Antonina Khudyakova

Antonina Khudyakova (Антонина Худякова; 20 June 1917 – 17 December 1998) was a senior lieutenant and deputy squadron commander in the 46th Taman Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment, 325th Night Bomber Aviation Division, 4th Air and Air Defence Forces Army, 2nd Belorussian Front during World War II. For her service in the military she was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union on 15 May 1946.

Civilian life
Antonina Khudyakova was born on 20 June 1917 in the town of Novaya Sloboda, in the Oryol Governorate of the Russian Empire (present-day Sloboda of the Karachevsky District, Bryansk Oblast in the Russian Federation). She graduated the Bezhitsk technical school in before moving on to the Kerson Aviation School 1940. After graduating she worked as an instructor at the Oryol aviation club.

Military career
After joining the Red Army in 1941 and completed training in 1942, she was sent to the Eastern front in May as a deputy squadron commander of the 588th Night Bomber Regiment, which was renamed in February 1943 to the 46th Guards Night Bomber Aviation Regiment. By the end of the conflict, having survived several close calls with anti-aircraft-guns she had completed 926 sorties, bombing enemy targets. She was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union on 15 May 1946 "For the exemplary fulfillment of commanded missions, courage, bravery and heroism shown in the fight against the fascist invaders" in addition to the Order of Lenin, the Order of the Red Banner, Orders of the Patriotic War in the first class, and various jubilee medals; her combat stories were publicized in the second issue of Heroines, a Soviet magazine.

After the war
After the Second World War she stayed in the military in the reserve and graduated from the Zhukovsky Air Force Engineering Academy. Eventually she became an associate professor of engineering; she joined the Communist party of the Soviet Union in 1952. In 1961 she moved to the city of Oleksandriia in the Kirovohrad Oblast of the Ukrainian SSR and lived there until her death in 1998.