What would you do if the person you loved was killed? What if the people who did it then started destroying your country in the bargain? Do you quietly pick up what’s left of your life and move on? Or do you sell whatever you have left to fund a shot at revenge? For Mariya Oktyabrskaya it was an easy choice. After the Nazis invaded the Soviet Union and killed her husband, Oktyabrskaya launched an all-out personal vendetta against fascism. And Oktyabrskaya did it in a tank she paid for herself.
Oktyabrskaya was born in 1905 on the Crimean Peninsula to a poor family of peasants. After a few years working in a cannery and as a telephone operator, she married a Soviet military officer in 1925. As the wife of an officer, Oktyabrskaya quickly took an interest in all things military. She trained as a nurse, but she also took lessons on driving military vehicles and using weapons. Those years seem to have been happy for the young couple. But that wouldn’t last forever. In June 1941, their peace was shattered when the German Reich launched a sudden, massive invasion of the Soviet Union.
As the Germans advanced into Ukraine, the Soviet military endured staggering losses. Oktyabrskaya’s husband was called to the front while she was evacuated to Siberia to escape the advancing Germans. Oktyabrskaya spent two years working to support the war effort in Siberia. Then one day, she got a heart-breaking message: her husband had been killed in action. But while most people would fall into despair at the news that their spouse had been killed, Oktyabrskaya simply got angry. And she immediately vowed to kill every German on Soviet soil. But first, she had to figure out how she was going to do that.
At the time, the Soviet Army was reluctant to let women fight on the front lines. Women were allowed to join the military, and many did see active combat. But in the early years of the war, female soldiers were expected to serve in specialized support roles. At most, all-female infantry units might be kept just behind the front to provide a second line of defense if the first rank of male soldiers was annihilated. However, Oktyabrskaya didn’t want to “support” the army. She wanted to kill Nazis, as many of them and as fast as she could. So, she came up with a bold plan.
The Soviet Union allowed (and expected) its citizens to donate money to the war effort to build equipment. After hearing of her husband’s death, Oktyabrskaya sold everything she owned until she had enough money to “donate” an entire T-34 tank to the army. Deciding that if she had paid for an entire tank, she deserved a say in how it was used, Oktyabrskaya wrote to the government and made two requests. First, she wanted the tank to be named “Fighting Girlfriend.” Second, she wanted to drive it.