Mikhail Stepanovich
Shumilov
1895-1975
Mikhail Stepanovich Shumilov was the Commander of the 7th Guards Army of the Steppe Front, Colonel-General of the Guards. He was born on November 5 (17), 1895 in the village of Verkhnyaya Techa, the Shadrinsky district, the Perm province, now it is part of the Kataysky district of the Kurgan region. He finished the Zemstvo rural school, studied at the teachers’ seminary in Chelyabinsk. He was in the Russian Imperial Army since 1916. In 1916 he graduated from Chuguev Military School. He participated in the First World War as a junior officer of the Kremenchug Infantry Regiment, ensign. In 1917 he was a member of the Red Guard detachment at the front, a participant in revolutionary events. At the end of 1917 he was demobilized, returned to his native village, participated in the establishment of Soviet power. In April 1918 he volunteered for the Red Army. He was a participant in the Civil War. He was the commander of a volunteer detachment, in May 1918, joined the 4th Ural Rifle Regiment, formed in the city of Shadrinsk. He commanded a company in the regiment, and then became the commander of the regiment. He fought on the Eastern and Southern Fronts. In 1919 he was appointed as the commander of the 85th Special Rifle Brigade. Together with the brigade, he forced Sivash and stormed Perekop, fought against Makhno in Ukraine. After the war he remained in the Red Army. Since July 1921, he commanded a battalion and the 20th rifle regiment in the 7th Rifle Division of the Kharkov Military District. In 1924 he completed the Kharkov repeated courses of senior and senior command and political staff, after which he was appointed as a chief of staff of the rifle regiment. In 1929 he completed the Shooting and tactical advanced training courses of the Red Army “Shot” named after the Comintern. Since November 1929 he was the commander and military commissar of the 21st Infantry Regiment of the 7th Infantry Division of the Ukrainian Military District. Since December 1933 he was the Chief of Staff of the 96th Rifle Division of the same district, then – the Assistant commander of the 87th Rifle Division. Since June 1937 he was the commander of the 7th Rifle Division of the Kiev Military District. In February 1938 – March 1939 he participated in the fighting in Spain as an adviser to the commander of the army Group of the Central-Southern Zone. Since April 1939 he was the commander of the 11th Rifle Corps in the Belarusian Special Military District. At the head of the corps, he participated in the liberation campaign in Western Belarus in September 1939 and in the Soviet-Finnish War of 1939-1940. Since July 1940 the corps was located in the Baltic Special Military District. He was on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War since June 1941, as the commander of the 11th Rifle Corps of the 8th Army of the Northwestern Front; he participated in an unsuccessful defensive battle in the Baltic States, with great difficulty led parts of the corps out of the encirclement at the end of July at Chudskoe Lake. Since August 1941 he was the Deputy commander of the 55th Army of the Leningrad Front and participated in the defence of Leningrad. In November 1941 he was recalled to Moscow. Since January 1942 he was the Deputy Commander of the 21st Army on the Southwestern Front, participated in the tragic battles of the summer of 1942 in the Kharkov direction and on the Don. From August 1942 until the end of the war he was the Commander of the 64th (since April 16, 1943 transformed into the 7th Guards) army. The 64th Army under the command of Lieutenant General M.S. Shumilov held off the 4th Goth Tank Army on the distant approaches to Stalingrad for almost a month. Thanks to the steadfastness of soldiers and officers, as well as the thoughtful and courageous actions of the army commander in the south of Stalingrad (now it is the Kirovsky and Krasnoarmeysky districts of the hero city of Volgograd), industrial enterprises continued to operate. Then, for almost six months, army units held the defence to the death in urban neighborhoods. Later, army units under the command of M.S. Shumilov participated in the Kursk Battles, the crossing of the Dnieper, the Kirovograd, Uman-Botoshansky, Iasi-Chisinau, Debrecen, Budapest, Bratislava-Brno, Prague operations, liberated Romania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia. The army fought as a part of the Stalingrad, Don, Voronezh, Steppe, 2nd Ukrainian fronts. By the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR dated October 26, 1943, Colonel General Mikhail Stepanovich Shumilov was awarded the title of the Hero of the Soviet Union with the award of the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal for the successful crossing of the Dnieper River, the solid consolidation and expansion of the bridgehead on the west bank of the Dnieper River and the courage and heroism of the Guard.
Address: Moscow, Leningradsky ave., 75, bldg. 1
