Military ambulance train as it is equipped. Railway ambulance transport

CHAPTER TWELVE

MILITARY TRAINS

SPECIAL COMPOSITIONS ARE FORMED

Already on the third day of the war, June 24, 1941, the NKPS ordered the railways to form 288 military ambulance trains (150 permanent and 138 temporary). Six thousand cars were allocated for them and a staff of railway workers was appointed.

The military hospital train (VSP) consisted of specially equipped carriages for the seriously and lightly wounded, an isolation ward, a pharmacy-dressing station, a kitchen and other service carriages. Sanitary flights operating over short distances were formed mainly from covered freight cars equipped for transporting the wounded, as well as cars for housing a pharmacy-dressing station, kitchen, medical and service personnel.

Military ambulance trains were serviced by train crews, which included conductors, train carriage masters, a train electrician and a power plant driver.

The equipment and formation of military ambulance trains and flights was carried out at many railways and transport factories. Every day the NKPS received messages about the readiness of trains. Their formation and dispatch to front-line areas were strictly monitored.

Workers of the Moscow Car Repair Plant in short term equipped a military hospital train and sent it to the Southwestern Front. Then new trains were equipped. Factory workers - communists and non-party members - went to the front with them.

The railway workers of the Yegorshinsky branch of the movement undertook to prepare the ambulance train. The organizer of the work was the political department of the department. The initiative was supported by workers of locomotive and carriage depots, track distances and teams industrial enterprises. Komsomol members of the branch organized a collection of funds and property. Together with residents

In the Yegorshinsky district they collected 170 thousand rubles. Soon, a military ambulance train set off for the front with a team made up entirely of railway workers and workers of the Yegorshinsky district.

The staff of the Nizhnedneprovsky Car Repair Plant equipped and sent 36 military ambulance trains to the front. To transport the wounded from front-line hospitals, military sanitary flights, formed mainly from freight cars, plied on Pridneprovskaya.

The carriage shop of the Tashkent Locomotive Repair Plant received a combat mission - to prepare trains special purpose. The equipment for them did not arrive. It had to be produced locally. The machines for the seriously wounded were made by a team of women and teenagers under the guidance of the experienced master Lukyanovsky, evacuated from the Velikoluksky carriage repair plant. They worked around the clock. People understood that they needed to complete the task as quickly and as best as possible.

In September 1941, the first three ambulance trains left the carriage shop for the front, and four more in the next two months. In December, five trains with red crosses were sent to the front at once. The work of the team was highly appreciated in the order of the commander of the Central Asian Military District.

Workers from the Kuibyshev and Ufa carriage sections converted passenger cars into sanitary cars and formed 11 trains. The teams included experienced carriage masters, electricians and conductors.

On the instructions of the NKPS and UPVOSO, the Kuibyshev wagon section and depot equipped 80 military ambulance trains and flights. A. N. Boyko, who worked at that time as the head of the Kuibyshevsky carriage section and V. K. Uspensky, the deputy head of the railway carriage service, say:

At the Kuibyshev station, a strong point for the repair of military ambulance trains was organized. On some days, eight trains arrived here. All of them had to be carefully inspected, the heating, water supply, and electric lighting systems had to be checked and repaired, and broken glass had to be replaced. Repairs of bodies, roofs, and internal equipment required large amounts of labor. At first, the half-full food cauldrons in the kitchens caused particular trouble. Senior foreman A.S. Gavrilov found tinsmiths and tinkers among the evacuees. It immediately became easier. There was a shortage of lumber. They also found a way out - they began to catch driftwood in the Volga and deliver it by car to the sawmill.

One day, the military commandant of the station, S.A. Novinsky, called: “By the next morning, 8 military ambulance trains must be repaired and sent to the front.” And there are five more on the way - to Kuibyshev and three transit ones. All required repairs. The existing workforce cannot be used; people are already working two shifts in a row. Who can be involved? All engineering and technical workers were mobilized. The senior foreman of the Kuibyshev carriage depot A. N. Kuvanin remembered his blacksmith experience and went to help the workers. Among the railway workers is the political instructor of one of the trains - Serykh. The repairs were completed on time, and the trains went as intended.

A group of railway workers named after K. E. Voroshilov, who built a military hospital train. 1942

The road named after V.V. Kuibyshev worked with enormous stress. And it was necessary to pass even more trains. The question arose about increasing the length of trains. But there were difficulties with auto braking. Professor V.F. Egorchenko, who led the brake laboratory, helped solve the problem. They began running military ambulance trains of 32–34 cars.

Vera Panova wrote about what military hospital trains were like:

“... On the distant sidings, near some long railway station, stood a handsome train: freshly painted dark green carriages, scarlet crosses on a white field; on the windows there are hand-embroidered linen curtains of dazzling purity. Little did I know, when I entered the staff car with my tiny suitcase, what role this train, or rather the people to whom I was going, would play in my destiny. These people had been living on wheels for almost three and a half years: from the first days of the war, they gathered on this train and carried out their noble service with honor and immaculately. Military ambulance train No. 312 was one of the best in the Soviet Union, and the command decided that the train staff should write a brochure about their work - to transfer experience to the staff of other ambulance trains. The Perm branch of the Union of Soviet Writers sent me to help them as a professional journalist; I was the pen that would write down their stories and put them in proper order.”

And here is an excerpt from the order of the head of the military sanitary department of the North-Western Front dated March 14, 1942:

“On the initiative of women railway workers, activists of the station and the city of Bologoye, and women military personnel, a military sanitary fly-out No. 707 was formed as a gift to the North-Western Front for International Women’s Day.

In re-result love relationship to the point on the part of the women who participated in the formation of the military sanitary training camp, it is equipped to provide the evacuees with the maximum possible amenities. Caring for wounded soldiers, defenders of the Soviet Motherland, guided the working women who donated this train to our front.

For valuable assistance to the military sanitary service of the front, for the care shown for the wounded soldiers and commanders, express gratitude to A. A. Zybina - greaser of the third car section, P. B. Vikhrova - instructor in women's work, A. N. Osipova - Bologoye workstation , M.A. Bubnova - housewife..."

Car conductors, train car masters and electricians strived to constantly keep the cars in good condition and clean. Train carriage master N.A. Kosarev from the Mariupol station, working as a foreman of a military ambulance train, organized the care of carriages according to Lunin’s method and taught conductors the job of scrap. There was no need for mechanical inspection and routine repairs, and the transportation of the wounded was accelerated. Kosarev’s experience began to be widely used in servicing the carriages of military ambulance trains. In 1943, the innovator was awarded the high title of Hero Socialist Labor.

SPECIAL COMPOSITIONS ARE FORMED

Military ambulance trains were serviced by train crews, which included conductors, train carriage masters, a train electrician and a power plant driver.

Workers at the Moscow Carriage Repair Plant quickly equipped a military ambulance train and sent it to the Southwestern Front. Then new trains were equipped. Factory workers - communists and non-party members - went to the front with them.

The railway workers of the Yegorshinsky branch of the movement undertook to prepare the ambulance train. The organizer of the work was the political department of the department. The initiative was supported by workers of locomotive and carriage depots, track distances and teams of industrial enterprises. Komsomol members of the branch organized a collection of funds and property. Together with residents

The carriage shop of the Tashkent Locomotive Repair Plant received a combat mission - to prepare special-purpose trains. The equipment for them did not arrive. It had to be produced locally. The machines for the seriously wounded were made by a team of women and teenagers under the guidance of the experienced master Lukyanovsky, evacuated from the Velikoluksky carriage repair plant. They worked around the clock. People understood that they needed to complete the task as quickly and as best as possible.

Workers from the Kuibyshev and Ufa carriage sections converted passenger cars into sanitary cars and formed 11 trains. The teams included experienced carriage masters, electricians and conductors.

A group of railway workers named after K. E. Voroshilov, who built a military hospital train. 1942

Vera Panova wrote about what military hospital trains were like:

“... On the distant sidings, near some long railway station, stood a handsome train: freshly painted dark green carriages, scarlet crosses on a white field; on the windows there are hand-embroidered linen curtains of dazzling purity. Little did I know, when I entered the staff car with my tiny suitcase, what role this train, or rather the people to whom I was going, would play in my destiny. These people had been living on wheels for almost three and a half years: from the first days of the war, they gathered on this train and carried out their noble service with honor and immaculately. Military ambulance train No. 312 was one of the best in the Soviet Union, 96 and the command decided that the train staff should write a brochure about their work - to transfer experience to the staff of other ambulance trains. The Perm branch of the Union of Soviet Writers sent me to help them as a professional journalist; I was the pen that would write down their stories and put them in proper order.” 97

And here is an excerpt from the order of the head of the military sanitary department of the North-Western Front dated March 14, 1942:

“On the initiative of women railway workers, activists of the station and the city of Bologoye, and women military personnel, a military sanitary fly-out No. 707 was formed as a gift to the North-Western Front for International Women’s Day.

As a result of the loving attitude towards the work on the part of the women who participated in the formation of the military-sanitary training camp, it is equipped to provide the evacuees with the maximum possible amenities. Caring for wounded soldiers, defenders of the Soviet Motherland, guided the working women who donated this train to our front.

For valuable assistance to the military sanitary service of the front, for the care shown for the wounded soldiers and commanders, express gratitude to A. A. Zybina - greaser of the third car section, P. B. Vikhrova - instructor in women's work, A. N. Osipova - Bologoye workstation , M.A. Bubnova - housewife..."

THE WOUNDED ARE DELIVERED TO THE REAR

Constant control was established over the timely poisoning and passage of military ambulance trains and flights to the NKPS and on the railways. The heads of the railways pledged to personally monitor the situation with the passage of military ambulance trains and air ambulances and promote trains with wounded, empty ambulance trains and air ambulances on a par with operational military echelons.

During the war years, the volume of transportation for the evacuation of the wounded amounted to 11,863 trains. The fact that 72.3 percent of the wounded and 90.6 percent of the sick soldiers were able to be healed and returned to duty is due to the considerable work of the railway workers, who did everything to create military ambulance trains, quickly move them along the railways, and quickly deliver the wounded to the rear countries.

N. A. Kosarev - train carriage master of military sanitary train No. 342, Hero of Socialist Labor

On the day of June 22, recalled the major of the medical service, Honored Doctor of the Kazakh SSR, holder of orders Patriotic War II degree and Red Star, honorary railway worker A.K. Sukhorukova, and in 1941, a young doctor at the Turksib railway hospital, I went to the front with a military ambulance train. Accompanied by the sound of wheels, she repeated, like an oath, the words of the chief surgeon of the Red Army, Nikolai Nilovich Burdenko:

“You, soldiers of the Red Army, remember that we will be with you! We will protect your health, share all the difficulties of combat life and, along with you, we will despise danger! Together with you we will draw our courage from the enthusiasm of the great multinational people, when he will defend the achievements of his liberated labor with arms in hand!”

...Our military ambulance train rushed west, towards the front. Don't forget those terrible days. I can’t erase my first seriously wounded person from my memory. Here he is, as if in reality. Not alive and not yet dead. Doesn't scream, doesn't complain, doesn't demand. The gaze is motionless. The pulse is barely palpable. Was it easy to maintain the necessary calm, to overcome involuntary weakness - no, not weakness - fear! Overcame...

Thousands of medical workers railway transport put on military uniform.

The timely evacuation of the wounded was of great importance. Do not leave a single wounded on the battlefield - that was the law. Perish yourself and save your comrade - such was the tradition of front-line brotherhood.

The rescue of a wounded warrior was defined by the order of the People's Commissar of Defense of the USSR dated August 23, 1941, as a manifestation of high military valor, ranking on a par with the exploits of pilots, tank crews, infantrymen, artillerymen, and sailors.

The railway workers showed courage and dedication, delivering the wounded to their destinations on time, saving mercy trains during enemy air raids and shelling.

Despite clear identification marks, Nazi pilots from the first days of the war hunted for military ambulance trains. In 1941 alone, there were 224 attacks on these trains.

After a massive air raid (August 29, 1941) at the Mga station, the tracks were destroyed, the depot was on fire, locomotives and carriages were broken and damaged, and many were killed. By some miracle, one train with seriously wounded people survived. It must be sent as soon as possible. And at the station there is only one serviceable locomotive, but without a crew. And then the locomotive depot worker I.N. Chmutov, who did not have driving rights, climbed onto the locomotive. He drove the train to Leningrad and delivered it safely to the Moscow station. This was the last train to arrive in the city on the Neva from Mga in 1941. The next day Mga was occupied by the enemy.

Not far from Kharkov, at the Losevo station, on October 21, 1941, there was a military ambulance train. There were a lot of wounded here. It is impossible to place them in one composition. Then the commander of the armored train stationed here organized the attachment of several empty platforms to the fortress on wheels. From the hostel located next to the station tractor plant They took mattresses, laid them on platforms and thus evacuated all the wounded.

In the Debaltsevo area, fighting continued throughout November and December 1941. The fascists also continuously fired at the Depreradovka linear station, where air raids with ammunition and food arrived from Voroshilovgrad. From here, wounded soldiers and commanders were taken to the rear. Most often in exact time. The seriously wounded were brought to Depreradovka on sleighs. The slightly wounded traveled on foot. They were met by the station chief L.D. Gorenkin and senior switchman I.N. Prokopenko, assistant to the head of the political department of the Voroshilovgrad Komsomol branch I.Kh. Golovchenko, who often accompanied the trains. The situation sometimes developed in such a way that he had to work as an assistant driver, fireman, loader, compiler. The wounded were placed in wagons. Ammunition delivered by train was loaded onto the sled and sent to the front line.

On December 5, 1941, the military commandant of the Voroshilovgrad station gave the order: “Sanitation flight No. 5 with locomotive E 709-65, driver I. S. Kovalenko, is sent to Depreradovka for wounded soldiers and commanders.” Since Depreradovka was almost continuously subjected to fire raids, the flight stopped at the appointed place. The wounded - more than 120 people - were brought here through ravines and gullies so that the enemy would not notice. When it was time to leave, alarming news arrived: enemy troops were in Depreradovka.

“We will fight our way,” I. S. Kovalenko decided. We pumped water into the boiler, filled the firebox with coal and set off. When approaching Depreradovka, we noticed a group of Nazis on the platform. “Open the purge valve!” - the driver ordered the assistant. The fascists running towards the train were doused with a hot water-steam mixture. There were screams and groans, then random shooting. But the little sanlet had already passed the station and jumped out of the enemy ring.

On the Kupyansk-Valuiki section, an ambulance flight with wounded soldiers, heading to the rear, was suddenly attacked by enemy planes. The first pair of bombers dive howling. There is nothing to defend ourselves with - there is no provision for installing anti-aircraft guns on military ambulance trains. The enemy knew that he could act with impunity.

The driver A. Fedotov brakes sharply, although he knows that by doing so he is causing enormous pain to the wounded, but all the bombs fell in front, and the train is intact. The track is damaged, the train is frozen. And the planes go on the attack one after another. Four carriages caught fire - people were dying. The locomotive and conductor teams uncouple the cars, knock out the flames from them, and rescue the wounded. Fireman Samsonov died, driver Fedotov received burns, chief conductor Efimov’s clothes are on fire, but members of the train crew continue to fight for people’s lives. Finally the planes stopped bombing, as their deadly cargo had run out. Soon the fire was finally extinguished. The path was corrected and the train moved on.

The feat of the railway workers is highly appreciated: the chief conductor I. I. Efimov was awarded the title of Hero of Socialist Labor, and the driver Alexey Fedotov was awarded the Order of Lenin.

On the Ryazan-Ural road, driver A.G. Korneev drove a military ambulance train. During an enemy air raid, he was seriously wounded, but, bleeding, he brought the train out from under the bombing, saving hundreds of wounded soldiers and commanders. Alexander Gavrilovich Korneev posthumously awarded the order Red Banner.

On July 14, 1942, Nazi aircraft carried out a massive raid on the Dolzhanskaya station on the North Donetsk road. Firemen Zinchenko and Matvienko were killed, assistant driver I. Pirogov was seriously wounded, senior driver V. Ya. Dubina was wounded. The team buried the dead, with the help of local railway workers, fixed the leak in the tender, made the most necessary repairs and moved on. At the Krasnaya Mogila station they are met by the station duty officer and a group of soldiers.

Help out. The train containing the seriously wounded must be removed immediately.

“We’ll take it,” V. Ya. Dubina firmly stated, having recovered a little from his wound. They unhooked the broken cars from the train and patched up the locomotive as best they could. The senior driver sat behind the right wing, and his brother Mikhail and A.G. Ermakov were the assistant driver and fireman. The route of this military hospital train ran through Gukovo, Zverevo, Rostov, Bataysk, and Kavkazskaya. It was bombed more than once, but Mineral water arrived without loss.

The risky voyage on a faulty locomotive did not end there. In the hospital at Yevlag station, near Baku, V. Ya. Dubina’s fragments were removed, and the flight continued across the Caspian Sea to Kzyl-Orda.

How did you get there on such a mutilated steam locomotive, they were surprised at the local depot. - I can’t believe that they followed the trains...

In 1943, machinist Vasily Yakovlevich Dubina was awarded the title of Hero of Socialist Labor.

At the beginning of August 1942, not far from Armavir, recalls the commander of the third company of the fifth bridge battalion of the first guards railway brigade, Georgy Mikhailovich Odulov, mostly demolition fighters remained at the station. They must restore the damaged track, send the wagons with cargo that were at the station along it, and then blow up the track. When the cars were sent, barrage work began.

At this time, wounded Red Army soldiers began to arrive at the station; more than a hundred of them gathered here. The only possibility is to evacuate the wounded along the railway track that was preparing for the explosion. There is a locomotive and carriages, but there is no person who knows how to drive a locomotive. Sergeant Ptitsyn found a former locomotive driver among the local residents. He was already old and seriously ill, he could not even speak. The soldiers carried him in their arms to the locomotive and carried him into the booth. Ptitsyn asked to show what needs to be done to set the car in motion. When the driver fixed his gaze on any lever or tap, Ptitsyn took hold of it, and if the patient nodded his head, the sergeant understood that he was acting correctly. Then they attached four carriages with the wounded to the locomotive and sent them towards Tuapse.

In the parks of Bologoe Oktyabrskaya station railway There were several trains, including a military ambulance. Enemy planes appeared above the station. The duty officer at the third post ordered switchwoman Kuznetsova to prepare a route for the military-sanitary mission. Kuznetsova rushed to move the switches. A bomb exploded nearby. The fragment overtook the woman when there were only a few steps left before the last arrow. With the last of her strength, Kuznetsova reached for the lever, moved the switch, gave the driver a signal and fell dead.

On June 18, 1944, at the Sebezh station of the Kalinin Railway at two o'clock in the morning, a group of fascist bombers illuminated the station with rockets on parachutes. A few minutes before this, the ambulance train arrived and the station duty officer N.V. Savelyev managed to give the command to replace the locomotive. The bombing began. The telephone connection was immediately cut off. The duty officer could not call any switch post, nor the depot, nor the train dispatcher. Together with the military commandant, he rushed to where the orderly was standing in order to immediately send the train out of the station. The fascist vultures made one approach after another. Everything around was burning and collapsing. But people were there. Senior switchman Innokenty Burmakin showed courage and courage. Under a hail of shrapnel, I quickly prepared a route, brought the locomotive under the ambulance, and the train left.

Passing point No. 6 on the new building line Kizlyar - Astrakhan. During the evacuation, dispatcher of the Voroshilovgrad branch Ekaterina Konyaeva was assigned here. Along with her, railway workers arrived from the Rodakovo station: A. I. Grechany, who was assigned to lead a small team of the patrol, shunting dispatcher D. I. Mogilny, switchmen S. V. Verbitsky and I. A. Kovalev, and also Mogilny’s sixteen-year-old nephew, Alexander .

On a quick fix They built housing from sleepers and other materials left by the builders: something similar to a dugout. Then they sent a decommissioned two-axle car. One half was allocated for work, the other for housing.

The echelons were moving continuously: to the north - military, to the south - with evacuated wounded and equipment.

On the morning of September 23, 1942, a military ambulance flight arrived at the patrol. She was brought by the driver A. Kalyuzhny. Two conductors for the entire train. It was they who asked Katya to pick wormwood for brooms in the steppe. As I was returning, I heard the roar of planes and the whistle of bombs. She rushed as fast as she could to the flaming carriage, riddled with shrapnel, where she lived and worked. Of all the comrades, only Ivan Kovalev showed signs of life:

Turn me on my back. I want to see the sky.

“I’ll help you now, Ivan Andreevich,” Katya carefully placed a bunch of wormwood under the dying man’s head.

A groan was heard from the side. Katya rushed there. Driver Kalyuzhny, wounded in the leg, crawled away from the burning carriage. She pulled him away, quickly bandaged him and hurried to send a military ambulance flight. Fortunately, she is unharmed.

I found a telephone set in the wreckage, attached it to a pole, contacted the neighboring station and gave permission to the driver’s assistant to proceed further.

The train left. Soon Kalyuzhny was taken to the hospital by a car that arrived from a nearby station. The dead were buried.

Katya was left alone. For almost three days I met and saw off trains at a deserted siding. It’s unclear how she had the strength, after a three-day shift, to walk 5 kilometers to the railroad workers’ dugout!

Of no small importance for serving the soldiers of the Red Army was the creation of bathhouse trains at the railways and factories of the NKPS. Every appearance of such a train at the front brought joy to the soldiers of the Red Army. Here’s what a front-line newspaper wrote about one of the trains in those years: “A small train can be seen in the distance. The carriages shine in the sun with fresh paint. On one of them it is written: “A train-bath for soldiers of the Red Army from the workers of the Northern Railway and the Vologda Locomotive Repair Plant.”

Let's board this unusual train. The impeccable cleanliness and wonderful amenities are pleasing to the eye. We are asked to undress. The attendants indicate the order of passage through this train.

We enter the hairdresser. It's also clean and cozy here. And here is the bathhouse itself. How nice it is to wash in it - so comfortable and hot!

The train-bath has a rest room. If you washed before your friend, then wait here. Newspapers, chess are at your service...

The soldiers and commanders of junior lieutenant Shkudov’s unit, having washed in this wonderful bathhouse and rested, ask the newspaper’s editors to convey heartfelt thanks to the workers of the Northern Railway and the plant.”

Other kind words were addressed to the railway workers. Short, but no less expressive: “Thank you warmly. Major Vasiliev." " Thank you very much. Lieutenant Pushkov." “This is a wonderful bathhouse! Comrade railway workers know how to please front-line soldiers. Senior political instructor A. Kakorin.” “Everything here is good, wonderful. I was deeply moved by such love and care for the soldiers and commanders. Thank you! Senior battalion commissar K. Novikov.”

TREATMENT AND PREVENTIVE WORK

During the Great Patriotic War, employees of medical institutions (hospitals, clinics, outpatient clinics, medical and obstetric centers) of railway transport worked with enormous stress. In frontline areas they provided medical assistance around the clock. Sanitary and medical posts were organized in the echelons of evacuated enterprises, institutions and the population.

Evacuation hospitals were organized on the basis of the Central Clinical Hospital of the NKPS and road hospitals at large railway junctions. We restructured the nature of the work of hospitals and quickly prepared them to receive the wounded. Some doctors were drafted into the Red Army in the first days of the war. In evacuation hospitals, many general practitioners and doctors of some other specialties became surgeons.

Moscow railway workers hand over a sauna train to front-line soldiers

The team of the evacuation hospital at the Central Clinical Hospital of the NKPS, headed by Professor T. P. Panchenkov, providing timely and highly qualified medical care to the wounded, ensured the return to duty of more than 7 thousand Red Army soldiers. Hospital workers fought day and night for life and health. Soviet people. Doctors N. S. Zhigalko, T. I. Linnik, E. D. Terian, I. I. Yudina, nurses O. M. Andreeva, A. M. Zakharenkova, A. S. Osipenko, N. V. worked selflessly Sazonova and many others. When there was not enough donor blood for the wounded, doctors became donors.

The first military hospital train from near Kaluga delivered 363 wounded on September 3, 1941 to the Moscow Central Clinical Hospital named after N.A. Semashko of the Yaroslavl Railway, which was transformed in July 1942 into the Central Clinical Hospital of the NKPS. The hospital staff showed high level of organization. Surgeons and general practitioners, trained under the guidance of Professor V.R. Braitsev and leading surgeon K.E. Pokotilov, successfully treated the wounded. An example of selfless work was set by the head of the hospital V. A. Rukavishnikov, doctors N. B. Arutyunova, K. P. Ivanov, M. V. Leminovskaya, I. M. Lobodenko, nurses E. I. Gladchikova, E. G. Kuzmicheva , K.N. Maskina and others. During the war, thousands of Red Army soldiers and officers were restored to health in the hospital.

The entire medical network of railway transport closely interacted with the military medical service of the Red Army. The wounded and sick from the evacuated population were hospitalized in railway medical institutions.

The war caused population migration in the country. There is a danger of the emergence and spread of mass diseases. From the very first days, sanitary facilities in railway transport experienced a heavy burden. Active work was carried out to prevent and eliminate infectious diseases by railway sanitary and medical institutions, and the necessary medical assistance was provided on site. Disinfection stations, isolation checkpoints, sanitary and disinfection trains and disinfection teams were created.

In December 1942, the medical and sanitary departments on the roads were reorganized into medical and sanitary services, and the Central Medical and Sanitary Directorate into the Main Medical and Sanitary Directorate of the NKPS. This has increased their role and responsibility for providing medical care. In January 1943, road and linear sanitary and epidemiological stations were organized on the basis of sanitary stations.

Practical assistance to medical institutions was provided by famous medical scientists V. R. Braitsev, I. A. Kassirsky, N. V. Konovalov, E. F. Rabkin, S. F. Kazansky, V. I. Kazansky and other specialists who worked in evacuation hospitals and railway hospitals.

On the roads, the scheme and methods for disinfecting trains and stations developed by Professor P. I. Nikitin and other specialists of the Central Research Laboratory of Hygiene and Epidemiology of Railway Transport were widely used.

The head of the medical and sanitary service of the Central Asian Road, Sh. Workers at the sanitary control point were busy here around the clock. The small staff, led by sanitary doctor A.S. Grigorieva, was overloaded. Doctors met and saw off trains day and night, identified sick people, carried out sanitization carriages. If necessary, patients were sent to the district hospital.

On the initiative of the railway workers of the Tashkent junction, industrial training for recovering wounded soldiers was organized in the sponsored hospital. A communications office was installed at the hospital. The theoretical course was taught by Lipatov, a teacher at the Transport College of Communications. Electrical engineering, turning and metalworking rooms were opened in the same hospital. People who could no longer fight received a specialty..."

Thanks to organizing the timely evacuation of the wounded to the rear of the country, carrying out extensive medical and preventive work, railway workers made an invaluable contribution to saving the lives and restoring the health of thousands and thousands of Soviet people, preventing mass infectious diseases among the population.

The first units of railway troops in the world were created in Russia in 1851 by order of Emperor Nicholas I. At the beginning of the twentieth century. Russian empire had very numerous and one of the best railway troops in the world. Included Russian army there were 12 railway battalions, organized into 4 railway brigades. The Baranovichi railway brigade was responsible for the European part of Russia and combat training of personnel for all brigades. The Turkestan railway brigade ensured the functioning and protection of the Trans-Caspian railway, the Ussuri brigade - the Ussuri railway, and one of the most combat-ready Zaamur brigade - the Chinese Eastern Railway.

By the beginning of the First World War, a well-equipped railway ambulance transport had been created: in September 1914, 74 military ambulance trains were deployed at the front, and by December 1916 there were already about 400 of them...

Below are a selection of photographs of the sanitary train of Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna, the military sanitary train of the Vyatka province, formed by the local branch of the Red Cross and the sanitary bath and laundry train created with the money of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, during the First World War.

The sanitary train of Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna.

01. Internal view pharmacies

02. Interior view of the ward car of the ambulance train

03. Doctors and nurses having lunch in the dining car

04. Interior view of the ward car of the train's ambulance train

05. Operating room of the ambulance train

06. Medical and service personnel of the ambulance train

07. Kitchen of the ambulance train

08. Car for the seriously wounded

09. Interior view of the carriage for the lightly wounded

10. Interior view of the kitchen car

11. Train medical team

Military medical train of the Vyatka province, formed by the local branch of the Red Cross

12. A group of train personnel with the chairman of the local administration of the Red Cross, Governor A. G. Chernyavsky (fourth from left in the first row) and his wife, trustee of the Community of Sisters of Charity O. K. Chernyavskaya (fifth from left in the first row)

13. General form military hospital train

14. Group of members of the Vyatka local administration of the Red Cross and train personnel

15. Interior view of the carriage for the seriously wounded of a military hospital train

16. Interior view of a third-class carriage for lightly wounded military ambulance trains

17. Interior view of a fourth-class carriage for the lightly wounded on a military ambulance train

18. Interior view of the operating room of a military ambulance train

19. Interior view of the carriage for the personnel of the military ambulance train; in the foreground is a corner of the dining room

20. Desk in the compartment of a senior doctor on a military ambulance train

21. Interior view of the kitchen car of a military ambulance train

The laundry train, which was used during the First World War and was created with the money of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna.

23. Platform for transporting an ambulance.

24. Tank car for transporting water.

25. Steam locomotive with tender.

26. Power station car.

27. Hairdressing department.

28. Bath car.

29. Bath car.

During the Great Patriotic War, military ambulance trains saved millions of wounded soldiers, making their way from the “cauldrons” and the hottest places on the front line.

Mobilization

June 24, 1941 People's Commissariat Railways (NKPS) instructed the railways to form 288 military ambulance trains. Six thousand cars were allocated for them and a staff of railway workers was appointed. The military hospital train (VSP) consisted of specially equipped carriages for the seriously and lightly wounded, an isolation ward, a pharmacy-dressing station, a kitchen and other service carriages. In addition to the VSP, the so-called sanitary flights played a huge role in the evacuation of the wounded. They moved on short distances, and were formed mainly from covered freight cars equipped for transporting the wounded. Military ambulance trains were serviced by train crews, which included conductors, train carriage masters, a train electrician and a power plant driver.

On July 17, 1941, military hospital train No. 87 set off from Saratov on its first voyage. rare photo– his boss, captain of the medical service Pavel Kondratievich Tabakov, is posing against the background of this composition.

Soon the wounded Red Army soldiers will call this train “Happy”, and after another 64 years, VSP No. 87 will be removed documentary, in which the son of military doctor Tabakov will take part - famous actor and director Oleg Pavlovich Tabakov. The legendary train made 135 trips into the thick of war hell and during all this time lost only the tail car and one person killed! At the same time, thousands of soldiers' lives were saved on train No. 87.

Baptism of fire

On September 1, 1941, at the Novo-Alekseevka station, “Schastlivy” came under fire from enemy aircraft for the first time. VSP-87 paramedics continued to provide assistance to the victims. The train personnel met the second raid with rifle fire.

“Especially memorable was the loading in Taganrog on October 3, 1941, in the conditions of panic that gripped the city due to the approach of fascist troops. At the same time as a small group of wounded (50 people), our train was supposed to transport workers and personnel from eight hospitals. However, the wounded began to be transported on motorcycles and cars directly from the battlefield. Soon their number increased to 147. I learned that stretchers of the wounded were left in one of the hospitals, and immediately took measures to remove these patients, and they were all taken by train,” Pavel Tabakov later recalled.

Exploits of railway workers

Despite the clear identification marks of the Red Cross, Nazi pilots from the first days of the war hunted for military ambulance trains. In 1941 alone, there were 224 attacks on these trains.

On December 5, 1941, the military commandant of the Voroshilovgrad station gave the order: “Send sanitary flight No. 5 with the locomotive E 709-65, in which Ivan Kovalenko worked as a driver, to Depreradovka for wounded soldiers and commanders.” Since Depreradovka was almost continuously subjected to fire raids, the flight stopped at the appointed place. The wounded - more than 120 people - were brought here through ravines and gullies so that the enemy would not notice. When it was time to leave, terrible news came: enemy troops had entered Depreradovka, and the escape routes were cut off.

“I decided that we will fight our way! We pumped water into the boiler, filled the firebox with coal and set off. When approaching Depreradovka, we noticed a group of Nazis on the platform. “Open the purge valve!” – I ordered my assistant. The fascists running towards the train were doused with a hot water-steam mixture. There were screams and groans, then random shooting. But the ambulance had already passed the station and jumped out of the enemy ring,” the driver of the ambulance train, Kovalenko, later recalled. Another feat was accomplished by railway workers on the Kupyansk - Valuiki section. An ambulance flight with wounded soldiers, following to the rear, was attacked by enemy planes. There is nothing to defend ourselves with - there is no provision for installation of anti-aircraft guns on military ambulance trains. The enemy knew that he could act with impunity.
The driver A. Fedotov braked sharply, contrary to all instructions, thus saving hundreds of lives - all the bombs fell in front, but the train survived.

A minute later, the bombs finally hit the train, four cars caught fire at once, and the wounded began to burn alive. Then the locomotive and conductor crews uncoupled the cars and began to knock out the flames from them. In the fight against the fire, fireman Samsonov died, driver Fedotov received burns, and the clothes on chief conductor Efimov caught fire, but members of the train crew continued to fight for people’s lives. The planes only stopped bombing when they ran out of their deadly cargo. Soon the fire was finally extinguished. The path was corrected and the military ambulance train moved on.

Saboteurs and traitors against ambulance trains

From the first days of the Great Patriotic War, saboteurs and saboteurs began to “work” in our rear. Here are just two pieces of evidence of their inhuman “exploits.”

“Before my eyes, the Germans bombed a hospital train,” says Great Patriotic War veteran Ekaterina Kovalenko. — When everyone was evacuated from Dnepropetrovsk, I was part of the ambulance train. We stood at the Nizhnedneprovsk-Uzel station, waiting for the green light to be given. And we only had to drive a little bit - near Novomoskovsk, in the Oryol region, there was our evacuation hospital. But the dispatcher at the station turned out to be a pest: not only did he not release our train, which was standing on the tracks between two fuel trains, but he also signaled to the German aviation who should be bombed.”

Orderly Levitsky Leonid Semenovich talked about how the saboteurs worked in our rear: “While loading the wounded, two fighters appeared in the air - one ours and the other German. A German plane shot down our pilot just above the Vasilkovsky airfield, and after some time this wounded pilot was brought to us. When the German "Messer" turned back, from the rocket launcher, from the ground, he was given a signal by a green rocket. There was a local resident standing close to us who said: “Don’t spend the night in the carriages, kids, because this signal sent to him tells him that there are military trains here - they will bomb you.”

The next day, at 7 o'clock in the morning, military ambulance train No. 1078 was attacked by 18 German bombers.

“The first nine planes reached the railway and began to bomb us, and then another nine arrived - this continued until 11 o’clock in the afternoon,” the war veteran recalled.

Sanitary trains were required by the medical service of every front, every army. The echelons were formed, among other things, at the expense of citizens - this required huge funds for those times - 170 thousand rubles per train. Military hospital trains transported millions of wounded and sick during the war. They were a kind of hospitals on wheels, where doctors and nurses worked all day long at operating rooms and dressing tables.

During the Great Patriotic War, the Red Army widely used ambulance trains - trains designed for the evacuation and provision of medical care to the wounded and sick during hostilities (military sanitary train), which included carriages specially equipped for transporting and treating victims , as well as auxiliary cars, such as operating rooms, kitchens, pharmacies, staff cars, morgue cars, etc. Sanitary cars were used as part of ambulance trains in wartime in three typical special formations: freight cars and heated cars in combat zones actions; temporary military ambulance trains are in the near rear, as well as rear hospitals. By appearance sanitary carriages were no different from a passenger carriage; Inside they, as a rule, had: sections for infectious and non-infectious patients, arranged across the entire width of the car; departments for medical and service personnel; a kitchen with a stove and a cube for heating water, as well as a toilet and a common corridor along the wall of the carriage. In order to maintain cleanliness and hygiene, the floor was covered with linoleum, and the walls were painted with light-colored oil paint. Furniture, floors, ceilings and walls were made with smooth surfaces, without corners, with a smooth transition from one surface to another. Upholstered furniture, as it is difficult to disinfect and clean for placement in sanitary cars, was not used. During the Great Patriotic War, millions of lives of Soviet soldiers and civilians were saved by military ambulance trains, which carried out not only evacuation and first aid, but also acted as mobile hospitals equipped with operating rooms.

The sanitary car presented in the museum's exhibition was designed in 1925 and built at the plant named after. Egorov in Leningrad in 1937. After the start of the Great Patriotic War on June 24, 1941, the People's Commissariat of Railways of the USSR ordered the formation of 288 ambulance trains. For these purposes, 6,000 passenger cars were converted, mostly four-axle ones, which were used to transport wounded and sick soldiers and officers. The ambulance car, converted from a classy wooden commuter carriage, has a wooden body covered on the outside with 1.5 mm thick metal sheets. There are 10 three-tier shelves installed along the side walls with mounts for stretchers and devices for eating in a supine position; dressing; medical staff compartment; shower; toilet and other service premises.

Restoration work on the ambulance car was carried out at the car depot at the Ozherelye railway station of the Moscow Railway. Sanitary Railway carriage donated to the museum Federal service railway troops in 1995.

Car weight – 42 t

The total length of the car (along the axes of the couplings) is 21.4 m

Car length (body with vestibules) – 20.2 m

Width – 3.14 m

Body height – 2.9 m

Height from the rail head – 3.75 m

Car base – 8.2 m

Carriage bogies - TsNII type
Hitches – automatic coupler with buffers

Capacity – 30 people.