Biography KOSHKA

Peter Cat, a real hero who has become a legend to someone who is familiar with the history of Sevastopol superficially, may seem that this is the same legendary character as the hero of Twardowski Vasily Terkin or Tolstoy Platon Karataev, who is considered a collective image of the Russian sailor. But no, the apartment -maker Peter Markovich Cat was a real person who performed completely real feats.

Fate took him 54 years of life. Born Peter Cat 10 22 by n. But over these half a century, he managed to accomplish so many feats, the glory of which was widely dispersed throughout Russia. This really made him more like a literary hero than a real person. Moreover, there were many books about him over the past one and a half centuries, and among the famous writers who found the place for Peter the cat on the pages of their works, was Lev Tolstoy himself, who met with him at Sevastopol bastions.

Wittle, Chumak, recruiting hard to say who Peter Cat would become, if not for the recruiting, in which he got 21 years old. The son of serfs, from childhood, distinguished not only with good health and dexterity, but also with an obscure mind, he was restless. Having barely matured, Petya Cat found the opportunity to see the world wider than the limits of his native village, and fled to the Chumaks - nomadic merchants who traveled throughout Little Russia and the Russian south.

Apparently, it was there that he acquired that easy temper and skills of a magnificent storyteller, which became famous among his comrades no less than military exploits. As the legend says, it was witty that brought the cat to trouble: they say that he somehow especially poisonously walked along the lake out of the landowners, for which he was given to recruits. This option is not excluded, but it is much more likely that this is just that “literary” detail, which over time has overgrown the life of the famous sailor.

In reality, almost certainly the reason why the summer cat was given to recruits was his insane. The wandering with the Chumaks, he was not a great value for the local peasant community, and since the decision to give the recruitment was made precisely by the world, they decided to hand him over to Soldierchina. By the decision of the local military boss, Peter Koshka fell into the recruitment team, which was sent to Sevastopol.

The first years of his service in the naval crew of the Black Sea Fleet also have to be judged rather by legendary and literary sources, and not by documents that have almost not been preserved. And these sources say that his easy disposition helped him earn the respect of naval comrades, while wit and tendency to unexpected antics created a reputation as an undisciplined sailor among officers.

Therefore, he was initially sent to serve on the Silistria battleship, which by that time was already preparing to withdraw from the combat composition of the fleet since the year the sailboat served in Sevastopol with a blockshop, that is, a floating warehouse. And to put up a cat with a dreary service and officer nit -picking, if not for the transfer to the new Yagudiil battleship, at which the sailor took part in the Sinop battle in the year.

According to eyewitnesses, in that battle, Peter Markovich showed such an unprecedented contempt for death and such sailor skills that since then he has been looking at his wit and antics through his fingers. And soon the restless character of Peter the Cat was also a new application. In the year, when Yagudiil was already anchored in the Sevastopol Bay, locked by his flooded comrades, the sailor of the second article, along with other sailors, was sent to help the ground troops defending the city.

There, the all-Russian glory found the sailor. Rong with death, the participation of Russian sailors in the defense of Sevastopol became a prologue to the emergence of the famous "black pea jackets" of the times of civil and World War II. As a rule, they tried to take the most disciplined and educated recruits to the fleet in the middle of the 19th century, because they had to treat difficult naval mechanisms.

In addition, the service on sailing ships in many sailors developed desperate courage, which was very useful to them at the Sevastopol bastions. Peter Cat was able to serve along with other comrades in the Yagudiyla crew in the south battery of Lieutenant Aviv Perekomsky, located on the fourth bastion - one of the most dangerous sections of the defense. The battery commander himself was distinguished by his desperate courage and courage, his subordinates were also to match him.

But even among them, Peter Markovich managed to stand out with completely incredible feats. It is enough to mention those of them that have become the most famous. Once a sailor of a cat, armed with one knife, managed to capture three French soldiers. Another time, under the shelling, he pulled the body of his colleague by San Stepan Trofimov from the fanner of the enemy trench and survived only because all the bullets released into the brave man was accepted by a dead comrade.In addition, it was the sailor of the cat who owed the life of Admiral Vladimir Kornilov: the sailor grabbed the bomb that fell under the feet of the commander of the defense of Sevastopol, and threw it out of the trench.

This act quickly became legendary: they said that the cat threw the bomb into the boiler with porridge, which was why the wick went out at the projectile, and it did not explode. Was it so, now it was no longer to install, but on the monument to the legendary Kornilov sailor cat is depicted precisely with a bomb in his hands. And this, by the way, is the only figure accompanying the figure of the admiral.

In total, the sailor of the second article Peter Koshka participated in 18 night sorties, which were considered the most dangerous enterprises during the defense of Sevastopol. How many prisoners he managed to bring during this time, alas, it is not known: either such statistics were not carried out, or the papers were not preserved. But stories have been preserved about the resourcefulness of the sailor, who is once a cry of “Hurray!

On the attack! The certificate of this injury was left by another legendary defender of the city - the famous Russian surgeon Nikolai Pirogov.

And another famous participant in the Sevastopol defense, the Russian writer Lev Tolstoy, retained for the descendants of the word, with whom, barely restraining tears, Peter the Cat turned to him when the defenders of the city crossed the pontoon bridge to the north side, leaving the bastions: “Yak is so? Pavel Stepanovich Nakhimov. Cho will people say about us on Earth?

And everyone was handed the medal "For the protection of Sevastopol - GG. The medal was decorated with the chest of Peter the Cat. In addition to her, he was awarded the St. George Cross, which received for the feat of salvation of Stepan Trofimov’s body, and was presented twice to the same reward, for which he received a double increase in salary, as provided for the statute of the St.

George Cross. Since the four degrees of orders were introduced by the decree of Emperor Alexander II only in the year, shortly before the end of the Crimean War, the right to wear awards of 2, 3 and 4 of the degree sailor Peter the cat received only at the very end of the service, at the beginning of the X. By that time, he had already managed to be in reserve, since the participants in the defense of Sevastopol were counted in the besieged city for a year, return to the service in the year and finally resign in the year.

For the past four years, has served over ahead of his own free will. The retired apartment -maker Peter Koshka worked as a bypass in forestry, but even in such a purely peaceful service he managed to accomplish a real feat. In late autumn, he rushed to save two girls who had fallen under a thin ice, and after that it went down with a fever, from which he died on February 25.

Cover: Fragment of the panorama "Defense of Sevastopol". Sailor Peter Cat on the right with his colleague Fedor Zaika lead a captive Frenchman.