Ivan Antonovich Grigorev

Born 1902; died July 30, 1942. One of the organizers of the partisan struggle in Karelia during the Great Patriotic War of 1941–45; major. Member of the CPSU from 1922.

Born into the family of a Karelian peasant in the village of Padany, which is now located in the Karelian ASSR, Grigor’ev enlisted in the Red Army in 1919. At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War he headed a partisan detachment. Beginning in October 1941 he was placed in command of a special battalion on the Karelian Front. In February 1942 he became commander of the First Partisan Brigade. During the winter of 1941–42, his brigade conducted 67 combat operations in the enemy’s rear. In the summer of 1942, over a period of 56 days, it carried out a 700-km raid in enemy rear areas, killing more than 750 enemy soldiers and officers. On July 30 the brigade was surrounded by the enemy in the vicinity of the Segozero forests. During the battle, Grigor’ev was wounded four times but continued leading the detachment. He died heroically in the course of breaking out of the encirclement and inflicting a crushing defeat on the enemy. Grigor’ev was awarded the Order of Lenin and the Order of the Red Star. He was buried in Padany.