Mikhail Devyatayev

Mikhail Petrovich Devyataev (; Moksha: Михаил Петрович Девятаев/Mixail Petrovič Devätaev; 8 July 1917 – 24 November 2002) was a Soviet fighter pilot known for his escape from a Nazi concentration camp on the island of Usedom, in the Baltic Sea.

Early life and military career Mikhail Devyataev was born in 1917 at Torbeyevo, Mikhail was the thirteenth child born to the family of a Mokshan peasant.

In 1934, he saw an airplane for the first time (it was an air ambulance that had arrived in Torbeyevo to pick up a sick person). After that, he decided to become a pilot.

He became a lieutenant and a fighter pilot. After a short time in hospital in late March 1945, the seven other escapees were sent to Penal Battalions. Five died in action over the following months. According to another account, all other eight escapees were assigned to the Penal Battalions, with only three surviving the war.

The escapees provided important information about the German missile program, especially about the V-1 and V-2.

Postwar

Devyataev was released from the filtration camp as part of the mass amnesty at the end of the war, and discharged from the army in November 1945. However, the stigma of his classification as a prisoner of war made it difficult for him to find a job for some time. Eventually, however, Devyataev found work as a manual laborer in Kazan. He took a job at the Kazan river port as a duty officer at the river station, then trained as a captain-mechanic. From 1949 onwards he worked as an assistant to the captain of the longboat Ogonyok; from 1952 he was the captain of the longboat Ogonyok, and from 1955 he was transferred to the position of captain of the motor ship.

Soviet authorities cleared Devyataev only in 1957, after the head of the Soviet space program Sergey Korolyov personally presented his case, arguing that the information provided by Devyataev and the other escapees had been critical for the Soviet space program. On 15 August 1957, Devyataev became a Hero of the Soviet Union and a subject of multiple books and newspaper articles.

He continued to live in Kazan. In the late 1950s, Devyatayev was entrusted with testing the "Raketa", one of the world's first passenger hydrofoil ships; for many years he worked as a captain of river ships and became the first captain of the hydrofoil ship "Meteor".

In 1959, he became a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). In 1972, he published his memoirs.

Death and legacy Devyataev died in Kazan in 2002, aged 85, and is buried in the Arskoe Cemetery in Kazan near the World War II Memorial. There is a museum dedicated to Devyataev in his native Torbeyevo (opened on 8 May 1975) and monuments in Usedom and Kazan.

V2. Escape from Hell – is a 2021 Russian prison action thriller war biopic film about Mikhail Devyatayev's escape, directed by Timur Bekmambetov.

Awards Hero of the Soviet Union (15 August 1957) Order of Lenin (15 August 1957) Two Order of the Red Banner (1 February 1944?) Order of the Patriotic War 1st class (11 March 1985) Order of the Patriotic War 2nd class (7 May 1944) Patriotic Order of Merit 2nd class Campaign and jubilee medals

Devyataev became an honoured citizen of the Republic of Mordovia, and of the city of Kazan, in the Russian Federation, along with the cities of Wolgast and Zinnowitz in Germany.