U.S. Army Decorations Awarded to Red Army Personnel in World War II

[mcwirsk]

Dear All

Here is an interesting photo of Guards Col Galperin, Matvej Jurievich. He is wearing both an American Legion of merit and a Bronze star. Interesting for a person to receive 2 American awards. Matvej's fathers name was Udel (nice Jewish name) and he has changed it to Jurij (more Russian)

The Col was a professor of Marxism at the University of Leningrad for many years and in his CV mentions all his war time achievements and decorations but makes no mention of his American awards. However there was a nice picture of him wearing these in his file.

Does anyone know how many American awards were made to Soviet forces and under what conditions. Is there a record of these awards???? Interesting that he is proudly wearing them in the photo and there is no mention of them in his file.

regards from sunny South Africa

Munroe

[Mahdi]

Wow. Interesting question and I would be interested in knowing the answer. I am not an expert on foreign awards (ie, non-Soviet & non-Russian, in this case), but I have found these pictures and thought I would post them - the veterans have foreign awards, which may or may not be American.

The person wearing the visor hat is Dmitry Kuzmich Malkov, and the other one is Ivan Ivanovich Zagriadsky.

Cheers!

[mcwirsk]

Dear Mahdi

Nice pictures. The awards look like Polish stuff to me. The cross one is a high bravery award if my memory serves me correct. Its seem that a lot of Russians received Polish or Czech stuff.

I have not seen much Romanian or Bulgerian stuff awarded to Russians but I am sure there must be.

The rarest of all is the British stuff to Russians. I have only ever seen a Military medal awardec to a HSU guy. My records show the following:

Military medals (non coms,Army) x 4 *
Distinguished service medal (non coms,Navy) x 5 *
Distinguished service cross (officers, Navy) x 4
Distinguished flying medal (non coms, Air force) x 4 *
Distingusihed flying cross (officers, Air force) x 4
No Distinguished Conduct medals or any DSO's

* means that these medals are named. They say something like SgtXXX member of Red army.

I know that the British awarded a few OBE's CBE's and CB's but it shows that very few were awarded. I suppose this accounts for the fact that so few Soviet medals were awarded to the Allied forces.

If anyone has any if these medals please let me know.

Kind regards

Munroe

[Dave]

Munroe-

Here is a table of what US Army awards were awarded to the Soviets during WW2:

MOH- None
DSC- 20
DSM- 20
Silver Star- 0
Legion of Merit- 242
DFC- 3 olc to DFC- 1
Soldiers Medal- 1
Bronze Star- 129
Air Medal- 0
Total Awards- 416

Of the LOM awards, they break down as follows:

Chief Commander- 1
Commander- 11
Officer- 18
Legionanaire- 88
(Though that doesn't add up to 242...)

I'll post more in a bit...

Dave

[Dadag07]

Originally Posted by Dave

Munroe-

Here is a table of what US Army awards were awarded to the Soviets during WW2:

MOH- None
DSC- 20
DSM- 20
Silver Star- 0
Legion of Merit- 242
DFC- 3 olc to DFC- 1
Soldiers Medal- 1
Bronze Star- 129
Air Medal- 0
Total Awards- 416

Of the LOM awards, they break down as follows:

Chief Commander- 1
Commander- 11
Officer- 18
Legionanaire- 88
(Though that doesn't add up to 242...)

I'll post more in a bit...

Dave

There was 1 MoH give to a russian marshal to koniev --------------------

[Christophe]

Originally Posted by Dadag07

There was 1 MoH give to a russian marshal to koniev --------------------

Sorry, but he got a Legion of Merit... :D

Cheers.

Ch.

[desantnik]

I agree. I am not aware of ANY foreign awarding of the Medal of Honor.

[desantnik]

I realize Wikipedia is not definitive, but this excerpt is from there:

Sixty-one Canadians who were serving in the United States armed forces have been awarded the Medal of Honor, with a majority awarded for actions in the American Civil War. Since 1900, only four have been awarded to Canadians.[48] In the Vietnam War, Peter C. Lemon was the only Canadian recipient of the Medal of Honor.

Most important criteria is the recipient must be serving in the US military (again with a few exceptions).

[Art]

Great post Dave!

[Dave]

Here's a great picture of Junior Leiutenant Ivan ******ich Zhurba, Hero of the Soviet Union (awarded 3 June 44) who was awarded the US Legion of Merit by the Military Mission to Moscow in December 44. I'm unsure of the reason the LOM was awarded, but it is interesting to note that the ribbon has been made into a tri-fold! I was offered this medal (he died in 1962, so all his other awards had been returned to the State) but his daughter (who was selling the medal) had been told that the medal was worth far more than it actually was (by about four or five times) and there was no way that I could rationalize spending that much on the medal! I did get to keep a scan of the photo... Enjoy!

--Dave