"Would you look at the CANNONS on that Mariya Vasilyena Oktyabrskaya!" (NSFW)

You ever look at your wife or girlfriend, and think to yourself, "Man, she's one tough bitch."

Well, she's not.

At least not in comparison to Mariya Vasilyena Oktyabrskaya... One of the toughest bitches I've ever had the pleasure of researching, and I am going to tell you all about her right now.

And to stay consistent with my other posts about women, I am going to pepper this history lesson with GIFs of muscular broads... To be honest, I am not a fan of such a look, but I will overwhelm you with them, nonetheless.

Going all the way back to the beginning, Mariya grew up dirt poor in Crimea at the start of the 20th century... If you have no idea where Crimea is, don't feel bad.  Neither did I.

Crimea is a peninsula on the Northern shore of the Black Sea.  If you were to hit a golf ball 600 miles from the southernmost point in Crimea, across the Black Sea, it would land in Turkey. 

Here's another fact about Crimea at the start of the 20th century... It was a shithole.

Mariya was one of 10 children in a family that rarely had enough food to go around.  She worked in a local cannery and eventually met the man of her dreams, a Soviet army officer named Ilya Oktyabrskaya. 

They married in 1925 when Mariya was 19, and it was then she began her fascination with all things military.  This captivation inspired her to learn how to drive and to shoot a gun, just in case the need ever arose where she would have to serve her country.

In 1939, Ilya was called to fight for the Soviet Union in WW2 and Mariya happily bid him farewell... After all, Russia was being invaded by Germany and needed brave soldiers like Ilya.

She was quoted once as saying, "Marry a serviceman, and YOU serve in the army: an officer's wife is not only a proud woman but also a responsible title."

And 2 years later, Mariya got the call that is every wife’s worst nightmare… Ilya was killed in battle.

Following Ilya's death, Mariya sold everything they owned and wrote this letter to Stalin:

My husband was killed in action defending the motherland. I want revenge on the fascist dogs for his death and for the death of Soviet people tortured by the fascist barbarians. For this purpose, I’ve deposited all my personal savings — 50,000 rubles — to the National Bank in order to build a tank. I kindly ask you to name the tank "Fighting Girlfriend" and to send me to the frontline as a driver of said tank.

Stalin agreed.

But first, Mariya was made to go through several months of tank training (way more than her male comrades), but she passed with flying colors since Mariya could already drive and shoot… So she was sent to the front line.

--- So to recap what has happened so far... When Mariya’s husband was killed fighting in WW2, she sold everything she owned, bought a tank, named it "Fighting Girlfriend," and set off to kill as many Krauts as humanly possible... And I am 5 GIFs deep. ---

On October 21, 1943, her first mission in Fighting Girlfriend was to help block zee German troop's route to Moscow. 

She drove Fighting Girlfriend around the battlefield like a fucking champ, destroying several anti-tank guns, a machine gun nest, and a shitload of enemy soldiers.

Then her tank was hit by artillery fire.

With Fighting Girlfriend out of action, Mariya was ordered to remain where she was and wait for help… Obviously, she didn’t because women never fucking listen.

Instead, she calmly got out her tank in the middle of a war zone, fixed it, leaped back in, and entered the fight once more.

Her heroism got her promoted to Sergeant, and Mariya and Fighting Girlfriend went back out onto the front continuing their steady stream of battlefield successes.

Then, on January 17, 1944, the tank was hit by a German anti-tank shell, this time in its tracks, and was once again immobilized.

And because again, she doesn't fucking listen, Oktyabrskaya immediately got out of the tank and began to repair the track, amid fierce artillery fire.

She managed to repair the track, but she was hit in the head by shell fragments and lost consciousness.

After the battle, she was transported to a Soviet military field hospital near Kiev where she remained in a coma for two months, before finally dying on March 15th, 1944.

The following August, Oktyabrskaya was posthumously made a Hero of the Soviet Union in recognition of her bravery in the battles around Vitebsk, and, more importantly, she is one of the subjects in this week's episode of Twisted History which is chock filled with the baddest bitches history has to offer...

Give it a listen and take a report.

THE END

-Large