Vasilii Stepanovich Popov

Born Dec. 27, 1893 (Jan. 8, 1894), in the village of Preobrazhenka, now the settlement of Kikvidze, Kikvidze Raion, Volgograd Oblast; died July 2, 1967, in Moscow. Soviet military commander, colonel general (1944). Hero of the Soviet Union (Apr. 10, 1945). Member of the CPSU from 1919. Son of a peasant.

Popov graduated from a teachers’ seminary in 1913 and from a school for ensigns in 1916. He joined the Soviet Army in 1919 and served in the Civil War of 1918–20 as assistant chief and chief of staff of a division. He graduated from the Military Academy of the Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army in 1922 and from training courses for one-man commanders (seeONE-MAN COMMAND) at the Military Political Academy in 1931. He was commander of a rifle corps in the Soviet-Finnish War of 1939–40. Popov saw service in the Great Patriotic War (1941–45) as corps commander in 1941, deputy army commander in charge of rear services in 1941–42, commander of the Tenth Army on the Western Front from 1942 to 1944, deputy commander of the First Byelorussian Front in 1944, and commander of the Seventieth Army on the First and Second Byelorussian fronts in 1944–45.

After the war, Popov was head of the advanced training courses and head of a department at the M. V. Frunze Military Academy. He retired in 1959. He was a deputy to the second convocation of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. Popov was awarded two Orders of Lenin, five Orders of the Red Banner, two Orders of Suvorov First Class, the Order of Kutuzov First Class, the Order of the Red Star, various medals, and two foreign orders.