JimZ

No comments yet? I'll take it that you are busy trying to find who she is. Hints? Not yet - too early! Not until there is some feedback on your part.

WHO AM I? I am known, not for anything I did but for whom I was. I hide some secrets about my younger days and my story may not be known to many. Who will share my tale? Enjoy!

Thanks Ilja. Gimme some time to think of something.....

That looks like a young Kirill Meretskov. Not quite sure what happened to him on 23 June other than the fact that he was trying to come up with a plan to stop the german advance. Probably not being so successful got him accused of being a traitor by good old Beria leading him to imprisonment and torture. When Stalin realised he was short of competent generals , he was released and when meeting Stalin, he was asked "How are you feeling?" Anyways, on 8 September 1945 he was awarded none other than the Order of Victory. Makes you wonder, time and again, how much better the Soviet Union might have faired against Germany had Stalin been less paranoid and had the purges not taken place.

Well, how about taking the superglue as far away from your collection as is humanly possible. I dare not ask what it was doing so close! And as far as I know, that ribbon will never be the same again. You may try to use thinners but that will simply ruin the ribbon completely. And I doubt if warm water will be of any use at all.

Indeed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pavlik_Morozov "The most popular account of the story is as follows: born to poor peasants in Gerasimovka, a small village 350 kilometers north-east of Yekaterinburg (then known as Sverdlovsk), Morozov was a dedicated communist who led the Young Pioneers at his school, and a supporter of Stalin's collectivization of farms. In 1932, at age 13, Morozov reported his father to the political police (GPU). Supposedly, Morozov's father, the Chairman of the Village Soviet, had been "forging documents and selling them to the bandits and enemies of the Soviet State" (as the sentence read). The elder Morozov, Trofim, was sentenced to ten years in a labour camp, and later executed.[1] However, Pavlik's family did not take kindly to his activities: on September 3 of that year, his uncle, grandfather, grandmother and a cousin murdered him, along with his younger brother. All of them except the uncle were rounded up by the GPU and convicted to "the highest measure of social defense" - execution by a firing squad. Thousands of telegrams from all over the Soviet Union urged the judge to show no mercy for Pavlik's killers. The Soviet government declared Pavlik Morozov a glorious martyr who had been murdered by reactionaries. Statues of him were built, and numerous schools and youth groups were named in his honour. An opera and numerous songs were written about him. Gerasimovka's school, which Morozov attended, became a shrine and children from all over the Soviet Union went on school excursions to visit it. During the investigation of Trofim Morozov's case his wife Tatyana Morozova, Pavel's mother, stated that Trofim Morozov used to beat her and bring home valuables received as payment for selling forged documents. Pavel, who was only 13 at that time, just confirmed evidence given by his mother. It has been suggested since the collapse of the Soviet Union that Pavlik Morozov may not have been as perfect as it was supposed. In the mid-1980s Yuri Druzhnikov, a dissident writer expelled from the Soviet Writers' Union, performed an investigation, met with surviving eyewitnesses, and wrote a documentary book about Pavlik. Originally circulated in samizdat, it was published in the U.K. in Russian (Юрий Дружников, Доносчик 001, или Вознесение Павлика Морозова) in 1988 and soon thereafter translated into several languages. The first English translation appeared in 1996 under the title "Informer 001: The Myth of Pavlik Morozov." In his book, Druzhnikov disputes every aspect of the Soviet propaganda version of Pavlik's life. For example, different sources in Soviet literature listed different ages for Pavlik, when he was killed; in the Soviet textbooks, there were differing photographs of Pavlik all showing different boys; the fact that Pavlik was not a pioneer when he was killed. According to the Soviet source, Pavlik's grandfather was responsible for his murder; according to Druzhnikov, the grandfather was heartbroken about the death of Pavlik, organized the search when the boy went missing, and maintained his innocence during the trial. While not saying it outright, Druzhnikov hints that Pavlik was killed by a GPU officer, with whom Druzhnikov met while doing his research. Catriona Kelly in her 2005 book Comrade Pavlik: The Rise and Fall of a Soviet Boy Hero agrees with Druzhnikov that the official version of the account is almost wholly fictional, the evidence sketchy and based mostly on second-hand reports by alleged witnesses, and that Pavlik did not snitch on his parents and was murdered after a mundane squabble. Kelly also shows how the official version's emphasis shifted to suit the changing times and propaganda lines: in some accounts, Pavlik's father's crime was not forging the documents, but hoarding grain; in others, he was denounced not to the secret police, but to the school-teacher. In some accounts, the method of Pavlik's death was decapitation by saw. The one surviving photograph of him shows a malnourished child, who bears almost no resemblance to the statues and pictures in children's books. It has also been said that he was nearly illiterate and was coerced to inform on his father by his mother, after Pavlik's father deserted the family. Kelly, who had access to the official archives of the case, states that Druzhnikov's theory that Pavlik was killed by the GPU is unlikely. Druzhnikov accuses Kelly of extensive plagiarism from his book, and also of "dependence on those who have admitted her to archives", i.e. from employees FSB - successors of GPU. According to most recent research, Gerasimovka was described in the Soviet press as "kulak nest" because all villagers refused to join the kolkhoz, a state-controlled collective farm during the collectivization. Pavlik informed on neighbours when they did something wrong, including his own father who left the family for another woman.[1] Pavlik was not a Pioneer, although he wanted to be one. There is no evidence that the family was involved in the murder of the boy, which was probably a work of other teenagers with whom Pavlik had a squabble over a gun." The ball is now in you court Ilja.

Not Karol Wojtyla! He is just a child who died at a very young age. He was a veritible product of the communist machine. There are two versions surrounding our characther. The hyped up communist 'legend' ... and what is more likely, the true story.

Totally clueless so far?

I was going to pass on the challenge but instead I'll throw this question instead: Who am I? Please tell my story. And then, TELL MY STORY! Its an easy one!!! Good luck

If you want help I suggest you post larger pics... Some of our members here don't have the same vision they had 50 years ago :cheeky:

And amazingly that's all there is on Wiki! Little more on the net......

Well done! My pic came from my last visit to the Central Armed Forces museum in Moscow and was taken on my cell phone. I got a thrill out of sneaking a great number of pics!! I remember looking at some orders on display and explaining to my wife why those specific orders were fakes ... when a young museum assistant came up to me to ask if he could help me!! Sure enough I politely told him that no, I did not need any help but thank you! I was not going to go into the merits of what was a fake and and more importantly explaining why and how I knew!! As my visit of the museum continued I was shocked at the number of fakes or lets call them "replacement" pieces have been intorduced into the display stands. It is my fear that a lot of orders left that museum in the same way that they left the Hermitage! Disappointing but nevertheless an attempt to meet the growing appetite for high end soviet awards. And then we wonder why the exportation of Soviet ODMs has been illegalised. Well done Dan and Christophe, but particularly Dan on finding Soviet Marshal of Artillery Nikolai Nikolaevich Vornov's group.... incidentally born in 1899 (turn of the century) and died 1968. It is amazing how much a group can tell us about the person it was awarded to.

So far so good Dan. How can you know the missing orders but do not know the name?

1 HSU 6 Lenins 4 Red Banners, 20 years RKKA, Leningrad, Moscow, Stalingrad, both Victory medals and various commemorative medals till the 1968 SAF 50th. A lovely group in the making... with our man ... as we already established... being born somewhere around the turn of the century and passing away between 1968 and 1975 (just before the 30th anniversary of Victory over Germany was issued) Again, I want something really BIG to reveal more... but if it is Big enough, more will be revealed. Of course, I consider the recipient's name to be Big ... so something less than that will do... ... But beware, I may want more than what you give. Plus the group has some other very distinguishing features which should be uncovered first. Good luck!!

Well Christophe, "I take the easy shot... Let's just guess what could be the top row : 1 HSU, 6 Lenin, 4 Red Banners... " That is BIG. I was wondering if you managed to guess from the positions of the upper bar with the number of medals on the lower bar. But I thought it might be just a bit more complicated as that as their could be mutiple HSUs.

Based on what Christophe? Walk us through your guess first..... .... see you after the break....

So... not as helpful as you'd be expecting but this is what I am throwing at you next. No Kutuzov (yet? - perhaps?) No Nevsky (yet? - perhaps?) No OGPWs (yet? - perhaps?) Some foreign decorations. Disappointed? More effort - More info.... come on..... We're heading down the right path (perhaps?).... Lost of goodies still concealed and they'll only come out with more info on your part! Keep guessing. Who is going to take the next shot?

Are you thinking that Dan? Lets uncover a few of the goodies at the bottom then! Dan, I'll trade you the vowel for a Nevsky or even a couple of OGPW's!!! Heck for A Nevsky or a couple of OGPW's I'll give you the answer Glad you're enjoying it!

From the medal bar I'd have said pretty much the same but I would not have mentioned the navy - but you are right, he was not in the navy. Yes, born turn of the century and died in the indicated range. Well done. Not completely right but not completely wrong either.

I want somthing bigger this time - tell me something about the group or the recipient. Maybe how many Lenins and red banners in total? Or perhaps something about the lower boxes - they seem too small for suspension orders/medal.... mmm... Its gotta be something BIG though for me to uncover the next part of the puzzle.

Not a marshall of the Soviet Union..... Cause that would be too easy!!! And a man? .... yes a man!

Could be any group so far but if you read the medals, you might already start to place some dates on our mystery Soviet!

Thanks Christophe. Taking the idea from a previous question, lets see if this generates any interest. The group below belonged to a high ranking Soviet - just that parts of it have been lost - OOPS!!! We can try to find them if you say something about this group that is relevant to it. It will get easier as it progresses - but to get more of the picture, you must tell me something relevant. And when you do, I will reveal other parts of the hidden picture - but not necessarily what you have mentioned. Hopefully, and I say hopefully, the final pictures will yield sufficient information for the group to be distinguished and identified with relative ease once the major pieced have been found! Good luck.

Quiz is Running out of steam it seems! So lets see if we can push it along that little bit more. "This is the <Baikanour> hangar where a drama occured exactly 7 years ago, beginning of May 2002. The roof of this hangar collapsed, with 8 dead workers as a consequence. Several reasons have been given for this accident : something falling on one of the massive fuel tanks kept inside the hangar, which would have produced a huge blast of air that caused the roof to swell and collapse, or a design miscalculation when the building, built in the 1960s, was renovated in the 1980s. The hangar was originally built for the Soviet moon exploration program and was later used for assembling Energia booster rockets and the Buran. A full-scale test model of the Buran was trapped beneath debris after the collapse. Ch."

Mmm.... German E-Scam is notorious for fakes. As far as Soviet and I daresay, even German Imperial, there are alot of good Eastern European repros which are placed as original pieces at bargain prices. Caveat Emptor!