Nikolai Iakovlev

Born Dec. 19 (31), 1898, in the city of Staraia Russa, in what is now Novgorod Oblast; died May 9, 1972, in Moscow. Soviet military figure. Marshal of artillery (1944). Member of the CPSU from 1923.

The son of a worker, Iakovlev became a private in the army in 1917. In 1918 he joined the Red Army. He graduated from the Second Petrograd Artillery Courses in 1920 and completed academic courses for command personnel in 1924. From 1937 to 1941, Iakovlev was chief of artillery in a series of military districts. He took part in the liberation of the Western Ukraine in 1939 and in the Soviet-Finnish War of 1939–40. He headed the Main Artillery Directorate of the Red Army from June 1941 until the end of the Great Patriotic War of 1941–45.

After the war, Iakovlev served as head of the Main Artillery Directorate and first deputy commander of the artillery. In 1948 he was appointed deputy minister of the armed forces of the USSR. Iakovlev was named first deputy commander of the National Air Defense Forces in June 1953 and commander in chief in January 1955. In December 1960 he became a military inspector and counselor with the Group of Inspectors General of the Ministry of Defense of the USSR.

A deputy to the second convocation of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Iakovlev was awarded six Orders of Lenin, two Orders of the Red Banner, two Orders of Suvorov First Class, the Order of Kutuzov First Class, the Order of the Red Banner of Labor, and various medals.