“Missing in action” - many people received notices with this phrase during the war years. There were millions of them, and the fate of these defenders of the Motherland remained unknown for a long time. In most cases, it remains unknown today, but there is still some progress in clarifying the circumstances of the disappearance of the soldiers. Several circumstances contribute to this. Firstly, new technological capabilities have emerged to automate the search for required documents. Secondly, search teams carry out useful and necessary work. Thirdly, the archives of the Ministry of Defense have become more accessible. But even today, in the vast majority of cases, ordinary citizens do not know where to look for those missing in action during the Second World War. This article may help someone find out the fate of their loved ones.
Search difficulties
In addition to factors that contribute to success, there are also those that make it difficult to find those missing in action during the Second World War. Too much time has passed, and there is less and less material evidence of events. There are also no more people who can confirm this or that fact. In addition, missing persons were considered suspicious during and after the war. It was believed that a soldier or officer could be captured, which in those years was considered almost a betrayal. A Red Army soldier could go over to the enemy’s side, and this happened, unfortunately, often. The fate of traitors is mostly known. Collaborators who were caught and identified were tried and either executed or given long sentences. Others found refuge in distant lands. Those of them who have survived to this day usually do not want to be found.
Where to look for missing prisoners of war during WWII
The fates of many Soviet prisoners of war after the war developed differently. Some were pardoned by the Stalinist punitive machine, and they returned home safely, although for the rest of their lives they did not feel like full-fledged veterans and they themselves felt some guilt before the “normal” participants in the hostilities. Others were destined for a long journey through places of detention, camps and prisons, where they most often ended up on unsubstantiated charges. A number of soldiers released from captivity ended up in the American, French or British occupation zones. These, as a rule, were handed over by the allies to the Soviet troops, but there were exceptions. For the most part, our soldiers wanted to go home to their families, but rare realists understood what awaited them and asked for asylum. Not all of them were traitors - many simply did not want to cut down forest in the Far North or dig canals. In some cases, they find themselves, contact relatives and even assign them foreign inheritances. However, in this case, the search for those missing in action during the Second World War 1941-1945 can be difficult, especially if such a former prisoner changed his last name and does not want to remember his homeland. Well, people are different, as are their destinies, and it’s hard to condemn those who ate bitter bread in a foreign land.
Documentary trail
However, in the vast majority of cases the situation was much simpler and more tragic. In the initial period of the war, soldiers simply died in unknown cauldrons, sometimes together with their commanders, and there was no one to write reports on irrevocable losses. Sometimes there were no bodies left, or it was impossible to identify the remains. It would seem, where to look for those missing in action during the Second World War with such confusion?
But there is always one thread left, by pulling which you can somehow unravel the history of the person of interest. The fact is that any person, and especially a military man, leaves behind a “paper” trail. His whole life is accompanied by documentary circulation: clothing and food certificates are issued for a soldier or officer, he is included in the In case of injury in a hospital, a medical record is opened for a soldier. Here is the answer to the question of where to look for missing people. The Second World War ended long ago, but the documents are kept. Where? In the Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense, in Podolsk.
Central Archives of the Moscow Region
The application procedure itself is simple and free. The archives of the Ministry of Defense do not require money for the search for those missing in the Second World War of 1941-1945, and bear the costs of sending the answer. In order to make a request, you need to collect as much personal information as possible about who you want to find. The more there is, the easier it will be for Central Asian workers to decide where to look for those missing in action during the Great Patriotic War, in which storage and on which shelf the treasured document may lie.
First of all, you need your last name, first name and patronymic, place and date of birth, information about where you were called from, where you were sent and when. If any documentary evidence, notices or even personal letters have been preserved, then, if possible, they should be included (copies). Information about government awards, incentives, injuries and any other information related to service in the Armed Forces of the USSR will also not be superfluous. If you know in which the missing person served, the unit number and rank, then this should also be reported. In general, everything that is possible, but only reliable. All that remains is to put it all on paper, send it by letter to the Archive’s address and wait for a response. It won't be soon, but it will definitely happen. The people who work in the Central Election Commission of Moscow Region are obligatory and responsible.
Foreign archives
In the Second World War of 1941-1945, if the answer is negative from Podolsk, you should continue abroad. The hard times took Soviet soldiers languishing in captivity wherever they went. Their traces are found in Hungary, Italy, Poland, Romania, Austria, Holland, Norway and, of course, Germany. The Germans kept documentation pedantically; a card was issued for each prisoner, equipped with a photograph and personal data, and if the documents were not damaged during hostilities or bombings, the answer would be found. The information concerns not only prisoners of war, but also those who were involved in forced labor. The search for missing persons in the Second World War sometimes makes it possible to find out about the heroic behavior of a relative in a concentration camp, and if not, then at least clarity will be brought into his fate.
The answer is usually laconic. Archives report on the settlement in the area of which a soldier of the Red or Soviet Army took his last battle. Information about the place of pre-war residence, the date from which the soldier was removed from all types of allowance, and the place of his burial are confirmed. This is due to the fact that searching for missing persons in the Great Patriotic War by last name, and even by first name and patronymic, can lead to ambiguous results. Additional confirmation can be provided by the data of relatives to whom the notification should have been sent. If the burial place is indicated as unknown, then it is usually a mass grave located near the specified settlement. It is important to remember that reports on casualties were often compiled at the battlefields, and they were written in not very legible handwriting. Searching for missing persons in WWII 1941-1945 can be difficult due to the fact that the letter “a” resembles an “o”, or something like that.
Search engines
In recent decades, the search movement has become widespread. Enthusiasts who want to clarify the question of the fate of millions of soldiers who laid down their lives for their Motherland are engaged in a noble task - they find the remains of fallen soldiers, determine by many signs whether they belong to one unit or another, and do everything to find out their last names. No one knows better than these people where to look for those missing in action during the Second World War. In the forests near Yelnya, in the swamps of the Leningrad region, near Rzhev, where fierce battles took place, they conduct careful excavations, handing over to their native land its defenders with military honors. Search teams send information to government officials and the military, who update their databases.
Electronic means
Today, everyone who wants to find out the fate of their glorious ancestors has the opportunity to look into the commander’s reports from the battlefields. And you can do this without leaving your home. On the website of the Ministry of Defense archive you can familiarize yourself with unique documents and verify the veracity of the information provided. These pages emanate living history; they seem to create a bridge between eras. Searching for missing persons in the Great Patriotic War by last name is not difficult, the interface is convenient and accessible to everyone, including the elderly. In any case, we need to start with the lists of the dead. After all, the “funeral” simply could not come, and for many decades the soldier was considered missing.
On this page we have collected resources that will help you find a soldier (deceased relative or friend), search for those killed and missing in the Great Patriotic War.
Volunteer project "Archive Battalion"
The volunteer project “Archive Battalion” to restore information about participants in wars of the 20th century accepts and processes applications for research into the combat path of participants in the Great Patriotic War.
People's project “Establishing the fate of missing defenders of the Fatherland”
At present, the fate of more than 4.7 million defenders of the Fatherland who went missing during the Great Patriotic War has not been established. To this day, the remains of a large number of Russian soldiers and officers remain unburied.
Memory of the people
The People's Memory project was implemented in accordance with the decision of the Russian Victory Organizing Committee of July 2013, supported by the instructions of the President and the Decree of the Russian Government in 2014. The project provides for the publication on the Internet of archival documents and documents about the losses and awards of soldiers and officers of the First World War, the development of the projects previously implemented by the Russian Ministry of Defense about the Second World War OBD Memorial and Feat of the People into one project - Memory of the People.
Feat of the people
The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation presents a unique open access information resource, filled with all documents available in military archives about the progress and results of major combat operations, exploits and awards of all soldiers of the Great Patriotic War. As of August 8, 2012, the data bank contains information about 12,670,837 awards.
Generalized database "Memorial"
The generalized data bank contains information about the defenders of the Fatherland who died and disappeared during the Great Patriotic War and the post-war period. The work was done on a large scale: tens of thousands of documents were collected and converted into electronic form, with a total volume of more than 10 million sheets. The personal information contained in them amounted to more than 20 million records.
Immortal Regiment of Russia
The all-Russian public civil-patriotic movement “Immortal Regiment of Russia” collects stories about participants in the Great Patriotic War. The database is updated daily. Here you can not only add your veteran soldier to the all-Russian “piggy bank”, but also search for existing ones.
Electronic book of memory “Immortal Regiment - Moscow”
“Immortal Regiment - Moscow” together with the “My Documents” State Service Centers are collecting information about residents of the capital who took part in the Great Patriotic War. Now there are already more than 193 thousand names in the archive.
“Soldat.ru” - database of those killed in the Second World War
Soldat.ru is the oldest portal on the Russian Internet for establishing the fate of dead and missing military personnel and searching for their loved ones.
"The Winners" - Soldiers of the Great War
With our project we want to thank by name the soldiers of the Great Patriotic War living next to us and talk about their feat. The “Winners” project was created for the 60th anniversary of the Victory. Then we managed to collect lists of more than a million veterans living near us.
The site also contains a stunning interactive and animated map of the fighting of the Great Patriotic War.
Electronic memorial “Remember About”
On the social website “PomniPro”, each registered user can create a memory page, a photo gallery of a deceased loved one, talk about his biography, honor the memory of the deceased, leave words of memory and gratitude. You can also find a deceased relative and friend, search for those killed and missing in the Great Patriotic War.
Memorial of the Great Patriotic War
The site is conceived as a people's encyclopedia, a virtual Memorial to the fallen participants of the Great War, where everyone can leave their comments on any entry, supplement information about the War Participant with photographs and memories, and turn to other project participants for help. There are about 60,000 project participants. More than 400,000 cards have been registered.
MIPOD "Immortal Regiment"
The site has a large database of participants in the Great Patriotic War. The chronicle is maintained by community members. Now there are already more than 400 thousand names in the archive.
Find a soldier. Memo for those who are looking for their heroes
1. Check the data on the OBD Memorial website
When checking data about a person, open the “advanced search” tab and make attempts by typing only the last name, then the last name and first name, then the full data. Also try to check the information by setting the last name parameters, and the first and patronymic parameters only with initials.
2. Send a request to the archives of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation
The request must be sent to the address: 142100 Moscow region, Podolsk, Kirova St., 74. "Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation."
Enclose the letter in the envelope, clearly stating the information you have and stating the purpose of the request. Enclose one blank envelope with your home address as the recipient's address.
3. Check the data on the “Feat of the People” website
If you do not have information on awards, you can go to the “Feat of the People” website. In the “People and Awards” tab, enter the information requested.
4. Check parameter information
There are additional ways that can also help you find and identify information about your veteran. The website “Soldat.ru” presents a list of search technologies, we draw your attention to some of them:
- Database of Internet links to school museums of the Russian Federation, which have exhibitions about the combat routes of units and formations of the Soviet Army
- How to establish the fate of a serviceman who died or went missing during the Great Patriotic War
- Information on materials held by the International Red Cross Tracing Service
- Request forms for search, evacuation and search of graves through the Tracing and Information Center of the Russian Red Cross (
In the database of the Memorial Ministry you can find information about the rank of the person killed in World War II, the unit in which he served, the date and cause of death (killed, died of wounds, missing) and place of burial.
The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation has created a Generalized Computer Data Bank containing information about the defenders of the Fatherland who died and disappeared during the Great Patriotic War, as well as in the post-war period (OBD Memorial).
The main goal of the project is to enable millions of citizens to determine the fate or find information about their dead or missing relatives and friends, and determine the place of their burial.
The Military Memorial Center of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation carried out work that was unique in scale, technology and deadlines, as a result of which an information and reference system of global significance was created.
The implementation of the technical part of the project - the creation and content of the OBD Memorial website (www.obd-memorial.ru) was entrusted to a specialized organization - the Electronic Archive Corporation.
The data for filling the Generalized Data Bank is taken from official archival documents stored in the Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation and in the Military Memorial Center of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. The main body of documents are reports from combat units about irretrievable losses, other archival documents clarifying losses (funerals, documents from hospitals and medical battalions, captured cards of Soviet prisoners of war, etc.), as well as passports of burials of Soviet soldiers and officers.
On the website you can find information about the rank of the deceased, the unit in which he served, the date and cause of death (killed, died of wounds, missing) and place of burial. Moreover, the site contains scanned copies of all processed source documents containing information about personalities. These documents make it possible to identify the fallen with great accuracy, as they often contain additional information, such as the names and addresses of relatives to whom the burials were sent.
Scanned and made available online as part of the project about 10 million sheets of archival documents and over 30 thousand passports of military graves . For the first time, you will be able to familiarize yourself with real documents and conduct your own search and research.
Today there is no such data bank in any country in the world. The implementation of such a project requires the construction of a multi-stage chain of collecting, checking, digitizing paper volumes amounting to millions of sheets, loading data into a powerful search system, and providing global multi-user access to documents. At the same time, all the people involved in its creation feel a special responsibility for the fact that every mistake made in the work can radically change the fate of a particular warrior. All this makes even more valuable the fact that it was in modern Russia that the combined actions of the state, public organizations and scientific and technical firms led to the creation of the Memorial OBD.
The OBD Memorial will be a monument to all soldiers who died and went missing in defense of our Motherland and its interests, in practice implementing the slogan “No one is forgotten, nothing is forgotten.”
Work to replenish the data bank continues.
The Great Patriotic War took, according to various estimates, from several million to tens of millions of lives. A huge percentage of WWII participants are considered missing. With the help of the Internet, it has become possible to trace the combat path of soldiers in order to find them and immortalize their exploits.
The entire Soviet people took part in the Great Patriotic War - from an ordinary working person to the famous artist Yuri Nikulin - the participants of the Second World War, no matter who they were, brought the great Victory of the USSR over Germany and its allies.
Of the tens of millions of WWII participants, less than half returned alive.
The Great Patriotic War took a large number of lives - the Soviet people suffered the greatest losses, because it was they who bore the brunt of the German military machine. And although foreign sources deny this, it was the Soviet Union that made a key contribution to the victory over Nazism and fascism. The death toll still cannot be calculated accurately.
Many families want to find out whether their loved one is on the list of WWII participants and what fate befell him during the fighting.
Nowadays, searching for WWII participants is still a difficult task. Despite the fact that the World Wide Web has made it possible to work with databases much faster, many documents remain lost. It is worth noting that there are many such resources (sites for searching for the dead, missing and veterans) and they are all in the public domain - anyone can visit the electronic database and try to find their loved one.
Since many of the WWII participants are considered missing, their bodies are still being found. Monuments to WWII participants are erected at the expense of the state - the organization of funerals also falls on the shoulders of special bodies of the Russian Federation and other CIS countries.
The search for dead WWII participants began on a large scale relatively recently - in the early 2000s. Historians began to actively close the dark pages of history, and there was a desire to perpetuate the memory of the participants in the Great War. The Internet played perhaps a key role in this. It made it possible to create electronic databases that are much easier to work with than archives.
At the same time, organizations such as the “Immortal Regiment” began to emerge, and many websites opened that were easy to work with – just know the basic information about the WWII participant. Knowing the name of a WWII participant, a person has a high probability of finding the dead or missing.
Losses in the Great Patriotic War
According to various sources, USSR losses range from 7 to more than 40 million people. At the same time, the number of missing people remains extremely high even this year.
The figure of 7 million is cited by domestic historians, while foreign historians believe that the real losses are hushed up and the death toll is much more catastrophic - about 40 million people, including civilians.
The official death toll in the war was constantly changing. For example, Stalin called 7 million people, while under Khrushchev a much more catastrophic figure was called - 20 million.
Throughout the second half of the twentieth century, estimates of 7 and 20 million victims were constantly criticized. According to documents, in the first year of the war alone, when the Red Army suffered one defeat after another and fell into cauldrons, losses amounted to more than 3 million - and that’s just the military. Another example is the Battle of Stalingrad. About 1.2 million military personnel died in it alone—these are those who were found. There were also bloody battles near Moscow, Leningrad, the Battle of Kursk, the storming of Berlin, and so on. Many are still considered missing.
It is also difficult to calculate losses due to the fact that many WWII participants died in German captivity. Terrible conditions, constant executions, hard work and meager rations led to the fact that only a small percentage of prisoners managed to return to their homeland. The Germans have been burning documentation relating to atrocities in concentration camps in recent months in an attempt to hide information from the world, and therefore this data is considered irretrievably lost.
It is still impossible to accurately determine the number of victims, since historians do not have access to all the documentation. During the fighting, recruitment into the army was so chaotic that mistakes were often made in the names and surnames of recruits, which seriously complicates the work with documents. Some of the papers were lost or destroyed during the fighting and retreat of the Red Army forces in the first years of the war.
Documents from the second period of the Great Patriotic War have been preserved in a larger percentage. The largest part of the missing are soldiers of the Red Army who tried to hold back the enemy's advance in the first years of the war. The years 1941-1942 were extremely difficult for the Soviet republics (USSR) and searching for the names of WWII participants in this period is the most difficult. Young men and old men were called up to the military registration and enlistment offices - many simply did not have time to enroll and were immediately sent to the front, since the enemy was inexorably advancing and there was a catastrophic shortage of people.
A huge number of bodies have yet to be found, and families want to find their relatives so they can be given a proper burial.
To do this, you can use a site like "Memory of the People" is a powerful online resource that searches for WWII participants by last name.
Home page of the website “Memory of the People”
On the People's Memory website you can search for awarded people by last name and first name - a huge database that has been collected over the years will help with this. On the site you can also search for WWII participants who returned from the war to be sure that the person survived the fighting.
In addition, this resource also helps to find out the burial places of soldiers, obtain information about losses in a particular battle, and find information about the service of a Red Army soldier. The situation is more complicated with the rear workers, who also played a big role in the victory over Germany - there are much fewer similar resources for finding them, as well as documents with the data of these people.
There are many queries on the Internet: “I’m looking for a WWII participant,” “where can I find a veteran by last name?” In this article you will learn about all the ways to find missing relatives.
How to find a participant in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945 by last name
Such popular sites as:
- http://www.obd-memorial.ru – allows you to find useful information about combatants who died or went missing;
- http://www.moypolk.ru - allows you to find information not only about soldiers, but also who worked in the rear, children of the war, and were in the ranks of the partisans;
- http://www.podvignaroda.ru - opens access to lists of decorated combatants;
- http://www.pamyat-naroda.ru is one of the largest Internet resources, which is supported by the Ministry of Defense and provides access to all found documents from the period of the Great Patriotic War;
- http://www.dokst.ru – a list of prisoners of war who died while being captured by the Germans and many others (alas, all the names of those killed are not in the database).
On the above-mentioned resources, you just need to enter the name of interest, and the search engine will give you all the relevant results.
A valuable source in searching for dead WWII participants are funeral- This is a document that is a notification of the death of a serviceman. These documents can also be found on the above sites.
If you have information about awards, this will greatly simplify your search, as you can access lists of awardees and try to find the name you need there.
A thorough analysis of official sources in state archives will make it possible to find grandfathers and great-grandfathers who participated in the Second World War, although this procedure takes a lot of time.
Archive of the Ministry of Defense: search by last name of WWII participants
The military registration and enlistment office is the place where a WWII participant could be noted for the last time, and therefore their archives are also important - they should contain valuable information, including dates of birth, registration, surname, place of military service.
The archives of the military unit and naval academy are no less important sources. The archives of such institutions may also contain valuable information about WWII participants.
The central archive of your city is a must-visit for those who want to find their missing relative who participated in the Second World War of 1941-1945. Anyone can visit it, because now all the archives of the USSR are in the public domain.
WWII awards: search by last name
A website was created specifically for searching by last name in archives awarded during and as a result of hostilities "Feat of the people". It is not difficult to find out about awards given to WWII participants, because all lists are publicly available.
Home page of the website “Feat of the People”
“Feat of the People” is a huge data repository where all combatants who distinguished themselves in battle with the enemy are collected. Consequently, if your relative who took part in hostilities received some kind of award, he was entered into the “Feat of the People” database.
In the catalog of orders and medals you can find veterans, dead and disabled people who were awarded the “Red Star”, a list of participants in the battle (battle) for Moscow, and so on.
Unfortunately, there is no 100% guarantee that you will find your loved one, since too many documents were lost during the war and for a long time no one searched for the missing.
If you cannot find information on websites, you need to visit the archives of the regions where the person you are looking for was born. For example, if he was born in the Republic of Bashkortostan, then you need to visit the local archives, which contain a list of WWII participants born in this region.
The situation is somewhat more complicated with those killed abroad. For example, if a WWII participant died in Belarus (Belarus), you need to go to the embassy so that they can open access to archives in that country.
The “Feat of the People” website is supported by the Ministry of Defense. Their goal is to perpetuate the memory of all the heroes of the great war, regardless of what rank they were in and what scale of feat they performed. An equally important goal is the patriotic education of young people against the backdrop of the exploits of their grandfathers.
The main source of information is archival documents that are digitized and entered into the database.
Speaking in numbers, on the “Feat of the People” website there is:
- more than thirty million records of awards of orders and medals “For Military Merit” and “For Courage”;
- more than twenty million records of awards of the Order of the Great Patriotic War, I and II degrees, which were awarded on the fortieth anniversary of the Victory;
- one hundred million sheets, which in total amount to more than two hundred thousand archival files.
There are three search options available on the “Feat of the People” website, including:
- search for decrees and orders on awards;
- searching for people and their rewards;
- search for data by place and time.
On the website “Feat of the People” you can see lists of people and their awards, study real award lists of WWII participants, which are a valuable source of information. The award documents are publicly available and there should be no problems working with them - the main thing is to be patient.
On the “Feat of the People” website you can also find an anniversary card index of awards for WWII participants - it contains all the names and surnames of the soldiers who received anniversary awards on the 40th anniversary of the Great Victory. It describes extensive information about the participants of the Second World War, including their dates and places of birth, and other valuable data.
Also here you can see the movements of armies and military units, which makes it possible to trace the combat path of a WWII participant.
The “Feat of the People” website, unfortunately, has one drawback - it will be useless for those who are looking for information about combatants who went missing, but for this there are other Internet resources, which were also discussed in the article.
WWII veterans: search by last name
Missing people, veterans, dead and heroes of the Great Patriotic War can be found using regional, regional and city directories.
Significant assistance in searching for living veterans, those who have already died, or those killed as a result of hostilities is provided by the popular Internet site http://moypolk.ru/, which is supported by the all-Russian campaign “Immortal Regiment”, the work of which has only recently gained momentum.
Do not forget to visit the archives of those cities in which the veteran was first born or where he served. For example, if he was born in the Tsivilsky district, look at the lists of participants in the local regional archives.
Immortal Regiment of Russia
“Immortal Regiment” is a large-scale social movement whose goal is to preserve personal information about participants, witnesses of the Great Patriotic War, home front workers, workers in factories producing military equipment and ammunition, and so on.
The “Immortal Regiment” was created in Russia - in the city of Tomsk, by three activists: Igor Dmitriev, Sergei Kolotovkin and Sergei Lapenkov.
Initially, the scale of the movement was small, but now it operates in eighty countries around the world.
All the initiators of the movement are journalists who came up with the idea of creating the “Immortal Regiment” after they began to notice every year that fewer and fewer veterans were coming to the parade dedicated to Victory Day.
During the first march (occurred in 2012) in Tomsk, more than five thousand people took to the streets of the city, carrying posters with photos of their relatives who fought in the Great Patriotic War.
The first procession of the “Immortal Regiment” in 2012 in the city of Tomsk
This action was immediately covered in the media and began to rapidly gain momentum throughout the country and beyond.
The main logo of the movement was the crane bird. The creators of the logo were primarily inspired by the song “Cranes,” which is dedicated to soldiers who died during the fighting.
The Immortal Regiment logo is a crane.
On the official website of the “Immortal Regiment” http://moypolk.ru/, anyone can independently determine the fate of their loved ones who died during the fighting in the Great Patriotic War or went missing. Every month, thanks to the site, people manage to find dozens of dead heroes who brought us victory over Nazism.
Database of those killed in the Second World War
One of the largest databases on the Internet on those killed during hostilities, in the post-war period, as well as on missing persons is located on the website https://obd-memorial.ru/html/
OBD "Memorial" offers an advanced search for WWII participants by last name. In it, you initially need to enter the last name, then the first name or initials of the soldier.
Archival data of participants in the Second World War 1941-1945 is in the public domain, and therefore you can be sure that if information about the person you are interested in exists, you will definitely find it on this site.
Victory in the Great War over the Germans and their allies came at a high price - millions died, hundreds of thousands simply disappeared, but their memory should not be forgotten.
Activists continue to search for burial places of soldiers. The President of the Russian Federation fully supports the work of such organizations like the Immortal Regiment, having issued special Decrees and instructions.
With the help of the Memorial website, millions of people can find the burial places of their loved ones who died at the hands of the enemy. A large-scale campaign was carried out to create this resource. As a result, we have gained access to an information and reference system of truly global importance, which simply has no analogues in world practice.
Winners: Soldiers of the Great War
A project was created for the 60th anniversary of victory in the Great Patriotic War "Winners", which aims to once again recall and perpetuate the feat of the Great War.
Every year the number of veterans decreases - these people leave. Many even began to forget the last time they saw a veteran of the Great Patriotic War.
On the 60th anniversary of the victory over the Germans, the organizers of the “Winners” project were able to create a list of more than one million veterans who still live with us and should never be forgotten.
Participants in the “Winners” movement believe that no matter how assessments change and how history is interpreted, the feat of our grandfathers and grandmothers should never be forgotten. And the day of May 9 should remain the Day of the Great Victory over the Nazis.
The names of those who fought in the Second World War should always remain in the memory of all generations to whom the participants in the hostilities gave a peaceful life.
Great assistance in collecting the names of veterans was provided, first of all, by the presidential administration, which helped find more than one million heroes. The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation also provided lists of WWII veterans who retired - there were more than one hundred thousand winners on the lists.
In the very first days, the creators of the site began to receive letters in which relatives of combatants wrote that they had found their loved one on the site, who was considered dead.
Regardless of where your loved one served during the Second World War - in the NKVD troops or as an ordinary ordinary soldier in the Red Army, if he is on the list of veterans we have collected, you will be able to find him.
It would seem difficult not to find a loved one for sixty years. However, at that time there was a catastrophe in the country on a global scale and many were unable to get to their home, especially if it was completely destroyed by the Germans.
At the moment, the site is functioning to the best of its capabilities - the creators of the project, unfortunately, do not have the current addresses of veterans of the Great Patriotic War.
The creators of the site believe that the Internet provides new opportunities to tell the younger generation what this Great War was like for our grandfathers and grandmothers, who shed blood for their Motherland and loved ones.
The “Winners” website has a special multimedia map of the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945, which will allow you to learn in detail about the course of hostilities, the movements of armies, and so on.
The managers of the site considered it necessary not to delete the names of already deceased veterans - they celebrated the 60th anniversary of the victory and always remain alive. Therefore, on the site you will not see the dates of death of veterans.
Find a soldier - a reminder for those who are looking for their heroes
The Immortal Regiment organization decided to provide assistance to those people who are just trying for the first time to find their loved ones who fought in the Great Patriotic War.
Domestic archives, as well as foreign ones, the official website of the Ministry of Defense, special Internet resources - they are your best assistant in finding war participants.
In a special memo "Find a Soldier" they talked about ways to find veterans that are currently relevant and will help you find your loved one.
The search procedure is as follows:
- Visit the Memorial website at the following address: http://obd-memorial.ru. To try to find a person, you need to open the “advanced search” tab. Initially, it is advised to enter only the person’s last name, then you can add the first name and other data. In addition, try to write the last name in full, and write the first and middle names with initials.
- Travel to the Russian State Archives.
- Contact the Russian Ministry of Defense for help by sending a request to provide information about a participant in hostilities. To do this, you need to fill out a letter and send it to the following address: “Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation,” Kirova Street 74, Podolsk, Moscow Region, 142100. You must state your request in as much detail as possible in the letter, provide all available information and enclose it in the letter a blank envelope with your home address.
- Look for information about your loved one on the Feat of the People website. At the following address: http://podvignaroda.mil.ru, you can see if the person you are looking for is on the list of awarded veterans. If you only know your first and last name, then you should go to the “People and Awards” tab - the search engine will give you all the relevant results.
- This point will help you if you are absolutely sure that your relative who participated in the hostilities is buried outside. There are several ways to find a relative: contact the embassy of the Russian Federation in a particular country, or find help in the Russian House of EU member states.
- The popular Russian website “Soldat.ru” talks about many other ways in which you can find your relative: send a questionnaire to the International Red Cross tracing service, make socio-legal inquiries to the archives, visit a database of Internet links to school museums in Russian Federation, which may contain exhibitions about the combat routes of formations and units of the Soviet Army.
If such search options have not brought you success, visit the website http://soldat.ru - there you will find a lot more tools for work and, perhaps, one of them will help you find the person you have been looking for for decades.
Website "Soldier"
If you know the initials, full name, surname, or at least patronymic, finding the burial place of a WWII participant is much easier.
Book of Memory
"Book of Memory"- another online project that was created specifically to perpetuate the memory of the exploits of Red Army soldiers, home front workers and partisans who fought in the Great Patriotic War.
In addition, the “Book of Memory” project provides significant assistance to search teams, allowing them to consult printed volumes regarding the information they contain about KA (Red Army) soldiers.
The “Book of Memory” project is global in nature - many countries have their own books, for example, Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan. In addition, individual regions also create “Books of Memory” - educational institutions such as schools also do the same, and it does not matter where they are located - in a village or a city.
Now the “Book of Memory” project is fully supported by the “Immortal Regiment”. At the moment, the project is actively developing - the society actively supports search work and favors the creation of printed publications with stories of eyewitnesses, victims and veterans of the Great Patriotic War.
“Book of Memory” of the Kaliningrad region
The electronic memory book is constantly updated with new stories and names, revealing to the younger generation more and more details of life during the Great War with the Germans and their allies.
The electronic version of the “Book of Memory” of Russia can be found at http://narkompoisk.ru
Immortal Regiment
As already mentioned, officially "Immortal Regiment" was created on the territory of the Russian Federation in city of Tomsk. And although the movement was initiated in 2011, it has officially existed since 2014.
Before the “Immortal Regiment,” other movements arose, but none of them received such significant support from society wishing to perpetuate the memory of the participants in the Great Patriotic War.
In 2012 there are already fifteen large cities in Russia decided to organize a procession of people on Victory Day with posters of photos of participants in the hostilities.
In 2013 Russia has already been joined by countries such as Ukraine, Israel and Kazakhstan. These states also suffered greatly during the fighting of 1941-1945, as well as from repression by Nazi Germany.
In 2014 the number of cities supporting the Immortal Regiment movement has increased up to five hundred, and the number of countries is now seven. Due to the growing popularity of the movement, its organizers created their own website - on it, every relative of a combatant can try to find a deceased, missing person or veteran.
In 2015 The Immortal Regiment has already passed in seventeen countries around the world and covered more than a thousand cities.
In 2016 there was an incredible surge in the popularity of the “Immortal Regiment” - people joined the action forty-two countries.
On the official website of the “Immortal Regiment”, as of 2016, more than 350 thousand stories were published. It is interesting that not only the stories of combatants are published here, but also those who spent the war in German captivity and provided the work of the rear. A special place is given to the stories of children of the war, for whom it was no less difficult than for adults.
“Immortal Regiment” calls on everyone to help promote the organization, because it pursues noble goals - to help find relatives who died during the fighting, living veterans and perpetuate the exploits of the heroes of the Great Patriotic War.
In 2015, when the country celebrated the 70th anniversary of the Victory, The President of the Russian Federation took part in the procession of the “Immortal Regiment” - Vladimir Putin, which provides significant support to the movement.
At the moment, it is impossible to establish all the names of the participants in the Second World War of 1941-1945, but the help of the “Immortal Regiment” from everyone who cares will help us get closer to this number.
Thanks to the above-mentioned resources, grandfathers and grandmothers were found who were participants in the Second World War and who had long been considered dead. Tens of thousands of families were able to find the bodies of dead and missing relatives in order to bury them with dignity and perpetuate their memory.
Everyone who fought in the Second World War should be known, everyone should know their names.
There is probably no family in the entire territory of the post-Soviet space that was not affected by the Great Patriotic War. After all, at that terrible time our army suffered colossal losses. Some returned home and lived to old age. Others remained on the battlefield and to this day little is known about them. This article will be useful for those who continue to search for the names of their relatives in the books of memory of those killed and missing during the Second World War from 1941 to 1945.
How to search for missing WWII soldiers by last name on the Internet
There are many resources on the Internet that help people establish long-past events and determine the fate of warriors. Among them are large projects, the data for which is provided by state archival services. Some sites are communities. Here, users join forces to search for the information they need much more efficiently. First of all, you definitely need to visit the OBD Memorial book of memory.
The website is located at https://obd-memorial.ru/html/. This is a general database containing more than 16 million profiles of participants in the Great War. Among them you can find those who died on the battlefield, died in hospitals from wounds, and went missing from 1941 to 1945. The questionnaires on the site provide all the data that is currently known about a person. The hero's orders, rank, military units in which the soldier served, the place and date of conscription, and the cities he visited are displayed.
For search:
If this search doesn't help you, try using the advanced form to add more details. You can open it in the form on the main page near the “Find” button.
Where else can you find information about soldiers from the Great Patriotic War?
Quite a lot of time has passed since the Great Patriotic War. But various kinds of military documents have still been preserved, which continue to be useful in searching. You need to know whether the wanted soldier has been promoted to rank. This information is especially useful. Since after receiving a junior lieutenant in training institutions, a special personal file of the soldier is immediately opened. All details are entered here. Information can also be obtained from Central archives of the Ministry of Defense.
In fact, any information that concerns the wanted soldier will be useful to you. If he was wounded on the battlefield, then these records are stored in the medical department of TsAMO. The wounded person’s medical records record the time of injury, in which hospital he was treated, from which military unit the employee was, and much more.
Perhaps the one you are looking for was captured by invaders. Knowing this information can greatly help your investigation. There is a database on prisoners of war on the website at http://www.dokst.ru/main/node/1118.
Online database of WWII prisoners of war
The database search is organized in the usual way:
- Start typing the person's last name or select the first letter of their last name.
- In the list, profiles immediately expand when clicked and provide information for viewing. The resource is a kind of book of memory of the dead and missing participants of the Second World War in the period 1941-1945.
Where to look for photos of WWII participants
Having information about your grandfather, a WWII participant, you can try to find a photograph of him from the time of the war. The website https://foto.pamyat-naroda.ru/ has a photo archive that contains a large number of images of front-line soldiers. Use the search bar on the main page via the link and enter the hero’s first and last name.
Search for photos of WWII participants
Perhaps it is in this virtual memory book that you will find his image or additional information.
The site provides the opportunity to download and post photographs of WWII participants on its pages. To do this you need to click on the big button on the left " Add a hero...» and fill out the detailed form on the next page.
Adding a photo of a WWII hero to the site
Photos are carefully checked by site moderators. If the uploaded image does not meet the parameters or photo posting rules, it will be rejected. To view them, scroll down the form page and click on the appropriate link.
“Memory of the People” - a book of memory of those killed from 1941 to 1945
"" is another large online portal for searching for participants in the Great Patriotic War, created on behalf of the President of the Russian Federation. It stores military documents, more than 100,000 maps of troop movements in 1941-1945. Each visitor can find out the time and place of conscription, places of death of soldiers and other information.
There is no need to register on the site to search:
The website has an online map of the movement of Soviet troops in 1941-1945. The military battles of that time are displayed here.
Map of military battles 1941-1945.
At the top of the map is a timeline. By setting the date, you can see offensive operations and settlements where battles were fought. As well as military units and each participant. Under the map you can find the original attack plan for a particular battle.
Additional sources for searching for missing persons
To find your relatives who fought for their homeland in World War II, other equally useful sources will help you. You can find various reference books on the website http://soldat.ru/spravka/. For example, a directory of military units or a directory " Liberated cities" In the site menu you can find a forum, documents, bulletin boards on military topics, which will also be useful in your investigation.
Directories on the events of the Great Patriotic War
A large number of soldiers fought in the Second World War on the territory of Soviet Ukraine. There is a separate portal for Ukrainians who lost loved ones in the war. In the book of memory of those killed and missing in the Second World War https://memory-book.ua/ you can try to find people if you have at least some information about them. It’s not just Ukrainians who are being looked for here. After all, these lands were defended by other peoples. On the website you can see maps of mass graves. Each icon indicates the number of warriors. And by selecting one of the graves on the map, you can get detailed information about where the monument is located and the names of the people.
You can establish some of the events of those years by reading the military literature on the website http://militera.lib.ru/. This resource is entirely dedicated to diaries, biography, military history and war letters. There is literature here not only on the topic of the Second World War.
Another useful resource for searching by last name is located at http://rf-poisk.ru/page/34/. This is a book of memory of those killed and missing during the Second World War in the period from 1941 to 1945. This resource is useful because it contains links to books of memory for the regions of Russia. Open the home page and select the desired link.