Kirill Orlovsky


Kirill Prokofyevich Orlovsky was a Soviet partisan commander, a functionary of the Soviet secret police, and the chairman of a major kolkhoz. He was a recipient of the Hero of the Soviet Union award for courage during fighting the Nazi occupation behind enemy lines.

Early life and career

Kirill Prokofyevich Orlovsky was born in the village of Myshkovichi, Minsk Governorate, Russian Empire, into a family of Belarusian peasants on. In 1906, he entered the Popovshchina parochial school, graduating in 1910. In 1915, he was drafted into the Imperial Russian Army, first serving as a private in the 251st reserve infantry regiment and from 1917, as a non-commissioned officer in the 65th Siberian rifle regiment, commanding a sapper platoon, seeing action at the Western Front of World War I. In January 1918, he was demobilized, returning to his native village.