The She-wolf of Murmansk
Anya Kapranova saw the move to Murmansk in the spring of 1939 as her great escape. Her family had lived and died on the land they had worked for generations and her life would have been just another dull chapter in that story if she did nothing about it. There had been conflict and terrible scenes with her parents and siblings but it was obvious to all that she was just like her Fathers brother who was another with a heart not linked to the land.
Her Uncle had run away to sea at a young age, got caught up in a war and a revolution and then tried the sea again only getting as far as Murmansk where he found work at the docks. He became one of the first to be trained on the Sokolov bulk lifters and over the years had risen to a position where he oversaw all bulk lifter operations.
There was a bond between Anya and her Uncle and they wrote to each other often and met whenever he could get away to visit his brother and his family. When Anya was age 18 he wrote to his brother offering Anya board and lodging with himself and his wife and a clerical job at the docks.
Anya had been a swift learner at school with an understanding of numbers and letters that came easily to her. Much family debate and tears followed but it was obvious Anya would not be happy in her current life and so in the spring of 1939 she began her new life in Murmansk.
She settled in quickly throwing herself into her the work and her new life. She was a popular and attractive young woman and in the summer of 1940 she met a young man with whom she fell in love with. Danil was two years older than Anya and worked for her Uncle on the Sokolov Bulk lifters. He would take her for rides on the great machine and even taught her to operate it at which she became extremely adept.
They planned to marry and that would really have been the happy ever after ending to the story had it not been for the events of Sunday June 22nd 1941. Germany smashed its way into Russia and the struggle to save the motherland began. By October conscription had begun and over the next 12 months more and more men were leaving to join the military services, Danil included.
Women began to take over more of the work the menfolk had previously done and by early 1943 Anya was a working her bulk lifter when the news came that Danil was dead. She was in the early stages of pregnancy at the time and seemingly took the news quite calmly. She threw herself into more and more work and longer and longer hours until her exhaustion and pent up grief consumed her.
She lost the baby and sunk into a deep depression that no one could penetrate and so this went on for some time until once again her Uncle intervened in her life. He had been “volunteered” into a non-combat training role on the military version of the dockside bulk lifter, the Sokolov Volkosob.
He needed an aid and Anya would be perfect for the role in which she became something of a star to pupils and teachers alike. However, death came into her life again when her Uncle was given command of the first Volkosob unit to enter combat. Her uncle didn’t even make it to the front as the transport he was traveling to his unit in was destroyed by an air attack.
With so many men at the front it fell to the women of Russia to man the factories and keep the supply lines open any many women became Solkolov bulk lifter operators. When the Volkosob began to make a difference many women with operative experience were drafted into the army.
Anya applied as soon as she was able and she along with her sister operators would become legendary by the wars end but non so much as Anya who would be known as the She-wolf of Murmansk.
Russia had always been at a disadvantage even with the great bipedal AFV’s they deployed in large numbers but even so the Wehrmacht continued to dominate the battlefield until the introduction of the Sokolov Volkosob. It was fast, manoeuvrable and a relatively small target with a fearsome armament ridden in the main by women thought by some of the enemy to be something beyond human with seemingly supernatural powers.
The Sokolov Volkosob helped turn the tide of war in favour of Russia, fighting all the way to Berlin where Anya Kapranova ended her days. She was the most highly decorated of all the Volkosob operatives or “Wolf Riders” as they became known. She had the highest kill rate and was said to have no fear and so perhaps that is why on 10th May 1945 she wandered out of camp and was last seen in an area designated as a danger zone.
There were a great many unmarked mine fields at that time.
