Mikhail Dmitriyevich Baranov

Mikhail Dmitriyevich Baranov was born on 21 October 1921 in the village of Gorki, now in Slantsy district of Leningrad region, into a peasant family. He was Russian. He finished school in 1937, worked as a lathe operator at the Kirov works and enrolled the same year as a pupil at a flying club. In October 1938 he completed the Leningrad central flying club and was sent to the Chuguyev military school for pilots. He was commissioned junior lieutenant in October 1940 and posted as a junior pilot to the 271st Fighter Aviation Regiment in the Baltic Special Military District, where he served until May 1941. From the start of the Great Patriotic War he served with the 183rd Fighter Aviation Regiment on the Southern Front. Commanding a flight, he lost not one aircraft of his flight in the first two months of the war — in the conditions of the summer of 1941 that was the basis of his standing in the regiment. By the end of September 1941 he had five victories. By August 1942 his score had passed twenty. He distinguished himself in the air fighting over the great bend of the Don during the battle of Stalingrad. By decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of 12 August 1942 he was made a Hero of the Soviet Union with the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star. The decree uses the general formula about exemplary performance of combat tasks and the courage shown in them; it names no single episode, and the basis is his accumulated record. In the autumn of 1942 the 8th Air Army formed the 9th Fighter Aviation Regiment from its best pilots, under Major Lev Shestakov. Baranov and his regular wingman Ivan Sergeantov were among the first sent to it; Captain Baranov became deputy regiment commander and later, on health grounds, regimental navigator. He did not die in action. A leg injury had left him barred from flying, but on 17 January 1943 Guards Captain Baranov obtained permission for a training flight. At 3,000 metres the aircraft lost control and he was killed. He was twenty-one. Over his operational service Baranov flew about 200 combat sorties, fought 70 air battles and shot down 24 enemy aircraft. He is buried in the town of Kotelnikovo in Volgograd region, in a common grave in the civil cemetery; his name also appears on the memorial plaque of the common grave on the station square at Kotelnikovo. After the war a named memorial slab was placed on Mamayev Kurgan in Volgograd. A street in Kotelnikovo carries his name, he is commemorated on the Kirov works memorial, and a plaque stands in the town of Slantsy. Exhibits about him are held in the Volgograd museum of the defence of the city.