Glory II,30982,Platoon Commander,172th Rifle Division,Wrocław

[Droocoo]

Recently I purchased an Order of Glory 2nd class to Vladimir Petrovich Kolodi of the 172nd Rifle Division, 102nd Rifle Corps, 13th Army 1st Ukrainian front. It was given for actions on March 14th 1945.

Soviet medals are not my usual sphere of collecting. I would like to ask under what circumstances he won the award, i.e what battle was being fought at this time. I have the citation but it makes no mention of place or any enemy formations he may have faced.

Kolodi was also a holder of the Order of Suvorov. I have no idea what class of the order he held, nor of the citation of the award. If anyone could help with those details, I would be very gratefull.

The serial number of the award is #30982 and his rank abbreviation is Comr. (I assume that is a junior sergeant??)

As I said earlier, I am not primarily a Soviet collector, I only have 2 other Soviet medals in my collection. Any help with the above, would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

[Jeffrey Meffert]

It would be unusual for the same man to get both a suvurov, usually given to commanders and other senior officers, and an order of glory, restricted to enlisted personell except for junior pilot officers. Almost necessarily the order of glory would have to be given early in the war, the soldier to be promoted to a position of command, and then win the suvurov at the tail end of things (or for some postwar combat command).

[Eryk]

Having the citation that is likely all the information re: the specific battle that you'll ever get from archival research on the individual.

Look for a unit history for the division or higher command. Here is a map that shows your division's position a month after the award was given. The situation had been pretty static, so odds are that the action took place in that same area.

PS. And not to be negative but... it's a Glory II, and what Jeffrey says above is sooo true. And a red flag.

[Alexscl]

Order of Suvorov belongs to the Rifle Division not to Private Vladimir Petrovich Kolodi.

You will need an additional research, the document is an extract from the Award citation and it does not give you the date of the battle, just the date of Prikaz.

And yes, his rank was Private (Krasnoarmeyets) - the lowest military rank.

[ph3s]

And yes, his rank was Private (Krasnoarmeyets) - the lowest military rank.

then I assume 'comr' is shortened from 'comrade' ?

[CtahhR]

Here is the original citation to clear up any confusion.