This article will talk about a woman who served as an executioner for the Nazis to save her life. The main character of our story is Tonka the Machine Gunner. The biography of this woman, whose real name is Antonina Makarova, is presented in the article. She posed as a heroine of the Great Patriotic War for about 30 years.
Antonina's real name
In 1921, Antonina Makarova, the future Tonka the Machine Gunner, was born. Her biography was marked by many interesting facts, as you will see after reading this article.A girl was born in a village called Malaya Volkovka, into a large peasant family, the head of which was Makar Parfenov. She studied, like others, in a rural school. It was here that an episode occurred that influenced the rest of this woman’s life. When Tonya came to study in first grade, she could not say her last name because of shyness. Classmates began shouting: “She’s Makarova!”, meaning that Makar was the name of Tony’s father. So, with the light hand of a local teacher, perhaps the only literate person in this village at that time, Tonya Makarova, the future Tonka the machine gunner, appeared in the Parfenov family.
Biography, photos of victims, trial - all this interests readers. Let's talk about everything in order, starting with Antonina's childhood.
Antonina's childhood and youth
The girl studied diligently and diligently. She also had her own revolutionary heroine, whose name was Anka the Machine Gunner. This film image had a real prototype - Maria Popova. This girl once in battle actually had to replace a dead machine gunner.Antonina, after graduating from school, went to Moscow to continue her studies. It was here that the Great Patriotic War found her. The girl went to the front as a volunteer.
Makarova - a soldier's traveling wife
Makarova, a 19-year-old Komsomol member, suffered all the horrors of the Vyazemsky Cauldron. After the heaviest battles that took place in complete encirclement, only one soldier remained from the entire unit next to Tonya, a young nurse. His name was Nikolai Fedchuk. It was with him that Tonka wandered through the forests, just trying to survive. They didn’t look for partisans, didn’t try to get through to their own people, ate whatever they had, and sometimes stole. The soldier did not stand on ceremony with Tonya, making the girl his “camp wife.” Makarova did not resist: the girl just wanted to survive.In 1942, in January, they reached the village of Krasny Kolodets. Here Fedchuk admitted to his companion that he was married. His family, it turns out, lives nearby. The soldier left Tonya alone.
Antonina was not expelled from the Red Well, but the local residents had enough worries even without her. But the strange girl did not want to go to the partisans. Tonka the machine gunner, whose photo is presented below, tried to have an affair with one of the men remaining in the village. Having turned local residents against herself, Tonya was eventually forced to leave the village.
Salary killer
Near the village of Lokot in the Bryansk region, Tony’s wanderings ended. At that time, a notorious administrative-territorial entity operated here, founded by Russian collaborators. It was called the Lokot Republic. These were, in essence, the same German lackeys who lived in other places. They were distinguished only by a clearer official design.Tonya was detained by a police patrol. But they did not suspect her of being an underground worker or a partisan. The police took a liking to the girl. They took her in, fed her, gave her something to drink and raped her. The latter, however, was very relative: the girl, who was striving to survive, agreed to everything.
Tonya did not serve for long as a prostitute for the police. One day, drunk, she was taken out into the yard and put behind a Maxim, a heavy machine gun. People stood in front of him - women, men, children, old people. The girl was ordered to shoot. For Toni, who at one time completed not only nursing courses, but also machine gunners, this was not a big deal. True, the dead-drunk woman didn’t really realize what she was doing. Nevertheless, Tonya coped with this task.
Makarova found out the next day that she was now an official - an executioner and that she was entitled to a salary of 30 marks, as well as her own bed. The Lokot Republic fought mercilessly against the enemies of the new order - communists, underground fighters, partisans and other unreliable elements, including members of their families. The arrested people were herded into a barn, which served as a prison. Then, in the morning, they were taken out to be shot. 27 people fit in the cell, and it was necessary to eliminate everyone in order to make room for new victims.
Neither the Germans nor the local residents who became police officers wanted to take on this work. And here Tonya came in very handy, a girl with shooting abilities who appeared out of nowhere.
Tonka the Machine Gunner (Antonina Makarova) has not gone crazy. On the contrary, she decided that her dream had come true. And let Anka shoot at her enemies, but she shoots children and women - everything will be written off by the war! But her life finally got better.
1500 killed
The girl's daily routine was as follows. In the morning, Tonka the Machine Gunner (Antonina Makarova) shot 27 people with a machine gun, finishing off the survivors with a pistol, then she cleaned the weapon, in the evening she went dancing and schnapps in a German club, and then, at night, she made love with a cute German or a policeman.
She was allowed to take the belongings of those executed as an incentive. So Tonya got a whole bunch of outfits. True, they had to be repaired - bullet holes and traces of blood immediately interfered with wearing these things. Sometimes, however, Tonya allowed “marriage”. Thus, several children managed to survive because the bullets, due to their small stature, passed over their heads.
Local residents, who buried the dead, took the children along with the corpses and handed them over to the partisans. Rumors about Tonka the Muscovite, Tonka the machine gunner, the female executioner, spread throughout the area. She was even hunted by local partisans. However, they were never able to get to Tonka. About 1,500 people became victims of Makarova.
By the summer of 1943, Tony's biography took another sharp turn. The Red Army moved west and began the liberation of the Bryansk region. This did not bode well for the girl, but at that time Tonka the Machine Gunner very conveniently fell ill with syphilis. The real story of her life, you see, resembles an action-packed film. Because of her illness, the Germans sent her to the rear so that she would not re-infect the sons of Greater Germany. Thus, the girl managed to escape the massacre.
Instead of a war criminal - an honored veteran
However, in the German hospital Tonka the machine gunner also soon became uncomfortable. The Soviet troops were approaching so quickly that only the Germans had time to evacuate. No one cared about their accomplices.Realizing this, Tonka the Machine Gunner, the executioner, escaped from the hospital. The story, the photo of this woman - all this is presented so that the reader understands that evil is always punished, although the justice of what happened to Makarova at the end of her life can be debated for a long time. But more on that a little later.
Antonina found herself surrounded again, this time in the Soviet Union. But now the necessary survival skills had been honed: she managed to get documents. They said that Tonka the Machine Gunner (whose photo was presented above) all this time served as a nurse in one of the Soviet hospitals.
The girl managed to enter the hospital for service, where at the beginning of 1945 a young soldier, a war hero, fell in love with her. He proposed to Tonya, and the girl agreed. The young couple, having gotten married, left after the end of the war for the homeland of her husband Tony, in the city of Lepel (Belarus). So Antonina Makarova, the female executioner, disappeared. Antonina Ginzburg, a distinguished veteran, took her place. However, Tonka the Machine Gunner did not disappear completely. The real life in wartime of Antonina Ginzburg surfaced 30 years later. Let's talk about how this happened.
New life of Antonina Makarova
Soviet investigators learned about the monstrous acts committed by Tonka the Machine Gunner, whose biography interests us, immediately after the Bryansk region was liberated. They found the remains of approximately 1.5 thousand people in mass graves. However, only 200 of them were identified. Witnesses were interrogated, the information was clarified and verified, but still they could not get on Makarova’s trail.Antonina Ginzburg, meanwhile, led the ordinary life of a simple Soviet person. She raised her two daughters, worked, and even met with schoolchildren, to whom she told about her heroic past. Thus, Tonka the Machine Gunner found a new life. Her biography, children, her occupation after the war - all this is very interesting. Antonina Ginzburg is not at all like Antonina Makarova. And, of course, she took care not to mention the deeds committed by the Thin Machine Gunner.
After the war, our “heroine” worked at a garment factory in Lepel, in the sewing department. She served as a controller here - checking the quality of products. The woman was considered a conscientious and responsible worker. Often her photograph ended up on the honor board. Having served here for many years, Antonina Ginzburg did not make any friends. Faina Tarasik, who at that time worked at the factory as a personnel department inspector, recalled that she was quiet, reserved, and tried to drink as little alcohol as possible during collective holidays (most likely, so as not to let it slip). The Ginsburgs were respected front-line soldiers and therefore received all the benefits due to veterans. Neither her husband, nor family acquaintances, nor neighbors knew that Antonina Ginzburg was Antonina Makarova (Tonka the Machine Gunner). The biography and photos of this woman were of interest to many. The unsuccessful search continued for 30 years.
Wanted Tonka the Machine Gunner (true story)
Few photographs of our heroine have survived, since this story has not yet been declassified. In 1976, after a long search, the matter finally got off the ground. Then, in the city square of Bryansk, one man attacked Nikolai Ivanin, whom he recognized as the head of the Lokot prison during the German occupation.Having been hiding all this time, like Makarova, Ivanin did not deny it and spoke in detail about his activities at that time, mentioning Makarova at the same time (he had a short affair with her). And although he mistakenly told investigators her full name as Antonina Anatolyevna Makarova (at the same time informing that she was a Muscovite), such a major clue allowed the KGB to develop a list of USSR citizens bearing the same name. But it did not include the Makarova they needed, since the list included only women registered under this surname at birth. Makarova, who was needed by the investigation, as we know, was registered under the name Parfenov.
First, investigators mistakenly identified another Makarova, who lived in Serpukhov. Nikolai Ivanin agreed to conduct the identification. He was sent to Serpukhov and settled in a hotel here. However, Nikolai committed suicide in his room the next day. The reasons for this remain unclear. Then the KGB discovered surviving witnesses who knew Makarov by sight. But they could not identify her, so the search continued.
The KGB spent more than 30 years, but found this woman almost by accident. While going abroad, Parfenov, a certain citizen, submitted forms with information about relatives. Among the Parfenovs, for some reason Antonina Makarova, by her husband Ginzburg, was listed as her own sister.
How the teacher’s mistake helped Tonya! After all, thanks to her, Tonka the Machine Gunner was out of reach of justice for so many years! Her biography and photos were hidden from the public for so long...
KGB operatives worked in jewelry. It was impossible to accuse an innocent person of such atrocities. Antonina Ginzburg was checked from all sides. Witnesses were secretly brought to Lepel, even the policeman who was her lover. And only after confirmation of the information that Tonka the Machine Gunner and Antonina Ginzburg were the same person, the woman was arrested.
For example, in July 1978, investigators decided to conduct an experiment. They brought one of the witnesses to the factory. At this time, under a fictitious pretext, Antonina was taken out into the street. Watching the woman from the window, the witness identified her. However, this was not enough. So the investigators conducted another experiment. They brought two other witnesses to Lepel. One of them pretended to be an employee of the local social security service, where Makarova was summoned supposedly to recalculate her pension.
The woman recognized Tonka the machine gunner. Another witness was outside the building with a KGB investigator. She also recognized Antonina. Makarova was arrested in September on her way to the head of the personnel department from her place of work. Leonid Savoskin, an investigator who was present at her arrest, later recalled that Antonina behaved very calmly and immediately understood everything.
Antonina's capture, investigation
After her capture, Antonina was taken to Bryansk. Investigators initially feared that Makarova would decide to commit suicide. Therefore, they put a woman “whisperer” in her cell. This woman recalled that the prisoner was calm and confident that, due to her age, she would be given a maximum of 3 years.She volunteered for interrogation herself and demonstrated the same composure, answering questions directly. In a documentary called “Retribution. Two Lives of Tonka the Machine Gunner,” Sergei Nikonenko said that the woman was sincerely convinced that there was nothing to punish her for, and attributed everything that happened to the war. She behaved no less calmly when she was brought to Lokot for investigative experiments.
Tonka the machine gunner did not deny it. Her biography continued with the fact that the security officers in Lokt took this woman along a path well known to Antonina - to the pit, near which she carried out monstrous sentences. Bryansk investigators remember how residents who recognized her spat after her and shied away. And Antonina walked and remembered everything calmly, as if it were everyday matters.
She said she didn't have nightmares. Antonina did not want to communicate with her husband or daughters. Meanwhile, the front-line husband was running through the authorities, threatening Brezhnev himself with a complaint, even to the UN, asking for the release of his wife. Until the investigators told him what Tonya was accused of.
The brave, dashing veteran then grew old and gray overnight. The family disowned Antonina Ginzburg and left Lepel. You wouldn’t wish on your enemy what these people had to endure.
Retribution
In Bryansk in 1978, in the fall, Antonina Makarova-Ginzburg was tried. This trial was the last major trial in the USSR against traitors to the Motherland, as well as the only trial against a female punisher.Antonina was convinced that the punishment could not be too severe due to the passage of time. She even believed that she would be given a suspended sentence. The woman only regretted that she would have to move and change jobs again because of the shame. Even the investigators themselves, knowing that Antonina Ginzburg’s post-war biography was exemplary, believed that the court would show leniency. In addition, 1979 was declared the Year of the Woman in the USSR.
But in 1978, on November 20, the court passed a verdict according to which Makarov-Ginzburg was sentenced to death. This woman's guilt in the murder of 168 people was documented. These are only those whose identities have been established. More than 1,300 more civilians remained unknown victims of Antonina. There are crimes that cannot be forgiven.
In 1979, on August 11, at 6 a.m., after all requests for clemency were rejected, the sentence against Makarova-Ginzburg was carried out. This event ended the biography of Antonina Makarova.
Tonka the Machine Gunner became very famous throughout the country. In 1979, on May 31, the Pravda newspaper published a large article devoted to the trial of this woman. It was called "The Fall".
It talked about Makarova's betrayal. The documentary biography of Tonka the Machine Gunner was finally presented to the public. Antonina's case turned out to be high-profile, even, one might say, unique. By decision of the court, for the first time in all the post-war years, a female executioner was shot, whose involvement in the execution of 168 people was officially proven during the investigation.
Antonina was one of three women in the Soviet Union who were sentenced to death by firing squad in the post-Stalin era and whose execution was reliably established. The other two were Berta Borodkina (in 1983) and Tamara Ivanyutina (1987). The 2014 television series "The Executioner" is loosely based on this story.
In the story, Makarova was renamed Antonina Malyshkina, played by Victoria Tolstoganova. Now you know who Tonka the Machine Gunner is. Biography, photos and some facts related to this woman were presented in this article.
Based on real events. Director Vyacheslav Nikiforov, based on the script by Zoya Kudri, created a fascinating historical detective story that tells about the investigation of war crimes in the years after the Great Patriotic War. The story told in the series is based on an investigation that actually took place in the 70s in the Soviet Union. Decades later, the KGB managed to identify Tonka the Machine Gunner, a woman whom the German occupiers forced to execute local residents.
“Channel One” began showing the multi-part thriller “The Executioner”
The childhood of Antonina Makarova
At the beginning of 1942, they ended up in the Bryansk region, where, as it turned out, Kolya’s children and wife lived. Antonina was disappointed - Fedchuk abandoned her, and he himself returned to the family. Antonina was left alone in the village of Krasny Kolodets. She couldn’t get along with anyone, everyone was against her, so Tonya had to leave the village.
Lokot executioner or Tonka the machine gunner
Wandering, Tonya ends up in the “Lokot Republic” - an administrative-territorial entity created by the Germans in the occupied village of Lokot, Bryansk province. The Germans detained the girl, gave her food, drink and rape. She agreed to anything as long as she didn't get killed. Tonya did not serve as a prostitute for the Germans for long; she was destined for a different fate.
Soon, a drunken Tonya was taken out into the yard and ordered to shoot her compatriots with a Soviet Maxim machine gun. In the first minutes, she looked at the people who did not take their eyes off the punisher. But the high concentration of alcohol in the blood gave courage and Antonina coped with the task. The next day, Makarova officially became an executioner: she was paid money for the murder and provided with a bed.
Tony's heroine was Anka the machine gunner - a character from the film "Chapaev". Anka shot her enemies, and Antonina shot women, children and old people. But she believed that the war would write everything off and no one would know about it. To save her own life, she shot about three dozen people every day. She was allowed to keep the things of those killed. Sometimes short children managed to survive - Tonya missed.
Rumors spread around the area about “Tonka the Machine Gunner,” a ruthless killer from Moscow, responsible for the lives of about one and a half thousand of her compatriots. The partisans tried to find her, but the Lokot punisher lived with impunity for a long time.
Tony's life changed dramatically in the summer of 1943, when the Red Army began liberating the Bryansk region. The Germans sent Makarova, who was sick with syphilis, to the hospital, but she soon escaped from there. In 1945, Antonina found herself among her compatriots and passed herself off as a Soviet nurse thanks to a stolen document. Then she began working in a Soviet hospital, where a war hero, a young Belarusian soldier, fell in love with her. They got married and left for his homeland - the city of Lepel. So Tonka the Machine Gunner became war veteran Antonina Ginzburg.
Life of Antonina Makarova (Ginsburg) after the war
For thirty years, investigators searched for Tonka, who at that time was working and raising two children. In addition, she told schoolchildren fictitious stories about the heroic past. The KGB got on her trail quite by accident, when a certain citizen Parfenov was about to go abroad. He submitted forms containing information about his relatives, among which was the name of his sister, Antonina Makarova (Ginzburg).
KGB operatives, having checked the facts from all sides, arrested Antonina. She told investigators about her service to the Germans. At a time when her husband indignantly demanded Tonya’s release, she did not even want to talk to him. Ginsburg learned the whole truth about the dark past of his beloved Tony from investigators. The family renounced Tony the executioner and left the Belarusian city of Lepel.
The death penalty
Makarova was tried in Bryansk in the fall of 1978. She hoped to receive a suspended sentence, but the court sentenced her to the harshest punishment - execution. All attempts to appeal the verdict were in vain - the court was unforgiving and did not blame everything on the war, as Makarova had hoped. So, on August 11, 1979, Tonka the Machine Gunner was executed.
Svyatoslav Knyazev
Forty years ago, a death sentence was imposed on a female executioner, widely known as Tonka the Machine Gunner. The number of her victims, according to various sources, ranges from 168 to 2 thousand people, which allows some authors to classify her as one of the bloodiest female killers in human history. In the media, one can often encounter attempts to justify the killer, declaring her a mentally ill person or an unfortunate victim of circumstances. However, experts who worked with documents in Tonka’s case see no basis for such allegations.
Thanks to the media and cinema, Antonina Ginzburg (Makarova) became one of the most famous executioners-collaborators operating during the Great Patriotic War in the occupied territories of the Soviet Union. However, her life is so shrouded in all sorts of myths that it is quite difficult to understand who Tonka the Machine Gunner really was. Experts believe that her life story can help answer the question of why, at a time when most Soviet citizens were defending their homeland, there were people who were ready to kill their compatriots for a small salary and food rations. Historians Dmitry Zhukov and Ivan Kovtun, authors of the book “The Burgomaster and the Executioner,” helped RT understand the life story of Tonka the Machine Gunner and the motives for her crimes.
Fundamental distortion of biography
“For some reason, in newspaper articles and documentaries about the case of Tonka the Machine Gunner, much is depicted incorrectly, even in those that are based on real documents. The emergence of certain ideas about Tonka’s life story was also influenced by the series “The Executioner”. It is clear that this is a feature film and there can be no complaints against its creators regarding the accuracy of the description of events, but you need to understand that it should in no way be perceived as a historical source. Apart from some aspects of the general outline, it has nothing in common with reality. Some of the events in it are distorted, others are completely fictional,” Dmitry Zhukov said in an interview with RT.
- Still from the TV series “Executioner” (2014)
Even the date and place of birth of Antonina Makarova are controversial. According to the most common version, she was born on March 1, 1920 in the village of Malaya Volkovka, Smolensk province. Other sources indicate the year 1922 or 1923, and Moscow is also named as the place of birth. A man with the same surname and initials as Antonina Makarova’s father appears in the “All Moscow” directory for 1917, but disappears from it in 1923. Therefore, the parents of the future Tonka the Machine Gunner could indeed have been residents of the capital, who for some reason left Moscow and moved to the provinces. However, the most fundamental distortion of the biography of the future collaborator concerned not the date and place of her birth, but her last name.
“The last name of Antonina’s parents is Panfilov. But this was in the early 1920s. It was not clear how the metrics were kept, and Antonina’s birth certificate was not issued. When she entered school, she was most likely recorded in the journal as Makarova by her father’s name - Makara. They later issued a passport and Komsomol card in the same name.
A paradoxical situation has arisen: the parents, brothers and sisters are Panfilovs, and Antonina is Makarova. After the war, this will dramatically complicate the lives of state security officials who will be looking for the “Lokot executioner,” Ivan Kovtun said in an interview with RT.
In the mid-1930s, Antonina moved to Moscow, where she lived with her aunt Maria Ershova. After graduating from school, she worked for some time in a tannery and then in a knitting factory. However, the girl, apparently, did not like this work, and, citing vision problems, she transferred to the position of a waitress in the canteen of the Ilyich plant. Even before the start of the war, Antonina Makarova attended Red Cross courses, so in August 1941 she was sent to the military registration and enlistment office on a Komsomol ticket. Her first place of service temporarily became the canteen of one of the military units.
Many years later, Antonina, hoping to soften her fate, will state that during this period she allegedly did not take the oath and was not awarded a military rank. However, this is a lie: according to documents from the Ministry of Defense, in August 1941, Antonina Makarova was called up for military service and became a sergeant in the fall. From the buffet she was transferred to the position of medical instructor in the 422nd Infantry Regiment of the 170th Division of the 24th Army of the Reserve Front.
"Lokot executioner"
During the Vyazemsk operation, Sergeant Makarova was captured, where she met a soldier named Fedchuk (according to some sources, his name was Sergei, according to others, Nikolai). A personal relationship developed between them, and together they escaped from a prisoner of war camp, heading to the village of Krasny Kolodets, Brasovsky district. “The series “The Executioner” shows a scene of Antonina’s rape by a soldier with whom she ended up behind German lines. Nothing like that actually happened. Her relationship with Fedchuk, apparently, was completely mutual in nature; another thing is that upon arriving in his native village, he abandoned her and returned to his family,” noted Dmitry Zhukov.
In the Red Well, Makarova lived for some time with an elderly woman named Nyura. The village was located next to the village of Lokot, where the administrative center of the collaborationist Lokot Republic was located and a large garrison of traitors to the Motherland was stationed. It was created with the support of the Germans by Hitler's collaborator Bronislaw Kaminsky. Subsequently, the so-called Russian Liberation People's Army (RONA) was formed on the basis of the garrison.
- B.V. Kaminsky and RONA soldiers
- Bundesarchiv
Someone introduced Antonina to the deputy chief of the Lokot police, Grigory Ivanov-Ivanin. In December 1941, he took Makarova into his service and made him his mistress. She received a salary of 30 marks per month, free food and room. Antonina took part in several punitive operations. During one of them, Antonina accidentally almost shot the chief of police, a relative of her lover, after which she was transferred to serve in a prison.
Makarova was among the guards who formed the firing squad that carried out the sentences passed by the occupation authorities. Antonina was given a machine gun and a pistol. She began to take part in the executions of Soviet partisans and civilians and soon received the nickname Tonka the Machine Gunner.
“In a number of sources you can find a statement that Makarova allegedly enjoyed the process of murder, that she received sadistic pleasure from it. In fact, nothing indicates this. She was not a maniac in the generally accepted sense. Firstly, she had a completely prosperous family - none of her brothers and sisters were seen in unseemly acts. Secondly, she herself did not like the “work” of an executioner. She drowned her negative feelings in alcohol and left Lokot at the first opportunity,” emphasized Ivan Kovtun.
At the same time, according to Dmitry Zhukov, its activities in 1941-1943 were in themselves a unique phenomenon. “What was unique was that the executioner was a woman. The executions she carried out turned into a terrible theatrical performance. The leaders of the Lokot self-government came to see them, German and Hungarian generals and officers were invited,” the historian noted.
Tonka the Machine Gunner tried to make the most of her position.
There is evidence that she took the belongings of the people she killed, in particular clothes. After parting with Ivanov-Ivanin, Antonina drank a lot and entered into promiscuous relationships for money with both policemen and German officers.
In 1943, she fell ill with syphilis and was sent for treatment to one of the rear hospitals. But during the liberation of Lokt by the Red Army in September 1943, Makarova was not there.
There were even rumors that the Germans did not send Tonka for treatment, but killed her. It cannot be ruled out that Makarova herself tried to go further to the rear, as she felt that the situation was changing.
Having recovered, Antonina met a German corporal, whose military unit was moving to the west, and asked to join him as a servant and mistress. In fact, she deserted the ranks of the collaborators. Subsequently, according to some sources, the corporal died; according to others, he simply could not cover his fellow traveler for long: Makarova was driven into a common column with other refugees and sent to East Prussia. There she was forced into forced labor at a munitions factory, becoming one of millions of Soviet Ostarbeiters (the Third Reich's term for people taken from Eastern Europe to be used as free or low-paid labor).
In 1945, Makarov was liberated by Soviet soldiers. Due to the huge number of former prisoners of war, filtering at this time was carried out rather superficially. Antonina told the Soviet law enforcement agencies her real information, concealing only the fact of working for the Germans, and successfully passed the filtering.
Search and retribution
Makarova was reinstated in service and ended up in the 1st Moscow Division. In the summer of 1945, due to health problems, Antonina ended up in the hospital.
Here she was demobilized and remained to work as a civilian nurse. In August, Makarova met a mortarman, guard private Viktor Ginzburg, who was undergoing treatment. He went through the entire war, and in the spring of 1945 he accomplished a feat, destroying about 15 enemy soldiers in one battle and receiving a severe concussion. Antonina and Victor began to live together, and in 1947, after the birth of their first child, they got married.
Having changed several places of residence, the Ginzburg couple moved to Victor’s homeland - Belarus. Antonina tried to organize the family's move to Poland, but nothing worked out for her. In 1961, she got a job at the Lepel industrial plant, which soon gave her an apartment. In Lepel, Makarova was considered a respected war veteran - she participated in meetings with schoolchildren, her photographs were displayed on the Honor Board.
“After the war, Antonina, as a participant in the war, was awarded several medals, and formally fairly, since she actually served in the Red Army. Even at the trial, she was not deprived of her awards - perhaps they simply forgot about it,” said Dmitry Zhukov.
Even during the war years, state security agencies began to look for Antonin Makarov. However, the search was carried out using metric records, in which she appeared as Panfilova. Therefore, the search was unsuccessful. Antonina was careful - even on holidays she did not linger in the company, so as not to say anything unnecessary. Only in 1976, her brother, who by this time had become a colonel, indicated in his application form before going abroad that he had a sister whose maiden name was Makarova and who was captured by the Germans.
KGB officers became interested in this fact. A check began, people who knew Tonka the Machine Gunner began to be secretly brought to Lepel. She was identified, and in the summer of 1978, Antonina Ginzburg was arrested.
- Confrontation: a witness to the bloody events in the village of Lokot identified Antonina Makarova (in the photo: the far right of those sitting)
- Archive of the FSB Directorate for the Bryansk Region
By this time, the KGB officers had managed to collect so much evidence that the honored worker of the Lepel industrial plant had no choice but to admit that she really was the famous “Lokot executioner.” When leaving for Lokot, she clarified some details and accurately indicated the location of the executions. True, she admitted personal participation in only 114 murders.
“The number of Tonka’s victims is one of the most famous myths associated with her activities. The press attributes about 2 thousand victims to her. But this is a mistake. About 2 thousand Soviet patriots were killed by collaborators in the village of Lokot in 1941-1943, but, in addition to Tonka, there were other executioners. Having assessed all the facts, the court found Antonina Ginzburg’s personal participation in the commission of 168 murders proven. Her victims, of course, could have been much more, but not 2 thousand. Her former accomplices also took an active part in exposing Tonka the Machine Gunner. After the war, the death penalty was abolished for some time in the USSR, and some of the traitors, instead of execution, were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment, from 10 to 25 years. But in 1978 they were already free,” said Ivan Kovtun.
At the beginning of November 1978, court hearings began in the case of the female executioner.
Witnesses who spoke at the trial said that for years they had seen Tonka the Machine Gunner in nightmares.
Antonina Ginzburg admitted her guilt, but tried to soften her future fate, claiming that she never took part in torture and killed only those against whom the death sentence was imposed anyway. She said that she became a victim of circumstances - if she had not shot other people, they would have shot her herself.
- Archive of the FSB Directorate for the Bryansk Region
However, the court did not consider these “mitigating circumstances” significant enough. On November 20, 1978, Antonina Ginzburg was sentenced to death for treason. Attempts by lawyers to appeal the verdict were unsuccessful. On August 11, 1979, Antonina Ginzburg was shot.
“For family members, the truth about Tonka became a terrible psychological trauma. But it is worth noting that they were not subjected to any political or legal persecution. We deliberately did not publish the full data of Antonina’s relatives in our book, since some of them are still alive, and they already had a hard time. As for her motives, apparently, Tonka was a very prudent, pragmatic and rather immoral person. Moreover, these qualities were manifested in Makarova throughout her life - from the fact that she moved from a factory to a canteen in her youth, and ending with the fact that she hid from the investigation and tried to justify herself in court. The same qualities were developed in many other collaborators. These were people of a fundamentally different type than Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya or Liza Chaikina,” concluded Dmitry Zhukov.
Antonina Makarova (or Antonina Ginzburg) is a woman who became an executioner for many Soviet partisans during the war and received the nickname “Tonka the Machine Gunner” for this. She carried out more than 1.5 thousand sentences of the Nazis, forever covering her name with indelible shame.
Tonka the machine gunner was born in the Smolensk region, in the small village of Malaya Volkovka in 1920. At birth her surname was Parfenova. Due to an incorrect entry in the school register, Antonina Makarovna Parfenova “lost” her real last name and turned into Antonina Makarovna Makarova. This surname was used by her in the future.
After graduating from school, Antonina went to study at a technical school, intending to become a doctor. When the war began, the girl was 21 years old. Inspired by the image of Anka the machine gunner, Makarova went to the front to “beat the enemies.” Presumably, this is what prompted her to pick up a weapon such as a machine gun. Professor of psychiatry Alexander Bukhanovsky at one time investigated the personality of this woman. He suggested that she might have a mental disorder.
In 1941, Makarova managed to escape the Vyazemsk operation, a catastrophic defeat of the Soviet army near Moscow. She hid in the forests for several days. Then she was captured by the Nazis. With the help of Private Nikolai Fedchuk, she managed to escape. Wanderings through the forests began again, which had a bad effect on Antonina’s psychological state.
After a few months of such a life, the woman ended up in the Lokot Republic. After living with a local peasant woman for some time, Antonina noticed that the Soviet citizens who collaborated with the Germans settled well here. Then she went to work for the Nazis.
Later at the trial, Makarova explained this act with the desire to survive. At first she served in the auxiliary police and beat prisoners. The chief of police, appreciating her efforts, ordered the zealous Makarova to be given a machine gun. From that moment on, she was officially appointed executioner. The Germans thought that it would be much better if a Soviet girl shot the partisans. And you don’t need to get your hands dirty, and this will demoralize the enemy.
In her new position, Makarova received not only a more suitable weapon, but also a separate room. To make the first shot, Antonina had to drink heavily. Then things went like clockwork. All other executions were carried out by Tonka the Machine Gunner while sober. Later at the trial, she explained that she did not treat those she shot as ordinary people. For her they were strangers, and therefore she did not feel sorry for them.
Antonina Makarova “worked” with rare cynicism. She always personally checked whether the “work” was done well. In case of a miss, she would definitely finish off the wounded. At the end of the execution, she removed good things from the corpses. It got to the point that on the eve of the executions Makarova began to go around the barracks with prisoners and select those who had good clothes.
After the war, Tonka the Machine Gunner said that she never regretted anything or anyone. She didn’t have nightmares, and the people she killed didn’t appear in visions. She did not feel any remorse, which indicates a psychopathic personality type.
Antonina Makarova “worked” extremely hard. She shot Soviet partisans and their relatives three times a day. She has more than 1.5 thousand ruined souls to her name. For each executioner in a skirt she received 30 German Reichsmarks. In addition, Tonka provided intimate services to German soldiers. By 1943, she had to be treated for a whole bunch of venereal diseases in the German rear. Just at this time, Elbow was recaptured from the Nazis.
Then Makarova began to hide from both the Russians and the Germans. She stole a military ID somewhere and pretended to be a nurse. At the end of the war, using this card, she worked as a nurse in one of the hospitals for Red Army soldiers. There she met Private Viktor Ginzburg and soon became his wife.
After the war, the Ginzburgs settled in the Belarusian city of Lepel. Antonina gave birth to 2 daughters and began working as a quality controller at a clothing factory. She had an extremely reserved character. I never drank, probably for fear of spilling the beans about my past. For a long time no one knew about him.
Security authorities searched for Tonka the Machine Gunner for 30 years. Only in 1976 were they able to trace her. 2 years later she was found and identified. Several witnesses immediately confirmed the identity of Makarova, who was already Ginzburg at that time. During the arrest, and then the investigation and trial, she behaved surprisingly calmly. Tonka the machine gunner could not understand why they wanted to punish her. She considered her actions in wartime to be quite logical.
Antonina's husband did not know why his wife was arrested. When investigators told the man the truth, he took the children and left the city forever. It is not known where he began to live subsequently. At the end of November 1978, the court sentenced Antonina Ginzburg to death. She took the verdict calmly. Later she wrote several petitions for pardon. On August 11, 1979 she was executed.
This article will talk about a woman who served as an executioner for the Nazis to save her life. The main character of our story is Tonka the Machine Gunner. The biography of this woman, whose real name is Antonina Makarova, is presented in the article. She posed as a heroine of the Great Patriotic War for about 30 years.
Antonina's real name
In 1921, Antonina Makarova, the future Tonka the Machine Gunner, was born. Her biography was marked by many interesting facts, as you will see after reading this article.
A girl was born in a village called Malaya Volkovka, into a large peasant family, the head of which was Makar Parfenov. She studied, like others, in a rural school. It was here that an episode occurred that influenced the rest of this woman’s life. When Tonya came to study in first grade, she could not say her last name because of shyness. Classmates began shouting: “She’s Makarova!”, meaning that Makar was the name of Tony’s father. So, with the light hand of a local teacher, perhaps the only literate person in this village at that time, Tonya Makarova, the future Tonka the machine gunner, appeared in the Parfenov family.
Biography, photos of victims, trial - all this interests readers. Let's talk about everything in order, starting with Antonina's childhood.
Antonina's childhood and youth
The girl studied diligently and diligently. She also had her own revolutionary heroine, whose name was Anka the Machine Gunner. This film image had a real prototype - Maria Popova. This girl once in battle actually had to replace a dead machine gunner.
Antonina, after graduating from school, went to Moscow to continue her studies. It was here that the Great Patriotic War found her. The girl went to the front as a volunteer.
Makarova - a soldier's traveling wife
Makarova, a 19-year-old Komsomol member, suffered all the horrors of the Vyazemsky Cauldron. After the heaviest battles that took place in complete encirclement, only one soldier remained from the entire unit next to Tonya, a young nurse. His name was Nikolai Fedchuk. It was with him that Tonka wandered through the forests, just trying to survive. They didn’t look for partisans, didn’t try to get through to their own people, ate whatever they had, and sometimes stole. The soldier did not stand on ceremony with Tonya, making the girl his “camp wife.” Makarova did not resist: the girl just wanted to survive.
In 1942, in January, they reached the village of Krasny Kolodets. Here Fedchuk admitted to his companion that he was married. His family, it turns out, lives nearby. The soldier left Tonya alone.
Antonina was not expelled from the Red Well, but the local residents had enough worries even without her. But the strange girl did not want to go to the partisans. Tonka the machine gunner, whose photo is presented below, tried to have an affair with one of the men remaining in the village. Having turned local residents against herself, Tonya was eventually forced to leave the village.
Salary killer
Near the village of Lokot in the Bryansk region, Tony’s wanderings ended. At that time, a notorious administrative-territorial entity operated here, founded by Russian collaborators. It was called the Lokot Republic. These were, in essence, the same German lackeys who lived in other places. They were distinguished only by a clearer official design.
Tonya was detained by a police patrol. But they did not suspect her of being an underground worker or a partisan. The police took a liking to the girl. They took her in, fed her, gave her something to drink and raped her. The latter, however, was very relative: the girl, who was striving to survive, agreed to everything.
Tonya did not serve for long as a prostitute for the police. One day, drunk, she was taken out into the yard and put behind a Maxim, a heavy machine gun. People stood in front of him - women, men, children, old people. The girl was ordered to shoot. For Toni, who at one time completed not only nursing courses, but also machine gunners, this was not a big deal. True, the dead-drunk woman didn’t really realize what she was doing. Nevertheless, Tonya coped with this task.
Makarova found out the next day that she was now an official - an executioner and that she was entitled to a salary of 30 marks, as well as her own bed. She mercilessly fought the enemies of the new order - communists, underground fighters, partisans and other unreliable elements, including members of their families. The arrested people were herded into a barn, which served as a prison. Then, in the morning, they were taken out to be shot. 27 people fit in the cell, and it was necessary to eliminate everyone in order to make room for new victims.
Neither the Germans nor the local residents who became police officers wanted to take on this work. And here Tonya came in very handy, a girl with shooting abilities who appeared out of nowhere.
Tonka the Machine Gunner (Antonina Makarova) has not gone crazy. On the contrary, she decided that her dream had come true. And let Anka shoot at her enemies, but she shoots children and women - everything will be written off by the war! But her life finally got better.
1500 killed
The girl's daily routine was as follows. In the morning, Tonka the Machine Gunner (Antonina Makarova) shot 27 people with a machine gun, finishing off the survivors with a pistol, then she cleaned the weapon, in the evening she went dancing and schnapps in a German club, and then, at night, she made love with a cute German or a policeman.
She was allowed to take the belongings of those executed as an incentive. So Tonya got a whole bunch of outfits. True, they had to be repaired - bullet holes and traces of blood immediately interfered with wearing these things. Sometimes, however, Tonya allowed “marriage”. Thus, several children managed to survive because the bullets, due to their small stature, passed over their heads. Local residents, who buried the dead, took the children along with the corpses and handed them over to the partisans. Rumors about Tonka the Muscovite, Tonka the machine gunner, the female executioner, spread throughout the area. She was even hunted by local partisans. However, they were never able to get to Tonka. About 1,500 people became victims of Makarova.
By the summer of 1943, Tony's biography took another sharp turn. The Red Army moved west and began the liberation of the Bryansk region. This did not bode well for the girl, but at that time Tonka the Machine Gunner very conveniently fell ill with syphilis. The real story of her life, you see, resembles an action-packed film. Because of her illness, the Germans sent her to the rear so that she would not re-infect the sons of Greater Germany. Thus, the girl managed to escape the massacre.
Instead of a war criminal - an honored veteran
However, in the German hospital Tonka the machine gunner also soon became uncomfortable. The Soviet troops were approaching so quickly that only the Germans had time to evacuate. No one cared about their accomplices.
Realizing this, Tonka the Machine Gunner, the executioner, escaped from the hospital. The story, the photo of this woman - all this is presented so that the reader understands that evil is always punished, although the justice of what happened to Makarova at the end of her life can be debated for a long time. But more on that a little later.
Antonina found herself surrounded again, this time in the Soviet Union. But now the necessary survival skills had been honed: she managed to get documents. They said that Tonka the Machine Gunner (whose photo was presented above) all this time served as a nurse in one of the Soviet hospitals.
The girl managed to enter the hospital for service, where at the beginning of 1945 a young soldier, a war hero, fell in love with her. He proposed to Tonya, and the girl agreed. The young couple, having gotten married, left after the end of the war for the homeland of her husband Tony, in the city of Lepel (Belarus). So Antonina Makarova, the female executioner, disappeared. Antonina Ginzburg, a distinguished veteran, took her place. However, Tonka the Machine Gunner did not disappear completely. The real life of Antonina Ginzburg surfaced 30 years later. Let's talk about how this happened.
New life of Antonina Makarova
Soviet investigators learned about the monstrous acts committed by Tonka the Machine Gunner, whose biography interests us, immediately after the Bryansk region was liberated. They found the remains of approximately 1.5 thousand people in mass graves. However, only 200 of them were identified. Witnesses were interrogated, the information was clarified and verified, but still they could not get on Makarova’s trail.
Antonina Ginzburg, meanwhile, led the ordinary life of a simple Soviet person. She raised her two daughters, worked, and even met with schoolchildren, to whom she told about her heroic past. Thus, Tonka the Machine Gunner found a new life. Her biography, children, her occupation after the war - all this is very interesting. Antonina Ginzburg is not at all like Antonina Makarova. And, of course, she took care not to mention the deeds committed by the Thin Machine Gunner.
After the war, our “heroine” worked at a garment factory in Lepel, in the sewing department. She served as a controller here - she checked. The woman was considered a conscientious and responsible worker. Often her photograph ended up on the honor board. Having served here for many years, Antonina Ginzburg did not make any friends. Faina Tarasik, who at that time worked at the factory as a personnel department inspector, recalled that she was quiet, reserved, and tried to drink as little alcohol as possible during collective holidays (most likely, so as not to let it slip). The Ginsburgs were respected front-line soldiers and therefore received all the benefits due to veterans. Neither her husband, nor family acquaintances, nor neighbors knew that Antonina Ginzburg was Antonina Makarova (Tonka the Machine Gunner). The biography and photos of this woman were of interest to many. The unsuccessful search continued for 30 years.
Wanted Tonka the Machine Gunner (true story)
Few photographs of our heroine have survived, since this story has not yet been declassified. In 1976, after a long search, the matter finally got off the ground. Then, in the city square of Bryansk, one man attacked Nikolai Ivanin, whom he recognized as the head of the Lokot prison during the German occupation. Having been hiding all this time, like Makarova, Ivanin did not deny it and spoke in detail about his activities at that time, mentioning Makarova at the same time (he had a short affair with her). And although he mistakenly told investigators her full name as Antonina Anatolyevna Makarova (at the same time informing that she was a Muscovite), such a major clue allowed the KGB to develop a list of USSR citizens bearing the same name. But it did not include the Makarova they needed, since the list included only women registered under this surname at birth. Makarova, who was needed by the investigation, as we know, was registered under the name Parfenov.
First, investigators mistakenly identified another Makarova, who lived in Serpukhov. Nikolai Ivanin agreed to conduct the identification. He was sent to Serpukhov and settled in a hotel here. However, Nikolai committed suicide in his room the next day. The reasons for this remain unclear. Then the KGB discovered surviving witnesses who knew Makarov by sight. But they could not identify her, so the search continued.
The KGB spent more than 30 years, but found this woman almost by accident. While going abroad, Parfenov, a certain citizen, submitted forms with information about relatives. Among the Parfenovs, for some reason Antonina Makarova, by her husband Ginzburg, was listed as her own sister.
How the teacher’s mistake helped Tonya! After all, thanks to her, Tonka the Machine Gunner was out of reach of justice for so many years! Her biography and photos were hidden from the public for so long...
KGB operatives worked in jewelry. It was impossible to accuse an innocent person of such atrocities. Antonina Ginzburg was checked from all sides. Witnesses were secretly brought to Lepel, even the policeman who was her lover. And only after confirmation of the information that Tonka the Machine Gunner and Antonina Ginzburg were the same person, the woman was arrested.
For example, in July 1978, investigators decided to conduct an experiment. They brought one of the witnesses to the factory. At this time, under a fictitious pretext, Antonina was taken out into the street. Watching the woman from the window, the witness identified her. However, this was not enough. So the investigators conducted another experiment. They brought two other witnesses to Lepel. One of them pretended to be an employee of the local social security service, where Makarova was summoned supposedly to recalculate her pension. The woman recognized Tonka the machine gunner. Another witness was outside the building with a KGB investigator. She also recognized Antonina. Makarova was arrested in September on her way to the head of the personnel department from her place of work. Leonid Savoskin, an investigator who was present at her arrest, later recalled that Antonina behaved very calmly and immediately understood everything.
Antonina's capture, investigation
After her capture, Antonina was taken to Bryansk. Investigators initially feared that Makarova would decide to commit suicide. Therefore, they put a woman “whisperer” in her cell. This woman recalled that the prisoner was calm and confident that, due to her age, she would be given a maximum of 3 years.
She volunteered for interrogation herself and demonstrated the same composure, answering questions directly. In a documentary called “Retribution. The Two Lives of Tonka the Machine Gunner,” he said that the woman was sincerely convinced that there was nothing to punish her for, and attributed everything that happened to the war. She behaved no less calmly when she was brought to Lokot for
Tonka the machine gunner did not deny it. Her biography continued with the fact that the security officers in Lokt took this woman along a path well known to Antonina - to the pit, near which she carried out monstrous sentences. Bryansk investigators remember how residents who recognized her spat after her and shied away. And Antonina walked and remembered everything calmly, as if it were everyday affairs. She said that she was not tormented by nightmares. Antonina did not want to communicate with her husband or daughters. Meanwhile, the front-line husband was running through the authorities, threatening Brezhnev himself with a complaint, even to the UN, asking for the release of his wife. Until the investigators told him what Tonya was accused of.
The brave, dashing veteran then grew old and gray overnight. The family disowned Antonina Ginzburg and left Lepel. You wouldn’t wish on your enemy what these people had to endure.
Retribution
In Bryansk in 1978, in the fall, Antonina Makarova-Ginzburg was tried. This trial was the last major trial in the USSR against traitors to the Motherland, as well as the only trial against a female punisher.
Antonina was convinced that the punishment could not be too severe due to the passage of time. She even believed that she would be given a suspended sentence. The woman only regretted that she would have to move and change jobs again because of the shame. Even the investigators themselves, knowing that Antonina Ginzburg’s post-war biography was exemplary, believed that the court would show leniency. In addition, 1979 was declared the Year of the Woman in the USSR.
But in 1978, on November 20, the court passed a verdict according to which Makarov-Ginzburg was sentenced to death. This woman's guilt in the murder of 168 people was documented. These are only those whose identities have been established. More than 1,300 more civilians remained unknown victims of Antonina. There are crimes that cannot be forgiven.
In 1979, on August 11, at 6 a.m., after all requests for clemency were rejected, the sentence against Makarova-Ginzburg was carried out. This event ended the biography of Antonina Makarova.
Tonka the Machine Gunner became very famous throughout the country. In 1979, on May 31, the Pravda newspaper published a large article devoted to the trial of this woman. It was called "The Fall". It talked about Makarova's betrayal. The documentary biography of Tonka the Machine Gunner was finally presented to the public. Antonina's case turned out to be high-profile, even, one might say, unique. By decision of the court, for the first time in all the post-war years, a female executioner was shot, whose involvement in the execution of 168 people was officially proven during the investigation. Antonina was one of three women in the Soviet Union who were sentenced to death by firing squad in the post-Stalin era and whose execution was reliably established. The other two were Berta Borodkina (in 1983) and (1987).
The 2014 television series "The Executioner" is loosely based on this story. In the story, Makarova was renamed Antonina Malyshkina, played by Victoria Tolstoganova.
Now you know who Tonka the Machine Gunner is. Biography, photos and some facts related to this woman were presented in this article.