Nina, Zinaida, and Liubov
One of the older women to serve in the Red Army during World War II was Nina Petrova. She was one of the few women that we know of who came to Eastern Front with knowledge of combat, having already volunteered for the Winter War in Finland. At age 46 she joined a medical battalion before her days as a sniper.
The Winter War began with the Soviet invasion of Finland in 1939. Fighting took place for over three months and ultimately ended with Finland ceding land to the Soviet Union. Much of the world supported Finland and deemed the invasion unjustified. Fighting occurred in Finland once again after Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941 and the Fins wished to regain their lost territory. That territory remained under Russian control and became part of the USSR at the end of the war.
After Nina Petrova's time fighting in the Winter War, she became a sniper in the Red Army on the Eastern Front during WWII. By the Battle of Leningrad in 1944, she was promoted to Sergeant Major and used her skills to train others as snipers. She is believed to have trained more than 500 soldiers. From January to March 1944 Petrova eliminated 23 enemy soldiers, earning her the Order of Glory medal. Her official kill count of 122 makes her one of the deadliest snipers in the war. On May 1, 1945 she was killed in action when a mortar blast pushed her off a cliff. She was 51 years old and one week shy of German surrender.
Zinaida Tchoumakova, 84
“I was 12 years old when German soldiers took over our house,” she said. “We fled in the forest with my brother Maxime. . . . I would cook for the soldiers, as well as provide important information for them by spying on German troops’ movement.” Tchoumakova said she still has family in Ukraine, and feels “afraid” of the new conflict there.
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/photos/2015/05/red-army-women-wwii-veterans
"I got as far as Warsaw...And all on foot...The infantry, as they say, is the wartime proletariat. We crawled on our stomachs...We went sick, coughing, sleepy, dirty, poorly dressed. Often hungry...But we won!" - Lt. Liubov Ivanovna Liubchik, machine gunner
Dang! She was a badass!