Ludmila Pavlichenko was born on July 12, 1916. She was Ukrainian and everything seemed to lead a life like all girls her age. But fate had decided otherwise for her. She was to become the leading Soviet female sniper with 309 hits.
Pavlichenko had learned to aim from an early age, being a member of the Kiev shooting group. In June 1941, when the Germans attacked, she was studying history at the University of Kiev.
She immediately rushed to enlist and was assigned to the 25th Rifle Division and gradually developed into the best of the approximately 2,000 female snipers in the Red Army, of which only 500 survived.
Armed with a Mosin-Nagant rifle, equipped with a R.E. 4, fought in Odessa, initially, where he killed 187 Germans and Romanians. He then operated in Sevastopol, Crimea. For her action she was promoted to lieutenant, having reached 257 hits.
In June 1942 he was seriously wounded by an enemy mortar shell and retired from the war. By then he had reached 309 successes, having also killed 36 German snipers.
After her withdrawal from the race she was sent to the US and Canada – being the first Soviet citizen to visit America – on a courtesy visit. There he also met with President Roosevelt and his wife at the White House.
He retired at the end of the war, with the rank of major. She returned to her studies and received a degree in history. He worked as a historian in the history directorate of the Soviet navy. He died in 1974.