Mikhail Shumilov

Shumilov, Mikhail Stepanovich

 

Born Nov. 5 (17), 1895, in the village of Verkhtechenskoe, in what is now Sha-drinsk Raion, Kurgan Oblast; died June 28, 1975, in Moscow; buried in Volgograd, on Mamaev Kurgan. Soviet military commander; colonel general (1943). Hero of the Soviet Union (Oct. 26,1943). Member of the CPSU from 1918.

The son of a peasant, Shumilov graduated from the Chuguev Military School in 1916, during World War I, as an ensign. He joined the Red Army in May 1918 and, during the Civil War of 1918–20, advanced from a platoon commander to commander of a rifle regiment. He completed courses for command and political personnel in 1924, Vystrel courses in 1929, and the Advanced Academic Courses at the K. E. Voroshilov Higher Military Academy in 1948.

Shumilov fought in the Soviet-Finnish War of 1939–40 as commander of a rifle corps. In 1941 and 1942, during the Great Patriotic War of 1941–45, he served as commander of a rifle corps and as deputy commander of the Fifty-fifth and Twenty-first armies on the Leningrad and Southwestern fronts. In August 1942, Shumilov was named commander of the Sixty-fourth Army, which fought successfully south of Stalingrad and was reorganized in March 1943 into the Seventh Guards Army. Shumilov served in this capacity between 1942 and 1945 on the Stalingrad, Don, Voronezh, Steppe, and Second Ukrainian fronts.

After the war, Shumilov served as commander of the White Sea Military District in 1948 and 1949 and the Voronezh Military District from 1949 to 1955. He was in retirement from 1956 to 1958, when he became a military consultant to the Group of Inspectors General of the Ministry of Defense.

Shumilov was a deputy to the third and fourth convocations of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. He was awarded three Orders of Lenin, four Orders of the Red Banner, two Orders of Suvorov First Class, the Order of Kutuzov First Class, the Order of the Red Star, the Order for Service to the Motherland in the Armed Forces of the USSR Third Class, and various medals. Shumilov was also the recipient of foreign orders and medals.