan route. People actually lived deeper in the gorge. And they were not subordinate to the official Afghan authorities, but to the Mujahideen. Plus, there were always “spiritual” posts around the battalion, from which we were fired upon with enviable regularity. Plus, at the entrance to the gorge there was a “tsarandoy” (Afghan army) post. Plus Afghans are ferry operators. What else needs to be added to understand that the exit of the special forces detachment was known throughout the entire surrounding area!
Well, then everything is simple. The guys are completely relaxed. Complete incompetence of commanders. Radio commands on the open air in the spirit of “films about the great victory.” Dispersal of fighters throughout the gorge. Attempts to first play “war” and then play secrecy. Finally, the information reaches the brigade, a single infantry fighting vehicle reaches the gorge, and it is disabled. The helicopters, our battalion, the Airborne Assault Battalion from the brigade somehow remove the special forces from the mountains, collect the corpses and search for Sergeant Viktor Tarasov for almost two more days. From the turntables, indeed, on the very first day they talked about “ours” in the “sand”, who was being taken away by “spirits”. It’s hot, the “spirits” managed to mock the bodies. The special forces are in a state close to shock. I don’t know... No matter how prepared the fighters were, it was necessary to “dilute” them with experienced guys. And so... First euphoria, then complete despondency. Everything that is typical of young fighters, only on the scale of an entire squad.
That's basically it. Eternal memory to the dead. Long days of living alive."
Igor P., the detachment’s radio operator, recalls: “In those terrible days when the operation took place in Maravary, I spent two days in communication with headphones, heard everything that was happening there... Tsebruk reported to the battalion commander that he intended to pursue the “spirits.” The battalion commander gave the go-ahead, although he knew that the cover on either side was not yet ready. By the end of the second day, a group was assembled from those who remained in the detachment to carry out the dead and wounded. We pulled out the bodies of the guys (the “spirits” carried them all over this nasty gorge), which almost all showed signs of torture. The guys were put at the headquarters. Then all sorts of generals arrived and made patriotic speeches. Well, okay, a lot of water has passed under the bridge since then. Eternal memory to them!”
Igor Nepomnyashchy, the commander of the company that “covered” the guys from above, recalls: “After such a “baptism of fire,” some lost their nerves, we could not take the weapons from their hands... Many turned completely gray - at the age of 18... Then that morning, few understood what really happened. Let's remember the guys..."
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While the war is going on, the Snegirev twin brothers - Snegiri - are undergoing military training in the Siberian part along with other similar teenagers, torn from home. Having received news from their mother that the cow Zorka has calved, they voluntarily go home 60 km away to drink milk. And at this time an order comes to the political department - to arrange a demonstration execution for educational purposes. And having returned to the unit with gifts - and it didn’t even occur to them not to return - the brothers find themselves on trial. However, their comrades did not survive them for long - all died, including the foreman, who died on the train, and the special officer who committed suicide, who wrote a report on Snegiri in Novosibirsk - all except one, who was left without an eye and without an arm, but survived and returned. Three years after the end of the war, this disabled survivor with his wife and child is kicked out of the house that he had built with difficulty - it turned out that this house was not in the plan. The action begins with the eviction, then turns back, followed by the story of the death of the first company, after it - the story of the Bullfinches, which happened back in Siberian training, and finally returns again to the surviving hero, to whom his dead friends come to help build a new house .
The performance has been running for almost a year, but despite this, in some places it still does not keep up the pace, but this is a very minor drawback in light of the fact that there are very few such productions. It cannot be said that there are no attempts to stage something serious and socially significant at all - the problem is that there is often no worthy material for them, modern drama does not supply it, the old one has long been used up and is irrelevant. And if the material is of high artistic quality, then, as a rule, it is used for purely playful performances, not necessarily flat and vulgar, sometimes simply excellent (like “Optimus mundis” by Arseny Epelbaum), but not involving the understanding of any urgent or, conversely, eternal questions. Sometimes coincidences do happen, as was the case with “The Flying Goose,” which, however, is many years old. Unlike “The Goose of Passage,” “Bullfinches” (Sadur’s play is called “Death Men”) is a traditional drama in form, and not a prose text played out by roles. Although the director's decision is also arbitrary, there is no (fortunately) life-like resemblance, everything is at the level of symbolism, although not very original: greatcoats thrown onto the stage instead of the bodies of the dead, a red circle - either a bullfinch's breast, or a bloody moon, girls in white and wearing earflaps over those sentenced to death - the souls of the murdered, or maybe angels. All this is performed by an already established company of young artists: Akimkin, Tkachuk, Abashin, Tulchinsky and others. The performance sometimes lacks catchiness and open emotions - apparently, the directors consciously moved away from the “cabbage” aesthetics generally accepted today, but they went so far that at times the action seems very inexpressive - you can’t go far on subtext alone either. And the opposition to the communist ideology of popular Orthodoxy, or more precisely, the Old Believers, also does not work - in essence, there is little difference between them, although a believing peasant, even in the army, refuses to kill and performs kitchen duties (he dies, holding out a plate of soup to his comrades) looks very touching. “Bullfinches” as a whole is not too emotionally moving, despite the fact that the performance is interesting, clearly successful, with a clear main idea: in this country, war is not war, an ordinary person is not an ordinary person, a young person is not young, but still a suicide bomber, life is worth nothing.
2003 is the year of celebration of the centenary of the canonization of one of the most beloved Russian saints - St. Seraphim of Sarov. The same year marked one hundred years since the founding of our village of Snegiri.
Snegiri is an urban-type settlement (dacha village) in the Istra municipal district of the Moscow region, the largest settlement in the municipality of the urban settlement of Snegiri. Until the 1940s, the name was written Snigiri.
Population - 2.9 thousand people (2009).
Located on the Volokolamsk highway, northwest of Dedovsk, 25 km from the Moscow Ring Road. Snegiri railway station on the Moscow - Riga line. Together with the villages of Turovo, Khovanskoye, Lenino, Nadovrazhino, Petrovskoye, Sadki, Selivanikha, Dedovo-Talyzino, it forms the municipality of the Istrinsky municipal district, the urban settlement of Snegiri.
This rather noticeable holiday village is located in the western part of the region at a distance of 22 kilometers from the Moscow Ring. The dacha village is surrounded by smaller-density settlements. In a 5-kilometer zone from the dacha village there is the village of Rozhdestveno, the villages of Zhevnevo, Khovanskoye, Lenino, Sadki, Petrovskoye, Selivanikha. Near the dacha village there is a village. Lenino. The most notable among those listed can be called s. Rozhdestveno (has 3159 residents). The regional center is the city of Istra, located 11.6 km west of the holiday village of Snegiri.
Bullfinches
The area where the urban holiday village is now locatedBullfinches (DPGT Snegiri), in ancient times the blanket of a dense densespruce-pine forest - European taiga - with a significant admixture of oak, of which there was much more in those distant times.
Back in the 30sXXcenturies the mighty spruce-pine forest stretchedalong the railroad, where Zheleznodorozhnaya Street is now.
Nowadays the forest occupies about 54-55% of the area. Much to my regretAccording to this report, this area occupied by forest continues to decline due to“legal” and illegal logging, and these are the lungs of Moscow!
The Snegirevsky climate is favorable for life, recreation and treatment. It is no coincidence that the Administrative Office's holiday home is located hereunder the President of the Russian Federation, and before that, since 193 8 there was a houserest of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.
The surroundings of Snegiri are one of the most picturesque areasIstra land.
The beautiful Istra flows 4 km south of Snegiri. Its fairly clean water and green shores attract numerous vacationers in the summer.
From Moscow (Rizhsky Station) to Snegiri is 45 km, from Tushino 30 km, travel time is 57 and 34 minutes, respectively.
It is possible to travel to Snegiri without transfers from stations in the Kursk direction.
The first known mention in scribe books of the area where Snegiri is now located was in 1623. In the 17th - 18th centuries it belonged to the Goret camp of the Moscow district, and later to the Zvenigorod and Voskresensky districts.
On the map of 1800, the Snegirevo wasteland is not shown, and the territory of the future settlement probably belonged to several owners: the northern part of the guard to captain-lieutenant Alexei Nikolaevich Shchepotev, the southern part to Count Pavel Ivanovich Kutaisov - the son of Ivan Pavlovich (the patronymic is given by the name of the emperor) Kutaisov ( ca. 1759-1834), valet and favorite of Emperor Paul I, Turkish by nationality, eastern - to state councilor Andrian Andrianovich Lopukhin.
At a later time, 5 km north of Snegiri in the Khovansky area there were several estates.
In the area of Snegiri and Lenino, significant tracts of land belonged to the princes Golitsyn.
Vast estates - forest lands and wastelands - on the site of today's Snegiri, in the area of Lenino and Sadkov, belonged to the Counts Tolstoy.
In the 19th century, their forester was Yegor Gudkov. His house was located on the right side of the Volokolamsk highway at the entrance to Trukholovka. The estate was surrounded by linden trees. Unfortunately, at the end of the last century they were cut down.
Not far from Yegor Gudkov’s house there was a roadside teahouse, which was popular with those traveling to the New Jerusalem Monastery.
In 1870, construction began on the private Moscow-Vindavo-Rybinsk railway. Construction was carried out by the joint-stock company "Moscow-Vindavo-Rybinsk Railway Company". The railway was built on the territory of Moscow and 9 other provinces of the Russian Empire. One of its main lines is Moscow-Vindava (in Soviet times, Ventspils in Latvia). Train traffic on this line was opened on September 11, 1901, and in 1903 the Snigiri stopping point was opened. This is how it was common to erroneously spell this word at that time. This error was pointed out by a number of scientists, for example, Professor D.N. Kaygorodov. It was eliminated in 1955, the station became known as Snegiri. The date – 1903 – of the opening of the Snigiri stopping point should be considered the year of birth of the Bullfinches. In 2003, the village turned 100 years old!
Events in the life of the village of Snigiri - Snegiri
1916 G. The first small brick factories were built: Prince Golitsyn with 60 workers, N.I. Sorokin and A.F. Boyarova with 85 workers. The village owes its growth to them and subsequent brick factories.
1926 According to the Directory-Guide "Dachas and Neighborhoods of Moscow", the publishing house of the MKH near the platforms. There are only a few houses scattered around Snigiri, most of them railway houses. There are no dachas here. 77 people lived in 16 non-peasant households. In the labor colony there was 1 farm, in which 26 people worked.
1928-1929 Brick factory No. 6 for the production of red bricks in the Snigiri labor colony began operating, employing more than 300 people. Clay for making bricks was taken near the factory, where Cooperative Street is now.
1932 . The plant was transferred to the production of refractory bricks. To make it, the raw materials - white clay - had to be imported from remote areas. In connection with this, a railway access road to the plant was built.
1935 G . A small workers' settlement formed near the station.
1937-1938 Construction of dachas began. In Snigiri at that time there were already 80 houses, not counting country houses.
1939 A junior high school has been opened. The population of Snigir increased to 1.9 thousand inhabitants.
1941 The Great Patriotic War broke the measured life. As the army retreated, a factory and a railway bridge were blown up. Almost all the residents left with the troops.
In December 1941, there was a line in Snegiri where the German troops advancing on Moscow were stopped. The Nazis entered the village on the night of November 30, 1941. On December 2 and 4, they launched an attack (including with the participation of tanks) on the village of Lenino (now part of the village), but were repulsed by the enemy. The neutral strip was only 50 - 70 meters. The counteroffensive of Soviet troops began on the morning of December 8, and by the evening the settlement was liberated. As a result of heavy fighting in the vicinity of Snegiri, more than about 6,500 people died.
Remnants of ammunition are still found today - in 2008, during construction, a military grenade from the Great Patriotic War was discovered and neutralized by employees of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, and in 2009, a Soviet mortar mine was found outside the village of Lenino.
After the liberation of Snigiri, civilians began to return to their ashes, a bakery started operating, and a store opened. The village began to gradually heal the wounds inflicted by the terrible war.
1942-1943 During the fighting, only walls remained of the Snigirevsky plant. During this time, the plant was largely restored and all workshops were operational.
1949 G. The name of the plant has been changed. It became known as the Snigirevsky Fireclay Plant. Fireclay products began to be exported.
In the spruce forest north of the Volokolamsk highway, the construction of dachas for officers of the Military Engineering Academy, nicknamed “general dachas,” probably because of the large plots of land, was being completed.
1950 G. The plant is fulfilling orders for facing blocks for the high-rise building of Moscow University under construction.
1951 G. A second secondary school was opened.
1953 G. There are now 18 streets, alleys and passages in Snigiri.
1 954 The railway was switched to electric traction on the section to New Jerusalem. Travel has become more convenient and comfortable.
1955 G. The name of the station and the village was clarified; they became known as Snegiri. The plant became known as the Snegirevsky Refractory Plant.
1957 By the decision of the Istrinsky district executive committee, the Snegirevsky village Council of People's Deputies was formed. The number of streets and alleys increased to 26.
1959 The population of Snegiri is growing and amounted to 5.2 thousand people.
The town-forming industrial enterprise of the village is the Snegirevsky Refractories plant (production of fireclay, corundum refractories, thermal insulation materials and products, paving slabs, acrylic baths, polymers and plastics). The enterprise came into operation in 1928. With the onset of the economic crisis of the 2000s, production was stopped and almost all staff were fired.
The state unitary enterprise scientific and experimental farm "Bullfinches" of the Main Botanical Garden of the Russian Academy of Sciences, located on the eastern outskirts of the village, raised exotic cattle - "zebu cows" in the late 80s - early 90s. This is a hybrid of wild zebu bulls imported from Iran, Azerbaijan, India and a motley Russian cow. There were 750 heads on the farm. 14 purebred stud bulls once formed the basis of the herd's gene pool. When crossed with them, Russian “burenki” produced milk with a record fat content. The phenomenal results of the experiment were once exhibited at VDNKh. The current herd is no longer capable of such record milk yields, since the gene pool has not been replenished with fresh zebu sires for a long time.
Today, the basis of the village's economy is retail trade.
The vast majority of the economically active population travels to work in Moscow.
Among the famous residents are folk artists E. Maksimova, V. Vasiliev, who moved to the village in the early 1970s.
At different times, cultural figures, theater and ballet artists lived and worked in the “Masters of Arts” dacha community, located 4 km south of the center of the village on the banks of the Istra River. Among them are I. S. Kozlovsky, L. Maksakova, M. Maksakova, A. Ktorov, Mark Reisen, Aram Khachaturyan, Rodion Shchedrin and Maya Plisetskaya.
Current Russian politicians, including G. Zyuganov, permanently live in the Snegiri holiday home, located on the territory of the former estate of Count Kutaisov, 3 km south of the center of the village.
In the vicinity of Snegiri, next to I. S. Kozlovsky’s dacha, the filming of L. Gaidai’s film “Barbos the Dog and the Unusual Cross” (1961) took place.
1968 The Lenino-Snegirevsky Military History Museum was opened on May 9.
Interesting Facts
German heavy tank "Tiger" in the Lenino-Snegirevsky Military History Museum.
One of the few surviving heavy German tanks of World War II, the Tiger, stands outdoors in the museum in Snegiri. It was found by enthusiasts in a swamp near a military training ground in Nakhabino in 1973 and placed in a museum in Snegiri. The cost of the tank, according to experts, is about $1 million.
On the territory of the Volokolamsk Highway Museum, a T-34 tank is installed on a high pedestal, surrounded by five stylized dots. On the pedestal there is an inscription:
“Here, in the menacing days of the autumn of 1941, valiant warriors
The 16th Army stopped the enemy.
From here, on December 6, 1941, they launched a decisive offensive and began the defeat of the Nazi invaders."
December 5, 2001. A memorial to the Siberian soldiers who defended Moscow was opened here.
In 1996, a sculptural group was erected - a monument to internationalist soldiers; there are alleys in memory of those killed in the Afghan and Chechen wars, as well as in honor of the fallen soldiers of Russian special forces who gave their lives defending the Motherland.
In the summer of 2007, on the territory of the Lenino-Snegirevsky memorial complex, a majestic monument to the Mother of God was erected, holding in front of her a plate with the image of Jesus Christ, the Archangels Michael and Gabriel appear.
On May 7, 2000, a chapel in honor of the Holy Great Martyr Demetrius of Thessaloniki, assigned to the St. Seraphim Church in the village of Snegiri, was consecrated at the memorial. Memory of Saint Dm. Since ancient times, Solunsky has been associated in Rus' with patriotism and defense of the Fatherland.
1979 The number of residents living in Snegiri is increasing and reaches 6.1 thousand people.
1992 G.
1992 G. The Snegirevsky village Council of People's Deputies was transformed into the Administration of the village district.
1993 G. The Snegirevsky refractory plant became a joint-stock company.
1999 The village has 1,900 houses, but some are inhabited only in the summer months and are used as summer cottages. The population is gradually declining. The number of residents has decreased to 3.5 thousand people (2008), many marriages are dissolved.
2001-2003 According to the design of the architect Andrei Borisovich Barabanov, at the expense of the Research and Production Enterprise "Progress-1", a wooden Orthodox church of St. Seraphim of Sarov in the Old Russian style was erected in the area of the administration building of the village district.
January 15, 2003 , on the day of memory of St. Seraphim of Sarov, services began. On August 1 of the same year, on the 100th anniversary of the glorification of St. Seraphim of Sarov, new bells were consecrated and installed on the belfry.
2003 G. Widely noted 100th anniversary of the Bullfinches!
A huge shopping center called “Bullfinches” was built on Volokolamsk Highway. The village has a secondary school, an outpatient clinic, a community center (with an art school), a kindergarten, a furniture manufacturing workshop, industrial and commercial enterprises of various forms of ownership, public service enterprises, there is a city police department (since 2010 Police) and Istra forestry .
(Based on materials from the book by Yu.Z. Mikheev “Bullfinches, Trukholovka, Lenino, Sadki”, Wikipedia and some other sites)
