Cherniakhovskii, Ivan Danilovich

Born June 16 (29), 1906, in the city of Uman’, in what is now Cherkassy Oblast; died Feb. 18, 1945; buried in Vil’nius. Soviet military commander; general of the army (1944). Twice Hero of the Soviet Union (Oct. 17, 1943, and July 29,1944). Member of the CPSU from 1928.

The son of a Ukrainian railroad worker, Cherniakhovskii joined the Red Army in 1924. He graduated from the Kiev Artillery School in 1928 and from the Red Army Mechanization and Motorization Academy in 1936. At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War of 1941–45, he commanded the 28th Tank Division and later the 241st Rifle Division on the Northwestern Front; he took command of the XVIII Tank Corps on the Voronezh Front in June 1942 and in July was appointed commander of the Sixtieth Army, which fought on the Voronezh, Central, and First Ukrainian fronts. He was appointed troop commander on the Western Front on Apr. 15, 1944, and troop commander on the Third Byelorussian Front on Apr. 24,1944. He saw action during the liberation of Byelorussia, and, in the battle to crush the enemy’s forces in East Prussia, he was mortally wounded near the city of Mehlsack (now Pienięzno in the Polish People’s Republic).

Cherniakhovskii was awarded the Order of Lenin, four Orders of the Red Banner, two Orders of Suvorov First Class, the Order of Kutuzov First Class, the Order of Bogdan Khmel’nitskii First Class, and various medals.