Nikolai Ivanovich Galushkin (Russian: Николай Иванович Галушкин; January 22, 1922 – May 18, 2007) was one of the top Soviet snipers during World War II.
He was brought up in an orphanage, from where he escaped in July 1926, then lived for some time with a lineman, and later in the family of rural teachers, the Smirnovs.
In October 1941, Galushkin was drafted into the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army by the Omutninsky District military registration and enlistment office of the Kirov region.
[4] On April 26, while traveling to the front line during shelling from an airplane, Galushkin was slightly wounded in the “soft tissue below the elbow”.
The award sheet noted that by September 20, the sniper had brought the number of enemy soldiers killed to 115.
I answer: “Comrade General, excuse me, but I have already entered the academy.” – “Which academy?” – “Yes, to the one where our brothers and sisters fight, defending their homeland.” – "Well done!"
And when I arrive at my unit, a dispatch follows: to assign Private Galushkin the rank of junior lieutenant.In February 1943, he was one of the first to cross the Seversky Donets River with a group of fighters.
On June 4, 1943, rifle platoon commander Galushkin organized a “group hunt” – 6 snipers actually defeated a unit of the 333rd German division in the village of Sidorovka.
The German command appointed a reward for the sniper's integrity, Wehrmacht soldiers and officers were warned of increased danger in those areas where Galushkin and his fighters operated.
On July 19, during the next “hunt,” two German machine gunners stunned and subdued a sniper; in the same battle, Galushkin’s partner, Sergeant Taras Sadzhaya, was also wounded.
The submachine gunners searched Galushkin, and did not notice that a grenade and a pistol were hidden under his camouflage robe.
By decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of October 26, 1943, Nikolai Ivanovich was awarded the Order of Lenin.
In his diary, Nikolai Ivanovich notes that until October 1, 1943, he was treated by Olga Petrovna Kotovskaya, the wife of the Civil War military leader G.I.
After returning to the active army, Galushkin took part in battles in Ukraine and Eastern Europe, including the liberation of Kirovograd and the capture of the city of Iași, and was wounded three times.
While feeling unwell after being wounded, he led the unit's snipers and, while in combat formations, destroyed important enemy targets.
Over the years, he worked in film production, was a dispatcher at a construction site, and was also a photographer at the Borovitsa holiday home in Kirovo-Chepetsk.
After celebrating the 20th anniversary of victory in the war, the former commander of the 49th Infantry Regiment, Colonel N. I. Kharlamov, who left the unit in the fall of 1943 due to injury, sent a letter personally to the USSR Minister of Defense, R. Ya.