Serov, Anatolii Konstantinovich
Serov, Anatolii Konstantinovich
Born Mar. 7 (20), 1910, at the Vorontsovskoe Copper Mine, Verkhniaia Tura District, Perm’ Province, in what is now the settlement of Vorontsovka, city of Krasnotur’insk, Sverdlovsk Oblast; died May 11, 1939, in Moscow. Soviet military pilot; held the rank of brigade commander. Hero of the Soviet Union (Mar. 2, 1938). Member of the CPSU from 1931. The son of a laborer, Serov worked as an apprentice steel-worker. He joined the Red Army in 1929. In 1931 he graduated from a military school for pilots and aerial observers and in 1936 completed the first year of a course of study at the N. E. Zhukovskii Air Force Engineering Academy; thereafter he served in fighter aviation and was a test pilot. In 1937 and 1938, Serov fought as a volunteer against fascism in Spain, where he commanded a detachment of fighters and, later, a squadron. He fought in 40 air battles and shot down eight enemy aircraft. In 1938 he became head of the Chief Flight Inspectorate of the Red Army Air Force.
Serov died in an air crash. He was awarded the Order of Lenin and two Orders of the Red Banner. He is buried on Red Square at the Kremlin Wall.