The story of one hydropower worker

The eyes of Borys Heorhiiovych Vasylenko witnessed dozens of battles, and his hands fired hundreds of rounds. He is the only living employee of «Hydrosila» who participated in combat operations during World War II. A driver-mechanic, he first saw the war near Rostov as a very young man and celebrated Victory Day on May 9, 1945, behind the wheel of a captured Opel near Prague.

War! So much has been written and said about it, yet no book or film can fully convey the horrors experienced by those who lived through it. We can never completely understand it, but we can listen to the memories of those who fought for victory.

Our hero was born in 1924 in what was then Zinovievsk. When he was six years old, his family moved to Berdiansk. Borys joined the army in 1941 at the age of just 17. He first served as a cadet in Tbilisi, where he became acquainted with military equipment.

At that time, cadets trained on light trucks known as "one-and-a-half tonners", while tanks were provided only occasionally to help them learn to operate more advanced machinery. "We hadn't been there for even a month when an officer arrived and took us to Rostov...", Borys recalled. It was there that he first came under aerial bombardment. Later he served in Kramatorsk and Sverdlovsk, where he was assigned to a reconnaissance unit.

«WE DID NOT FIGHT SHOUTING 'FORWARD! FOR THE MOTHERLAND!' - WE DEFENDED OUR HOMELAND QUIETLY», Borys Heorhiiovych says when describing the war.

He received his first wound in the Kharkiv region near the city of Izium. Afterward, he managed to reach a military hospital on his own and was sent to Kotovsk for treatment.

After recovery, he joined the infantry and narrowly escaped death when an enemy bullet passed through his ear. On his way to the hospital, he came under bombardment several times but eventually reached a medical unit. He stayed there for about a week and then managed to return to military service.

As part of the 6th Tank Army under General Kravchenko, he participated in the Korsun-Shevchenkivskyi and Jassy-Kishinev operations. He also took part in the liberation of Kyiv.

On May 9, 1945, Borys Heorhiiovych was near Prague, driving a captured Opel and transporting ammunition. After the war in Europe ended, he was sent with his military unit to the Far East to assist in the war against Japan. After the war, he returned to Berdiansk, graduated from a technical college, earned a qualification in cold metalworking technology, and got married. He worked at the Dormash plant as a 6th-grade Quality Control Inspector.

His children's love of music eventually brought him back to Kirovohrad. The family relocated because there was no opportunity for his daughters to receive a proper musical education in Berdiansk.

He joined «Hydrosila» in the 1970s. Initially, he worked as a Quality Control Inspector, and a year later he was promoted to Head of Quality Control for Workshop No. 1. He held this position for 13 years. During his final two years at the company, he worked in the repair and mechanical department before retiring at the age of 62.

During retirement, he enjoyed fishing, built a garage and a house in Berdiansk with his own hands, and drove his children to the seaside in his own car. Borys Heorhiiovych explains the secret of his longevity simply - he always worked with his own hands and maintained a healthy lifestyle. "In my 94 years, I have understood one thing: life is movement, and my love for machinery never allowed me to sit still," he says. And as we know, hydraulics is an essential part of every machine and keeps technology moving.