Lyudmila Pavlichenko

Lyudmila Pavlichenko was a Soviet sniper credited with 309 confirmed kills during the Second World War. She fought in the sieges of Odessa and Sevastopol before being wounded and withdrawn from combat.

In 1942 she travelled to the United States, Canada and Britain to encourage support for a second front and formed a public friendship with Eleanor Roosevelt. She later trained snipers and worked as a historian and veterans’ advocate. Lyudmila Pavlichenko was born in Bila Tserkva and died in Moscow.

In Kate Quinn’s The Diamond Eye, Lyudmila Pavlichenko is a history student and single mother when the German invasion of the Soviet Union draws her into the Red Army.