Lyudmila Pavlichenko
War Hero
Remembered for killing over three hundred German and other enemy soldiers during World War II, this Soviet Red Army 25th Rifle Division Major earned the distinction of being history's most accomplished woman sniper. She received the Order of Lenin and was designated a Hero of the Soviet Union.
She participated in numerous amateur shooting events during her early years and went on to become a factory worker at the Kiev Arsenal.
Before enlisting in the Soviet military, she earned a history degree from Kiev University. In the years following World War II, she worked as a Soviet Navy historian.
She was born and raised in Bila Tserkva, a city that was then in the Russian Empire and now falls within the bounds of Ukraine.
She and Vasily Zaytsev were both prolific Soviet snipers of the Second World War.