Mariya Vasilyevna Oktyabrskaya

„Sometimes I’m so angry I can’t even breathe.”

After her husband was killed by the Nazis, Mariya Oktyabrskaya asked Stalin for a tank, so she could mow down German soldiers in revenge.

Unlike the other nations fighting in World War 2, the Soviets allowed women to fight in the war. Some flew aircrafts for the air force, but the vast majority of women were trained as snipers. Since the male advantage of increased upper body strength was not relevant in shooting and women were thought to be more patient and enduring in waiting for the enemy to show his Nazi ass, women became snipers in large numbers. The deadliest sniper of all time being Lyudmila Pavlichenko, a badass woman in her own right.

On the battlefield though, women were rare. It was believed that they did not belong in battle or tanks, where things got really ugly. Except a certain Mariya Oktyabrskaya didn‘t get the memo and went for a Nazi killing spree with her tank like there is no tomorrow. Well, how did that happen?

Mariya grew up in an Ukrainian family on Krimea with her nine siblings. With so many mouths to feed, the family was poor and Mariya worked all kinds of jobs she could find, like in a canning factory. Her life changed when she married an officer of the Soviet army and she thrived on all military things. She bloody loved weaponry, vehicles, being in the army officer‘s wife‘s club, you name it. When the front crawled closer to home, she was being moved to Siberia while her husband went to war. He was killed in 1941, but the news didn‘t reach her until two years later. Mariya was done with the world. With her beloved husband dead, her thoughts were focused on one thing only: killing Nazis (Leutenant Aldo Raine would have loved it, right?). She sold off all her belongings and wrote a letter to Stalin (writing a letter to Stalin himself is pretty badass in itself if you ask me):

Dear Joseph Vissarionovich!

In the battles for the Motherland, my husband, the regimental commissar Oktyabrsky Ilya Fedotovich, died. For his death, for the death of all Soviet people tortured by the fascist barbarians, I want to take revenge on the fascist dogs, for which I contributed all my personal savings to the state bank to build the tank – 50,000 rubles. Please name the tank “Fighting Girlfriend” and send me to the front as the driver of this tank. I have a specialty of a driver, I have excellent command of a machine gun, I am a Voroshilov shooter. I send you warm greetings and wish you good health for many, many years for fear of enemies and for the glory of our Motherland.

Guess what? Stalin bloody loved it! He wrote back a nice little letter that her wish would be granted and Army Command sent her to tank training for several months. Then they gave her the damn tank with the words ‘Fighting Girlfriend’ written on the side as requested and sent her off to resolve this anger mangement issue of hers.

Since women in tanks were never before seen, the male soldiers mocked her tirelessly, thinking her presence was some kind of a joke. Well, Mariya soon proved them wrong in her very first battle in Smolensk in Oktober 1943. She was the first to break through enemy lines, mowing down everything that moved. She went completely berserk on a Nazi-killing-revenge-bloodfest. When her tank was immobilized, she ignored her superior‘s orders, jumped out off the tank and repaired „Fighting girlfriend“ under enemy fire. She was absolutely mad. Or maybe she was just annoyed she had do take a break from the Nazi killing action? Anyhow, after the battle was over, Mariya had killed more than 30 German soldiers and destroyed numerous hostile machinery.

She was so super angry about the death of her husband that nothing but revenge was on her mind. She didn‘t give a shit about anything else. The anger never cooled down for a bit. After her first battle, she wrote in a letter to her sister: „Sometimes I’m so angry I can’t even breathe.” In the following month, November 1943 at the battle of Vitebsk, again, Mariya is doing her thing, going batshit crazy in complete bloodlust turmoil, the tank is being immobilized, she jumps out, repairs the damn thing and goes on with her killing duties.

Mariya is being celebrated. She foung her calling and avenged her hubby‘s death dozens of times. But all good killing sprees come to an end. In January 1944 during the Leningrad offensive, while repairing her tank she‘s being hit in the head. She‘s in a coma for two more months before she dies.

She was only 38 years old when she died. After her death, she was made a „Hero of the Soviet Union“, the highest honor for bravery during combat and she one of only two female tank drivers awarded with this title.