Terug

Linden

At the cemetery of Linden (district of Luven, East Flanders province) there is a grave of the Soviet partisan Vasiliy Petrovich Zhuravlev, who died in October 1943 during a partisan operation.

The grave is located in the part of the cemetery reserved for military burials. The concrete gravestone reads in Flemish: “Vasiliy Zhuravlev, the soldier of the USSR, partisan, group A34, was born in the Soviet Union, died in Linden in 1943”.

Monument

Next to V.P. Zhuravlev’s grave there is a monument erected by the residents of Linden in memory of local residents and partisans who died in 1940–45, during World War II. The list of partisans contains the name of V. Zhuravlev and more accurate date of death – October 1943.

 

Biography

 

Zhuravlev Vasiliy Petrovich, born April 22, 1920 (Ryazan Governorate, Egorevsky uyezd, Gorkovskaya volost, village of Selnikovo (now Moscow region, Kolomensky district, Gorki, village of Selnikovo). Before military conscription he worked at the Kolomna plant named after Kuybyshev, in the Iron Foundry as an electrician of 6th rank. In 1939, he was called up for military service by Kolomensky Regional Military Commissariat of the Moscow region, made it to the training detachment of the Black Sea Fleet, and then to the monitor “Martynov” (project SB-37) of the Danube Military Flotilla.

On June 22, 1941 Martynov monitor was in Izmail, in August–September 1941, the ship took part in battle actions in the territory of Zaporozhye. At the Konka river, 4 km above the village of Blagoveshchenskoe, on September 18, 1941 at 4:18 Martynov was sunk by the crew due to the impossibility of breaking into the Black Sea, and on October 6, 1941 it was excluded from the list of Navy ships. The crew continued battle actions on land.

V.P. Zhuravlev was reported missing in January 1942.

In fact, V.P. Zhuravlev was captured and was driven for hard labor in Belgium. He escaped from a prisoner-of-war camp, joined the Belgian Resistance (group A34), participated in combat operations of partisans. He died in October 1943 in the town of Linden, where he was buried.

(Some information and a portrait were provided by A. Novikov, living in the city of Kolomna, Moscow region, the son of V.P. Zhuravlev’s nephew. We thank K.B. Strelbitskiy for the help in material preparation)

 

Annual memorial ceremonies

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2020

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2014

2012

2011


Dear visitors,

We would like to draw your attention to the fact that spelling of the names, surnames and places of birth of Soviet citizens buried in Belgium may be distorted due to the fact that they are quite often written only in Flemish and French in registration books and on monuments.

We thank the Brussels-Belgian Archdiocese of the Russian Orthodox Church, the organizations of Russian compatriots and Russian foreign institutions accredited in Belgium for providing photos and their efforts to preserve the memory of the heroism of the Soviet soldiers who fell in the Great Patriotic War.

The Embassy will be grateful for providing any information and photos of Soviet military graves of the Second World War in Belgium and the ceremonies held on them. Please send material to the email address of the Embassy amrusbel@skynet.be with the note «War Graves».